Revelation, Christian Nationalism, Israel, and Dispensationalism | Theocast (w/ Chris Gordon)

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Listen, we want to handle as much of your questions as we can, so we're going to get started. I'm going to pray for us.

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Please do. All right? You guys, you guys brought a bucket full, so all right.

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Father, we have heard so much of you today, and I pray that my brothers and sisters here will continue to be encouraged.

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But right now, Lord, I ask that you would provide wisdom to my brothers as we think to encourage each other and the rest of your kingdom that is here.

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Lord, give us grace and mercy that might keep us humble, in Christ's name, amen. So are you just going to read these?

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So if we don't answer somebody's question, should people take it as we just think their question is unimportant?

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Oh, wow. Someone dropped coins. Like, we don't personally like you if we don't answer your question. If there's a question here that says, pick me, and it has a $100 bill in there, should

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I do that? Yes. It's a good donation. You know, that's how you get your question answered. I just want you to know.

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You heard it here first. Oh, wow. Hey, seed gift right there. It's fake. So much for...

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Oh, it's a track, and it's a million -dollar one. This goes in the thing you asked for.

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All right, admit it. Yeah, that's right. That's right. I am not picking up.

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Do we want to run through a little bit of the talks? I think that'd be fun. Yeah, let's go through the talks, and we'll take... Let's go through the talks a little bit. And then we'll read them.

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We could let these guys pick a couple for us, if you want, while we go through the talks. Okay. First question.

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What do you want to do? Talks first, or you want to... Brother, you do you. Brother Chris... Brother Pastor Chris Gordon, you do what you want, man.

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We're just here for you. Here we go. Read it. You're excited about it. Dispensationalists claim they just read the

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Bible literally. You always like when people say just in front of everything. It's just kind of interesting. But they just read the

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Bible literally. Do covenant theologians... This is a good question. ...allegorize or spiritualize the text?

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I mean, you could have about 19 lectures on this. So I'll start by giving a quick answer.

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I love my dispensational brothers because many of them did fight for the veracity and a lot of the doctrines that have been lost because of rationalism.

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And so the fundamentals of the faith are important, and they really were fighting for, hey, listen, we need all of Scripture. We can't toss any of it out.

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So praise God for them. But when it comes down to some of the influence of certain theologians, it is interesting.

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So you have to understand, I was born and raised in a dispensational church. I was trained in a dispensational college and a dispensational seminary.

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And so I've seen all the arguments. I used to make them myself. And the one thing is that they do take

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Scripture literal, and I'll give them that, but it's literalistically because there are portions of Scripture that they understand you can't take literal because it forces you.

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I mean, Jesus isn't a door. He's not a vine. And God owns more than a thousand hills.

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He owns all the hills, right? So they agree on those areas. And so some of it, in our opinion, it feels like it's a little bit of a pick and choose based upon what argument, like what theology you're trying to argue for.

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So I don't think this needs to be a bath session, but when we're looking at it, at times it feels like our theology is done in reverse.

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Like here's our position from an eschatology, and now it needs to fit in our Bible. Yeah.

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Go ahead. You want to speak to that? Yeah. I think, you know, and I mean, that's a really good point.

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Part of the challenge is when somebody says, I just read the Bible literally. You have to always challenge that premise with the question, what genre of Scripture are you looking at?

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Because the genre of Scripture you're looking at reads differently than when you say, I want to read it literally.

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If I'm reading historical narrative, I have a certain way of reading that as a story that works from A to B.

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If I'm reading wisdom literature, or I'm reading, let's just say, apocalyptic literature, which is where they generally, when they make that statement, they're generally talking about apocalyptic literature.

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Well, I just read the Bible literally. Is Jesus a literal lamb? Right. It breaks down in every way with apocalyptic.

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What does it mean to read, you know, a genre that's intended to be symbolic literally?

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It's symbolic genre. So you have to treat the genre on its own terms.

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So it's an abuse of the text, a misunderstanding of the text as to what genre and what the author is intending to do.

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All the numbers in Revelation are symbolic. Right. You know, just like you were saying earlier, it's a multitude no man can number, well, we have 144 ,000.

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Which, right. You see, you run into all kinds of conundrums. It's the cube of 12 by the square of 10. That's interesting. Right? I mean, seriously.

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It's just like these numbers mean things. Symbolic. I agree with everything that's been said in the interest of not repeating.

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Two comments. One, many, many grave errors have been made in the history of the church by taking things literally that were not written that way.

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I mean, even the understandings of priests and the mass and different things like that in some ways relate to this.

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Even using the language of altar in a New Covenant category, I mean, that's a figurative way to speak.

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There's nothing to be sacrificed anymore. Things like this. So, in addition to things the other brothers have said, secondarily,

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I think we need to ask the question as Christians living in this era when we have the entirety of the canon, how did

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Jesus and how did the apostles read the scriptures? Right? We have a pattern, a sound pattern of how we should understand the

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Bible. And Paul, frankly, I mean, this is certainly true if Paul went to a dispensationalist seminary. This also would be true in many of the

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Baptist seminaries, even the Calvinistic ones. Paul would get an F in hermeneutics class, like in terms of how he understood typologically, like how he typologically understood the

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Old Testament. How he understood things to be metaphors. How he understood things to be figurative. Like when Paul says that the rock that Moses hit in the wilderness was

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Jesus, like people lose their minds over that kind of thing.

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Clearly, the apostles had a different hermeneutic and a different way of interpreting the Scripture. And the best interpreter of the Old Testament is the

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Holy Spirit speaking to us in the New. So, yeah, we always want to take

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Scripture out as it was intended, right? Right. And that does come down to…

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Don't read it literally, read it correctly. Yeah, and that does, it can come down to a lot of different influences.

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You know, all three men up here will admit that something has influenced our interpretive model, and we're always trying to find the holes in it and correct it.

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What's hard about dispensationalists at times, the ones I've interacted with, is that they don't say they have an interpretive model.

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They just say they read the Bible and then just believe it. And unfortunately, because of how old the document is, this book, and how many genres it has, and how it ebbs and flows, it doesn't work just like a normal book.

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You actually have to have an interpretive grid. And the last comment I'll make on this is that a lot of the reason why they'll pit covenant theology against dispensationalism is that, you know, they say, well, things like covenant of works, covenant of grace, covenant of redemption, are not explicitly seen.

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You're not, there's no reference in the Bible for it. Therefore, we're not going to hold, we're only going to hold to covenants that the

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Bible references. What you're talking about right now is the word concept fallacy. Yeah, word concept fallacy. If the word is not in the

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Scripture, then the concept is illegitimate. That does not hold. That's right. So, I don't care what you title the covenant of works, but you have to hold to the concept that Christ is the one who fulfilled the works of Adam, right?

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You have to hold to that. And then you have to back up and say, well, where did that come from and why is it important? And as you work that trail from Paul backwards to Genesis, you realize there was a promise made that Jesus kept, and it wasn't one that was stated in the same way like Noah or as Abraham.

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Yeah, all right. While we're just having fun and we're just talking, this is good. So, one of the charges that's often raised by dispensationalists, so a similar charge to guys like us who would affirm not only covenant theology, but a law and gospel distinction, let's say.

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It's like, listen, you guys are imposing your system and your framework on the Bible, and you shouldn't do that.

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Few thoughts there. One, everybody has a system and everybody has a framework. The question is whether your system and framework is any good or not.

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Because people often will say, you know, no creed but the Bible, no confession but Christ, and you're waving a study

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Bible in my face. Well, what do you think those notes are? You know, I mean, it's an untenable position.

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Secondarily, what we would say about covenant theology or the law and gospel distinction is as you survey the text itself and you take the text on its own terms, various genres, various testaments, etc.,

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these are things that come up out of the Bible, actually. The way the covenantal framework of Scripture is revealed, it comes from the

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Scripture. The way the law and the gospel are revealed, it comes from the Scripture. Now, we can talk about covenant theology.

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We can talk about a law and gospel distinction as tools that we then go back to the Bible with these tools and we can better understand any given passage.

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That's how this works. We're not aiming to be irresponsible with the text. We're aiming to help people better understand it because the

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Lord has actually revealed these things in His Word. Especially when it comes to dispensationalism and many of the ideas today, where do you find these ideas in our historic confessional statements?

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You don't. And that should say a lot. We need to be good students of looking at our history and roots and seeing what others said who were before this who were not affected, as we were talking about, by the certain political aspects that drove this particular eschatology.

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So, I think that's important, too. This is a good question. On the great day of consummation…

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As opposed to some of the other ones that weren't good. That's what you should understand. Yeah, I don't know what I said. Chris, I'm kidding.

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Just go ahead. Okay, thank you. Ignore him. On the great day of consummation, when God's creation, human beings, angels, heaven and earth, will be made new, we will all be glorified.

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Before this happens, would you say that the Lord's people who have gone before us and are now part of the church triumphant but do not yet have their newly resurrected bodies, would you say that the disembodied saints in heaven are glorified yet not in a consummated way?

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So, would you say there are two phases to our glorification? We're glorified in heaven, even without our new body, and we are fully glorified when raised up in our new glorified body on the day of consummation?

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I'll just briefly get this going. By all means. I think that's a really good question. I think we have to remember we're a little bit…

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I find this challenge, at least in how we approach death today, that we're a little bit gnostic in how we look at death, as if the body goes into the ground, that's just the shell of so -and -so, that's not so -and -so.

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We say the true person is in heaven, dancing around in heaven. We've got all kinds of things to deal with in that thought, right?

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Hard to do that without a body, right? Yeah, you're not dancing. Nobody who dies is dancing around in heaven. There, in Corinthians, Thessalonians makes this clear, that when we die, our souls go to be with the

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Lord. We have, you know, a soul existence and a bodily existence. The body goes in the ground.

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That very body is going to rise again at the resurrection. The very bodies we have, this is what 1

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Corinthians 15 is all about. It's going to rise in power and in glory, and then it will be reunited with our soul existence.

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So the saints in heaven are not glorified yet. Actually, the whole picture of them is that they're crying out, they're resting with the

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Lord. They're crying out, how much longer? In other words, the imagery is, they're waiting for us, Hebrews says, to come in.

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And Hebrews says, they're not complete apart from us. So there's an encouragement to that end, that yes, they're with the

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Lord. Yes, they have peace, but it's not fully consummated yet until Jesus comes and resurrects our bodies where together we celebrate in our new resurrected bodies and souls together in the new heavens and the new earth in the feast that he's prepared for all of us, the grand reunion.

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So there's still an anticipation from them waiting for the completion of the fullness of the promises of God, which includes your bodies.

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Now, you all know our bodies are breaking down. They're not in good shape as we get older, and that's a wonderful problem.

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I agree with everything you said. I think to put it in simple terms, would I understand there's two stages to our glorification?

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I think my answer to that would be no. I would understand that glorification is bodily resurrection where we will be with the

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Lord and we will be with Jesus and we will be like him. I think that the intermediate state, which is what we're talking about, where our souls go to be with the

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Lord upon dying, our bodies go into the ground, as you said, our souls were present with the Lord. Now, that state, while not the final consummated state, while not glorification, is characterized by peace and rest.

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We're in the Lord's benevolent presence. It's wonderful. All is well. But glorification, I would understand, is speaking specifically to bodily resurrection, you know, the consummation of our redemption, the resurrection of our bodies.

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Yeah, it's my shot. Great. It's like the appetizer.

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We're waiting for the meal, baby. Yeah. This is another good one that we really haven't addressed too much.

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It seems that the great weakness of the dispensational view of eschatology is their focus on the ethnic Jew, while God's Word clearly teaches that our

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Lord Jesus Christ's redemptive work has saved Jew and Gentile, slave and free, male and female, paraphrasing

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Galatians. Thus, the true Jew, the true Israel, is

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Jesus Christ Himself, in an overextension. Let's see. It's church. This is a long one. Please discuss the dangers of narrow -mindedly emphasizing the ethnic

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Jew in our day and age as being the covenant people of God, especially as it relates to current geopolitical debates.

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Ironically, we're not saying that an ethnic Jew who rejects the Lord Jesus Christ as the Messiah is a pagan as any unbeliever, question mark?

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Want to go? That's all, John. You got it. We did a podcast on this, so maybe go listen to that.

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Justin made a comment in the podcast this morning about how political policies have been made because of this.

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I mean, yeah, it's clear. I don't know if I said it this morning or not. I know we've talked about it at points that even American foreign policy has been influenced by dispensationalism with pastors talking to presidents in this country for decades about how we should relate to Israel that was formed as a geopolitical state in 1948.

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It's true. Yeah, the restoration of the people and the temple and the millennial reign, if you understand

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Scripture that way, it is something you get excited about. It's like, all right, Israel's back in their land. Now we're going to start rebuilding the temple, and then we're going to go into the thousand year reign, whatever.

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And it could seem like that's, I mean, their argumentation is working, right? And it's really complicated because if you take that position, theologically, you have a lot of problems.

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The reinstitution of the temple in Ezekiel, it's like you take half of what Ezekiel says, and you take it literal and take the other half and throw it out because Ezekiel is trying to use word pictures of things that they would understand.

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Can you imagine me trying to describe to you an iPhone 100 years ago? A phone in general, right?

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You'd be like, okay, so it's plastic or metal, it has glass, and somehow you communicate.

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It's like, well, what are you doing? And Ezekiel's writing, and he's trying to use things they understand.

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So he's using temple language and the restoration of the people, but he then adds to it.

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He's like, and so you remember the temple and the animals, and from the temple flows this stream of water out the door and down the steps and out in the gates, and it goes out into the desert, and everything comes alive.

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Well, that's nothing like it was before, right? But they don't talk about, dispensations don't want to talk about that part of Ezekiel because he's talking about what does

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Jesus say when he shows up? Destroy that temple in three days, I'll raise it up again. I'm the temple, like I'm the housing of God, and from me flows everlasting water, right?

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So all these pictures that are used in the old are meant to point us to Christ and the fulfillment of Christ, and unfortunately what ends up happening is, no, they have to have the literal land, the literal temple, and therefore that's the ultimate aim of God is the restoration of Israel and all the promises to Israel, and it's just hard to hold that position with all the scripture, but if you do hold it, there's a lot to be excited about right now because, well,

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Israel's in the land, so now we're waiting on the temple. Go ahead. Yeah, so like Romans 9 through 11, just a few comments on this.

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Paul is very clear about the privileged position of the Jews. He also talks about the mystery of how

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God is saving all of his elect, Jews and Gentiles, where the rejection of the Messiah by the

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Jews, large scale, right, results in the salvation of the Gentiles. The salvation of the

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Gentiles then results in jealousy amongst the Jews, and that results in what?

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The Lord saving elect Jews as well, and it's just kind of back and forth effect that Paul depicts, and he says this is mysterious, right?

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This is what he's praising the Lord for his grace and his wisdom in saving his entire remnant, the entirety of his elect at the end of Romans 11, and so he does acknowledge even later in the letter that Gentiles in one sense do have a spiritual debt to Jews because the

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Christ came through them, right? The gospel came to the Gentiles through the Jews, so what

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I'm trying to convey right now is antisemitism is from hell, right? So that's clear, but then alongside that, all people, all saints are saved one way.

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We all agree. Jew and Gentile alike are saved by the Messiah, the promised seed of Abraham, the promised seed of the woman, and the

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Lord has worked in his providence through history, even through the hardening of Israel and the rejection of the

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Christ to save all of his elect, whether they're Gentiles or Jews. And I think we're on the right track when we think in these terms.

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Now, we could talk certainly about the geopolitical state that's Israel, but we did an entire podcast on that, like you said,

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John, and we'll just shamelessly plug that because rather than talk for 45 minutes now, you could just listen to that. I'll just add to that that we're not erecting walls again that the gospel has taken down.

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Amen. So Paul makes very clear in Ephesians chapter 2 that the two have been made one.

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Exactly. So we have been grafted into that tree as the Israel of God.

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Paul has no problems in Galatians 6 calling the whole church the Israel of God. And so we're not…I talked with David Hawking about this one time.

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David Hawking…does anybody know David Hawking? He kind of coined the phrase replacement theology, that the church…that these replacement theologists, which are typically

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Reformed people, have tried to replace all the promises of God made to Israel with the church today.

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And our answer to that needs to be very clear. That's not true. We haven't replaced anything. We are the fulfillment of the plan to Israel.

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Fulfillment and expansion. Expansion and addition. It was an addition plan from the beginning that when

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God made the promise to Abraham, who was not a Jew, he was a pagan Gentile moon worshiper.

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He was a moon worshiper. Joshua 24, read it. In him, all the Gentiles of the earth would be blessed.

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That was the plan from day one. It wasn't that, as the dispensationalists say, we got Jesus came, the

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Jews rejected Jesus, and then he went to plan B, which is the church. That's a terrible view, not only of the sovereignty of God, but of the whole plan of God that was counted on in the

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Old Testament that would include this. That would include… In Luke 2, right? When Simeon takes

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Jesus up in his arms, I mean, he says the same thing. I mean, this is a light, you know, for the Gentiles, right?

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In the glory of your people Israel. I mean, it's always been the Lord's plan to your people. Well, Paul even says in 1 Corinthians that the plan was hidden so that the rulers of this age, the demonic realm, if they would have known the plan originally, they wouldn't have crucified

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Christ. So that's why it's called, Paul says, I'm here to reveal to you the mystery of Christ, which is Christ to be the fulfillment of Israel.

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Right. And to save all of God's people. There's two more points I want to make real quick. I think this is so important that dispensationalists have been supporting

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Israel, calling Israel the apple of God's eye, using 1948 as a great, you know, there's the evidence right there.

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Israel has remained in unbelief. So are we supporting a nation in unbelief?

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Just like any other nation of any other people, we call them to repentance and faith. So, you know, this is not a joke when

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I say that for a while there in the 80s and 90s, they were sending money for the temple and for the furniture project when the temple would be rebuilt.

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That would be the ultimate, I think this we have to say clearly. The ultimate blasphemy would be to re -erect that temple and localize the worship of God when

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Jesus said, we're not worshiping anymore on this mountain and re -enact sacrifice and offering.

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What would you be doing? Denying the one sacrifice of Christ. I've asked a dispensationalist this so many times.

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So you get the money, you get the temple, you get it free from the Muslims, all that problem.

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Are you re -instituting sacrifice and offering? Silence. Because that would be the ultimate blasphemy to the work of Christ.

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So I think what our responsibility to the Jews, and if you're learning anything from Israel, it is their land keeps getting taken away from them.

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They're hated over and over and over. Everyone seems to hate them in the world. That's kind of a perennial warning that scripture always said.

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That's what will happen to any nation for unbelief. So does

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Romans 11 leave the door open for the possibility of Israel, national repentance?

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I was just talking with Scott Clark about this. He doesn't think so, but I think it leaves the possibility that it could happen.

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It doesn't promise it. But you could see a great turning of people to Christ over there, but it won't be in any different way than it is now.

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Because Paul says, even now, according to the election of grace, there is a remnant coming in.

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So all Israel is being saved. All of God's people are being saved. Justin and I are doing some more work on covenant theology this year, so stay tuned for that.

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Okay, I'm going to change this question a little bit because it has specific names in it, but I think this is a good one to address.

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What advice do you have as pastors for sheep who, in the flock, are being influenced,

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I'll just say, by movements, whether it be the Christian Nationalist movement, to transform the culture as now the new mission of the church?

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How do you shepherd people through that right now? So they're in a church where that's being promoted.

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Is that the question? No. Pastors who have sheep in their flock who are being influenced by this and want to see this happen.

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How do you counsel sheep in that regard? Or be pulled into all this? Yeah, so they're in the church and this is happening.

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Yes, right. Yeah, I had this conversation with somebody right before. This is so hard.

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We get a lot of emails and comments from you guys about this.

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This is so common. Well, I mean, I'll start with this. I think my encouragement, because this is, what do you do if you're a pastor, right?

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That was the question. Helping sheep who are getting pulled into all this. I mean, the best thing, in my opinion, that you can do as a pastor on a weekly basis is to be super clear on Christ.

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It's in the gospel, right? Do not allow anything to obscure Him. Be very clear on the mission of the church.

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Be a dogged defender as well of Christian freedom, Christian liberty, right? Make it plain.

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Here are issues of law. Here are issues of conscience and wisdom. And these are not one in the same, right?

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I think that kind of stuff is very important for pastors to do on a regular basis. And it develops tools of discernment in your people's minds so that they can better navigate all the things that we'll be faced with in our lifetimes.

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That's a general word. I think that really where the rubber meets the road on this is what is the mission of the church and how do you answer that question?

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And how, as a pastor, do you try to make that plain to your people? Is it, and as we surveyed the

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New Testament, we kind of talked about all this earlier, is it the transformation of culture? Is it the overhaul of the government? Or is it something else?

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I think it is something else. Very clearly, the Lord is saving all of His people from every nation, tribe, and language.

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And He is doing that through the preaching of the law and the gospel. He's doing that through the administration of the sacraments.

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He's doing that through the right practice of discipline. And that's what we do in the church. Then what we do, last thing,

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John, we rightly distinguish between the mission of the institutional church and the callings of Christians in the society.

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So this is huge. I said this recently, even from our own pulpit, in preaching

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Romans 13, because we've got a number of people in our local church that serve the government in various capacities in their vocation, right?

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And I commended that as a good thing for Christians to be involved in, right, in the common kingdom. And I said, look, you know,

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I've been called to this ministry to preach God's word in this local congregation. I have no plans to run for office, but maybe you should.

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I think that's a legitimate and worthwhile pursuit, right? So we seek the good of the city, but we do that as individual

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Christians scattering into the society to love neighbor and serve our neighbor through our vocations and various callings.

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The mission of the institutional church is much more narrow in every good way that that could be met.

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I think that's where I would begin because I think that exposes the errors of this

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Christian nationalism and theonomy. And yeah, well, the Republican Party called me earlier this year and asked me if I wanted to run.

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I said, no, but… You know, this is a conversation that Justin and I have had.

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I'm going to change it a little bit, Justin. There are times… JUSTIN PRICE It doesn't offend me, John. JOHN SINIFFER There are times where we…

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Hopefully you get the attitude from Theo Cassett, speak the truth, but do it with gentleness and meekness. Do it with love, right?

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The goal is to draw people into the affections of God. And so we need to be clear. We need to be bold.

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We need to be fearless with love. But there will become times where you need to be direct and you need to warn sheep of where they're headed.

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And after you've warned them once and twice and they will not listen. Paul talks about a contentious person who's causing strife within the congregation to avoid them and then eventually put them out.

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And we've both had to wrestle with people who were very contentious. And I know for a fact, you and I were having a conversation about this, that there are times you have to protect those who are wanting to be led and guided by you as elders.

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And if there's someone that is potentially being influenced outside of you, not that we're these dictators or we're the gods of our own world, but all three of our churches are confessional.

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We have doctrinal standards. We present this to them. This is how we're going to lead you. This is how we're going to direct you.

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This is how we're going to preach. This is how we're going to feed you. And if someone joins that and then changes because they've been influenced by someone else, we want to shepherd them and guide them.

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But that moment where they become contentious and they no longer are willing to be shepherded by you, that is a warning that goes to them.

29:10

Because I've said it straight. I've said it to people before. It is very obvious. You do not trust me and you do not want me to shepherd you.

29:16

I think it's time for us to talk about finding you new shepherds. This is how I word it. And I am not so naive to think that everybody that God sends me will be ones that I'm capable of shepherding.

29:29

It's just not the case. So speaking to my fellow pastors and elders that are out there, there might be times you need to help a congregant move on.

29:38

This is important. You know, I think it's Lloyd -Jones in Preachers and Preaching.

29:44

He says, you know, and this was a man who lived in a time of the social gospel.

29:52

And the social gospel killed the church in the UK. So it's already happened.

29:58

This has already been lived. This has already been done. Where the social gospel, everything turned to political, everything turned to all the social causes of the day.

30:09

And lo and behold, the church emptied out. Because you don't have any power in that. That's not the gospel itself.

30:16

Those may be implications of the gospels. People love their neighbor. But Lloyd -Jones was very clear.

30:23

But I think something he said in Preachers and Preaching is really helpful. Much of this, when he said it in his day, and it applies to ours, much of this is just talk.

30:36

Nobody's really doing much. It's just delegated to the realm of theory. Okay, so that's all this is on social media.

30:46

It's a bunch of guys who've taken a stand, and it's delegated to the realm of theory. But what are they doing?

30:52

You might give the perception that you've done something, but what's been done? What can you do?

30:58

You can tell somebody how to vote. Should pastors be doing that? What's our job?

31:05

We only have a limited amount of time with God's people. So our job has to be to preach the scriptures, to preach the law and the gospel, to preach

31:12

Christ, to set people free, because people are dying. The most important issues are in front of us, and these issues, as important as they are, are not the most important issues.

31:25

But Lloyd -Jones then goes on to explain that, listen, when the ministry of the gospels faithfully tended to, it will have a positive light effect in the culture by the members.

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It will actually accomplish the thing that everybody's sitting around and talking about and debating about.

31:41

And so I think how I would counsel, how I have counseled in the past, depends on the person.

31:47

Maybe they're already decided. We are not people of balance. We are people who fall into ditches on every side, and to be able to have a correct perspective through this all and to keep priorities is really important.

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Because these other things, as I said, I think in the talk today, they're pulling us away from the most important issues of life.

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And now that, when I say that, you see the challenge. You always have to qualify. Do I love my country? Of course I love my country.

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We've lived in one of the best countries you could live in. For freedoms, of course I love my country.

32:24

Do I pray for the city? Of course I pray for the city. Do I want the best politicians to be in office who are going to make choices that are wise and good?

32:33

Of course I'm going to pray for that. That's being a good citizen. It's being a good citizen.

32:39

Well, in Christians, I mean, Romans 13, I mean, Paul is very clear that Christians should be the best citizens. Right. I mean, it's really not complicated.

32:47

I mean, where the government does not bind our conscience to act in a way that is contrary to God's Word, we submit to the government.

32:55

I mean, that's another conversation for another time. Weekly, we pray as a congregation. We pray for our local and global leaders.

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And that doesn't mean, and we don't only do that when we agree with the platform of the party that's in power.

33:07

It's not when we voted for the guy in office. It's like, no, we do that all the time. And Paul writes that into the context of the Roman Empire, for goodness sakes.

33:13

I mean, it's not like he's saying, hey, guys, I'm only writing and applying this to you if you're under an upright and just government.

33:20

Right. And, but he sets in priority to always remember what our citizenship is in heaven.

33:26

Oh, no, amen, brother. No, amen. But we're citizens of two kingdoms. Absolutely. Right. We're citizens of the kingdom of heaven and the common kingdom of the world.

33:33

We're citizens of the United States. I trust most of us in this room. You got another one? Yeah. Oh, we have just a few minutes left.

33:39

Sure. Yes, I have a few. Okay. This is a good one.

33:47

When leadership is deviating from the gospel and we are convicted to leave the church, should we warn others before leaving?

33:58

I'm going to add to this. How should we conduct ourselves? When is the right time to leave a church?

34:06

How do we handle that if we fully in conscience believe that the ministry is not being faithful to the design and the calling to preach the gospel?

34:19

This is what I thought the original question was in the last one. So I want to be clear here. We're not talking about a secondary issue.

34:27

We're talking about the gospel is not being preached because that will change my answer.

34:34

I'm understanding this question to be primary issues, but I think it's important to weave in how you handle secondary issues.

34:40

Well, I think, yeah, we can answer both. Yeah. Yeah. I was explaining this to somebody recently.

34:47

They're wrestling with this, whether they should leave the church or not. And, you know, it would all be great if we lived in Escondido, but we don't.

35:00

I'd totally come here. It'd be awesome. Or we lived in Asheville, you know. So we do live in cities where the gospel is being preached, but at times you feel like you're taking it in with, you know, some other garbage.

35:19

And you have really, if you've come to the conclusion, it is, I've got to go.

35:24

I've got to leave because I asked this. I asked this question to this individuals. I said, do you find it hard to invite people to your church?

35:33

And both of them were like, yeah, we can't do it. That's a problem. That's your family, right?

35:38

This is where you come to gather and your God comes and speaks to you. And you're like, I don't want to invite people to have that conversation with God.

35:47

You with me for a moment here? This is not good. So if you've determined that you need to leave,

35:53

I think we can handle how you should leave. We can talk about that in a minute. But you should never leave until you have a place to go.

36:02

You know, there were literally some people who left California and moved out to Tennessee.

36:07

They just assumed they were going to buy 40 acres, have a job, and off they go. That is not what happened.

36:14

A lot of people just kind of treat church that way. Like, well, whatever, we'll just find the next church. And I don't think you should do that.

36:20

You may consider, you may have to relocate, you know, the next town over. You've got to be able to be fed and shepherded.

36:26

It's required of you that you are assembling and you're receiving.

36:32

And it's part of God's design for how he advances the mission. So I'll say that, and I'll let you guys speak to it.

36:37

And then we can talk about how you leave. Yeah, so to me, the answer is completely different based upon whether we're talking about the gospel isn't being preached in this church versus there are secondary matters that are real and significant that I disagree over.

36:52

Because these are completely different worlds in my mind. In the first case, if it is objectively verifiable that gospel is not being preached in this church, the pastor should be fired.

37:03

I don't know what your church polity is, but like, burn this thing down and let's revitalize it.

37:09

Like, that's my answer on that one. I don't mean be a jerk. I don't mean, you know, be out of control on social media.

37:16

I don't mean gossip and slander. But I mean, through orderly mechanisms, whatever your polity is, it's like, this isn't good.

37:22

And this is not a true church because Christ is not being preached. That is very different. On the other one, let's just say it's a secondary matter over whatever.

37:32

Let's not say, because we've got to agree on secondary matters to have a church together. Baptism, you know, the Lord's Supper, how we administer the sacraments, church governance, things like that.

37:39

But there are other things that we could say. You know, how you think households should be arranged, et cetera.

37:44

Like, let's say we disagree on a matter like that. I would say, this is how I've talked to people in our context, when they have disagreements with our pastors and our church on these issues.

37:54

It's like, brother, sister, you have complete freedom in Christ to be a member of any gospel preaching church you choose. My desire and hope for you is that you find a congregation where you are able to worship the

38:03

Lord in good conscience. And what we would want, if that's not here, we want to be able to pastor you and help you find that congregation, and we want you to keep in touch with us as you're looking for it.

38:13

So we want to be open -handed with these things. Obviously, we're happy to reason over them. But I think then we get into the question of how to leave well.

38:20

Because then, if it's a secondary matter, I would encourage people to think in these terms. If you look around and you think, you know, if I had something to say about this,

38:30

I would do things differently. Things could be done differently. That's one thing. You could probably stay.

38:37

You could go. But if you look around and you think, biblically speaking, I'm convicted that things should be done differently. That's when you need to consider leaving.

38:44

Then you think about, how do I leave well? Right? You're respectful. You're humble. You're grateful.

38:49

You assume well of the leadership. You assume well of the saints of that congregation. You don't say much. You don't cause division.

38:55

You peacefully move on to another congregation, and we go about our lives. Q On the spot, tertiary issues or issues of preference.

39:03

Do you guys agree with everything that happens at your churches? A Tertiary? Brother, I don't even agree.

39:08

I mean, we don't even have unanimity amongst our elders. We agree on all secondary matters at a certain level. But when it comes to the implementation of certain things, there can even be disagreement amongst elders.

39:18

Q And they're the pastors. A And so certainly there are in the congregation. And tertiary matters? Are you kidding me?

39:23

I mean, it's just like we've got people. Q Yeah, we do things at our church. I was like, well, if I was a dictator, I wouldn't do it that way.

39:29

A Well, I always say this. I always say this. We build our church on no one's preferences, including my own.

39:34

Q That's right. A Right? I mean, what are we doing if we're just united around preference? Q Consider others more significant than yourself.

39:40

I think one of the things to think about in this connection is, yeah, and maybe moving a little bit into handling it well.

39:47

Because I agree with everything you brothers just said. I mean, it's a central issue. Our lives are pretty short.

39:52

And we have, especially if you're raising children, I see a lot of people who will stay in a church merely for social reasons.

40:01

Q Not a good idea. A Because their families... Q Been there a long time. A Been there a long time. My grandma was baptized in the building.

40:08

I mean, you can get all kinds of sentimental reasons, right, for the reason. And yet you can really harm the spiritual development of your children.

40:19

And typically what happens then, too, which is not healthy, is you go home and what you're doing in your home is complaining about the church.

40:27

And you know you're essentially teaching and training your children how to leave the church early.

40:35

So you want to make sure you're maintaining a positive view of the church. If your conscience is that bound that you can't do that, then yes, you have to.

40:43

Q You need to go elsewhere. A You have to do that for the sake of your family and children. But I think one of the things in terms of leaving correctly, do you have something you want to add to that?

40:53

Q No. You're going the right direction I want to go. A Oh, I'm glad. Q I hope you feel affirmed, Chris.

40:58

A You should feel very affirmed by John right now. Q You're as smart as me as of right now. A So one of the things to think about when you're thinking of leaving correctly is to realize, you know, you should have elders in the church who care for you.

41:15

Elders are given to oversee their job is. Now a lot of this presupposes a

41:20

CEO model that we're so used to in American church. The pastor's running the show. The pastor's doing everything.

41:26

He's the unquestionable guy. He's the guy who you can't get to. The guy you can't touch.

41:32

All that's presupposed in a lot of this. One of the beauties of the eldership is if an eldership is functioning in a healthy way, is their job is to oversee the ministry.

41:42

The pastor is not a lone ranger. The pastor is accountable to the elders himself, at least should be.

41:49

That's why a good Presbyterian government is healthy. Q Brother, we affirm, me and we affirm a plurality of elders.

41:55

Goodness. A I got a clap on that. Did you hear that? I got a clap. It's your own church, brother. I'm not done.

42:02

I guess what I'm saying is talk to your elders. If you have good elders, they should be visiting you, caring for you.

42:12

A lot of times on the other side of it, what we experience as pastors is there's a lot of people who are never happy with the church.

42:18

So you always want to check your attitude and make sure that a lot of people move around and then we don't know why.

42:25

All of a sudden, so -and -so is just gone, right? And then we hear from some family member, well, they didn't like this that happened, or they were mad at something you said.

42:32

And, you know, I still think in the old days, you know, one of the things when my dad had to leave the church because of the things that were happening in his church, you know,

42:42

I remember the model he set for me as a young child. He went to that pastor and he talked to that pastor and he worked with the elders.

42:51

And finally, when he couldn't come, he explained to them why he had to move on. That was a noble way of doing it. That's what

42:57

I wanted to jump on was that the first time your elder or pastor, let's say your dispensational church, that they hear about your issue is after you have left or that you're leaving,

43:08

Peter and Hebrews say you need to allow them to shepherd you. So if you're having a struggle that's very significant to the point you might detach yourself from the body, you need to go to them first.

43:22

Here's my struggle. Will you shepherd me, right? And even if you're in a dispensational church, let that pastor do his job, right?

43:29

PARSONS So I would say this is maybe kind of a hybrid spot, and I realize it's five o 'clock, so we need to shut this thing down. Like, we talked about the gospels not being preached.

43:37

We talked about a secondary issue. I think many of you may encounter situations where you're in a church and it's kind of like, well, it's sort of in between, guys.

43:43

It's almost like a 1 .5 kind of issue. And there, I think my encouragement is if you think, like, let's just say the differences are over the distinction between the law and the gospel.

43:53

That's a big deal. PARSONS It is. PARSONS Big deal, okay? Now, but you do agree, if I were to ask you, this is what

44:00

I always ask people, because they're like, man, I go to a church and they don't understand the law and gospel distinction, or we're not covenantal, something like that.

44:06

What should I do? It's like, all right, do you think that Jesus is being preached there? And they'll say, well, yeah,

44:12

I do. I think that Christ is being preached as the Savior of sinners. You know, not on our merit. It's on His merit.

44:17

We're to trust in Him alone. Okay. Then we might disagree on some significant issues of doctrine and theology, but I think that's a true church.

44:25

What I would encourage you to do there, go to your pastor. If you think that he is able to have the conversation, engage and talk, do not necessarily expect that you're going to persuade him.

44:36

But then, if you're not able to, I think you leave peacefully. If you already know that, man, this church is united in their convictions that are not gospel, they're not covenantal, and the

44:49

Lord's doing some good here, but I'm dying spiritually. That's when I would just say, be kind, be humble.

44:54

Go to your pastor and say, you know, I have some different doctrinal convictions that are significant for me and my family, and we need to go elsewhere.

45:03

And just leave it at that. But you have to go somewhere. Yeah. But I think this is how you reason through what does it look like to leave well, based upon what

45:12

I'm experiencing and seeing in my local church. And prayer. Of course. All right. Last question.

45:18

Are we really doing it? So we're just going to completely explode this. No, this is it. Choose one. I didn't write this.

45:25

Water, wine, or whiskey. So if I were a Baptist, it should say...

45:31

Oh, wait, let me answer. Let me answer. If I were a Baptist, it should say grape juice. If I were Presbyterian, it should say wine.

45:37

And I guess if you're a Pentecostal, you'd say whiskey. Is that right? I don't know how to understand the question because...

45:43

So obviously we need water to sustain us. So I'm just going to put that aside. I mean, if you're asking me that question, man, it's tough.

45:50

I'm going to say whiskey, but I love red wine. Well, listen, if you're at the Moffitt house, we start with water as we cook.

45:56

We drink wine with dinner and then we cap it with a whiskey. And you're a Baptist? Amen, brother.

46:02

All right. We are. Well, we'll wave at you in the liquor store. It'll happen.

46:08

It's so nice to have all you guys tonight. Tonight we have the real treat of having Dr. Godfrey speak to us. I know it's going to be a wonderful talk.

46:15

And so I hope to see all of you. I hope we have a few more, especially from the church, but please come back. We'll start promptly at 7 o 'clock.

46:22

Is it 7 or 7 .30? 7. Oh, it's 7 .30? 7 .30. Can we change it?

46:28

Okay, then it's 7 .30. Okay, great. Okay. So we'll be around so we can talk with you. So we'll be here at 7.

46:33

If the schedule says 7 .30, that means we'll start. But that means we will start promptly at 7 .30.

46:38

So do not show up at 7 .29 and expect that to go well. Just saying. Just so you know what you're getting. You get to hear Dr.

46:44

Bob Godfrey not only speak, but then do a panel. It's going to be good. It'll be fun. Don't miss it.