February 7, 2020 Show with Conference Interviews featuring Justin Peters, Dr. James R. White, and Marcus Pittman

Opening Theme: Iron Sharpens Iron and the G3 Conference Interviews

Live from the historic parsonage of the 19th century Gospel Minister, George Norcross, in downtown Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron. This is a radio platform in which pastors, Christian scholars, and theologians address the burning issues facing the Church and the world today.

Proverbs 27, verse 17 tells us, Iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another. Matthew Henry said that in this passage, we are cautioned to take heed with whom we converse and directed to have a view in conversation, to make one another wiser and better.

It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next two hours, and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions. And now, here's your host, Chris Arnzen.

Good afternoon, Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, Lake City, Florida, Champaign County, Illinois, and the rest of humanity living on the planet Earth, who are listening via live streaming to ironsharpensironradio .com.

My name is Eric Nielsen. I'm sitting in today for Chris, as we have our third day of conference interviews. All three of these interviews today are from the recent G3 conference that was held this past January, and we have interviews with Justin Peters, Dr. James R. White, and Marcus Pittman.

Just before the G3 conference this year, Chris held his biannual pastor's luncheon, and Justin Peters was the featured speaker at that pastor's luncheon. The following week at G3, he stopped by the table and had this conversation with Chris.

Justin Peters on Word of Faith Teaching, Suffering, and God's Providence

Well, this is the final day of the G3 conference at the Georgia International Convention Center in Atlanta, Georgia, technically College Park, Georgia, a suburb of Atlanta. And I'm here with my friend Justin Peters of Justin Peters Ministries.

I just recently had the honor and privilege to have him speak a week ago at my Ironsharpensironradio pastor's luncheon. That was an overwhelming success. I think we may have had the largest crowd that we've ever had.

We had approximately 90 men there, and it was just a joy, and the men were riveted to everything Justin had to say. And I continue to get a stream of glowing reviews from the men that were attendants there at the Ironsharpensironradio pastor's luncheon, but I'm so thrilled that I have the double honor of being able to share fellowship with him again just a week later at the G3 conference.

And Justin, it's a delight to have you back at Ironsharpensironradio.

Chris, it's truly a privilege. I enjoy every time I come on, and I think the world of you, and I appreciate what you're doing. And I had a wonderful time last week, as you said, so I thank you very much.

Well, for those of you who don't know Justin or anything about his ministry, Justin was born with cerebral palsy, and he has a mission in life, first and foremost, to declare the gospel of Jesus Christ, that lost souls might be led to eternal life, and also, obviously, first and foremost, to give praise, honor, and glory to God.

But one of the secondary reasons that Justin's ministry exists is to expose false teachers, especially those who are involved in the Word of Faith movement or the Health, Wealth, and Prosperity gospel so-called movement, because it is no gospel at all.

But, Justin, this obviously has perhaps a deeper meaning, exposing these false teachers has a deeper meaning to you, having cerebral palsy, and I know that you had, as a younger man, even sought the possible healing of some of these so-called faith healers, and that left you in, obviously, at least initially, a deep state of discouragement.

Right, right, it did, Chris. Back when I was a teenager, a neighbor of mine came up and said God had spoken to him and told him that I was going to be healed, as long as I have enough faith, and I went to see some faith healers believing that I was going to be healed, and obviously was not, so that was my first exposure to the movement, and as you said, it was very discouraging because I thought I had, you know, there was a lack of faith on my part.

Now, I know now that I wasn't even converted at that time, but nonetheless, that's kind of what began my, that was what first exposed me to the movement, began my interest in it, and some have made the accusation that the reason I do these seminars now is because I'm bitter that I wasn't healed when I was a teenager, but I think I can safely say that nothing could be further from the truth now that I have a right understanding of God's sovereignty and a right theology of suffering and God's providence, and you know, if I have to live the rest of my life with cerebral palsy, that's fine.

I've got all of eternity to live without it.

You certainly don't carry yourself as someone that is living a life of bitterness. When people meet you, I'm sure no one walks away thinking in their head, man, that guy Justin's really got to let it go.

He's just eaten up with bitterness. I mean, you happen to be one of the most joyful people I've ever met and very encouraging and humble people I've ever met.

Well, I don't know if I deserve that, but thank you, Chris.

Thank you, brother.

And one of the bizarre aspects of this movement is its claim that Christians can speak things into existence.

Right.

And where did they even get that concept? Are they twisting the fact that Jesus Christ himself could feed huge crowds with, you know, five loaves and fishes and so on? Or what was the origins of that?

Yes, the origins go back to a couple of guys. The first one, Phineas Parkhurst Quimby, was a guy back in the 1800s. He was the father of the metaphysical cult known as New Thought. He's the one that first began to articulate some of these doctrines.

And then after him, Essek W. Kenyon picked up, expanded his teachings further and taught that we can literally speak things into existence just like God did. And that's the doctrine known as positive confession and the word of faith movement.

They actually teach that our words have within themselves inherent creative power. And whatever we speak, we will bring to fruition. So if we speak positive things, positive things will happen to us. Conversely, if we speak negative things, they say you shouldn't even say, I'm sick.

Even if you are sick, don't say it because that just entrenches the reality. It makes it a reality. Your words are that inherently powerful. And this is, of course, right in line with what God himself and only God can do, speaking things into existence.

That is an ability and an attribute that resides solely with God. But they take it from God and ascribe it to man, which is also in congruence with their little gods doctrine. They teach that we are, in fact, little gods.

If you're a Christian, you are a little god. Bill Johnson, the leader of Bethel Church, pastor of Bethel Church, Bethel Music, he says that Jesus was the most normal Christian who ever lived. Literally, that's a direct quote.

So if you're a Christian, you're just like Jesus. You have all the rights, all the privileges. You should never be sick. Speak things into existence. And it truly is. They blur that line between God the creator and us, his created.

They demote God and deify man.

And I don't know if you know the exact quote, but I can remember hearing a sermon so-called by Kenneth Copeland, where he took that to its logical conclusion and insinuated that he could have died for the sins of the world himself.

Do you remember that quote?

Oh, yeah.

Not only did he say that, he actually claims that Jesus told him that.

That's right.

Yeah.

That's right.

So he compounds error with more error, exponentially so. He says that Jesus came to him in a prophetic vision and said, well, Kenneth Copeland and Jesus were having a conversation. Kenneth Copeland said to Jesus, he said, now, wait a minute.

You don't mean that I could have done the same thing, do you? Meaning atone for sins. And Jesus, quote unquote, said to Kenneth Copeland, oh, yes, you could have done the same thing if you had only had the knowledge of God that I did, because you're a reborn man too.

And so Kenneth Copeland could have atoned for sins if he had just known God's word as well as Christ.

Right. And you said something very significant there. Jesus said allegedly to Kenneth Copeland, you're a reborn man too.

Yeah.

Jesus Christ, according to this, I don't even know what adjective to use to describe this horrific, evil, hellish teaching. But Jesus was the first born again man who became born again in hell after being tortured by the devil and his demons.

Yes, that's right. That is what they call the spiritual death of Jesus, spiritual death of Jesus doctrine. They do not believe that Jesus atoned for our sins fully on the cross. They believe that when Jesus died on the cross, the work was not completed.

It had just begun when Jesus died on the cross. Then he went to hell. Now, this comes from Essek W. Kenyon. Essek W. Kenyon wrote a book entitled From the Cross to the Throne. And when Jesus died on the cross, then he went to hell, suffered, was tortured by demons, died a spiritual death, ceased to be God and had to be reborn.

That Jesus actually had to get saved. And that is where the atonement of our sins, according to them, took place. Not on the cross, but down in hell. And this is a standard doctrine today in the word faith movement, the apostolic reformation.

Bill Johnson, for example, he said, and I have this on audio, we don't have it where we can pull it up right now, but he says to his congregation, he said, did you know that Jesus was born again? And he said, yes, he was.

He was born again. Born again, man. And so, I mean, it's utterly, utterly blasphemy. Blasphemous, Chris. They have a different God, a different Jesus, a different atonement, a different gospel.

So basically, you are saying this is not Christianity.

No.

Especially when you're talking about a leader or somebody who fully understands what they teach, for people to receive this as truth and teach it themselves, we cannot look at them as brothers in Christ.

That's right. That's right. No, we can't.

It is that severe.

Yeah, we're not talking here about who you think wrote the book of Hebrews or the date of the exodus or something like that. These issues go to the heart of the gospel. What one believes about Jesus Christ will determine where one spends eternity.

They have a different Jesus than the Jesus of the Bible. And I tell people a lot in my teaching, it's not enough to just believe in Jesus. Mormons believe in Jesus. Jehovah's Witnesses believe in Jesus.

Muslims believe in Jesus. You've got to believe in the right Jesus. You've got to believe in the Jesus of the Bible. And their Jesus is just as much a different Jesus as was, as is the Jesus of Mormonism or Islam.

It's a different gospel.

And it seems very clear that there are similarities to the occult in their theology and philosophy and practice.

Absolutely.

Which makes perfect sense when I hear the reports of people like Dr. Conrad Mbewe of Kubwata Baptist Church in Lusaka, Zambia, Africa, who is also the chancellor of the African Christian University. Although he recently received a new role there, I believe, so he can actively teach, which chancellors typically don't do.

But I've known Dr. Mbewe since 1995 and had the privilege of calling him a dear friend. The church where I was a member on Long Island before relocating to Pennsylvania, Grace Reform Baptist Church of Merrick, Long Island, New York.

That was the very first American church where Conrad preached.

How about that?

But he has given these horrific reports about the Word of Faith teachers there and barely distinguishable from which doctors.

That's right.

Yep.

Same thing. In fact, I was, I don't know if you know that, I was with Conrad last month.

No, I did not know that.

Yeah. I went to Zambia in December and had a wonderful, wonderful time there. I was in Kitway for a week-long conference and Conrad was one of the speakers there. So he and I were speaking together at this conference with some other speakers as well.

Had a wonderful time. And then I was, Conrad drove me down to Lusaka and we, I preached at his church. We spent the weekend together and what a good brother. I mean, just a dear, dear brother. He's the real deal.

Oh yeah.

And I have often repeated on my show that I believe he is the greatest living preacher on the planet earth.

Yeah.

A case could be made for that.

Yeah.

I've heard him referred to as the Spurgeon of Africa, but you know, we've got a lot of good faithful men out there and Conrad is certainly one of them.

Now, I think that we have to be careful not to broad brush all Pentecostals and Charismatics in this group. I believe that they are all in error on the signed gifts issue, but there is obviously a wide spectrum of understanding, even of the signed gifts amongst those, especially in the Charismatic movement, because Pentecostal denominations typically have a more historically defined theology.

When I say historically, I mean, historically, according to Pentecostalism.

Yeah.

That involves what they teach about the signed gifts and so on. But, you know, in the Charismatic movement, you have a broader spectrum of all the way to the totally insane and dark and dangerous, but you have also Brethren in Christ that believe nearly identically as you and I, except that they believe that the signed gifts are possible and they believe that they have not been convinced through Scripture that there are texts that clearly teach an abolishing of the signed gifts and so on.

So, even though we disagree, don't you think that we have to be careful not to broad brush these folks who I would call Brethren with these more sinister aspects of what would be called Charismatic behavior and teaching?

Yeah, Chris. And that is a distinction that I often make in my teaching, that the question between cessationism and continuism or continuationism, you know, as cessationists, you and I believe in the gifts of teaching and mercy and administration and exhortation and giving and hospitality.

Those gifts are very much in operation. We would just say that the apostolic gifts, the signed gifts are no longer in operation. Gift of tongues or languages and interpretation of languages, two separate gifts, gift of miracles, gift of healing are no longer operative because those were apostolic gifts and there are no more apostles today.

So, those gifts are no longer operative and I think an overwhelming case can be made from Scripture, not necessarily that there's a verse that says these gifts ceased on this date, but you just look at the compendium of what Scripture teaches in the New Testament and you see the progression, chronological progression even through the New Testament, you see those gifts fading away.

But so, this is a very, very, very important issue. It is not though, as you said, it's not an inherently salvific issue. There are genuine believers who would believe that those gifts still continue.

So, we're not saying that if you're a Charismatic, you're lost. So, but there, and I know some Charismatics, continuous, that rail against the Word of Faith movement and the New Apostolic Reformation.

So, but I do think it is a very, very important issue because of the ripple effects. It's a very slippery slope, to be real honest. It's a very slippery slope from the continuous position right into Benny Hinn land.

Right, and it's also a slippery slope into a denial of the sufficiency of Scripture.

Yeah, and I would say the position itself necessitates a denial of sufficiency of Scripture. If you hold to the continuous position, you cannot, with a logical consistency, also hold to the sufficiency of Scripture because they're mutually exclusive positions.

They're contradictory positions.

Now, I'd like you to give a word of comfort and encouragement to listeners who are suffering with illnesses of all kinds. They may be wrongfully convinced that they are displeasing to God, they are unfaithful, and it may be that they are racking their brains trying to think of this unconfessed sin that is the reason that they are in a hospital bed, perhaps even with IV tubes hooked up to them, breathing apparatus and so on, or whatever the case may be.

Now, we are all sinners, that's for sure. Right. And I do believe, as we have even discussed, I believe I actually brought it up in the Q &A session when you were conducting the pastor's luncheon. There are cases where God chastises those whom He loves with illness or what have you because they are being disobedient in some way, and it's a wake-up call to them, perhaps.

And we even have the example in Scripture of people approaching the Lord's table in an unworthy manner, and some of them were sick and even died because of that.

Right.

But that should not be the absolute and final conclusion that every sick person draws. Maybe it should be an initial thing that causes them to search their hearts, but it shouldn't be something that rests there and remains there, this haunting fear that could just paralyze someone in depression and so on.

Yes, that's right. That's right, Chris. The fact of the matter is we live in a fallen world, and one of the consequences of living in a fallen world, the fallen state of humanity, is that we get sick, and we have disabilities, and cancer, arthritis, multiple sclerosis, whatever, your head cold.

Next time you catch a cold, it's because we live in a fallen world. And also aging. The reason we age is because we live in a fallen world. And I'm kind of amused when I hear these prosperity preachers teach that you should always be healed because we've been completely delivered from the effects of the curse, and yet you can look at videos of Benny Hinn or Kenneth Copeland or fill in the blank year by year, and guess what?

Every year they look a little bit older than they did the year before, and it's because this fallen world is taking its toll on their bodies. Same reason we get sick. But look through the Bible. This is where I always take people to Scripture.

Look through the Bible. There are many examples of faithful servants of God who were sick. Moses. God said to Moses, who has made man's mouth? Who makes him dumb or deaf or seeing or blind? Is it not I, the Lord?

Elisha, 2 Kings 13, died of an illness, and yet he had a double portion anointing of the great prophet Elijah, and yet he died of a sickness. Paul, take a little wine for your stomach and your frequent ailments, he wrote to Timothy.

And Paul himself had a bodily illness, and I don't even take people to the thorn in the flesh because I'm not convinced that was a bodily illness. Go to Galatians chapter 4, verse 13. Paul said, you know that it was because of a bodily illness that I came and preached the gospel to you the first time, and that which was a trial to you in my bodily condition, you did not despise or loathe, but you received me as an angel of God, even as Christ Jesus himself.

So here's the man who wrote roughly a third of the New Testament, and he was sick. What do you do with that? Did Paul not have enough faith to be healed? He wrote a third of the New Testament. So you're in good company, dear brother, dear sister in Christ, if you are sick.

Many of the Bible's most faithful servants of God were sick, so we should expect this. And I have no problem at all with praying for someone who is sick to recover, praying that God would heal that person, that is perfectly fine.

And on occasion, but only when it's His sovereign will to do so, God does heal people. Quite honestly, it's more the exception than the rule. It's not a common thing. On occasion, though, He does. But if God does not bring healing, He promises something far better.

He promises that His grace will be sufficient. His strength will be made perfect in our weaknesses. 1 Peter 5, verse 7, Peter says, cast all your anxieties upon Him because He cares for you.

He cares.

And literally in the Greek, Chris, He cares for you. That phrase, the literal rendering of that is it matters to Him about you. It matters to Him about you. That is just an overwhelming thought when you think that the one who spoke the universe into existence creates everything and holds every molecule in all the universe in its appointed place.

It matters to Him about you. Whatever it is that you're going through, it matters to Him. And so Selah, you know, God, He is a God who is near. He understands our pain and our struggles. And He never leaves us, never forsakes us.

And in the midst of our suffering, in the midst of our trials, sickness, disease, whatever it is, the greatest desire that we should have for our lives is to carry the name of Christ well. Lord, use this sickness to conform me more into the image of your Son.

And may I carry your name well through the sickness, through the trials. May I glorify Christ. That's what we should really be praying for.

Amen. Well, brother, it is always a pleasure to have you on Iron Shepherd and Zion Radio. I look forward to your return for another two-hour interview during one of our live.

Broadcasts.

But you have certainly made this experience of being here at G3 a richer one for me due to your fellowship and just your constant, being a constant source of encouragement.

Thank you, Chris. Likewise, brother. Thank you so much.

And justinpeters .org is the website.

Correct.

Justinpeters .org.

Great.

God bless.

You too.

I hope you've enjoyed this conversation with Justin Peters. At this time, we're going to take our first break to hear from our sponsors.

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James White on Apologetics, Islam, Critical Theory, and the Shifting Battles in Christianity

Welcome back to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. I'm Eric Nielsen, and we are listening to interviews from the 2020 G3 Conference. This year at the G3 Conference, Dr. James White did not have a booth with Alpha and Omega Ministries.

Instead, he was visiting a number of booths at the G3 Conference, and he stopped by the Iron Sharpens Iron Radio booth. Here's the conversation that Chris had with James White.

Well, here I am at the fourth G3 Conference that I've attended, manning an exhibitor's booth for Iron Sharpens Iron Radio here in Atlanta, Georgia, at the Georgia International Convention Center. And I am here live on site with Dr. James R. White of Alpha and Omega Ministries, one of my favorite guests on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

And he is wearing...

He's waving at everybody going by because he knows everyone here. It's really weird.

And he's wearing probably the coolest cross necklace I've ever seen in my life.

You know where I bought that? I bought that on the Navajo Reservation in northern Arizona when I was driving back and forth between the Colorado of Colorado. I stopped, I saw it, and I was like, oh man, I really, really want that.

But I didn't get it. Drove up two miles down the road, banged a UAE, went back and got it because it was so unique.

Yeah, it is.

I mean, it just, it just glows. I've just never seen anything that catches the light as beautifully as that one does.

Very, very nice.

Yeah.

I love Navajo stuff. I mean, they make beautiful pottery and stuff like that. They're a neat people. And it's just sort of sad to see what's happened to them in Arizona. It's, we could get into it. But when the government tries to provide for you, it's going to screw up.

Right.

It's going to screw up badly and create all sorts of problems in the process. So anyway.

Well, why don't you tell our listeners some of the most pressing issues today that face Alpha Omega Ministries. You are on the front lines of so many battles, it seems, and Christendom today. And perhaps even go through a progression of those things that were primary in your focus when you started Alpha Omega Ministries and lead us up until the present day.

Well, you know, it has changed so rapidly and so quickly. The foundations haven't. But, you know, when we first started doing stuff on Long Island, the battles were a little bit more easily defined. You had your liberalism.

You had, you know, we were doing debates on Roman Catholicism and finally did our first debate on Islam there on Long Island, even though I don't consider that my first Islamic debate.

Yes, I know.

Because I hadn't started studying Islam yet. You were defending the deity of Christ. Against a fellow who would eventually leave Orthodox Islam anyways, which is rather interesting. And that's where we got the messing with the Philippians defense, which we had never heard of before.

And I know I've told you, Chris, but over the years, I play some of the audience Q &A from that. What was the name of the church?

That was, at the time, it was the Bible Baptist Church of Syosset.

Yes, yes, it was in Syosset.

They've since changed the name and it's a totally different kind of church.

Right, right. But the people that recorded it were from their side, if you remember that. And it was rather interesting how they did things. They didn't really mind whether the audience was interrupted by what they were doing or not.

And so the angle of one of the cameras had you and my wife and my daughter. So you could see me and Hamza Abdul-Malik and the moderator. And then you're here. Then Kelly's here. And then Summer's here.

And so I love pointing out to people that there's my nine-year-old daughter listening as this whole long line of Muslims are asking her dad these questions about the Bible and the deity of Christ and stuff like that.

And those questions were amazing. Now, in hindsight, it's like, well, duh. But at the time, it was like, oh, my. This is going to be really, really interesting.

Defeat three.

Defeat three, defeat three. That's right. So back then, things were not nearly as complicated.

You hardly had any conflicts with those that would profess to be reformed back then. Exactly.

Yep, yep. Or even with the Calvinism issue, at least there was much more unity. There's been much more fracturing. And part of it is because of, well, critical theory divides. That's what it's meant to do.

I was actually sitting at dinner last night with a very well-known atheist, who if I mentioned him, you'd go, oh, yeah, I know exactly who it is, who is an expert on critical theory and what it's doing to our society.

And no matter which direction you pushed, the other side was always seeking to fracture and divide. And that's what critical theory does. It breaks things down. And how effectively they're doing it, even within the academy, not even including Christians and things like that, that's coming into the church.

And the result is the divisions that we see now, to where it seems like there's no one front that we're battling on anymore. It seems like we're surrounded by the enemy, and the fire is coming from every which direction.

So it's sort of nice when you can come to some place and find a lot of folks that are pulling the same direction, even though we all sort of realize, wow, things have gotten much more complicated. But it's nice to see.

I mean, you and I have been here, I think this is the fourth year I've spoken here,.

Too.

And it's nice to see that it's flourishing. It's nice to see folks that we've known and helped get started and things like that, and see old friends. But you also see friends that are now getting old.

You and I have been at this a long, long, long time. You're looking pretty gray in the jowls yourself. I mean, look at this white beard, man. I mean, I just wish the whole thing would go that way. I would look so much cooler if I had a completely white beard.

There's also stuff you can buy to darken it. But have you ever tried to find something to lighten it? No, no, no. It just doesn't work that way.

So when you started Alpha Omega Ministries, if I can remember correctly, which would have been in the 70s, perhaps?

Oh, goodness. No, we started in October of 1983.

OK, well, it wasn't that far off. And it was primarily Mormonism that you were...

Mormonism first. Jehovah's Witnesses came pretty fast after that. If you're going to be talking about Mormonism, then everybody should be asking about the.

Witnesses.