August 21, 2019 Show with Brent Ward on “Christians in the Military: One Veteran’s Testimony & Counsel”

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 chapter 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 in 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, and the rest of humanity living on the planet Earth who are listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com.

This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Wednesday on this 21st day of August 2019.

And I'm thrilled to have on the program today for the very first time Brent Ward. Brent is a former

Army 82nd Airborne Paratrooper and Gulf War veteran, and he is currently the

Director of Development at IRBS Theological Seminary in Mansfield, Texas. Today we are going to be addressing

Christians in the Military, One Veteran's Testimony and Counsel, and it's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the very first time ever to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Brent Ward.

Thank you, Chris. I'm really glad to be on. It's a real blessing. I'm going to immediately give our listeners our email address if you have any questions.

It's chrisarnzen at gmail .com, C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N, gmail .com.

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

Please only remain anonymous if your questions involve a personal and private matter. That's chrisarnzen at gmail .com.

And, well, before we even go into your personal testimony, and as we have a tradition here on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, where our first -time guests give a summary of their salvation testimony, including the kind of religious atmosphere, if any, they were raised in, and what providential circumstances were raised up in your life to draw you to our

Sovereign Lord and save you. But before that, tell our listeners who have not yet heard anything about IRBS Theological Seminary, tell them something about this wonderful seminary, which happens to be a key sponsor of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

Thank you, Chris. Yes, IRBS Theological Seminary is a full residential seminary founded on confessional

Reformed Baptist distinctives. We are established in training men in the work of spreading the gospel around the world.

We have some degree programs. Our Master of Divinity program is a 110 -hour program designed to be completed in residence.

We do offer a Master's of Art Religion. That degree is not intended for preparation for gospel ministry, but we offer that as well.

And then we have a certificate program. In fact, I'm actually registered as a student for the certificate program.

It's a 16 -hour program designed to supplement previous ministral studies. And so we have some great things going on.

Registration is amongst us. In fact, our first class actually begins tomorrow with Dr.

Renahan in preaching through the Psalms. And so we're really excited about that one -credit -hour intensive tomorrow and Friday.

Great. And for any more details, you can go to irbsseminary .org,

irbsseminary .org, and don't forget, there's two S's back -to -back. In the middle of that URL, very often when there are two letters, two of the same letters back -to -back in a

URL, people may forget one of those letters, so it's irbsseminary .org.

Well, let's now continue with, as I said earlier, your personal salvation testimony.

What kind of religious atmosphere were you raised in, if any, and how did our

Sovereign Lord draw you to himself and save you? Yes, thank you.

So I was, to be a confessionally Reformed Baptist now is truly the kindness of the

Lord. I was raised in the

Charismatic Movement, and in particular, not just the Charismatic Movement, but if you are familiar with the

Word of Faith Movement. Oh, yeah. In fact, I've had Kosti Hinn on this program, who is the nephew of Benny Hinn, and Kosti is now a

Reformed Baptist and cessationist pastoring in Arizona. Isn't that wonderful?

Amen. So my father was a

Charismatic pastor, and so I grew up around the Church. It was all about the experience, and I believe that you'll find that that is still the case, but during this time, we're talking about the 70s, and so it's nothing for us to be in someone's home or people being in our home and capturing some kind of experience.

And so while they had a sincere desire,

I would say, to experience God, I would say that it was anemic in the sense that it wasn't very deep in regards to looking at the character, nature, or work of Christ.

It had more to do with how I was feeling at the time and what kind of experience I could have, if that makes sense.

And so I never really made a professional faith during that time.

I did a little bit later on, but for the most part, in terms of a truly surrendering to Christ, it was much later.

What I did is I essentially, I was walking in a lot of rebellion at a young age, and every young man, when he is in rebellion against his parents, and in particular his strong father, what they want to do is they want to join the military.

And so, you know, if I'm not going to be obedient to my dad, I'll go and join the army. That's not the wisest choice, but I thought it was a good idea, and my dad was more than happy to help me sign up.

And so I went into the army. I was a forward observer.

Now, just out of curiosity, let me just interrupt you for a moment. Did you have other family members in the military?

So my dad was ex -Navy. He was a Navy guy, and so I went

Army. My grandfather was a World War II vet. So my father was a

Vietnam veteran. My dad was a Vietnam veteran. My grandfather was a

World War II veteran. And so I did have a background with having service to my country being a really big deal.

I thought it was a great idea just to get away from the house, you know. Every rebellious young man probably needs to go in the army.

That being said, it was a quick time.

It was an interesting time. Like I said, my MOS was a forward observer.

Basically, I was the redheaded stepchild of the artillery and that we would actually be the ones that would be attached to infantry or calvary, and we would call in the artillery, either being mortar fire, artillery, close air support through F -11s with the copperhead missiles, or naval gunfire.

So we were the guys that had the radios and would call that in. My first duty station was actually in Korea.

And after airborne school. So they do all the training. They sent me to jump school and then sent me to a leg unit in Korea.

It didn't make much sense to me at the time, but hey, that's what happened. And then after that one year,

I went to the 82nd there at Fort Bragg in North Carolina, which is about two and a half hours from my hometown there in Wilmington area.

And it was a real quick stint. We did several different training exercises, a couple police actions, and then the

Gulf War. And we'll get into that a little bit. During that entire time,

I was not serving the Lord. In fact, when we get into it a little bit in detail, I don't know if I saw a really good

Christian witness, and I know that other people's experience is quite different than my own.

But for me, I saw a lot of people make professions of faith, but in terms of what

I would consider a true surrender to Christ, I don't know if I saw consistent biblical

Christianity during my military stint. So I was hardened after the

Gulf War. Got out, didn't really want to stay in. Went back to my hometown in Wilmington.

And honestly, my dad probably had one of the wisest things that he could have asked me to do.

He said, listen, I want you to be able just to make a reconnection with your family, with us, with your brothers.

I have two brothers that are younger than I. One is nine years younger and the other 11 years younger.

And so this puts me at about 22 years old. And I did,

I wanted to make that connection again with my family. He says, look, will you just consider attending the church on Sundays and then

Sunday afternoon, Sunday evening, just spend time with us, with the family. And I said, sure,

I can do that. And, you know, I would go. I was hit and miss for quite some time.

I would say that my rebellion against God got greater and greater.

I was an angry man. A lot of bitterness, a lot of things going on in terms of just mental anguish, not realizing the

Lord had me right where he wanted me the entire time. And a friend of my dad's was a pastor, and he was at special courses, and he was close by.

And I really appreciated him. He was a kind of a tell it like it is kind of guy. He had suggested that I read a book of the

Bible. And so he suggested that I read the Gospel of John, and I agreed to do so.

And so I cut my teeth on the Gospel of John, and, Chris, it wrecked me.

Did you say wrecked? Did you say W -R -E -C -K -E -D?

It did. The Gospel of John absolutely wrecked me. When you come into contact with the

Word of God, and it really, in this manner, for me, in terms of these statements of deity, of Christ and who he was and what he did, and I believe that John makes it very clear in terms of even his own purpose statement there at the end of John.

He, no doubt, was going to tell you who Christ was. And so I cut my teeth on that, started still attending fairly regularly, and I believe that sometime in there, you know,

I wouldn't say that we held, well, the church held to decisional regeneration. You know,

I didn't go and walk down an aisle. I will say this, that at some point during that time that I felt tremendous conviction over my sin and brokenness over who

I was and absolutely knew that I needed Christ. And so at some point,

I believe that the Lord awakened me and quickened me and was very kind to me and showed me a tremendous amount of mercy during that time.

And so from the book of John, after I completed that, I decided I was going to start reading the

Bible. And it just started in Genesis. You know, when you get into Genesis and Exodus, you know, those are great, wonderful stories.

I had to kind of plot through some of the others. You know, when you start getting Leviticus and Deuteronomy for a young guy, it was pretty tough.

But, you know, over time, I believe that the Lord just showed His kindness in regards to changing me and my desire to surrender.

I'll use that term because I didn't know what else to do other than just to surrender wholeheartedly to Him.

The gentleman that I brought up to you, that was a friend of my father's that was a pastor, although he was a charismatic, he wasn't quite as charismatic as we were.

If I could say he was more charismatic with a seatbelt, some of the reading that he recommended was

Calvin and Spurgeon and John MacArthur are these types of men. And, you know,

I cut my teeth on some of this, and I had never experienced any of this type of resources before.

And it was like I had taken my, I hooked my mouth up to a fire extinguisher.

It was just incredible, these resources in regards to who

God is and in light of who God is, who we are. And it was tremendous,

Chris, just how the Lord providentially put that man in my life. I eventually actually moved to where he was and went and served under his church for a time before moving to Dallas, Texas several years later and attending

Bible college. It was a charismatic Bible college, and that's where I met my beautiful wife of 20 years.

But at that point, I would tell you that I was Calvinistic and really just starting to learn things about the doctrines of grace while going to a charismatic

Bible college. And during that time, that particular Bible school actually had some faculty, some staff that taught

Calvinistic aspects and doctrines. Wow. Yeah, it was actually quite incredible during that time to have several on staff that were

Calvinistic. Can you mention the name of that institution? Sure, Christ for the

Nations here in Dallas, Texas. Okay, because there was a Christ for the Nations here on Long Island, when

I say here. I used to live on Long Island. I'm in Pennsylvania now. But where I was born and raised on Long Island, there was a

Christ for the Nations as well. I believe that they did have a school up there, and they had shut it down after a while.

So Christ for the Nations came out, definitely word of faith, came out of the tent revival meetings.

And I would say that during the time that I was a student in the 90s, there was at least an acceptance of differing views.

But later on, and they had every right to do so, as an organization, they decided that they wanted to reinstitute the old

Charismatic or Pentecostal roots. And so eventually, they wanted to route out any form of Calvinism.

And that's another story, actually a part of our conversation tomorrow, as I eventually became a staff member at that school.

And we can talk about that. But later on, so after I had graduated,

I served the church, several different Charismatic churches, and slowly became a leader of the church, as a small group leader.

Our small group that we met was in our home became fairly large. And when I say large, we had a small group of a little over 20 people.

And eventually got planted out of that Charismatic church and became our own church.

And all the while, I'm sitting here and I'm studying and we're going through, and I had a desire to teach expositionally.

And I just wanted to teach Bible. And so as we're just going through and learning and really just coming to know more about our faith in Christ and the power of the word, we made a jump from being

Charismatic to literally being a cessationist, and eventually adopting the confession of faith in 1689 and becoming confessional as well as associational.

So the word took us through quite the process, as you can imagine. And if you could define for our listeners who are either new

Christians, non -Christians, or they're just not familiar with the term cessationist, if you could define that for us.

Sure. So a continuationist, let's start there. A continuationist would be someone that would hold to what we would call the scientists and say that those things are still in place for today, whether that be the gift of prophecy, the gift of speaking in tongues, of healing, and interpretation of tongues, those types of things.

And so that would be a continuationist. A cessationist view for us is that at the moment that God's word was completely finished during the first century, that those things were no longer needed, that God's word is final, and it is everything that we need for life and for godliness.

And we can really—I know that our conversation tomorrow will get into more detail on that, and I look forward to that conversation because I believe that although it is a second -tier issue, it is a vital second -tier issue, and it affects how we view several different things in terms of the intention of the

Church when she gathers together corporately, as well as individual Christian growth and maturity and the role of Scripture in the life of the believer, and ultimately,

I believe, the glory of God. I think that looking at this second -tier issue is crucial in terms of those positions and how it affects those different issues in the life of the

Church and the believer. Yeah, in fact, our listeners should mark down on their calendars that you will be returning tomorrow, 4 to 6 p .m.

Eastern Time, here on Iron Trubman's Iron Radio. Yes, I'm looking forward to that conversation.

Me too. So, I know that a part of your history is that you were serving in the role of a pastor.

You felt the call, believed you had the call from God to enter into the ministry.

I sometimes wrongly, I think, use, as most of us do, the word felt, and I apologize for that.

But it is a part of it. I mean, it's not just intellectual knowledge. There is a feeling and an emotion that is attached, but we can't base our lives upon feelings.

So tell us about your call to the ministry. Sure. So it was my intent in Bible college to go into the ministry.

And so while there, I served in a local church here in South Dallas, in Midlothian.

It was a really nice little church and served there, interned there, was eventually licensed for the ministry there, and eventually ordained as charismatic into the ministry.

Eventually took another role of physician with another church, like I was telling you, in regards to becoming more like a small group pastor.

And this was a unique situation in terms of, now we're going to get into ecclesiology,

Chris, but this particular church, what we did is the small groups would meet individually on Sunday morning, and then once a month, all the small groups would assemble together for a corporate worship service.

And so it was a very unique small church model. And eventually something that I felt that I couldn't fit into, but here

I had been leading a group of just incredible people who really were coming alongside of me in terms of this journey of Reformed theology.

And so I'd actually asked, it was during, I don't know if you remember, the

Todd Bentley revivals a while back. Yeah. So it was during that era, and that really was a dividing line because I called them out, you know, and was very outspoken against this teaching and this ministry.

And if you want to call it a revival, I was very outspoken saying this is a false teacher.

He is not teaching scripture. He's literally talking about the angel Emma and getting downloads from heaven and visiting heaven.

And so I was pretty outspoken about that. It became a demarcation, a dividing line, and I was still a good friend with the lead pastor of that particular church.

We did see eye to eye that it was probably time for me to plant outside of them.

So with their blessing, they sent us out. I believe we had a little over 20 people at that time.

I'm not quite sure on the number in terms of exact, but I believe it was around 20.

And so it was during that time that I didn't want to be a standalone. And I knew that I was out on my own and very young.

During that time, I had just gotten my hands on this interesting document.

You may be very familiar with it. It's called the London Baptist Confession of 1889.

And I had Sam Waldron's book. His little commentary on it.

Well, it's not really that little. It's about 10 times the size of the confession. It's true.

And so I'm cutting my teeth on it, thinking that I'm starting to get a grasp on it, and just knowing that I am just really over my head.

And so I had reached out to a local

Reformed Baptist church that I knew was confessional. And it was recommended by another pastor who knew that that was the direction that I wanted to go.

And it was actually Heritage Baptist Church, where I am a member of now. And so Pastor Larry Vincent and Pastor Jarrett Jones met with me over lunch and started meeting with me and recommended that I start to visit the local association, become more familiar with the

LBC and what that means. And during this time, this is a unique connection, and I love this,

Chris. As I'm doing this, it was recommended that I take this particular class that they were going to be offering in December that was coming up, called

Baptist Symbolics. And the gentleman that was going to be teaching that class was

Dr. Renahan. Well, you think you begin to grasp the confession until you take

Dr. Renahan's Symbolics class, and I was truly blown away with his treatment of it and just the care and awe that he puts in terms of the class and really how it reflects in terms of Scripture.

I think that he truly is the foremost expert in confessional reform Baptist doctrine in history.

I believe that to be the case, and he was very helpful in that. So that's the connect point in terms of me meeting

Dr. Renahan and starting to learn more about our confession. Our church did adopt the confession, and I ultimately pastored for just shy of 10 years.

Now, we have friends outside of confessional Christianity who wrongly believe that confessionalism is a violation of either

Sola Scriptura or a more fundamentalist way of looking at it.

The Bible alone as our sole infallible authority. So how do we briefly, because we've already demonstrated in past programs why this is not true, but how would you put our listeners at ease who are unfamiliar with confessionalism and to dispel these paranoid and false stereotypes that they may have.

I mean, obviously there are people who may abuse confessions and treat them equally with the

God -breathed canon, but that's a rare thing, I think. But if you could, just explain in summary form.

Absolutely. So we absolutely hold that the

Holy Scripture is the only sufficient, certain, and infallible rule of all saving knowledge, faith, and obedience.

In fact, I'm taking that directly from our own confession, that right off the bat, chapter 1, paragraph 1 addresses this issue that Holy Scripture is the ultimate authority.

The confession itself, if I could say it this way, is a summary of what we believe that the

Bible teaches, and it allows us to speak very concisely and succinctly concerning doctrines of Scripture and of God and of salvation and of the

Church. And so it proves as a wonderful tool, a mooring, if you will, to keep us away from error and false doctrines.

Amen. And it connects us with our brothers and sisters in Christ from the past, going back to the 17th century, and even further before that, because they were not teaching novel things that arose for the first time in the 17th century.

But it's a guardrail, and it's a sign, if a church is departing from their confession, that they may be accepting or adopting a novel idea, a heretical understanding of certain areas of Scripture.

So it is an important part of the, I think, Christian life, is to be confessional, and obviously the confession has to be biblically sound to begin with, and the

Reformed confessions are just that, although we would disagree on infant baptism and church polity and government when it comes to our friends who accept the

Westminster and the three forms of unity, but those still have much in common with our

London Baptist confession. They do. You know, and just to know that we have safeguards like this during a time in history where we have so many spurious teachings.

We see the attack on God's Word, the attack on the character and nature of God, and even

His attributes and who He is. These things are prevalent, and we need to have these safeguards in place for us individually as well as the church corporately.

Great. Well, we have to go to our first break right now, and by the way, before I forget to do this, since the

Gospel of John had such a profound effect upon you coming to faith in Christ, I want to strongly recommend a booklet published by Chapel Library, which is a publisher that is very faithful to biblical

Christianity and Reformed Christianity, which I believe are synonymous. It is called

The Doctrines of Grace in the Gospel of John by R. Bruce Stewart, who just went home to be with the

Lord in 2006. But this was really extremely helpful to me, even in my early years of Christianity, in coming to see how biblical the doctrines of grace are.

It's just a 32 -page booklet, and it's available at chapellibrary .org, chapellibrary .org,

The Doctrines of Grace in the Gospel of John by R. Bruce Stewart. We're going to be going, as I said, to our first break.

Our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com, chrisarnson at gmail .com, and please give us your first name at least, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside the

USA. Only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal or private matter. Don't go away.

We'll be right back after these messages from our sponsors. Hello, my name is

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S's in the middle. I hope to hear from you soon. God bless you. As host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, I frequently get requests from listeners for church recommendations.

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so place your orders there, solid -ground -books .com. We are now back with our guest today, and his name is

Brent Ward, and he is a former Army 82nd Airborne Paratrooper and Gulf War veteran and Director of Development today at IRBS Theological Seminary in Mansfield, Texas, who is also a key sponsor of this program.

We are discussing Christians in the military, one veteran's testimony and counsel. Our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com.

chrisarnson at gmail .com. And if you could, Brent, now focus a bit more on your military experience.

I know that you had mentioned earlier that you didn't really experience much of a

Christian witness anywhere, and of course you gave the caveat that many other Christians in the military do have a different experience than your own.

But if you could tell us about that and other negative experiences before you go into the positive experiences that our sovereign

Lord providentially brought to you when he placed you in the military. Sure.

So I've been thinking a lot about this, knowing that you and I were going to talk about it.

I think that when you have an organization that you're bringing in a lot of young men that are unredeemed, that are totally depraved, and you put them together, the negative aspects of that is that there's a lot of wickedness.

There's a lot of evil, a lot of sin.

And so you just have to be very mindful of the organization in terms of it's a full and broken world.

As I think about that, I just want to be mindful of that fact.

You put these young men into an environment where you are training them to be killers, at least in the combat arms portion of it where I was at.

And something in terms of if you don't have a good moral ethical compass, it could wreak havoc if that's not been tempered correctly.

So I would say that that would be the major negative aspect of it. In terms of just the immaturity of young men going in, being trained to do some incredible things really, and at the same time still having the same nature as being very prevalent in their lives, their being their moral compass or the lack thereof.

So can you give us some detail, as detailed as you care to, experiences that you've faced that really were, at least from a human perspective, we know that God works all things together for the good, for those who love

God and are called according to His purpose. But as far as a human experience, what you believe were at least at the time detrimental to you.

Detrimental. While you're thinking,

I'm going to give our email address again. It's chrisarnsen at gmail .com. C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com.

Please give us your first name at least. City and state. Country of residence, if you live outside the USA. Only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal or private matter.

One of the reasons that I'm asking you for more detail is because you had mentioned that after you returned home, after your experiences in the

Gulf War, etc., there was anger and dissatisfaction and lack of content.

There was a bit of turmoil going on in your life. How much of that had to do with your military experience?

Sure. Okay, so that's helpful. I think let's take it historically and kind of move forward if that's okay,

Chris. So my first duty station was

Korea. Okay, that's South Korea, not North Korea. And at that time in the late 80s, we've got, in terms of combat arms, what you would do is you would serve 90 days on the demilitarized zone, okay?

And so most of the time your training was involved in preparing you to be on the demilitarized zone.

So you've got the MDL, which is the military demarcation line, and on the

North Korean side, we're to stay 150 meters from that. On our side, we're to stay 150 meters, but we patrol all along this demarcation line, okay?

That does mean that you do have live ammo. It is real for our audience.

When it comes to the Korean War, it is still the longest ceasefire in existence.

We never really had a true ending of that war.

And so anyway, with the demilitarized zones, live rounds, you are going to have those kind of interactions with the enemy.

Fortunately for me, being attached to, at that time, the cavalry scouts, what you would do for those 90 days is during the daytime you do a scouting mission, and then at night you would dig in and you would just wait.

We really never saw anything. I don't have any really stories other than the fact that, and this was just an experience that I had, is we were hunkered down pretty low, and I did have a snake crawl on top of the back of my legs as I'm in a fixed position, live rounds on me, and I am deathly afraid of snakes.

That was quite the experience as a 19 -year -old young man who had to really keep his mouth shut as the snake crawled behind my legs.

But anyway, that's just a funny little story. A poisonous snake?

I didn't look. I didn't look.

When you do those kind of patrols as well as the guard post, guard duty type thing right across from your enemy, it does kind of wear on you psychologically in terms of just ever being ready.

But I didn't have anything in terms of any negative experience there.

I would say that that stuff happened in the Gulf. After me spending a year there, then

I come back to the States and I'm assigned to the 82nd Airborne. It was 1st of 319, which was the artillery unit.

That's a regiment. And we were attached to the 1st of the 505 PR, which is

Paratrooper or Parachute Infantry Regiment. And so obviously as a red -headed stepchild, we are attached to infantry and ready to go.

So I would say just the thing that comes to mind is that you are asked to do things that could potentially break your conscience in terms of liberty of conscience.

Let me say it that way. There are just going to be things that in terms of orders, in terms of clearing out a building or what have you that are just going to be difficult and weigh on you.

And I don't think, and even from just a common kingdom standpoint, I don't believe that we have a resource to help soldiers be able to come back and integrate very well in regular society.

I think that that is a point of contention. I think it's hard after you go through the distresses of the military, and in particular if you're in any form of conflict and the stresses involved with that.

It takes a little while to come back from that, if that makes sense. Yes, it does.

And we're going to our midway break right now. It's the longer than normal break because Grace Life Radio, 90 .1

FM in Lake City, Florida, requires of us a longer break in the middle because they have to, by FCC regulations, localize

Iron Trip and Zion Radio to the Lake City, Florida area. So they air their own public service announcements and commercials during this extended break while we air our globally heard commercials.

So please use this time wisely, this extended break. Use it wisely. Not only write down the information provided by our advertisers so that you can more frequently and successfully patronize them, because the more you patronize our advertisers, the more likely they will remain our advertisers, which means, subsequently, the more likely we will remain on the air because we depend on the advertising dollars of our sponsors to remain on the air.

So please remember that. I know that many of my listeners, unfortunately, fast forward through the commercials.

I understand the temptation to do that, but please don't do that because we really need you to patronize our advertisers if you want us to exist.

So the more you fast forward through our commercials and ignore them, the more likely we will eventually go off the air.

So please try not to do that. We'll also write down questions during this break for our guest today, Brent Ward, on his experiences in the military, on Christian subjects involving the military in general.

And our e -mail address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com, C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com.

Please give us your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside the USA. Only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter.

Don't go away. We'll be right back with more of Brent Ward and Christians in the Military. Hi, I'm Stephan Limblad, Assistant Professor of Systematic Theology at IRBS Theological Seminary in Mansfield, Texas.

I accepted this call to teach at the seminary because I'm firmly convinced that the people of God in the churches of our

Lord Jesus Christ need to be firmly grounded in the truth of Holy Scripture. I'm excited to be teaching such subjects as the nature of theology and the doctrine of Scripture and even the doctrine of the person and work of Jesus Christ.

Our churches and our people need to be well grounded in these truths. Indeed, future ministers of the gospel need to understand these truths in order to proclaim them to all of God's people.

If you want to learn more about our program, visit us online at irbsseminary .org.

Chris Sorensen, host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio here. I want to tell you about a man I have personally known for many years.

His name is Dan Buttafuoco. Dan is a personal injury and medical malpractice lawyer, but not the type that typically comes to mind.

Dan cares about people and is a theologian himself. Recently, he wrote a book titled

Consider the Evidence for the Bible. Ravi Zacharias wrote the foreword.

Dan also has a master's degree in theology. Dan handles serious injury and medical malpractice cases in all 50 states.

He represents many Christians in serious injury matters all over the country. Dan is an exceptional trial lawyer.

He wrote the test for the National Board of Trial Advocacy. Currently, his firm has over 100 cases that have settled for $1 million or more, and in approximately 10 different states.

In Illinois, his lawyers had the fourth largest settlement in the state's history. In New York, his case involving a paralyzed police officer made the front page of the

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Dan Buttafuoco's number is 1 -800 -669 -4878. 1 -800 -669 -4878.

Or email me for Dan's contact information at chrisarnson at gmail .com.

That's chrisarnson at gmail .com. James White of Alpha Omega Ministries here.

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I'm Dr. Gary Kimbrough, pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church in Laurel, Mississippi. God tells us in James 127 that pure and undefiled religion is a visit to fatherless and widows and their affliction.

In the providence of God, three years ago, I discovered a poor, small church outside Lusaka, Zambia, in a township called

Kabanana, who are taking care of 24 orphans. I found them just at the time when they had lost all their funding.

What was I to do? Could I just say, God bless you and walk away? The situation of the children set heavily upon me.

As I was praying concerning this need, it came to me, I trust from the Lord, to tell the orphans' plight to a broader audience.

The entire need for their clothing, food, education, and some medical services is $73 per month per child.

If just 50 of us would give $35 a month, we could meet the need. Bethlehem Baptist Church will pay the fee to get the funds there, so if you give a dollar, a dollar will get to the orphans.

In this season of hope and giving, will you consider giving hope to 24 orphans? Please send your gift of any amount to Bethlehem Baptist Church, 838

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Again, the address is Bethlehem Baptist Church, 838 Reed Road, Laurel, Mississippi 39443, or bbclaurel .com.

Thank you. When Iron Sharpens Iron Radio first launched in 2005, the publishers of the

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Iron. Criticizing. Iron. I think that's what it's called. This is

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It's a great conference. I love it. And Chris Arnzen was there last year. He's been there, I think, every year.

It's great to see him there. You and I actually did some recordings in the lobby at that place, which is a highlight for me.

So tons of stuff going on, tons of great speakers. And no matter where you are in the building, you will hear Chris Arnzen's laugh.

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If you live on Long Island or if you're visiting the metropolitan New York area, I invite you to join us for worship at The Haven on Sundays at 4 .30

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James White of Alpha and Omega Ministries and the Dividing Line webcast here. Although God has brought me all over the globe for many years to teach, preach, and debate at numerous venues, some of my very fondest memories are from those precious times of fellowship with Pastor Rich Jensen and the

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Did you know that all believers are priests? In 1 Peter chapter 2 verse 9, the Apostle Peter describes

Christ's church as comprising a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God's own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.

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Visit CitizenPriest .com today. Hi, I'm Buzz Taylor, frequent co -host with Chris Arnson on Iron Sharpen's Iron Radio.

I would like to introduce you to my good friends Todd and Patty Jennings at CVBBS, which stands for Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service.

Todd and Patty specialize in supplying Reformed and Puritan books and Bibles at discount prices that make them affordable to everyone.

Since 1987, the family -owned and operated book service has sought to bring you the best available

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That means you can get to the good stuff faster. It also means that you don't have to worry about being assaulted by the pornographic, heretical, and otherwise faith -insulting material promoted by the secular book vendors.

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That's CVBBS .com. Let Todd and Patty know that you heard about them on Iron Sharpen's Iron Radio.

And remember, there are two excellent free offers at CVBBS .com.

With any purchase, well, at least the first one is offered for free with any purchase. The second one requires a $50 minimum purchase.

The first book is yours absolutely free of charge. If you put in your comment section that you want the book.

It is True Love by James M. Renahan. Dr. Renahan is the president of IRBS Theological Seminary in Mansfield, Texas.

And let me give them another plug. Their website is IRBSSeminary .org.

IRBSSeminary .org. True Love, Understanding the Real Meaning of Christian Love from 1

Corinthians 13 by Dr. James M. Renahan. It's yours absolutely free with any purchase at CVBBS .com.

And if you want the more expensive book, The Hardback, also published by Evangelical Press, A Pastor in New York, The Life and Times of Spencer Cohn, which is my favorite of all time biography.

You can get that, as I said, for free with a $50 minimum purchase. It's a much larger book than Dr.

Renahan's book. Hence the requiring of the $50 minimum purchase.

As I have said to you many times before, this book, A Pastor in New York, The Life and Times of Spencer Cohn by John Thornberry, is my favorite of all biographies and should be, in my opinion, a major motion picture.

It is so fascinating. It should be turned into at least a documentary. Spencer Cohn was not only a school teacher and a lawyer and a stage actor, a theater actor in the 19th century, but he was also a war hero in the

War of 1812 and then a pastor at a renowned particular

Baptist church in Manhattan in the 19th century. A particular Baptist would today be known as a

Reformed Baptist church. So this book, I think, should be in the hands of anybody who loves history, especially if you are a

Christian and even more especially if you are a Calvinistic Baptist or any kind of Calvinist, sovereign, grace -believing

Christian. So, with this book, you have to add into the cart the book,

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I'm sorry, yes, IRONSHARPENSIRON, all capitals, all one word.

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So, remember the first book by Dr. Renahan, True Love, you get for free with any purchase, as long as you put it in the comments section of CBBBS .com

or tell them verbally. And the second one requires a $50 purchase minimum. Before we return to my guest today,

I just have a couple of very important announcements to make regarding special events that I hope that you can attend.

The first is a debate that is taking place between my friend

Pastor Bruce Bennett of Word of Truth Church in Farmingville, Long Island, New York, and Roman Catholic apologist

Matthew Luke Broderick on Saturday, September 7th at 6 .30 p .m.

at the Word of Truth Church in Farmingville, Long Island, New York. The theme is, Is the

Office of Pope Biblical? Is the Office of Pope Biblical? That's Saturday, September 7th, 6 .30

p .m. at the Word of Truth Church, Farmingville, Long Island, New York. For details, call 631 -806 -0614, 631 -806 -0614, or go to their website, wotchurch .com,

W -O -T, which stands for Word of Truth, wotchurch .com,

wotchurch .com, or 631 -806 -0614.

Then, in December, December 19th and 20th, which is a Thursday and Friday, I'm packing up my bags and heading back to my old stomping grounds in New York City to the

Foundations Conference, a conference of sermonaudio .com. I love this conference.

It is a conference exclusively for men in ministry leadership. That is largely due to the fact that it is a very small venue seating only less than 200 people.

I hope that you register and attend with me. Among the fascinating and talented and really gifted speakers on this roster are

Dr. Stephen J. Lawson, founder of One Passion Ministries, Paul Washer, Rev.

Jeff Thomas, Rev. Armin Tomasian, Rev. Richard Colwell Jr., and Rev.

Andrew Quigley. These are all remarkable men, and I've heard four of them speak in person, but have been given the highest of recommendations by sermonaudio .com

for the last two, Richard Colwell and Andrew Quigley, and if they recommend these men, they must be magnificent.

If you want to attend with me, that's Thursday and Friday, December 19th and 20th in Manhattan.

Go to thefoundationsconference .com, thefoundationsconference .com, and you'll have all the details that you need.

Then in January, I'm packing up my bags and this time heading down south to the

G3 Conference. The G3 stands for Gospel, Grace, and Glory, and this is another magnificent conference that has a roster that is very amazing and enviable, the largest roster of speakers

I have ever encountered at a Bible conference. This is Thursday, January 16th, through Saturday, January 18th, in Atlanta, or should

I say College Park, Georgia, and this is at the

Georgia International Convention Center. By the way, if you wonder why I'm sometimes hesitating while I'm speaking, there's a giant wasp circling around my head in the studio, so pray that I can send that wasp to its maker very soon.

The roster at the G3 Conference this January, by the way, which is on the theme Worship Matters, the roster includes the aforementioned

Kosti Hinn, the nephew of the notorious heretic and charlatan

Benny Hinn, and Kosti has renounced his uncle and the heretical theology of his uncle, the

Word of Faith teachings that my guest today was raised in as well, and Kosti Hinn is now a

Reformed Baptist and a cessationist pastor. You heard the ads by James White that he is pastoring in California.

A recent change on that is that he was sent by his church in California to now pastor in Arizona.

So Kosti is a remarkable man. In fact, he's going to be my guest on Monday, the 26th of August, God willing, so mark your calendars for that.

Other speakers include Derek Thomas, who is very well known by Reformed Christians globally,

James White, who I've been repeating, and whose voice you've been hearing in many ads on this show.

Dr. James R. White of Alpha Omega Ministries will be there. Dr. Joel Beeky, another friend of mine since the 1990s.

Once again, we have Stephen J. Lawson and Paul Washer on the roster at this conference.

Stephen J. Nichols, the president of Reformation Bible College, the college founded by the late R .C.

Sproul and Ligonier Ministries. Dr. Tom Askell, who is the executive director of Founders Ministries, the

Calvinistic ministry in the Southern Baptist Convention. My friend Todd Friel of Wretched TV and Radio.

Vody Baucom, one of the most powerful and gifted preachers alive in the 21st century. And Phil Johnson, my good friend, who is the executive director of Grace to You, the ministry of John MacArthur.

And, as you have already heard, John MacArthur himself is on the roster of this conference.

I strongly urge you to not only register to attend, but if you have a business or parachurch ministry, I strongly urge you to register for an exhibitor's booth as well that you can man, just like I will be doing.

Because with the addition of John MacArthur, they normally at the

G3 conference have over 5 ,000 people. With the addition of John MacArthur, which is a recent addition to their lineup,

I am very confident to say that I believe that they will have over 6 ,000 people there.

So it's an ideal place to have an exhibitor's booth. In fact, I know that IRBS Theological Seminary has had an exhibitor's booth at this event at least a few times.

So, if you want to either just attend or register for an exhibitor's booth, go to g3conference .com,

g3conference .com. And please always mention Chris Arnzen of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio whenever you register or whenever you respond to any of the commercials that we announce.

Finally, if you love this show, you don't want it to disappear from the airwaves, please donate as frequently as you can and as generously as you can by going to ironsharpensironradio .com.

Click support, then click, click to donate now. You can donate instantly with a debit or credit card. By doing that, you can also send in a check via snail mail at the physical address that will appear on the screen when you click support at Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

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And never put your family in financial jeopardy by giving to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. Never do those two things because providing for your church and your home are two commands of God.

Providing for my radio show is obviously not a command of God. But, if you're financially blessed above and beyond your ability to obey those two commands, you love the show, you listen to it often, either live or on the archived mp3s, you don't want it to stop airing, you love the guests and topics that we air that very often are not heard anywhere else, well, if that's the case and you have that extra money above and beyond your ability to obey those two commands

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We really urgently need your donations and your advertising dollars as well. If you want to advertise with us, send an email to chrisarnsen at gmail .com

and put advertising in the subject line as long as whatever it is you're promoting is compatible with what we believe.

We would love to help you launch an ad campaign immediately. You don't have to believe exactly as I do, but you need to be promoting something that is at least compatible with what

I believe. It's chrisarnsen at gmail .com and put advertising in the subject line. Don't forget, if you are not a member of a local

Bible -believing church and you're not even prayerfully looking for one, you're living in rebellion against God. I have lists of biblically faithful churches all over the world and I've already helped quite a number of listeners in the

Iron Sharpens Iron Radio audience find churches near them or find churches for their loved ones in all parts of the world or to find churches where they're going on vacation.

So if you are in one of those categories, please send me an email to chrisarnsen at gmail .com and put

I need a church in the subject line or something like that. And that is also the email address where you can send in a question to Brent Ward about Christians in the military.

That's chrisarnsen at gmail .com, chrisarnsen at gmail .com. Okay, Brent, let's now switch the questions to focusing on the positive aspects of your experience in the military, why you may even thank

God that you were there, even if there was much unpleasant things that went on in your experiences.

Tell us about these positive things. Absolutely. So I believe that when it comes to instilling discipline, when it comes to the ability to work with a team, and not just as an individual but a group of men that can come together, laying aside any pride, laying aside egotism, and coming and looking at a particular mission and addressing that mission with surgical precision is a beautiful thing.

It is quite astounding to be able to see that kind of camaraderie. I believe that in terms of the relationships that you establish in the military will be lifelong.

These are your brother -at -arms that you will be in a relationship with probably for the rest of your life.

And so I think that those are some real positive aspects to it. I don't think that I would be the disciplined man that I am today if it wasn't for the military.

So I'm truly grateful for the opportunity to serve. I do believe that while war is certainly not wanted, unfortunately it is sometimes necessary.

I think scripture is clear in regards to leadership being given the sword for a reason.

And I think that war in particular is to protect the innocent and promote peace. And so we're grateful for a strong military that allows us to do just that, is to protect the innocent and promote peace.

Okay, we have a listener who has a question for you, and he knows who you are actually.

His name is Luke from Cedar Hill, Texas. I was excited to hear that you will be interviewing my friend and former pastor,

Brent Ward. And he asks, I would love to hear you ask Brent Ward if he recommends young Christians join the armed forces, what his favorite rifle and handgun is, and when we can expect his written recounting of the

Panama Conflict. Why don't you start with the Panama Conflict and give us more details.

Okay, so the Panama Conflict, I'm going to make a quick funny.

I often get asked why did we go over to take out Noriega, and the operation was called

Just Cause. And so I often answer, Just Cause. As you are aware,

Noriega had some hostages, and he was a dictator there in Panama.

And it was decided by our government that it was time for him to step down.

And so we were asked and commissioned to go over in December of 89.

And that was the Rangers as well as the 82nd Airborne. In that particular sense,

I think most of it was the 325. Mostly to secure the airfield as well as to retrieve some hostages and take out

Noriega in terms of apprehend him, and I believe he's in a Florida prison if I'm not mistaken.

And so, yeah, Just Cause. And the other questions, do you recommend that young Christians join the military is the first one.

So yeah, that is a great question. I think that depends upon the individual.

I do think that every young man or even young lady should take great care and consideration in thinking about that.

I think that you need to look at your temperament and what you think you can and cannot handle.

Now, while in the military there is a great deal of military skill sets, you can do a great deal in terms of job.

I think you do have to recognize that you may be asked to do things you might not be comfortable with.

And I did bring that up in terms of just you are at a moment's notice prepared to have to be deployed for a long time, away from family, away from friends, away from loved ones.

And if you're in a combat arms MOS, that's military occupational skill set, understand that you are indeed potentially giving your life for the cause of your country.

I believe that if you take these things into heavy consideration, you feel like you should do so. I think it is certainly a dutiful thing.

I consider it the same category as law enforcement or a fireman.

An act of service and truly a benefit to, once again, if it's for the protection of the innocent and to promote peace, then certainly a great cause.

And what are your favorite rifle and handgun? Yeah, what an interesting question.

If we're talking about self -defense, and once again, I think that you've got to kind of consider where you're at.

And the reason I bring that up, it is situational. And first of all, if you're going to own a weapon,

I think you need to put a lot of rounds downrange. You need to be very proficient with your weapon. Don't just put it in the closet and not utilize it.

For someone like me, I don't live in the country. If I lived in the country, I would definitely have something a little bit larger in terms of size.

But my favorite tends to be, I carry a Glock 21, which is a .45,

and so it's a full bore .45. The reason that I carry a .45 and not a 9mm is because .45s

is not high velocity, and I don't want to go beyond my target. And so for home defense,

I would suggest either a .40 cal or a .45 ACP. A 9mm is high velocity, and when you have an adrenaline dump during a high -stress situation, like an intruder in your home and their heart is jumping out of your chest, it is very difficult to put bullet center mass.

It just is. And so I do, you know, if you've got a family, you've got children, you really don't want to go beyond the target.

And so I tend to suggest that in terms of a handgun. If in terms of,

I'm going to do another, I would probably also suggest a tactical shotgun, probably a Mossberg 500 or say a

Remington 870. The reason why a tactical shotgun and not your larger, say, hunting shotgun is because of the smaller barrel.

They tend to run about 18 to 20 inches, a little smaller. And I would recommend a semi -automatic or a pump when it comes to self -defense.

And if it comes to rifle, I'm very partial to the AR -15, which is a

NATO 5 .56. It's very lightweight, compact, has low recoil, and it's, in my opinion, very accurate.

And so, and in terms of capacity, I mean, you can hold up to 10 to 30 rounds. Are you also offering a marksman course at IRBS Theological Seminar?

That's a great suggestion. No, I think there's some other men more highly qualified than that.

Even members of our church, they could probably shoot better than I can now.

But I do have opinions when it comes to gun ownership, and so there's some great questions for sure.

And we did not get an answer about, I don't know if he was serious about the publishing date for your recounting the

Panama Conference. Yeah, there are, no, there are a lot of other qualified men that could write that story better than I could.

Well, thank you, Luke, in Cedar Hill, Texas. Since you're a first -time questioner, you have won a free copy of the

New American Standard Bible. So please give us your full mailing address so that CVBBS .com,

our sponsors, can ship that out to you as soon as possible. And we want to thank the publishers of the

New American Standard Bible for providing us these free Bibles for first -time questioners, and also

CVBBS .com for shipping them out. So thanks a lot, Luke. We hope to hear from you in the future very often with your questions for our guests.

We have, let's see here, we have Bebe in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, who wants to know, should a

Christian ever obey an order that violates his conscience? For instance, if he believes something is truly cold -blooded murder of innocent people, especially women and children, should he ever obey such a command?

Well, that's a great question. The answer to that is, no, you shouldn't.

With the understanding that if you are asked to do something like that, and I don't believe that the military is going to ask you to do that, but if you are asked to do that, understand, or just let me rephrase that, if you're commanded to do that, there may be repercussions in terms of the common kingdom, but in terms of standing before a holy and righteous

God, that's an easy decision. I don't think you should violate that conscience in that sense, no.

Now, when you say you don't believe the military would ever ask somebody to do that, do you believe that the military...

I do not believe that the military is going to command us to shoot innocent people.

Do I think that there may be an occasion where there will be collateral damage?

Yes, but I do not believe that there would be an order given to shoot innocents.

Now, you're saying that regarding the 21st century, but what about... Do you think that that has occurred in the past in our military?

I do. And once again, I would say, as a

Christian, don't violate conscience. I think that the military was established ultimately by God to protect innocent, to promote life and peace, and we should be a cause for that, for good and for justice.

When it comes to the murder of innocent people, no, I don't believe that that's something that...

I would not be able to make that decision. We have Harrison in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, who asks, there is a caricature of an

Army or Marine Corps sergeant who is constantly spewing profanities and threatening the soldiers with violence and perhaps even following through on the threats with real violence and those kinds of things.

Is this ever acceptable behavior by someone even in the military? Acceptable behavior is something that you quite possibly will experience.

I don't think you're going to experience physical maltreatment. I believe, and a lot has probably changed since I've been in.

I'm 88 to 92 is when I was in. You're definitely, you're more than likely going to have some kind of verbal mistreatment.

And it's something you probably just have to stomach. Like I said, it's not a godly institution or organization, and some of those things you're just going to have to reconcile with.

And Christopher in Suffolk County, Long Island, New York, asks, as far as a

Christian being in the military, there are some that have viewed Christians as inappropriate candidates for defending this nation because they think that those

Christians are going to be too soft or perhaps more prone to not be as aggressive or violent as they are required to be.

What is your opinion about this stereotype of Christians? I think that's probably individual to individual.

I think that when it comes down to it, a man is going to do what he's supposed to do according to his training.

And if he is trained to take someone down, that is exactly what he will do.

And it would be for the preservation of his own fellow soldiers as well as the preservation of his own life.

And so I believe that you will respond according to your training. And no, I don't think if you've been trained well, you will not hesitate.

Any hesitation will prove to be detrimental to your own preservation.

And of course, the history of the military is just filled with great

Christians who were true Bible -believing Christians who excelled in their service to this country as officers and as soldiers in the military.

Absolutely. Well, we have to go to our final break right now.

It's a shorter break than the last one. But if you have a question, please send it in immediately because we're rapidly running out of time.

Our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com. chrisarnson at gmail .com. Don't go away.

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Richard himself and we thank you very much for adding those two men to your prayer list.

We are now back with our guest Brent Ward and we only have a few minutes left.

Brent, I would like you to summarize in a couple of minutes what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners today before this program goes off the air.

I appreciate that opportunity. I think that first and foremost we serve the

King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. We serve the Lord Jesus Christ and I'm grateful for his loving kindness and mercy and changing the heart of a crude, rude dude that served in the military for a little while and so if you could just be mindful

I think that the big thing also is to pray for our servicemen that are currently in and for those that are on their way out and to be mindful of how they're reintegrating back into society and obviously their need for Christ and so just to be mindful of those things.

Amen. We have Susan Margaret in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania who asks,

How should Christians pray for the enemies of this country? That is a great question.

I think that ultimately that they would come to Christ, that the gospel would be spread throughout.

When I think of the idea of the

Iraqis or those in Afghanistan and all these places that are enemies enemies in terms of not just common kingdom but the enemies of the cross, the enemies of Christ, ultimately their heart needs to be changed and so I think that our prayer should be that there would be people that would go and preach the gospel to them and that Christ would show mercy and kindness and change their hearts and that they would surrender ultimately to the

King of Glory. Amen. And if you could summarize what you will be speaking on tomorrow on Iron Trip and Zion Radio.

Yes, I believe that our discussion is going to be in regards to, in particular, me coming out of the charismatic movement and going with Foreign Baptist but what

I would like to do is really talk about the nature of Relatory Gifts and the biblical purpose of tongues and how those things really aren't for today anymore.

And I think that that would be a great conversation. Amen, I agree. And that's tomorrow, 4 to 6 p .m. Eastern Time, so mark your calendars, set your alarms.

Hope to hear from you with great questions tomorrow. And don't forget that the website for IRBS Theological Seminary in Mansfield, Texas is irbsseminary .org

irbsseminary .org I want to thank you so much, Brent Ward, for being our guest today. I look forward to your return tomorrow.

I want to thank everybody who listened, especially those who took the time to write in questions. And I hope you all always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater