Paddleback Tweets

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ, based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the Apostle Paul said, �But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

In short, if you like smooth, watered-down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn�t for you. By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we�re called by the Divine Trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King.

Here�s our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry.

Weather, Travel, and Social Media Small Talk

Mike Abendroth here in the studio in beautiful downtown Burbank, and we are glad on this sunny day in Southern California. Don�t I wish? Well, I don�t mind New England, especially this time of year with all the pretty foliage and the colors of death outside.

It just so strikes me as the strangest thing when I look outside the studio here, which is nothing more than my study, my office, that there�s beautiful yellows, especially this year, oranges, reds. Of course, the greens are still there, but they go with these other colors.

I don�t know, what�s in a green plant? Not protoplasm, plasm-proto, photosynthesis. Whatever that green stuff is in plants, leaves, when the leaves die, then they turn these great colors. It�s amazing.

�This is my father�s world the song says, but isn�t there another song, �This world ain�t my home, I�m just passing through So how do I put those two songs together? I have no idea, don�t know whether I�m going or coming.

Wow, that�s an interesting thing. Well, if you�d like to go to Greece with us, I was going to say if you want to go to Israel with us, that�s two years away, but if you�d like to go to Greece with us, we�d love to have you go, April 17th through the 27th, 2013, partly cruise, partly tour, 11 days, Bethlehem Bible Church, no compromise radio.

I don�t really like to promote stuff, like sell my own stuff, so this isn�t really selling my own stuff. This is to go with us. You have to have a $300 deposit in by the end of November. So write us at info at nocompromise radio.

I�ll send you the registration form and the brochure. We�d love to have you go. All prices out of Boston. Well, I did have a little Do Not Be Surprised, Aaron�s website. Looked at it today. Great section on Doctrine Matters, and I also like the tweets that she has on here now.

I�m not a big Twitter person. I don�t tweet. I try not to get caught up in a lot of the social media. I don�t have a Facebook account. I sometimes go into Facebook to see what�s happening there. I might look at No Compromise Facebook, and I get in through the porthole of my daughter�s account, just kind of check it out.

I don�t have a blog. I guess I probably could sell more books if you have a blog. I try to sell some of these books that I have written to publishers so then they�ll sell them to the masses, to the hordes.

I just read a book about the Alamo. That was fascinating, thinking about hordes in Santa Ana, and I�m listening to a book on tape now about Custer, and there are hordes there too. That guy pretty much got what he deserved, but I guess it�s like Clint Eastwood in the Unforgiven movie.

Didn�t he shoot somebody? Why did you shoot him? You don�t even know if he had it coming. Everybody�s got it coming, something close to that. That�s a biblical statement, but on Twitter and on the blogosphere and all that stuff, I don�t really do a whole lot.

I do look at my brother�s Twitter account because sometimes I get to see pictures of his family, so that�s about it. But I do have these two from Aaron Benziger, I think I pronounced your name right that time finally, E. Benz, Mercedes Benz, Saddleback, Rick Warren.

I have two tweets that I�d like to read you, and so in case you�re like me, where you don�t tweet, Twitter, follow all these things, then you�ll know what�s going on. �God isn�t mad at you, he�s mad about you.

Merry Christmas, hashtag Saddleback, December 25th, 2011, Twitter for iPad, embed this tweet. You matter to God. All right, so I would assume that Rick Warren wrote this, maybe he didn�t, maybe somebody else did.

I�m trying to think on here if it actually tells me who wrote it. Well, certainly he�s responsible, I know I�m responsible for the things that go on here, at least at the leadership level. And then there�s another tweet on here and it�s from, let�s see, it�s from, I can�t tell when it�s from, that�s the problem, �God knows how great you are and then the TEV is quoted for Ephesians chapter 2 verse 10b, I guess you have to use the b�s in the tweets because there�s only 140 characters, and it says, �God has created us for a life of good deeds, which he has already prepared for us to do.

Well, you know what, not the worst translation of Ephesians 2 .10, I think we need to see more of the context regarding that whole issue, and that�s what I think I�d like to do now. Well, we live in the last days, and as 2 Timothy chapter 3 talks about, peoples, peoples, they�re good peoples.

My father, if he liked somebody, he�d always say, �He�s good people. So see, now you know where I got my poor grammar, where I got my poor grammar from. Now you know why I end sentences in prepositions, and I say �milk and I say �et cetera.

So here�s some milk to you, et cetera. See, when I really try, except the problem is I�m thinking about other issues, theological issues, and then I forget what�s going on with my diction. �And you were dead in the trespasses and sins.

Now, by the way, when I read this from the ESV, Ephesians 2, 1 to 10, I want you to think through, God knows how great you are, and God isn�t mad at you, he�s mad about you. We do have a personal relationship with God, whether we�re believers or unbelievers.

If we�re unbelievers, then that relationship is enemy, and if we are believers, that relationship is because of the person and work of God, our triune God, we are friends. Jesus Christ laid down his life for our sins and has made propitiation, made satisfaction, to use an Old Testament term, made atonement, and so we are no longer enemies.

We are friends. We no longer are alienated and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, Colossians chapter 1. We�re no longer adulterous people spiritually, we�re friends. And so, when I read Ephesians chapter 2, 1 to 10, you can think of several thoughts.

Maybe one would be this, when J .C. Ryle heard this read from the pulpit from a pastor during scripture reading, he got saved. You see both the need and the Savior. But I want you to say to yourself, God knows how great you are, and God isn�t mad at you, he�s mad about you.

I want you to see those two themes come out. You know, you�ll stare at those pictures, probably about 10 years ago, those books came out, stereograms, and if you looked at the picture just in a brief fashion, in a cursory fashion, you would see nothing but Rothko art.

You would see modern art. But if you stare at it, if you look through it, you know, if you�re going to punch someone, you kind of punch through the, through, well, same here, you look through it. So let�s see if we can find these themes.

Remember the two themes that you�re looking for, God knows how great you are. Wouldn�t that be a song, �How great I am, how great I art if you�re in Nebraska, et cetera, Following the Prince of the power of the air, the Spirit that is now my life, and I see now at work in the sons of disobedience, among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath like the rest of mankind.

But God, being rich in mercy because of the great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ. By grace you have been saved, and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.

Now listen to this, verse 7, So that in the coming ages He might show the immeasurable riches of His grace and kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing.

It is the gift of God, not a result of work so that no one may boast. Because God knows how great you are. Oh wait, sorry. For we are His workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in Him.

Saddleback, Rick Warren, and the Problem of Self-Exalting Tweets

Well, today on No Compromise Radio I'm just talking about tweets and Twitters from Saddleback. I remember years ago when the Purpose-Driven Church came out, and then the Purpose-Driven Life came out.

You know, he, meaning Rick Warren, hit it big, that is to say, in the evangelical circles, Southern Baptist circles, evangelical circles. And so we would drive down to Saddleback Church, Small C, on Saturday night for the service.

I think they had a service at 4 and at 6, and we were at the Shepherd's Conference, and we were learning about how to preach Christ and Him crucified, the exalted, resurrected, ascended Christ Jesus, seated at the right hand of God the Father, a position of power and authority and majesty.

Our worship should be God-centered, and Jesus is the center of worship in heaven, and therefore should be here as well. It's not about us, it's about God, and even our salvation is primarily a display of God's great grace.

Secondarily, of course, we receive that, we are changed, we are justified, we are regenerated, we receive benefit. I'm very very thankful for that. I'm very thankful to the Lord for that. But then we drive down to Saddleback, and maybe we'd stop at Robert Shuler's place at the time, and just check it out and see what a building looks like with 3 ,000 money nice area, nice little coffee shop, etc.

And then we'd go to the service. And it was fascinating, at the end of one worship service, quote-unquote worship service, end quote, it was Car Wash. Remember that old song, Working at the Car Wash, yeah?

Well that was the song that was sung at the very end by the Praise Band. I guess the camera crew was part of the Praise Band, I couldn't really tell. And then they showed a video of the associate pastor and his garage, and his garage was all messy, and so you need to keep your cars clean and your garages clean, because then that is a easy lead-in, an easy lead-in to keeping your life clean spiritually.

Some dopey thing like that that they had. Some tie-in. Working at the Car Wash, yeah. I don't think that particular service they sang the Celine Dion song for special music. I think that was a different time we went down there, and sadly what I remember is not wanting to look up at the singer because of the tight leather pants and low-cut top.

I remember that. Now you say, well, you shouldn't be thinking of those things. It was kind of hard when you're just sitting there in the sanctuary, small s, to not look. I guess you're not supposed to look during special music.

Now, as I've said many times in the show before, you need to cut a break to people, especially visitors and immature Christians and unbelievers when they're in the building for worship meetings. You know, everybody is in process, and as people grow in Christ Jesus, I think with men probably their hair in general gets shorter, and their mouth becomes more pure, and their eyes are more fixed on proper things, and with ladies their clothes are not as tight, and their tops aren't as low.

You know, that kind of thing. In general, progressive sanctification. So I remember looking over at our associate pastor at the time, Dave Jeffries, and he was seated I think in the front row because we got there late and had to sit in the front.

He just had his head down because you can't look. So I was looking around for our guys because we couldn't all sit together, and then there's Dave sitting, and when you can't look at special music, folks, something's not so special.

Isn't that special? Here's the thing. I know I'm not great, and I can hear people in Radio Land saying, well, that's true, and that's right. I am foremost of sinners. If I were an apostle, I would be the least.

You know, Paul calls himself in Ephesians 3, leaster. He uses that word. It's not in the English text because it doesn't seem to make any sense. It sounds like he would be from Nebraska. Leaster. I'm from Leicester, and I'm the leaster.

But don't we all know deep down that we aren't great? Muhammad Ali can go around saying that all the time, but deep down inside, we are sinful people, and we are dead in trespasses and sins as unbelievers, and even when we have been made alive in Christ Jesus, we still struggle with sins, and it's still the body of death and the flesh and the sin principle, called the sin nature if you'd like.

That remaining hangover of sin is still in us, and we aren't great. I can't create things. I can't sustain things. I can't judge people. I can't make them alive. I can't change people. I can't even do these things to myself.

I can't bear people's sins. I am not the Savior, and when you focus on yourself as if you were, you're going to need a prescription to get through the day. That's basically what's going to happen. How do you get through the day?

Thinking you are the Great One. Now, I am all for...see how we have to do this on radio? I am all for encouraging your kids. I'm all for encouraging other people. I emailed, text Zach today in Santa Cruz, family friend, young man, neat young guy, I don't even know how old he is, 25 or something, could be my son, and he tries to spend time with my son, and he is faithful to the Word, the Lord, his wife, ministry, wants to be an evangelist, he wants to do the work of evangelist, among other things.

I just said I was proud of him and hope my son grows up to be like him. That was a text today. Well, I'm not trying to say this person is great. I think you can encourage one another, can't you? I know whatever good is in Zach, and he would tell you as well that it's the grace of God in his life.

But the point is, we aren't great, and if you think you're great and you buy into that pablum that comes out of the pulpit, I don't even think they have a pulpit there, it's a little glass something, a saddleback, in between the diarrhea jokes from their guest speaker that I would hear, then you're not going to function properly as a Christian, because there is something to be said for us remembering how bad we were, so we remember now how great our salvation is.

Yes, Paul does talk about running this race, looking ahead, Philippians chapter 3, but there's also some reminding that we have to do to ourselves when it comes to our past, so we remember in our present how great the Lord is.

God isn't mad at you. Well, if you're a Christian, God isn't mad at you because he's not going to pour out his punishment, his wrath, and his just anger on his son, and then double jeopardy, be mad at you too.

He's mad about you. See, that kind of language, I guess it's Twitter language, but that's what comes out of the pulpit there as well, and print. God knows how great you are. See, this is language that, if you stroke people long enough, they believe it, and of course a lot of people will come.

Why is it that you go to an OPC church, PCA church, Reformed Baptist church, Bible teaching church, a real church, and of course there are some exceptions, but a lot of times these other churches are much smaller because they're telling people the truth.

They're telling people the truth, and some folks like the non-elect don't want to hear that. Who was it? I know Spurgeon, it's attributed to Spurgeon, but maybe others have said it as well, maybe Calvin.

Do we preach the gospel well enough so that the non-elect has sense enough to reject it? In other words, if you preach a gospel that God loves you just the way you are, I love you just the way you are.

That one? Remember that? And some kind of weird music in the background? Hey, unbelievers who aren't even elect, they'd go for that message. God loves me, and God's encouraging me, and it's a big noogie sandwich, you know, in my forehead.

You're the best, little buddy. Well, this Gilligan's Island's approach to sanctification isn't going to do it. We were dead in our trespasses and sins. We walked following the course of this world. We were far from free in our will, in our bodies, in our nature, following the prince of the power of the air.

We lived in our passions of the flesh, we carried out the desires of the body and mind, and we were by nature children of wrath. So when we read these kind of tweets and these Twitters, we have to say to ourselves, even though we have to cut this down a hundred and forty characters, it is possible to have good theology in a hundred and forty characters, because I've read some tweets, like I said on my brother's deal there, that can help us.

So when I read Ephesians chapter 2, I see it's by grace we've been saved, verse 5. It's all about God and what he did because of his mercy, because of his kindness, because of his grace, because of his love.

That's the motivation, it's all about God. So then we can sing, How Great Thou Art. We can say, Great is thy faithfulness. That's what we can do. And when we bury people, or we marry people, or we're worshiping in the meetings, we can say the focus is on Jesus Christ.

So God knows how great you are. They don't know how great I am because I'm not great. I'm wicked, I'm corrupt, I'm sinful, I don't think the way I should. Now there's the evidence of God's grace in my life, and I think people can see that, and I hope that they can.

And I hope, especially if they would see the old me and the new me, they would see progress. They would see when God starts a work, he keeps working on that person. What's a song I like to sing sometimes?

He's Still Working on Me, right? The kids song? I'm not what I want to be. I think there's another song that I probably shouldn't be listening to that I heard on my Pandora the other day. If I work real hard, I can be what I want to be.

Ephesians 2 and the Need for a Savior

All right, so, Mike Abendroth here, No Compromise Radio. This wasn't supposed to be a whole show, but it's turned into that. What does God want to show in Ephesians 2, 7? He wants to show in the ages to come his immeasurable riches of his grace and kindness towards us in Christ Jesus.

That is the real issue. And so, if we're pretty good, God's not so great. The difference is, hmm, ho-hum, boring, entertain me. But if we are really, you know, below, if we are really down low and God is up really high, exalted, lifted up, holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty.

The whole earth is full of his glory. And then he saves us. We are unholy, unholy, unholy. And then, because of God the Son, can you imagine? This religion, this God who becomes one of us, he cloaks himself with humanity so that then he dies for what we did.

He takes on the wrath that we deserved, and then now we have the creator and the judge who becomes the priest and the sacrifice. It's unreal. Who thinks this up? Who could come up with such a religion?

Only God has this great plan of salvation. And it doesn't start with, well, you know what, I'm great, and God's not mad at me. You say, well, this is just to speak to, this is just how we talk to Christians.

Well, listening to the 10 or 11 messages that I've heard at Saddleback—I don't know the exact number—I never walked out of there saying, I'm sure glad I have a Savior. When you preach imperatives, when you preach the law of God, when you preach the person of God, when you preach the holiness of God, the righteousness of God, the creator who judges, then don't you say to yourself, well, you know, that message about the tongue in James 3, that just made me thankful that I have a Savior.

And my Savior Christ Jesus, He cloaked Himself with humanity, and His tongue was perfect. His tongue didn't set anything on fire. It wasn't motivated by hell itself. His tongue perfectly worshiped God and perfectly spoke to others, and He perfectly used it in love and obedience to the Father.

I need a Savior. I'd like to have some preaching at Saddleback that shows me I've got to have a Savior. I need to run for my sins, repent, and turn to the Lord Jesus Christ. I need a Savior. How great thou art.

Great is thy faithfulness, not great is my faithfulness. Mike Abendroth here. Maybe just stay off of Twitter. That'll solve all your problems, unless it's NoCoTwitter at NoCoTweets .com or whatever it is.

No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible-teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life-transforming power of God's Word through verse-by-verse exposition of the sacred text.

Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at 6. We're right on Route 110 in West Boylston. You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.

The thoughts and opinions expressed on No Compromise Radio do not necessarily reflect those of WVNE, its staff or management.