Is Israel Really God's Chosen People? ***This week's podcast answers this and more!***

Today on Conversations with a Calvinist, we're going to be doing our first official unboxing video. We're going to be answering some viewer questions that have come to me through Facebook and email, and I'm going to be responding to a hateful voicemail.

Stay tuned. Conversations with a Calvinist begins right now. And welcome back to Conversations with a

Calvinist. My name is Keith Foskey, and I am a Calvinist. As I said, today on the program,

I've got several things I want to get to, and first out of the gate, I want to do my first ever unboxing video.

Now, if you're listening to this podcast on audio, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, wherever you listen on audio, you won't be able to see everything

I'm doing, but I will try to describe it as best as I can. A few weeks ago, I received a message from tinybibles .com

asking me if I would be willing to consider doing a review of their product.

They produce a legitimately tiny Bible, and they wanted to ask me to give an honest review, and they told me they would send me one to look at to do the review.

So I do want to say from the outset, I did not pay for this. I did not order this. They sent it to me, but I told them if they sent it to me,

I would give an absolutely honest review. This would not be influenced in any way by the fact that they actually gave me this product.

I want to be honest about it, so I will. First thing out of the gate is it comes in a tiny box.

I'm going to switch over now to where you can actually sort of see this. Okay, you can see this box that it comes in is not very big, and that was the initial issue that I had with it, because the reason why it's taken me so long to do this review is we lost it.

It was in my, it came to my house. It was sitting on my front porch. I came in, sat it on the dinner table. I asked my son to move it off the table during dinnertime, and the next day we couldn't find it.

My eight -year -old had misplaced it, and lo and behold, it actually accidentally got put in the trash because someone thought the box was small and thought it was trash, and so, and it did have a label on it, but again,

I have a lot of kids, and so that was just a mistake, but I was able to pull it back out, and so right away

I would say, yeah, it's a small box. This doesn't look like something that a Bible would normally come in, but we're going to see that it's much smaller than even this box, so right away,

I'm going to open it up. I didn't bring a knife with me, so I'm going to use my pen. I hope I don't mess up my pen here by doing this, and I'm going to go ahead and open the box right away and see what we have in the box.

All right, so immediately, again, should have brought a knife.

I'm not a professional unboxer, so forgive me. For those of you who are used to watching good unboxing videos,

I'm doing my best here, so we'll see. All right, so very first thing, you open the box up, and you notice inside there is tinybibles .com,

and it is a card. It says, thank you for your purchase of this unique Bible.

The world hasn't seen a Bible this size in more than a century, and if you go to their website, tinybibles .com,

you actually can read that story. I did that earlier to sort of acquaint myself with this. It says, we believe that the

Bible is the word of God, and as such, it's the most valuable physical possession you can own. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our

God stands forever. Well, obviously believe that. Very cool. So that's a little card that comes with it. It has some more information, how to read tiny

Bibles, what's your story, refer to a friend, things like that. That's all on this card right here that comes with it.

All right, so now let's dig in. We'll get into the actual, oh, wow. Okay. So most of this is paper and we have the actual tiny

Bible box here. And what looks like some information that this is probably just paperwork.

Yes. And don't want to show any of that. So we'll set that box off to the side.

Now we're actually in. Immediately you'll notice it comes with a, I guess that's 10 times zoom eyepiece.

I right away I can say, you know, as easy it was for me to lose the box. I can imagine this would be also easy to lose.

And again, I want to give an honest review. My concern would be one, this is basically clear.

And so I could see this being easy to lose. That would be my first negative, if anything.

So this is required for reading the Bible. I could see again, the fact that it's small, basically clear that that could be an issue.

If this gets lost. All right, so let's now dig into the actual Bible itself tear into the packaging here.

It looks like a ring box. If I could compare it to anything, I would say this is similar to the kind of box that you'd get.

If you go to a jewelry store, it's got a little bit of weight to it. I understand it's supposed to be less than two ounces with the, with the reading device.

So it's, it's relatively small, relatively small. All right.

So opening it up and here is the, here it is tiny Bible. Now this one is in the

King James version. I believe I, the, the, the author or the person who's printing these did say that he's trying to get some other translations.

I think the new King James is the next one that they're going to be doing. You can see in the light, this is, this is very small, but it's thick.

It's not, it's not, it's little, but it's not super little in the sense that it's, if you, if you put this in your pocket and you were, and you were a small person, small frame, maybe had small jeans, jean pockets, this would, this would, this would stick out.

I mean, it would have a little bit of thickness to it. And like I said, it's, it's very thick. Oh wow. Oh my goodness.

Okay. I'm going to have to move my microphone a little bit just to bring my head down.

Okay. This is a, this is actually a little bit smaller than I expected. I don't know what I expected, but that is really small.

My, my eyes are getting worse as I get older. And so it is, it would be,

I don't think it would be possible without the reading device to be able to read this. So let me, let me look through the reading device and see what, what it looks like here.

Okay. All right. So this is the, this, um, this doesn't seem to me like it would be very comfortable to read.

I just, just to be honest with you, if this was, if this was something I was going to be using for, for reading normally,

I think this would be difficult to do. Um, in fact, I'm going to try, I'm going to switch my vantage point here and actually come up here and actually try to read to you from this

Bible. So, right. I don't even know where I'm at. Um, I am in Jeremiah, I think

Jeremiah 52, the fall of Jerusalem.

See, I'm having a hard time. I, but again, I, I have, uh, my right eye is not good.

So try to use just my left eye here. Yeah, this is, this would be kind of difficult guys.

Uh, you know, I'm, you asked for an honest review. I'm saying this would be hard to use, uh, for me because I already have a problem with my eyes.

I should wear glasses. I normally don't cause I can get away without having to wear them. Um, my right eye is, is really blurry.

Um, my left eye is typically pretty good. So like here I'm, I'm, um, holding, this is

Ezekiel, Ezekiel 32 39.

Yeah, this is, this is really small guys. So this, and so right away, I would say if you have a, if you have an eye issue, um, if you wear glasses, uh, you, you, or you may need a better magnifying glass.

That, that, that's the thing. This little magnifying glass that comes with it may not be the, uh, may not be the solution for you if you wanted one of these.

And the next question is why would you want this? What, what would this be for? What, what are the, what is the purpose? If you go to their website, these are the things they say.

One, they say that this is based on something that existed in the past. They talk about the

David Bryce Bible and you can read the story. Again, go to tinybibles .com. You can read about it.

The David Bryce Bible has a historical legacy and they say by having this, you're sort of carrying on that legacy of having this tiny

Bible that was produced in the past and it's something that you could pass down to your loved ones.

So that, that, that's one of the reasons why they say this has value. Another thing is the, um, they talk about on their website, they talk about that this would be very easy to take with you somewhere.

You know, put, putting these together, you could put this in a backpack, you could put this in a pocket, you could put it somewhere very small.

And so the value from what they're saying is that, you know, you could take this with you, you put it, put it in the box, close it.

And now it's, you could put it anywhere you wanted. And if you're going backpacking or whatever, you can do that. And the, the other thing they said is the, and I think this is one of the things they're really trying to stress, if you read their website, is the idea of hiding this.

They have a picture of someone hiding this inside of a, uh, an electrical outlet that they've pulled the phone off of and there's an open space so they can put it in there.

And so the idea of hiding from a tyrannical government. Um, so that's, that's another thing, you know, keeping the

Word of God intact, even if the Word of God becomes illegal to have, this is one way to maintain the Word of God and keep it forever because you can hide it.

Um, and, and, and I'm sympathetic towards that because we support a missionary who has to hide

Bibles when he goes into certain countries and something like this could possibly be a value to him.

So as I said, I, I'm sympathetic to that. Someone needing to hide this, like a missionary going into a country, needing to take a

Bible along with him and not being able to do so legally, this could, this could provide some, some, a way of keeping that with them.

Uh, and the, and the other reason, um, they, they mentioned is giving this to a coworker. They said, you know, this, this could be a conversation starter.

This could be something that began a conversation maybe with your agnostic coworker. And you say, may I give you something very special?

This is a tiny Bible and giving it, giving it to them. These are the things they say on their website. And I have some thoughts about a few of those things.

Uh, one, I don't think that this will ever replace for the average person, a normal size Bible, because obviously this is going to be more difficult to read, as I said earlier.

So I'm not quite certain of the practicality of it for the everyday user. I could see its purpose for, like I said, missionaries, or if you're going on a trip and you need to pack as lightly as possible, backpacking, something like that.

And that's what they talk about on their website. So I could see some value in that. I would say a better magnifying glass for me would be necessary to make use of this.

Uh, but you may find use for yourself. So one of the things I'm going to ask you to do is in the comments, leave your thoughts on the tiny

Bible. If you think this is something that you would like to use, or maybe you have a different use for it, leave those thoughts in the comments below.

I'd be interested in reading what you think. Okay, moving on now, we're going to move on to some audience questions.

And I want to say, first of all, thank you to the person who sent in this question. It's a very relevant question and it has to do with the subject of Israel and the church.

And the question is this, is Israel really God's chosen people?

Now that's a short sentence, but it's actually packed with a lot that I'm going to have to sort of unpack as we're talking about the subject, because this is a very divisive subject in Christianity and particularly right now in online

Christianity on Twitter, Facebook, social media, things like that. People are having a lot of debates. People are having a lot of arguments.

Some people coming really harshly against others because of their differences on this particular subject and how they understand what the scripture says, particularly in light of the fact that there is a battle going on in the nation of Israel right now.

And there is a lot of opinions about that. There's a lot of emotions in that. And I want to try to come at this, not without emotion, but I want to come at this, trying to come at this as biblically as possible and not address necessarily the current conflict, because that is not my purpose.

But I want to address more the issue of what does the Bible say about the relationship between Israel and the

Church? And what happens when we begin talking about this is we bring in a lot of baggage to this conversation, because in general people have notions about this typically based upon how they have been taught.

And if someone is raised up as I was, raised up in sort of a dispensational view, and when

I say raised up, I mean my time in seminary. When I went to seminary, I started in 2002 and went through seminary for years and years.

I was there until I guess I graduated in 2008. So because I did undergrad work,

I did my graduate work, I did everything at the seminary I was at, and they allowed for that, which was really nice for me.

So, but in that, I was basically force -fed the dispensational view.

And the dispensational view says that there is a hard distinction between Israel and the

Church, and Israel and the Church are two specific entities in God's redemptive plan, and both of them are receiving different promises from God.

Both of them have distinct promises from God, and the promises that are promised to Israel as a nation are not for the

Church. And so the Church itself is to be distinguished from Israel, and they base this on some of the promises of the

Old Testament that they believe have not been fulfilled yet. And they say, well, because God doesn't lie and because God made these promises that have not yet been fulfilled, therefore, and particularly in regard to the land, in regard to the seed, because these promises have not yet been fulfilled from their perspective,

God still has to do that. So when is he going to do that? And they come up with different versions of how that's going to play out.

The popular view is called the dispensational premillennial view, where the rapture occurs, where Jesus comes in and removes the

Church, and then Israel becomes the focus again. And Israel becomes the focus during the seven -year tribulation, and then

Christ returns with his Church and sets up the millennial kingdom, which lasts for a thousand years.

And in that thousand -year millennial kingdom where Jesus rules and reigns from Jerusalem, the promises that were made to Israel finally find their fulfillment here on this earth as Jesus rules and reigns for a thousand years during the millennial kingdom.

So that's the view that so many people have. Many people don't even know that there's another view, or that there are other views.

I remember having a Bible study. I used to teach a Bible study at a high school where I worked during seminary, and one of the ladies that was there said something about the pre -tribulation rapture.

And I said, well, that's one view. And she goes, no, that's the only view. And I said, okay, you're unaware of different perspectives?

She said, there is no other perspective. This is what the Bible teaches. And so that's one of the things right away that I would want to address on this issue, and that's the subject of people who say, this is what the

Bible teaches. If you take the Bible literally, and you'll hear that a lot from the dispensational side, they'll say, we are the literalists.

We are taking the Bible literally. And if you take the Bible literally, what you have is a pre -tribulation rapture, seven -year tribulation.

Jesus returns to set up the millennial kingdom, and then there's going to be this millennial kingdom where the promises to Israel are fulfilled in Israel, literally here on the earth.

And so that is one view. That is not the view that I hold. And so when someone asks me, going back to the question, is

Israel really God's chosen people? I know that's built into the question. So for the person who sent in the question,

I wanted to address that first, because that's built into the question. Because the assumption is, well, Israel is

God's chosen people. There's conflict happening in Israel right now. Therefore God's chosen people are under attack, and we have to consider that in regard to things like national policy, things like how do we pray and who is really on the right side.

All of those things come into question when we start dealing with this subject of, is Israel really

God's chosen people? So right away, we have to understand that's one perspective.

Now, the other perspective, and there are more than two, but to simplify, the other perspective is that the

Church is the fulfillment of the promises made to Israel, and therefore the

Church is receiving in its fullness the promises that God made, and therefore the promises

God made have not gone unfulfilled, but they are being fulfilled in the

New Covenant. That all of the previous covenants, the Abrahamic Covenant, the

Mosaic Covenant, all of these covenants pointed towards a greater covenant that was to come, and that covenant is the covenant which is made by Christ through His blood.

So we would say that regards the New Covenant, and we know that the

New Covenant is made according to Scripture with the house of Israel, so it doesn't leave

Israel out as a nation, but it includes all the nations of the world.

So the wonderful thing about the Gospel, and this is what makes the Gospel so powerful, is that the

Gospel is able to bring in people from all languages, tribes, and tongues, and make them part of God's people.

I will call those who are not my people my people, right? That's the point of the Gospel, is that all nations will be blessed through the seed of Abraham.

And this is what the Apostle Paul says, God preached the Gospel to Abraham when he said to Abraham, through you all the nations of the world will be blessed.

So we have that promise given to Abraham that in his seed, and that is the

Lord Jesus Christ, where Paul tells us that, that it's not seeds plural, but it's seed singular, in the seed of Abraham, the

Lord Jesus Christ, there will be a fulfillment of this promise about all the nations being blessed, and they will be blessed through the person and the work of Jesus Christ.

So that is the other view. Some people call this replacement theology, and that term has become very negative.

People will say, well, the Church has replaced Israel as God's people, and a lot of people get very offended by that, a lot of people get very angry by that, and I would say that is an poor choice of words to call it replacement theology.

In fact, most people who call it replacement theology are doing so in a negative way, they're doing so as a, if you will, pejorative.

They're saying that it's bad because you're saying God had a people and God abandoned those people and replaced them with another people.

But that's not the picture that the Bible gives us. The Bible doesn't give us a picture of replacement.

The Bible gives us a picture of expansion, where God goes from his work among one nation, and he expands this blessing to all the nations, and he brings them into this one people called

Israel, the Israel of God. This one people is all, whether they be

Jew or Gentile, all are one in Christ. And this is going to lead me to some of the

Scripture I want to talk about. So, beginning right away, I want to look at, of course, I'm a Calvinist, I'm going to look at Romans 9.

I want to look first at Romans 9 and simply point this out. Paul is addressing the fact in this very passage about the question of the

Israelites, and has God's promises to them ceased? Has God failed in bringing about his promise?

So, it begins in Romans 9, chapter 9, verse 1, and I'm reading for the ESV. He says,

I'm speaking the truth in Christ, I'm not lying. My conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit that I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart, for I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen, according to the flesh.

They are Israelites. So, he tells us who he's talking about. Paul is an Israelite. He's talking about the Israelites. He's talking about physical offspring, the physical descendants of Abraham here.

And he says they're Israelites, and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, the promises.

All of those Old Testament things belong to them. It was given to them, and to them belong the patriarchs, and from their race, according to the flesh, is the

Christ, who is God over all, blessed forever. Amen. Very important phrase there, because it calls Christ God, but that's a different topic for a different day.

Verse 6, it says, but it is not as though the Word of God has failed, for not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel, and not all are children of Abraham, because they are his offspring.

But through Isaac shall your offspring be named. Right here, Paul is beginning to address that there is something different than just physical lineage that makes someone a genuine child of Abraham, someone who is a child according to the promise.

And he makes the distinction between Isaac and Ishmael. He says, through Isaac shall your offspring be named.

This means it's not the child of the flesh who are children of God, but the children of the promise are counted as his offspring. So there's something there to distinguish between the physical offspring and the spiritual offspring.

And he goes on to say, for this is what the promise said about this time next year, I will return and Sarah will have a son. Not only that, but also when

Rebekah had conceived children by one man, our forefather Isaac, though they were not yet born and had done nothing good or bad, in order that God's purpose of election might continue, not because of works, but because of him who calls.

She was told the older will serve the younger, as it is written, Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.

Right there. It's distinguishing between those who are truly children of Abraham and those who are not, and those who are truly children of Abraham, those who are his offspring of the

Spirit, not just offspring of the flesh. You can be an offspring of Abraham and not be one who is truly part of the kingdom of God, and that is clear here.

Now there's more to it about election and things like that, how God chooses, and those things that goes on after verse 13, but the point

I'm trying to make is that he clearly says not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel.

Now with that in mind, very quickly I just want to jump over to another passage. This is

Romans chapter 4. Now Romans chapter 4 says something very similar in referring to Abraham.

It talks about the circumcised and the uncircumcised, obviously referring to Jews and Gentiles, and it says, this is verse 7,

Romans 4 verse 7 says, Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man against whom the

Lord will not count his sin. Well who is this? This is the person who has been justified. This is the person whose sins are no longer counted against him.

We would say this is the person who is in Christ. And then he asks, is this blessing only for the circumcised or for the uncircumcised?

For we say that faith was counted to Abraham as righteousness. How then was it counted for him? Was it before or after he was circumcised?

It was not after but before he was circumcised. He received the sign of circumcision as the seal of his righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised.

So Paul is making an argument here that Abraham is the father of the circumcised and the uncircumcised, and because he became a man of faith, he believed

God before he was circumcised. And it says this in verse 11, it says, the purpose was to make him the father of all who believed without being circumcised so that righteousness would be counted to them as well.

And so right there we can say there's a breaking down of a wall. The wall between the physical offspring and the spiritual offspring now are one, and that oneness coming together demonstrates that that's the answer to the question.

Is Israel, again the question was, is Israel really God's chosen people? Yes, but who is

Israel? And who is a child of Abraham? Who is in that? And I think the argument can be made that Gentiles who believe in Christ are made part of that family.

We see this in Romans chapter 11, where it talks about the root being Israel and how the wild olive branches have been grafted into that root.

That's the Gentiles being made part of the family of Abraham, being made part of the people of Israel, being part of that of the

Israel of God. So another passage that's very important in regard to this is

Ephesians chapter 2. Now many of us are very familiar with Ephesians 2. In fact, I would say one of the things that people are very familiar about is

Ephesians 2, 1 through 10. We love Ephesians 2, 8 through 10, for by grace are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves is a gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast.

We love that passage. But many people are unfamiliar with, beginning in verse 11, because in verse 11

Paul argues that Jew and Gentile are one in Christ. And so this is what it says, it says,

Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called the uncircumcision by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands, remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.

That was the condition the Gentiles were in. But now, because of the new covenant, but now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ, for he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility.

Brothers and sisters, that to me is the answer. We are one in Christ.

The believing Jew, the Jew who believes in Jesus, the believing Gentile who believes in Jesus, are one in Christ.

If a person says that there's a distinction between Israel and the Church, I would say, but that wall has been torn down, that wall of separation.

And I argue that the promises—so this is where I would be on one side, not the other—that the promises made in the old covenant are fulfilled in Christ.

All of the promises of God are fulfilled in the person and the work of Jesus Christ, and are continuing to be fulfilled and will be fulfilled in the new heaven and the new earth.

We will receive a land, and we will receive the land of the new earth, and we will dwell in it forever.

That's the promise of the new covenant, and we have that promise to look forward to as the people of God.

So the question becomes, well, what about the modern Jewish person who lives in Israel?

Do they have any significance in God's plan? And this is where it becomes very difficult, because if anybody says no, they're not significant at all.

Some people get very offended by that. But let me simply say this. The Jew who rejects

Jesus is no better off than the Gentile who rejects Jesus. That's just the facts.

Because Paul said, again, going back to Romans 9, I wish myself to be accursed if it meant the salvation of my kinsmen according to the flesh.

What is Paul saying there? He is saying that their condition is—they're headed to hell.

That whatever promises that they had—and he did, he lists them—he said they had all of these things that they were given, but all of the things that they were given does not save them, does not make them righteous, and doesn't place them in a position of superiority in the plan of God, because they have rejected the

Messiah. And so if a Jew today rejects the Messiah, and many of them do, they are in no different condition than a

Gentile who rejects the Messiah, in that on the Day of Judgment they will not be able to hold to their lineage and say, but God, you owe me this or that because of my lineage.

That's not how it works. The person who receives Christ is the person who is in the

Kingdom of God, the person who is born again and receives the work of the Lord Jesus Christ on their behalf, which he made on the cross, that is the person who is a child of God and is the true

Israel. And I know that there are some of you who are going to disagree with me, and I look forward to hearing your disagreements.

I am always interested in what people have to say, but that would be my answer. Someone said, again, the question, is

Israel really God's chosen people? The answer is yes, but who is the true Israel? And the Bible teaches,

I believe, that the true Israel is those who trust in the Lord Jesus Christ, and those who have rejected

Christ are not spiritually part of the

Israel of God. One last thought, I just had this consideration, and I do know somebody's going to ask this, so let me go ahead and preempt the question by giving a short answer.

I have been asked many times, well, do you think that God has a future eschatological plan for ethnic

Israel? And my answer is, I don't know. And I would say there are certain passages that could lead people to conclusions like this, where it talks about the time of the

Gentiles ceasing, it talks about, again in Romans 11, God focusing his attention back on the root rather than the branches that have been grafted in.

So again, looking at Romans 11, this might be something to consider when someone says, well, what about that?

Okay, well, in Romans 11, it says, but if some of the branches were broken off, and you, although a wild olive should have been grafted in among the others, and now sharing the nourishing root of the olive tree, do not be arrogant toward the branches.

If you are—remember, it's not you who support the root, but the root that supports you—then you will say, branches are broken off so that I might be grafted in.

That is true, they were broken off because of their unbelief, but you stand fast through the faith so that you do not become proud, but fear for if God did not spare the natural branches, neither will he spare you.

Note then the kindness and the severity of God, severity towards those who have fallen, but kindness towards you, provided you continue in his kindness, otherwise you will be cut off.

And even if they do not continue in their unbelief, will be grafted in, for God has the power to graft them in again.

For if you were cut off from what is by nature a wild olive tree, and grafted contrary to nature into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these, the natural branches, be grafted back into their own olive tree?

See, again, Paul is distinguishing here between the natural members of the root, physical, and the spiritual, but he did make a point.

He said, if they believe, they can be grafted back in. But it won't be outside of belief.

It won't be outside of Christ. The blessings, the promises, all of these things find their fulfillment in Christ, not outside of him.

So therefore, Israel, and in this case, the physical nation of Israel, if they reject

Christ, they're no better off than the Gentiles. Okay, I want to move on now to another listener question, and this one has to do with family -integrated church.

And the gentleman who sent this to me, I'm gonna leave his name out of this, simply because I don't want to cause any issues at his home church.

He's having some conflict in his heart, and I want to be able to address that in sort of a general way.

And the conflict has to do with whether or not someone should try to bring Reformation in a church that's not

Reformed. And the reason why he's asking me this question, and he says so in the email, is because he knows my story.

Now, if you don't know my story, I grew up in the church that I currently pastor. It's not the same church that I grew up in, in the sense that it was once part of the

Disciples of Christ movement, which is a more liberal theological denomination. And I grew up in that, and was...again,

I went to a Baptist seminary, but I grew up in this church where there was a lot of differences theologically.

People had different... and there wasn't a lot of teaching on theology. So when I got out of seminary, the church first hired me as associate pastor under our previous pastor, then

I became the full -time preaching pastor in 2006. When all that happened,

I was in a place where I could bring Reformation through the preaching of God's Word, and through actively seeking to bring change in the body of the

Church. So that was what I was able to do because of the unique position that I was in.

And this person is asking me if he should be actively seeking to do that, and he mentioned some things in his church that are issues for him.

He said it's sort of a stereotypical Baptocostal Church, where there's things in the service and things on the

Lord's Day that he would disagree with. And one of the things that really gets him, and I mentioned this earlier, family integration, is he wants to bring his child into the worship service, but is being actively discouraged from doing so.

And again, not wanting to tell his whole story, but one of the things that was said was that when he spoke to the leadership about it, he was basically told, you don't want the crying baby to be a distraction from someone who is a sinner and coming to salvation.

You don't want a crying baby to distract them and maybe interrupt the process of them becoming a believer.

And again, I'm not quoting it directly, but that's the gist of it. And so my thoughts on that are immediately that my situation was so unique, and that God placed me in a position where I could bring change because of the position that God gave me within the body.

I was in the position of the preaching and teaching pastor. I had elders who supported me in what

I was doing, and it wasn't without conflict. I mean, I've told the story, two years after I started preaching in 2008,

I had a group try to have me fired for being Calvinistic. They were actually having meetings, private meetings, in their homes, and there was an actual sort of petition going around to try to have me removed.

So this was not an easy process. And again, I'm now 18 years in at this church.

Starting in 2006, next year, January will be 18 years, if I'm doing the math right. And that puts me in a place where I would say the church is still not really perfect.

I mean, we're in a lot better place than we are now. I have elders that I serve with who are godly men that I trust, and that support by preaching the same things that I preach.

But it wasn't always that way. I mean, I'm thankful for men like Jack Bunning, who has been a stalwart faithful man of God, who stood beside me in some very difficult times.

Men like Byron Starkweather and Richard Taylor and others who stood beside me. And the men that I serve with now, which are Mike Collier and Andy Montoro.

I'm so thankful for them. If I didn't have them, I don't know how God would have been able, how

God would have worked. I know he could have, and I don't want to say that he if he would have been able. God worked through those men, so having those men was helpful for me.

And if you're in a situation where you don't have that, I don't know, I don't know how God's gonna work through you.

I'm not saying he can't or that he won't, but I was comparing our situations a little different.

And the person in the email did say, this is a church he grew up in, it's the church he was married in, it's the church he loves, and therefore he doesn't want to just leave.

Because a lot of people are saying, well, if you have a desire for family integration, there's churches down the road that do family integration, why don't you just go there?

Or, you know, if you have a desire for more of a Reformed church, why don't you just go there? Well, I understand the desire to see your church that you grew up in become more godly and more

Reformed, because that's what I wanted, and that's what God did. So I believe it can happen, and I believe it's possible.

But a few things to consider where the differences would lie. I was in a unique situation to bring change, and if you're not in that situation, then it's going to be harder for you.

If you're not already in a position of leadership, if you're not already in a position where you can have a voice in meetings and things like that, then it's going to be more difficult for you right away.

And I'm not telling you to leave your church, but I am saying that your level of discouragement might even be more so than mine, and mine was pretty discouraging.

I mean, I wrote my resignation letter in 2008. I still have it. I'm thankful for Tom Askell, because Tom Askell actually encouraged me not to leave the church, but I was ready to resign that Sunday when

I found out people were having private meetings in their home about me. I was ready to leave. I wrote my resignation letter. I talked to Tom Askell, and he said, no, make them fire you.

I was thankful for that. So I stayed, and God blessed it, and so I'm thankful for that.

So the question is, you know, I don't want to address, you said, when do

I know when to try to work for change, or is it worth expending futile energy?

Likely, you said likely, futile energy, and I appreciate that you say likely, because, you know, any energy we expend for the

Kingdom of God is ultimately not futile, so don't think that. But when you say futile,

I think what you mean is potentially being without the result that you want, and there is that.

Sometimes people do missions work for years and they don't see the result that they would have wanted, or people work in a church for years and they ultimately don't see the change that they would have wanted, so that's possible and very, very likely that that could happen.

So I know that's what you mean when you say futile energy. So my response to that would be, right away, if you can begin to develop a better relationship with your pastor—and

I don't know what your relationship is, it seems like what he said about the baby, or what, you know, it mentioned here was the pastor who said about the baby causing conflict with someone becoming saved, that y 'all might have some different views about salvation.

Anybody who says that, I think, automatically sort of has maybe sort of a free will perspective, and maybe their idea of someone coming to the

Lord, everything has to be perfect or God won't be in it. I've heard, in fact,

I've heard people ask us, people have asked me specifically, hey, when is somebody supposed to come to the

Lord in your service? You don't have an invitation, so what if somebody comes in and they want to know

Jesus, and they leave, and you didn't give them the opportunity to know Jesus, aren't you wrong? And my answer is, well, first of all, there's nothing that makes a invitation portion of a service the time when people do business with God and when people become saved.

Most of the people that I know that were radically saved, like for instance my fellow elder and brother

Mike Collier, he was not saved by going forward in a church. He was saved when God saved him, and he remembers exactly where he was, and he tells me, we talk about that sometimes, about he remembers where he was.

I was in a truck driving down Broward Road when God saved me. So I had to explain to this person, we do have moments in our service where people are called to repentance and faith, and that is in the sermon.

And then after the sermon, we have communion every Sunday, so that communion becomes a point where people have to be faced with the reality that if you're not receiving the bread and the cup, then you're outside of the body, and therefore they're being faced with the fact that there's a distinction between the believer and the unbeliever, and the prayer is that God would use that to draw them and save them and give them the gift of eternal life.

So yes, all that is true, but the issue lies in, again, the issue with this is if you think a crying baby is going to stop

God from saving a soul, there's a little bit of an issue there for me, and it seems like the person who said that to you maybe is, that's what they think, a crying baby would stop the saving of a soul.

But here are some practical tips. So my practical advice, based on this email, things—and you did say something at the very end, you said you didn't expect a definitive answer, and I can't give you,

I can't tell you exactly what to do for an exact outcome, but here are some things I can tell you. One, if you're in the church that you're in, the

Bible does call us to submit to our leaders and not to make their jobs harder than it has to be.

You know, that's Hebrews 13. I'm not quoting it directly, but the passage is there. It says submit to your leaders because they have watch over your souls.

So this man, whoever he is, this pastor, if you're submitting to his leadership, you are submitting to that.

So I would not want to make his job harder than it has to be, but I would try to develop a relationship with him that would allow you to be able to speak more freely in the situation.

I don't know how big the church is, I don't know how available he is for opportunities to sit down and talk, but helping him understand your heart in this might help.

Also, it might give you the opportunity to ask questions like, you know, does he have a desire to see the church change?

Does he have a desire for Reformation? You would be surprised how many pastors are really desiring to see change in their church, but they don't feel like they can accomplish change because they don't, they just don't feel like they have any support.

So finding out if he wants change and letting him know that you want to see change too, maybe y 'all don't have the exact view of what that change is going to be, but at least come together and talk and say, you know, these are the things

I'd like to see. And if he says, well, I don't really see us going that direction, or I don't believe in family integration, or I think that's a bad direction, that might tell you something about the future of the church.

But if he says, well, you know, I'm open to the idea, or I, you know, it's just not something I can see us doing right now, or I have, you know, thoughts about that.

I'll tell you this, from the position of family integration, we have, this has been some really, there have been really difficult days in family integration for us, because we have family integration, family integrated worship, where we invite people to bring their children and toddlers into the worship service, and they can be somewhat distracting during worship.

And so we have to minister to everyone and try to help families know, hey, when the child is being a distraction, even mine,

I mean, I have kids down to one year old. My wife knows there are times where she may need to take the baby out, because he is creating a distraction hearing the

Word, hearing the preaching, but she takes him out, she deals with him, she brings him back in, you know, restores him to fellowship, as they said at the

Fight Left Feast conference, which I thought was funny. Like, take him out, deal with him, come back, restore him to fellowship, which was just a funny little phrase.

So, you know, being cognizant of that, and thinking about the others around you, thinking about not everybody understands things the way you do, and being courteous and conscientious to them is helpful.

And will this church ever be the church you want it to be? Maybe not.

And are you willing to continue to love these people in spite of your differences, or do you want to go somewhere else where you may find more like -minded people?

I can't tell you what to do in that, but I will tell you this. If the church you're in is preaching the gospel faithfully, and the pastor you're sitting under loves your soul, and you have a community there that you love, then some of these things are worth being able to say, you know what?

I disagree with some of these things. I'm gonna continue to seek change, but I'm not gonna be a thorn in the flesh of my pastor.

I'm not gonna be a thorn in the flesh of other people. I'm gonna seek to pray for the people around me.

I'm gonna seek to talk to people that I know can make change, and try to influence them in a positive way, not in a way that's heavy -handed or ultimative.

Please don't give your pastor an ultimatum. Well, if you don't change, I'm gonna leave. I know you, I think based on your email, I know you enough to say that you wouldn't do that.

But that's one of the things, you know, people sometimes will say, well, this is the change I need to see, or I'm gonna leave.

And sometimes I think, I would say, you know what? Well, maybe you need to find a different church, because if you're demanding these things, then that's not good.

That's, you know, unless it's a gospel issue, then outside of that, there's room for disagreement, there's room for difference.

And so I would just ask you to faithfully pray for your pastor, faithfully seek to be a friend to him, to come, you know, to bring your issues to him in a way that is not intended to be altogether corrective, but suggestive.

Here are some things that I would love to see us do, and hear his thoughts. And he may have thoughts that you haven't even thought of, or he may tell you there's things that he wants to see done that you've never even considered.

So those are my thoughts. I hope that's helpful. I hope that, by God's grace, you're able to find some peace in this situation, and that God would comfort you in seeking to bring

Reformation in the Church, if that's his will, that he would use you in this. And I pray that it would be.

So for my last thing today, I want to talk about a voicemail that I recently received on the

Church's answering machine. Answering machine? Nobody has an answering machine.

The Church voicemail, I said it, it's a voicemail. And I want to address it.

The person did not leave their name, but they left a scathing review about me and my preaching, and particularly about Calvinism.

And it's so funny, because last week I was at the Fight, Laugh, Feast conference, and I was talking to Joel Webb, and we were standing around talking, and he talked about the fact that, you know, he gets, he stirs up a lot of controversy and gets a lot of people who dislike him.

And I jokingly said to him, I said, you know, I'm trying to be universally adored.

I was kidding, because I was just saying, you know, I joke and I make people laugh, and I do enjoy making people laugh, but I know this, that I'm not universally adored.

I know that there are people out there who hate what I preach, who hate what I have to say, they don't even like the funny things that I say.

So I am very aware that there are people who are unhappy with things that I say. And this gentleman, whoever he is, left a voicemail on our church's voicemail, and I wanted to share it with you.

He didn't leave his name, so I'm not attacking him personally. He will know who he is if he hears this, if he watches this video and listens to the voicemail.

I just want to respond to some of the things that he said, because it's important that people understand the issues at hand.

So I'm going to play the voicemail, and I'm going to stop it as I go and respond to a few things.

Again, not angry. I think everybody's entitled to their opinion, especially their opinions of me.

And I just want to respond to some of what he said, because maybe there are some folks out there who think the same, and this is my response to those things.

So let's begin. I know it'd be unwise to try to correct

Mr. Foskey, because he's puffed up, and with his knowledge, especially with the

London Baptist Confession of 1689. Right away, just want to say, our church doesn't hold to the 1689.

I don't. We hold to the 1644 Confession, which is the earlier Baptist Confession. And this sounds like Chris Arnzen.

So I don't think it is. In fact, I know it's not. But right away, it sounds like Chris Arnzen is the one who left the voicemail, but I know he didn't.

Calvinism is a heresy. What you preach is heresies. If anybody ever runs across your stuff,

I will let them know that you are a heretic, you know, the Reform Movement and Calvinist Movement. But you're funny as hell, though.

I like you because you are foolish. Okay, by the way, I had to cut out some of the curse words.

It's interesting, though, that he says that Calvinism is heresy. Because when we define, what do we define as heresy?

Historically, how have we defined heresy? Specifically, Calvinism does not fall into the category of heresy, even if you disagree with it.

It would fall into the category of those things that are secondary issues, things that we can disagree about, things about how

God works, the issues of predestination, things like that. To say that Calvinism is a heresy, that's not true historically.

You may think it's heretical, you may think it's wrong, but that doesn't make it a heresy.

This is something that has been held by many groups, and he identified

Reformed theology as being heretical. Okay, so the Reformed theology is found in Baptist circles, in Presbyterian circles, in Anglican circles.

So to say that it's heresy, again, just because you don't like something doesn't make it heresy.

Just because you don't agree with something doesn't make it heresy. And so we have to at least understand that.

He's saying that I'm a heretic because I'm preaching things that he disagrees with. And we might be able to have a conversation where we sit around the

Word and we talk about what does the Word say about this, what does the Word say about that, and come to legitimate disagreements and a position of difference on things like predestination or election, just like the conversation that I have with Leighton Flowers.

We would be in much different perspectives. We would hold to much different positions on these things.

But as he said, he has Calvinists come and preach in his conferences. So to say that it's heresy, you know,

I'm not gonna let a Jehovah Witness come and preach at my church, because quite frankly, that's heresy.

And the distinction between is Jesus Christ truly God, that's a heretical issue.

How we understand things like predestination and free will, I don't think falls under the category of heresy. But this guy does, and he's saying that I'm a heretic.

So that would be my initial response. I would say these are issues that good godly men can disagree about, and should have these conversations.

Far from it. Maybe you ought to do what Sam Kenneson did. Yeah, you probably weigh just as much as he does.

Nice shot across the bow there. So maybe you ought to start doing what Sam Kenneson does. For those of you who don't know,

Sam Kenneson was a preacher back in the 70s, 80s. He was a

Pentecostal preacher, and he stopped being a preacher and started being a comedian. I have no interest in that.

I have no desire to do that, even though I enjoy comedy, making comedy videos, and I do have a stand -up show coming up that I'm going to be doing.

That has nothing to do with leaving... that's not... Sam Kenneson rejected the gospel, and rejected the revelation of God, and that's sad, and my heart breaks for his soul, but that's not the direction

I'm headed. I'll just go on and be a comedy show. How many people needlessly went to hell because of your

Calvinism, and your Reform movement? Shame on you. What are you going to do?

Jesus is going to say, you know, what are you going to tell Jesus when you meet him? Well, I did this, I did that, I did this, just like he said, depart from me.

I never knew you. No, it's what he did for us. I want to interject right there.

I have never in my life preached that I'm saved by what I do. I've never in my life preached that anyone is saved by what they do.

So by making that accusation, that is a... that in itself is slanderous, because it's saying that I am teaching people that they can be saved by what they do, or that I believe that I'm going to face

Jesus one day and be saved by what I do. I will tell you this, when I face Christ, the only thing that I will be able to trust in, and the only thing

I trust in now, is the finished and completed work of Christ on the cross. I actually believe that Christ accomplished what he set out to do when he went to the cross.

I actually believe that on the cross, when Jesus died, the wrath of God was satisfied, and that is my only hope.

My only hope is in the Lord Jesus Christ. This coming Sunday, I am preaching on three of the five solas, by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone.

And I believe that, and I preach that, and I proclaim that. And to say... and to insinuate otherwise is to show that you've never really listened to anything that I preach with any real discernment, because I preach by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, and I preach that unless a man be born again, he will not receive the kingdom of heaven, and unless a man believe on the

Lord Jesus Christ, because by being born again, he believes on the Lord Jesus Christ, and if that has not happened, he will not see the kingdom of heaven.

He will not be a part of the kingdom of God. So that's simply misrepresenting what

I teach. I would be a fool trying to correct you. You're a doctorate in demons.

Actually, I have a doctorate of ministry, but that doesn't matter, because anyone is worthy of correction if they're wrong, and I'm sure there are things that I am wrong about.

I don't have perfect theology any more than anyone else does, but on this particular subject, is there not room for disagreement?

There has been in history. Is there not room where we can have these conversations without calling each other names?

Stay off the internet. You're garbage, Mr. Foskey. I won't be doing that. I do like your humor, though.

You are funny, but I appreciate that. But really, your preaching is garbage. Have a good day.

All right, well, that was the voicemail that we received through the church voicemail.

I thought I would respond to it, share it with you all, and love to hear your thoughts in the comments. All right, guys, that's it for Conversations with a

Calvinist today. I want to remind you again that we try to put out a new podcast every week, and if you have questions that you would like me to address, you can send those questions to calvinispodcasts at gmail .com.

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