April 2, 2018 Show with Jason Montgomery on “What 21st-Century Christians Can Learn From 18th-Century English Baptist Pastor & Hymn Writer Benjamin Bedomme”

Live from the historic parsonage of 19th century gospel minister George Norcross in downtown

Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron, a radio

platform on which pastors, Christian scholars, and theologians address the burning issues

facing the church and the world today.

Proverbs 27 verse 17 tells us, Iron sharpens iron so one

man sharpens another.

Matthew Henry said that in this passage, quote, we are cautioned to take heed whom we

converse with 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 hour and we hope to hear

from you, the listener, with your own questions.

Now here's our 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 Monday on this

second day of April 2018, day after Easter Sunday,

and I hope that you all had a blessed time celebrating the resurrection of our Lord God Savior and King Jesus

Christ yesterday and all weekend, in fact, and I hope that you had also a

time to rekindle old relationships and start new ones and have precious

memories in the making for many decades to come with your family, friends, and

loved ones, and I just glad, I'm so glad that we are back now

on the air and I'm so glad that we also have a first -time guest on Iron Sharpens Iron today.

We have the honor and privilege of interviewing Jason Montgomery, who is an adjunct professor

of church history at the all -new IRBS Theological Seminary, that stands for

Institute of Reformed Baptist Studies Theological Seminary, soon to be launching its first

semester in Mansfield, Texas, and today we are going to be addressing what

21st century Christians can learn from 18th century English Baptist pastor and hymn writer Benjamin

Bedom, and it's my honor and privilege to welcome you to Iron Sharpens Iron for the very first time, Jason Montgomery.

Very exciting, it's good to see you very much

down here.

I do at church, sometimes I've worn out my welcome with some.

Oh, he's going to talk about Bedom again.

Well, I'm enthusiastic about today's program because I have never until yesterday

even heard of Benjamin Bedom, and I'm glad that you are going to be introducing him to me and I'm sure many others

in the Iron Sharpens Iron radio audience who have also never heard of him before, but is a

valuable enough figure from church history that you would even choose him

as the subject of your doctoral dissertation.

So he must be someone significant and worth our learning about, and

before we go into our subject at hand, first of all let me give our listeners the email address for Iron

Sharpens Iron radio.

It's chrisarnzn at gmail .com.

Chrisarnzn at gmail .com.

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

Please only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal or private matter.

And in addition to being on the faculty at IRBS Theological Seminary,

Pastor Jason, I understand that you are a pastor.

If you could tell us something.

About the church

where you

are the

under

-shepherd.

I am.

Community

Baptist

Church, 1998, for

many years.

Well I am assuming, since you are on the faculty at the IRBS Theological Seminary,.

It is a Reformed

Baptist Church.

Reformed

Baptist Church.

That's right.

I believe we

meet one another on

original

churches and that's

been a

great

thing.

In fact, I hope

at some

point in.

The near future to interview the president of IRBS Theological Seminary, Dr. Jim Renahan, on

his book that contrasts associationism with.

Denominationalism.

Yes, so your book that he came out with several years ago?

Yes.

Where he talks about the

consensory

ideation?

That's

actually

what

I was speaking about, yes.

Okay, well that's a good

point.

I believe so.

His name is prominent in my memory in regard to that

book.

That's very helpful.

And for those.

Of you who are clueless as to what we're talking about, there are many

people automatically assume that every Protestant Church

that comes by a different name, such as Baptist, is in a denomination.

But that is not the case.

Baptists historically have not believed in or participated in denominations, although

there are denominations today that are Baptistic and Baptist, I guess you could say.

But we do not believe, historically as Baptists, that there is any

hierarchical structure of authority outside of the local congregation other

than Christ himself and his inerrant word, that the local elders of a church,

as far as human beings are concerned, is the highest level of authority in a local congregation, and that

each congregation is autonomous and independent.

But if they are wise, they will be in some way involved in associations with

like -minded churches.

Have I adequately summarized this.

Situation?

I think so.

I

mean,

the 17th

century

Baptist

original

model, it's always

the

economy

of the local church, but I can

say certainly from my understanding of the Confession and my own experience, being a part of an association

like ARBCA, or like, incredibly refreshing,

and, and so...

Well, we don't want to steal too much of Jim Renahan's thunder for a future

interview.

And by the way, if you could try to keep in mind to keep your mouth as close to the

mouthpiece of whatever instrument you're using, whether it's a phone or a microphone,

because sometimes you seem to fade away.

So try to make sure that you don't turn your face away from the mouthpiece.

Okay.

Okay.

And by the way, just so our listeners know, in case they have to leave the program early,

I intend to repeat this information, but if you want more information about the

Faith Community Baptist Church in West Fort Worth, Texas, where our guest is the

pastor, go to faithcommunitybaptistchurch .com.

Faithcommunitybaptistchurch .com.

It's amazing that you were able to get that URL.

It's pretty...

I'm sure that there are Faith Community Baptist Churches all over the United States that would love to have that URL.

And also, for the IRBS Theological Seminary in Mansfield,

Texas, you may go to irbsseminary .org, irbsseminary

.org.

And we actually have a couple of exciting pieces of news in regard to

IRBS Theological Seminary.

The first is of which, and I think that my guest may have

heard this news just as recently as I did, but I am so delighted to

hear that there is a new partnership between IRBS Theological Seminary

in Mansfield, Texas, and Puritan Reform Theological Seminary in Grand Rapids,

Michigan.

Puritan Reform Theological Seminary is under the authority

of the president, Dr. Joel Beakey, who is the founder of this seminary, and

I have known Dr. Beakey long before he even founded this seminary.

And my friendship with him goes way back to the early 1990s, and I was

among the first people to get Dr. Beakey on the radio, and

we have had him on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio many times, and I also have had David Murray, who's a faculty

member there at Puritan Reform Theological Seminary, on this program, and other faculty members, and so

I'm very excited about this.

I don't know, as far as this specific new detail about

IRBS Theological Seminary, I don't know how knowledgeable you are in this regard, but.

There isn't

anything

that you

can say about

this.

Amen.

Yeah, well I'm

excited.

About it too, and I'll be delighted to eventually get all of the faculty members interviewed

on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, and I know that you folks are also having an

inauguration celebration in regard to IRBS

Theological Seminary on September 11th in Mansfield, Texas, and I

have been invited, I received an invitation from Judith Rogers to conduct

on -air interviews, on -site, on the new

campus of IRBS Theological Seminary.

I am hoping that I can get enough funds to afford to pay for that

travel, and to be able to join you on that very special day, but then

this also may be out of your orbit of specific knowledge, but what can you tell us about this event?

Just out of curiosity, do you know how close Mansfield, Texas is to Justin, Texas?

The reason why I'm asking is if the Lord enables me to get out there, I would love to see my oldest

brother John, who lives with his wife Jan in

Justin, Texas, and my brother is getting

on in years, and is in critical stage emphysema, and I appreciate our listeners praying for

him.

He is not a believer, and I would love to see him come to saving

faith in Christ, and hopefully that will happen before he departs from this earth, and only God

knows when that will be, but I know that he is 73, I believe

now, and so do you not know how close Justin is to.

Mansfield?

That's pretty good.

That doesn't seem like it'd be out of the.

Realm of possibility of being able to be in both places, if the Lord enables me to get out

there.

Of course, if he does enable me to get out there, I'm gonna make every effort to see my brother, but I

appreciate all of you praying about that, because I would not want to miss such an important event

in the history of the IRBS Theological Seminary.

Well, before we even get into the topic at hand again, what I

usually do when I interview a first -time guest is I have them give a summary

of their testimony of salvation.

I'd like to know what kind of religious upbringing you had, if any, and what the providential circumstances

were in your life that the Lord used to draw you to himself and save you, and then

how you realized you received a call from God to enter into.

The

ministry.

It would

be

great

to have

a

connection

against

God, but when

I was

around 10,

I

began

to

get

involved,

and

I got

into

college, very

involved

with the college

minister

we

had.

At 21, I began to

sense myself

in

the college

that

I

was in,

a lot

of navigator

stuff.

By the way, you.

Can look up on my website in the archive for at least one of the several

interviews I did with Jerry Bridges.

I surely enjoyed interviewing him, especially on his book, Trusting God Even When Life Hurts,

and I've given that book away to many people who have suffered loss of any

kind, whether it be their own personal illness, or the death of a loved one, or any other thing that comes into

their lives.

That's a tragedy, and we hopefully will get the old Iron Trump and Zion Radio

program's archives from when I was broadcasting it of New York all included on the new or the

current website.

Right now, we only, I believe, go back to 2015 with programs on our current

website, but.

Anyway,

I

interrupted

you,

I

just

love the

late Dr.

Jerry Bridges,

and

there's

still there's still a lot of five -point Calvinists I wish I'd

ever

met.

So we

went to that church for about a year

for ministry, and he said to me,

I hadn't even joined the church, he said to me, you don't even have to come and commit to

come to our church, he said,

and I thought, why would anybody want to give me time out of their busy life

to work with me on preaching?

So we ended

up joining John

Stott on Between Two Worlds,

preaching

various...

No, no, you

were.

Telling, I was asking you about not only your testimony of conversion to Christ, but

also the transformation that went on in your theological journey to where you discovered the

the doctrines of Sovereign Grace.

So you were right on.

Track

there.

Well good,

well that you

just

remember, of

course

I was nowhere

when Kennedy

was shot, but the doctrine of the limited atonement was in the middle of a

sermon.

Wow.

And...

Yes, I did hear

that.

I would love to

have been there.

Do you have a.

Recording of it?

Because I would love to hear how the inflections in your voice.

Change and all

that kind

of thing.

Well, I'd

still be

fascinating

to hear.

Praise God.

Wow, and by

the way,

Fred

Malone

is gonna be

my guest this Friday to.

Discuss his book on Credo Baptism, The Baptism of Believers.

Alone, I believe.

It's

titled?

Oh yeah,

it's a

masterpiece.

I'm

sorry?

Amen.

And by

the way, just.

Before we go to the break, when you were talking about limited atonement before, I immediately began

to remember an excellent quote by an old friend of mine who I have some

disagreement with on certain areas of theology, but John Reisinger, who is a fellow Calvinistic

Baptist, I remember him saying at a conference,

everyone who believes in hell believes in limited atonement.

You either believe God limits it or man limits it.

And that's really stuck with me because it's very, very true.

Those who believe in hell who are anti -Calvinists have no business really

saying anything in condemnation about limited atonement when they have to limit it unless they believe everybody

is going to heaven.

Absolutely.

We are going to our first break right now, and if anybody would like to join us on

the air with a question of your own, go send us an email to chrisarnsen at gmail .com,

C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com, and

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

And please only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter.

That's chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

And Christopher in Suffolk County, New York, just corrected me with one word that I

got wrong on Fred Malone's book title.

It's the baptism of disciples alone.

That's the actual, and the subtitle is a covenantal argument for credo -baptism versus pedo -baptism.

Fred will be our guest, God willing, this Friday.

But don't go away, we are going to our first break and we'll be back momentarily with our guest today,

and I'm sure that that we will be in store for a lot of new material from

Jason Montgomery on the pastor and hymn writer Benjamin Bedham from

the 18th century.

So don't go away, we'll be right back, God willing.

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Well, we are now back with our guest today, Jason Montgomery, who is the adjunct professor of

church history at IRBS Theological Seminary in Mansfield, Texas.

We are discussing what 21st -century Christians can learn from 18th -century English Baptist

pastor and hymn writer Benjamin Bedham.

If you'd like to join us on the air with a question of your own, our email address is chrisarnzen at gmail .com.

Chrisarnzen at gmail .com.

Please give us your first name, your city and state and country of residence.

If you live outside the USA and if you could now,

Pastor Jason, if you could let us know what it was

that or should I say how it was that you first came to discover Benjamin Bedham because he is,

at least today, a fairly obscure figure from history.

I'm sure that a lot of Reformed Baptist history buffs are not completely familiar with him.

I know that I wouldn't call myself a historian, but I had never heard of him until I learned of your

doctoral dissertation.

But tell us how you first came to discover him and what led you to be so excited about this

figure from the 18th century that you said, I am going to write my doctoral dissertation on this brother

from the 18th century.

Right, but

he wants to

talk.

Well, you got

you got to

tell me

though, I

know that our our

two.

Friends, Dr. Tom Nettles and

Ian Murray disagree on whether or not Gil was a hyper -Calvinist.

What is your opinion on that?

Just very briefly, even though it's not the same.

Well, he certainly isn't now.

I said he certainly isn't now.

Working

on

the

issue

of

hyper

-Calvinism,

I believe

it's

always

used

pejoratively.

Although he doesn't use hyper -Calvinism, he caricatures him.

I had not heard of

Betham.

And so Pierce was

really the

guy

I

was

interested

in.

And this was

before I

was, this was back

in 2013.

And in 2014, I believe that was the year that the ARBCA had their general assembly in

Gilbert on

the Ph .D. program.

In fact, we have to

we have to stop right there.

And pick up where you left off about the Ph .D. program when we return from our midway break.

It's a long, it's a longer than normal break because Grace Life Radio 90 .1 FM in Lake City,

Florida requires of us a 12 minute break between our two major segments.

So please be patient and take this time to write down information that our advertisers

give you so you can patronize them and also take the time to write questions in for our guests.

And our email address is chrisarnson at gmail dot com.

Chrisarnson at gmail dot com.

I am sure that Jason Montgomery will be more than delighted to answer any question that you have

to the best of his ability.

Try to keep it within the realm of church history, if not specifically the

main topic, Benjamin Bedham, the 18th century Baptist pastor.

But it can be broader than that.

Any subject on church history or Reformed Baptist distinctives will be fine.

And that email address is chris arnson at gmail dot com.

Chris arnson at gmail dot com.

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So take advantage of this excellent, beautiful, hardback book, The Salt of the Covenant or

The Biblical Doctrine of Salvation by ordering $50 or more worth of merchandise from

cvbbs .com.

And please always tell Todd and Patty Jennings, the owners of cvbbs .com,

that you heard about cvbbs .com from Chris Arnzen on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

In fact, I've got a shout out to Linda in Long Beach, Long Island.

She has said that as a result of my guest plugging The Cross of Christ by

John Stott, she has already ordered that book.

In the future, Linda, if you didn't do this already when you ordered The Cross of Christ,

please use cvbbs .com as your sole provider

for books from many different types of Christian publishers and authors

all over the world.

If they don't have it in stock already, they will certainly order it for you, but The Cross of Christ is such a classic that they would

readily have a book like that in stock at cvbbs .com.

And thank you, Linda, from Long Beach, Long Island for listening to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio today.

And by the way, a little bit of trivia, that is the hometown of Don Corleone, Long

Beach, Long Island.

And before we return to our guest, Jason Montgomery, you just have a couple of more very

important announcements.

The Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals is delighted to announce that they are once again

conducting the Philadelphia Conference on Reform Theology, which is held in two

locations, neither of which are Philadelphia.

They call the conference, the Philadelphia Conference, out of love and tribute to

the late Dr. James Montgomery Boyce, who held these conferences in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, at the 10th Presbyterian

Church for many years until he went home to be with the Lord.

This time around, this year, the conference will be held first at the

First Christian Reform Church of Byron Center, Michigan.

That's April 13th through the 15th.

And then secondly, the conference will be held at the Proclamation Presbyterian Church in Bryn Mawr,

Pennsylvania, which is the one I plan to attend, April 27th through the 29th.

The theme of the conference is the Spirit of the Age and the Age of the Spirit.

The speakers include Daniel Aiken, Richard Gaffin, Daniel Hyde, a man that I believe is the most powerful preacher

alive on the planet Earth, Conrad M. Bayway, pastor of Coboata Baptist Church in Lusaka, Zambia, Africa.

Richard Phillips, who is my friend from South Carolina, pastor of the Second Presbyterian Church

in Greenville, South Carolina.

Jonathan Master, David Murray, who's on the faculty at Puritan Reform Theological Seminary, now in

partnership with IRBS Theological Seminary on the doctoral program.

And Scott Oliphant from Westminster Theological Seminary.

They are on the roster.

If you'd like to register for either location or both, go to alliancenet .org,

alliancenet .org, click on events, and then click on Philadelphia Conference on Reform Theology, the

Spirit of the Age and the Age of the Spirit.

Please tell the folks at the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals that you heard about the Philadelphia Conference on Reform Theology

from Chris Arnzen on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

Last but not least, this is my least favorite portion of the show, my

most uncomfortable portion of the show, and that is where I have to ask you for donations.

I have refrained from doing this for many years until my advertisers, who spend harder money

keeping the show on the air, urged me to make these public appeals to the point where I broke,

realizing that I was broke, and realizing of the urgent need for finances.

So if you love this show, you don't want it to go away, you want to keep sharing the mp3s

with family, friends, and loved ones for free, you get edified by the guests and topics that we have on this

program, well please go to ironsharpensironradio .com, click support, and then click

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That's click to donate now, and you can instantly donate with a credit card or debit card.

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as often as you can, and as much as you can, with this caveat, never ever ever siphon

money out of your regular giving that you're accustomed to to your local church, never take food off of your family's

dinner table, or put your family in financial jeopardy by giving to ironsharpensironradio .com, providing for your church and

home are commands of scripture, providing for ironsharpensironradio .com is not a command of scripture, obviously,

but if you love the program and you are blessed financially above and beyond your ability to obey those

two biblical commands, then please consider supporting Ironsharpensironradio with your

donations.

That is ironsharpensironradio .com, click support, and click click to donate now.

If you'd like to advertise with us, just send us an email to chrisarnsen at gmail .com, chrisarnsen at gmail

.com, and put advertising in the subject line, no matter what it is you want to

promote, whether it is your church, your parachurch ministry, your business, your professional practice,

special event, as long as whatever it is that you are promoting is compatible with

the theology we express on ironsharpensironradio, you don't have to believe exactly as I do, but you do need to be promoting

something compatible with what I believe, then please send us an email to chrisarnsen at gmail .com, and I would love to

help you launch an ad campaign because we really could use the advertising dollars.

That's the same email address that you can send in your questions to our

guest today, Jason Montgomery.

Our email address again is chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

We are now back to Jason Montgomery and our discussion today, which is on a

unique and somewhat obscure figure from church history.

I don't know how many of our listeners have heard of the 18th century Baptist

that we are discussing today, Benjamin Bedlam, but I hope that this program will help open the

door for further investigation from you.

Perhaps one of these days you'll be able to get a hold of the doctoral dissertation that our guest has written on this

person.

Well, hopefully, perhaps Mike Gadosh will bring it into print.

Dr. Joel Beeky's doctoral dissertation is an excellent book that is now available

in print.

So, right before the break, you were talking about how you were beginning to

enter into the doctoral program, I believe, and pick up right where you left

off.

Yeah, yeah, I was having lunch.

I really just fell

in love with him as

a brother in the Lord.

Wow, praise God, that is very rare, that is very rare.

And died.

And I know that my, or I should say the pastor of the church where I am currently a member before I got

there, Walt Chantry, who I've interviewed on this program, he was pastor of Grace Baptist.

Church for at least 40 years, I know that.

What a longevity in the ministry.

And, you know, I'm not, I'm not faulting men for being at churches for short times.

I know things happen,

you

know,

things

just

happen.

To have them

in

my mind.

This guy

came

to

me.

Wow.

If

you

release

me,

theology,

and then

that.

You said something interesting.

You said something interesting right there.

That may not be all that out of the ordinary for Baptists to hear, but

if I'm not mistaken, do not many Presbyterian denominations, including the very conservative ones that

share very much in common with us, do they not believe that the pastor is

not a member of that local church?

I believe, I believe that is correct.

But yeah, the pastor's not a member of that church.

Well, I don't know if you've finished your train of thought, because we do have a few listeners that have

questions for you.

Well, that's great.

Sure.

Okay, we have Ronald in Eastern Suffolk County, Long Island, New York,

who said, are you aware of any friendship or interaction between John Gill

and Benham since they were contemporaries, and if there was any real significant

cooperation or partnership in gospel work between the two of them?

Wow,

that

is a great

question

between

Jonathan

and

John Gill.

And it

seems

that John

Gill

and

Gill,

and

so, but

I

have not

found between the two men.

Excellent.

Well, since you mentioned Jonathan Edwards, I want to give a plug to my guest tomorrow, Kurt M. Smith,

who is a Southern Baptist and Calvinist, thoroughgoing Calvinist, is going to be my guest

tomorrow on Iron Trip and Zion Radio to discuss Jonathan Edwards

and his defense for the Great Awakening.

That's our theme tomorrow on Iron Trip and Zion, four to six of market calendars for Kurt M. Smith on

Jonathan Edwards and his defense of the Great Awakening.

Thank you, Ronald.

Keep spreading the word about Iron Trip and Zion in Eastern Suffolk County and beyond.

We have Arnie in Perry County, Pennsylvania, who says,

have you ever heard of John Gill's friendship with the Seventh -day Baptist pastor Samuel

Stennett, who is also a hymn writer, and that they did pulpit exchanges there in England since

they worshipped on different days?

I actually did hear about that, even though John Gill is not a subject primarily.

I don't know if you've heard about that, but I know that Samuel Stennett was one of the preachers at John Gill's funeral,

and he was a Seventh -day Baptist, not a Seventh -day Adventist.

I don't want our listeners to be confused.

The Seventh -day Adventist did not even exist at that time, but he was

Seventh -day Baptist, and they did exchange pulpits, and I saw

the documentation for that, and that Stennett preached at Gill's funeral.

I don't know if you were aware of that.

I was.

In fact, I will try to get you a copy, because I was given a copy,

a reprint of Stennett's sermon at John Gill's funeral.

I'll try to get that for you.

That'd be wonderful.

Yeah, and I know that today some Reformed Baptists may get their boxers in a bind knowing that John

Gill swapped a pulpit with a Seventh -day Baptist, but of course, he was a thoroughgoing Calvinist.

I'm talking about Stennett.

We already know that John Gill was.

So they did share the doctrines of grace very strongly.

Fascinating story.

Stennett, and I'm trying to remember which Stennett it was,

but he was a

nation again.

He

would

write in the pages out

of

the

way

fully, and so they

gave that allowance.

Great.

Well, thank you, Arnie in Perry County, Pennsylvania.

Keep spreading the word about Iron Trip and Zion Radio in Perry County and beyond.

We're going to our final break.

It's going to be a very brief one.

And we do have a couple of you still waiting to have your questions asked and answered.

We'll get to as many of you as possible before the program is over.

Our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com.

Chrisarnson at gmail .com.

Please give us your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside the USA and only remain

anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter.

We'll be right back at bullying right after these messages with Jason Montgomery, the Adjunct Professor of Church History at

IRBS Theological Seminary in Mansfield, Texas.

Don't go away.

Enthusiastically serving our Lord Jesus Christ.

In fellowship, play, and together.

Hi, I'm Pastor Bob Walderman, and I invite you to come and join us here at Linbrook Baptist Church and see all that a church can

be.

Call Linbrook Baptist at 516 -599 -9402.

That's 516 -599 -9402.

Or visit linbrookbaptist .org.

That's linbrookbaptist .org.

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Hi, I'm Pastor Bill Shishko, inviting you to tune into A Visit to the Pastors Study every Saturday

from 12 noon to 1 pm Eastern Time on WLIE Radio,

www .wlie540am .com.

We bring biblically faithful pastoral ministry to you, and we invite you to visit the Pastors Study by calling in

with your questions.

Our time will be lively, useful, and I assure you, never dull.

Join us this Saturday at 12 noon Eastern Time for a visit to the Pastors Study because everyone needs

a pastor.

And if you call in during Pastor Bill Shishko's live call -in program, A Visit to the Pastors Study, if

you call in the program with a question, please tell Pastor Bill that you heard about A Visit to the

Pastors Study from Chris Arnzen on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio and First Love Radio, the new network

that is live streaming Iron Sharpens Iron Radio out there in Dublin, California.

They are delighted to announce that very soon the program hosted by Bill Shishko,

A Visit to the Pastors Study, will be added to the lineup of First Love Radio.

So we are looking forward to have Pastor Bill join me on the same roster

on First Love Radio.

And now we are back with the final 25 minutes or so of our discussion with Jason Montgomery, an

adjunct professor of church history at IRBS Theological Seminary in Mansfield, Texas.

We are discussing what 21st century Christians can learn from 18th century English Baptist pastor and hymn

writer Benjamin Bedham, and our email address is chrisarnzen at gmail .com.

We have J .D. from Tyler, Texas, who says,

What was Bedham's purpose in writing hymns?

For whom did he expect to sing them?

And what is your favorite Bedham hymn?

And could you sing it for us?

Okay, he says, What was

Bedham's purpose in writing hymns?

For whom did he expect to sing them?

I'm assuming the congregations of churches, wouldn't he?

And what is your favorite Bedham hymn?

Sure.

I don't mind.

Okay.

Anyway,

in the

early

19th century,

recommending

the

hymns

would be a

gentleman

appointed

in the church.

And, you

know, they

become more common in

hymn

writers.

Wow.

One day to see.

Yeah, definitely.

We need some new hymns that are not falling in line with the typical

contemporary syrupy sweet nonsense that we have.

And please, I know that there are many contemporary Christian artists who are producing beautiful,

biblically sound hymns and songs, so I don't want to besmirch all of them.

But it seems to be the minority that are doing that.

So it would be great to have some hymns that would be new to us that were still solid biblically.

Well,

and

it

just

goes

on.

Wow.

Is that the only Bedham hymn in there?

Oh, you can listen to all of the hymns of the Trinity Hymnal online?

You can go to the Trinity Hymnal.

Wow,

great.

And anyway.

Well, I'm gonna have to have my two new pastors at Grace Baptist Church in

Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

I'll have to have them, or ask them, I should say, to have these

Bedham hymns sung at a very soon worship service.

Yes, we have

been coming

into worship,

and that's

a

pretty

common

thing.

And I would guess that since you're talking about the 18th century, that these would have been sung a cappella

typically.

I would imagine so.

I don't think Bedham had the praise band thing going.

Well, I don't know if you've read John Price's book, but he makes a

pretty good argument.

He's Protestant outside of Lutheranism and Anglicanism.

He didn't use instruments until the 19th century.

I have not read Price's book.

It'll most likely be a cappella, I'm almost sure.

And our friend from Tyler, Texas has a couple of more questions for us.

Sure.

What can we learn about the purpose of confessionalism, the local church, and this is going to be

like for three different shows, confessionalism, the local church, and biblical associationism from Bedham?

Well, we could definitely schedule two more hours, but we don't have that right now.

Well,

yeah.

First

of all, I'm

drawing a

blank

there,

but there were three churches that were interconnected, and they...

Wow, the author of the Catechism.

Oh, okay.

Colin, the author of the

Catechism, does have Keech's name on it, and it commonly is...

He is a 19th

century

particular

Baptist,

I think

here, which

is on

the second...

I've been on that

now for a couple

of weeks.

You mentioned...

You mean in the opening announcement of my show?

Yes, yes, like that.

Yeah, that was his exegesis of the Iron Sharpens Iron passage.

Yes.

Another wiser and better...

Another wiser...

Yeah.

Well, actually, it was my announcer who said that.

Well, there you go.

How this also confessionalism association,

of which Bedham's Church in Borton was a member, was founded in 1655,

founded on a strong confessional

association of

churches.

Oh, yeah, he's one of my key sponsors on Iron Sharpens Iron.

He helps keep the lights on, literally.

Association of churches committed, on the whole, to the confession, and individual

churches within the association also committed to the confession of faith.

I can't really get to J .B.

Well, since J .D. has another question that's...

I usually don't allow one listener to have this many questions read and answered, since

they're all excellent.

I'll have one more by J .D. from Tyler, Texas, read,.

Does Bedham help us with any modern or ancient doctrinal differences or difficulties?

In what way and in what way does he inform our engagement with those whom

we may disagree with?

Wow, can you read that again?

I'm sorry, that's a long one.

Basically, I think he's asking about polemics.

Does Bedham help us with any modern or ancient doctrinal differences or

difficulties?

And in what way does he inform our engagement with those whom we may

disagree with?

The high

view

of confession, he's tried

to make

sure

that

we're

always grounding.

So, in essence, in that matter.

You know, I mean, the fact that the

guy...

Amen, amen.

So,

engaging with men who are not that,

going to touch

on the

issue of

Judaism and

Unitarianism.

All bad.

I'm sorry?

All bad.

Well, yeah, there you go.

What our

attendance, and speaking of Baptists, generally speaking...

Really?

Well, obviously, the Congregationalists eventually caved in, which is why the Ivy League schools are now

almost nearly all apostate completely.

Of the various...

Like

Anglicans

across

the

aisles

and will

come

to

Christ.

Well, brother, believe it or not, brother, we are out of time already, believe it or not.

No, I believe it.

I believe it.

And the time flew by very quickly, and I look forward to having you back on the program very soon.

I just want to make sure that our listeners have all of your contact information.

For those of you wanting to further investigate the IRBS Theological Seminary, go to

irbsseminary .org, irbsseminary .org.

And don't forget, there's two S's back -to -back in that URL, irbsseminary .org.

And then, of course, don't forget about the church where our guest pastors in

West Fort Worth, Texas, Faith Community Baptist Church.

That website is faithcommunitybaptistchurch .com, faithcommunitybaptistchurch .com.

Don't forget about the September 11th Convocation of

IRBS Theological Seminary in Mansfield, Texas, where I hope to be in attendance to do

live, on -site interviews.

And if you care to give any more contact information, brother, now's your time.

No, I think that is great.

And Chris, thank

you so

much for

having me.

Oh, the pleasure was all mine.

And don't forget, folks, tomorrow, Kurt M. Smith is going to be discussing Jonathan Edwards and his defense

for the Great Awakening.

And then we have, of course, we're going to have a show every day, but this Friday, we will have, God

willing, Fred Malone as our guest to discuss the baptism of disciples alone.

And we hope to receive questions from you then.

I thank everybody for listening today, especially those who took the time to email questions.

And I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater Savior than

you are a sinner.