December 8, 2016 Show with Gerald M. Bilkes on “Christ’s Parables: Glory Veiled & Unveiled” AND “Christ’s Miracles: Mercy Revealed”

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, 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 Arntzen. Good afternoon

Cumberland County, Pennsylvania and the rest of humanity living on the planet earth who are listening via live streaming.

This is Chris Arntzen your host of Iron Sharpens Iron wishing you all a happy Thursday on this eighth day of December 2016 and I know

I've got to update the opening announcement because we haven't been a one -hour program in well over a year.

We very quickly after relaunching the program went to a two -hour daily so I have to have our announcer update that one -hour announcement.

But I am so delighted to have on the program today for the very first time for the full two hours

Gerald M. Bilkus and Brother Bilkus is a professor of New Testament and Biblical Theology at Puritan Reform Theological Seminary in Grand Rapids, Michigan founded by Dr.

Joel Beakey who's been a guest on this program a number of times, a dear friend that I've known going back to the 1990s and today

Dr. Bilkus is going to be addressing Christ's parables Glory Veiled and Unveiled for the first hour.

The second hour we're going to be talking about Christ's Miracles, Mercy Revealed and those happen to be the titles of two books that we are addressing today on Iron Sharpens Iron.

If anybody would like to join us on the air our email address is ChrisArntzen at gmail .com,

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

But it's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the very first time to Iron Sharpens Iron, Jerry Bilkus.

Thank you so much Chris, it's a great honor and a great pleasure for me to be with you and I just want to thank you for your ministry and what you're doing for Christ's Kingdom.

It's a real pleasure to be on the air with you. Yes well I am delighted to have you on,

I've heard wonderful things about you and I am just anticipating a great program today.

And before we even go into the subject at hand, tell us something about Puritan Reform Theological Seminary.

Yes Chris, we've been very privileged to have the Lord working with us and through us, we believe.

I came on board at Puritan in 1999, so that's almost 18 years ago. Wow. Yeah, very thankful for that opportunity.

I was a young man at the time, 29 years of age, and Dr. Beeky and the board here contacted me.

I still wasn't even finished with my PhD. I was involved as an elder, ruling elder in a church in New Jersey.

I was working on my doctorate and there was an opening in Bible and they started talking to me. I really felt over time that this was the

Lord's way in my life, kind of remarkable. I wasn't looking for this, didn't expect it, but God opened this door and I've labored with Joel Beeky.

It's been a great honor. And with the others who've come on board, including David Murray and Bill van Dodeward and others, the

Lord is with us. Do pray that the Lord would keep us faithful for generations to come till he tarries.

That's the great need of the hour, the great need of seminaries in every age, but certainly today.

Great. Well, now I want to hear something about your own personal background, your childhood, what kind of religious atmosphere, if any, you were raised in, and what were the providential occurrences that the

Lord brought about in your life that drew you to himself? Yes, Chris, a great, great question.

Well, I was born in a pastor's home while my dad was training for the ministry in the free reform churches of North America.

He was here in Grand Rapids at the time and his first congregation was in Ontario. We traveled, in fact, we lived in the

Netherlands for a while, so I was raised in a pastor's home, reformed church he was serving.

The confessions were dear, the Heidelberg Catechism and things like that. I had a very solid upbringing.

I'm very thankful for it. I thought I was converted in my teenage years.

I sought the Lord. I soon discovered, though, that as the Lord tested me, as I look back,

I think it was really not a true faith. What happened was when

I was about 21, I had gone through college. I was told that I had some gifts for higher learning.

I was urged to pursue that. I did that. My professor urged me to go on to Princeton Seminary.

And I knew that that was a liberal institution. My parents warned me against going.

You can imagine that conversation, can't you? In my naivete,

I thought I was strong in the faith that could handle that. I remember saying that, in fact, to my dad.

I went there. After a few months, half a year, I realized that I was trying to walk a fine line between holding on to the convictions with which

I was raised and, obviously, the stream of liberalism, which was really a torrent that was pulling at me.

I was not strong enough at all. It was really my pride and hindsight that pulled me to go to an institution that was looked at as being very prestigious.

After a while, I realized I couldn't walk that line. That was an imaginary line. Either the

Lord was the God and I had to follow Him, or I'd be swept along in the God of this world.

That led to a crisis in my life. It was very personal, very uncovering.

I had a view of my own heart. In the sense that, when you follow your own imaginations, where do you end up?

I realized I couldn't trust my heart. The Lord was really striving with me. I was under a good ministry.

I had stayed with a solid Reformed church, so it was providential.

God was bringing me under solid preaching, the sovereignty of God, the depravity of man, and the glory of Jesus Christ, the need for salvation.

It was really a wrestling of my soul that ensued for months, even years. In the end, before God, I just confessed all my sin and also my pride.

I realized that if I had to lose my whole education and all that, I had chosen the way of foolishness.

The way of rebellion is hard, but I was prepared to do that. For the first time in my life,

I decided that I would say nothing that was against the authority of the Word of God, come what may.

A very difficult period ensued, but I felt in my conscience and in my heart liberated. More than that,

I think it taught me valuable lessons about what we need to do in our time.

There are many who are cozying up to the world and to false doctrine. I'm convinced through that experience in which

God graciously kept me and brought me that that's not at all what we need to do. We need to stand fast in these evil times, as the

Scriptures say. That's a bit longer than I wanted to say, but hopefully that's helpful. Oh, that's perfect.

By the way, you say you were from a free -reformed church background. Are you familiar with the congregation in Pompton Plains, New Jersey?

Oh, absolutely. That's where the Lord, I believe, had mercy on my soul.

Wow. Yeah, they were in Clifton, New Jersey at the time, and when I arrived there,

Reverend Gerald Hamster was the minister, and he was the preacher that the

Lord used in my life to really convict me of sin. He was a man who loved

Christ, but wouldn't move an inch from the Gospel in any way. And in the years that ensued, there was a period of vacancy, and there were others that came.

Pastor Lawrence Roth was the minister there. The elders were very good role models for me.

The Lord blessed me there abundantly. It was a Bethel for me, in the sense that the Lord was in that place, and when

I was there initially, I knew it not, but I came to discover it. Yeah, when

Pastor Lawrence Roth was there, he and the congregation there participated in a program that I developed that lasted,

I don't know, I think it probably lasted nearly seven years, called The Voice of Sovereign Grace, and what it was is every night,

Monday through Friday, a different Reformed pastor had the floor, if you will, had the airwaves where his sermon was aired, and the program had the same title and theme, and the only difference was that every night the specific pastor whose sermon was airing was announced with the details of that specific congregation, and that congregation, along with other

Reformed churches in different denominations, had a part of that program,

The Voice of Sovereign Grace, and I've had a little bit of interaction with Pastor Jay Lewis.

I haven't gotten to know him well, but he seems like a very nice man, a nice brother in Christ. Yes, that's wonderful to hear,

Chris. That congregation has a very fond place in my heart, and God has used those people there in my life.

He had mercy on my soul there, and yeah, it's wonderful to hear that. Well, I didn't even know that before I asked you that question, so that was not a staged interaction.

I just want our listeners to know. The ways of God are interesting, aren't they? They're pathfinding out. That's right.

Well, we are going to be discussing two books that you've written, as I mentioned earlier before.

The first we are going to be focusing on during the first hour is Glory Veiled and Unveiled, A Heart -Searching

Look at Christ's Parables. If you could explain what was the motivation for you to write this book to begin with?

Yes, Chris. Well, it's interesting. The motivation was initially not very glamorous at all.

What happened was I was contributing some articles here and there to Dr. Beeky's Banner of Sovereign Grace Truth, and I dealt with some different things.

The books of Ezra and Nehemiah, I'd looked at James, and he said to me, well, what are you going to do next?

Have you thought of doing the parables? And I'd always had an interest in the parables. I teach New Testament here at Puritan Reform Seminary, and I always like digging into the parables.

I thought, sure, let me do that. And so I started handling a number of parables, and I started seeing some things that I thought, hey,

I need to take this thread, all the parables, and I need to really probe this and see what

I can find here. And out of that was born this book, Glory Veiled and Unveiled.

And basically what I found was that these parables really shine a light on our hearts, uncovering a lot of the deep -rooted sin in our lives, but they also shine at the same time a glorious light on Jesus Christ.

And they're just heart -searching. That's what they are. They search our hearts, and they allow us to search the heart of the

Savior and in Him, that of the Triune God. So, it ended up being a very experiential journey for me.

I dug into these parables, and I felt that they dug into me. Chris And if you could explain why the parables are known as a mystery.

David Yes, that's the key here, Chris. You've hit it. Obviously what

I just said about the parables applies to all the Word of God. The Word of God searches our hearts.

It's light, all of it, from beginning to end. And we need the light of God's Word to shine into our hearts as it does through the application of the

Holy Spirit. And when it does that, at the same time, it will also show us the grace of God in Jesus Christ.

But in the parables, all this, what I just said about the Scriptures, comes to the fore in a very remarkable way.

When Jesus taught His parables, He didn't do it simply to give some nice, easy illustrations.

This is what many people think the parables are. They're just kind of like those sermon illustrations that everyone perks up their ears and listens because they love a good story mixed here and there through the sermon.

That's not, certainly not, the first and foremost reason why Jesus taught parables.

He tells us Himself in Mark 4, Matthew 13, that the parables are to convey the mystery of the

Kingdom of Heaven. And what He means by that is, is that the Kingdom of Heaven is a kingdom that is not visible to the human eye, but it comes mysteriously through the

Word, by the Spirit, into the hearts of men and women in whom God is working.

And as the parables, especially in Matthew 13, illustrate, it comes in a very subtle way, like a mustard seed that's planted.

But over time it grows, and the Kingdom of Heaven is shown in all its grandeur, beauty, and loftiness.

Though initially, there's scarcely anything that can be seen. In fact, it can hardly be seen.

The Lord does this work in our souls. There's nothing on the outside necessarily that happens, but the fruit of it is seen, and it will spread the world over.

So that's just to get at very briefly. There's much more we could say about that, but I hope that people will get away from the idea that, yeah, they're nice stories.

There's no doubt about it, and they grip us. But if that's where it stays, we haven't gone into the meaning of the parables at all.

We do have a listener all the way in Slovenia, Joe, who says,

Please ask Brother Gerald to explain about the ten virgins of Matthew 25, verses 1 through 13.

My question is specifically about verse 7 and following. Since the bridegroom,

Jesus, has come, and the five foolish virgins weren't ready, as they should have been, to go into the banquet immediately, why are they instructed to go and buy oil from the dealers?

Why aren't they simply told that they aren't prepared at his arrival, as they should have been, and now it is too late?

Thanks for your insights. Grace and peace in Christ, our hope. Excellent question there from our brother.

And I just looked at this chapter, actually, last week, I think it was. We've been going through Matthew here in one of my classes, and we stood still here at Matthew 25, so this comes at a great time for me.

Here's the lesson I would give you up front about the parables. Though the parables indicate very deep truths, we can't necessarily take every ingredient in the parable and apply them spiritually, in a sense that we force the parable into directions that the parable isn't intended to go, and that would bring us into conflict with the rest of Scripture.

So that's a principle up front. Now, some parables, some of the details matter more than other parables.

For example, the parable of the sower and the soils, Christ himself gives us the interpretation of that parable, and the birds mean something, and the seed means something, and this soil and that soil and the other soil all mean something.

But in the case of this parable of the ten virgins, an excellent question.

The point of that is to tell this gripping story that we all can feel ourselves, we can all relate to, of not being prepared.

And what happens there in that parable is the five are being unmasked for not being prepared.

And yeah, in terms of the story, they're sent to go get oil, which they do, and it's all too late. Now, if we compare that with the whole teaching of Scripture, when the end comes, when the trumpet blast will come, then there's no more time.

And so, in terms of that parable, we need to subject our interpretation of that parable to the rest of the canon and say, we're not going to make a doctrine off of this, as if some people have an extra chance, or that there's some hiatus of time, or some extra opportunity.

Absolutely not at all. In fact, the parable illustrates that. The door is shut. So, whatever these people do at this time, it's not working.

And that's how I would read that parable, is don't force it. It's a good question, but you have to answer that in light of the whole

Scripture and not take this in some other direction that the parable is not meant to go.

Well, thank you, Joe, in Slovenia, and thank you for providing an American address for us, because we are sending, as our gift to you for your question, a free copy of the book that we are addressing right now.

That is Glory Veiled and Unveiled by Gerald M. Bilkus, and we are shipping that out to your daughter in the

United States, as you have provided her address. And that saves

Cumberland Valley Bible Book Services a lot of money on postage, because they ship out all of our winners, their free

Bibles and books and DVDs and CDs and other things that you, the listener, win when you submit questions.

So, we thank Reformation Heritage Books for providing that book for you, and we also thank

Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service, cvbbs .com, for shipping that out to you.

We have CJ from Lindenhurst, Long Island, New York, who says,

Are all the parables fictitious stories that have truth embedded in their storyline?

I wonder, for instance, is the rich man and Lazarus an actual account, or is it merely a story to teach a valuable lesson?

One of the things that confuses me about the rich man and Lazarus story is that the rich man appears to be in hell, whereas, according to my understanding, and I have been taught this by reliable Reformed scholars, even from Banner of Truth, that no one is in the lake of fire right now.

That is something that the damned await until the time of judgment, the last day.

If you could explain. That's a great question, and indeed a lot of ink has been spilled about this.

To cut to the chase, indeed, the questioner is right in the sense that it is not technically specified as a parable.

Some of the other parables have that right at the top, and Jesus told another parable saying we don't have this in Luke 16 towards the end there.

So technically, we could really dispute that point, whether it is, strictly speaking, a parable.

However, it does have parabolic significance, for sure, and in terms of this point that I'm making in the book about how the parables search our hearts and how they open up the heart of God, certainly that unit does the same as well.

So I treat it as a parable, though with a caveat, I think I even mentioned that in the book, that some have said it doesn't totally go along with all the marks of a parable.

There's a personal name, Lazarus. Some people have said that maybe just simply be a code name, as in Lazarus means

God heals. And so maybe that's Christ's way of saying that this was one whom the

Lord had mercy on. But anyhow, the questioner is very right. This has been disputed. I guess

I would come down and say, though not strictly a parable, it's told among other parables, it has parabolic force, and certainly what's going on in terms of the dynamic that I'm highlighting is there as well.

Well, thank you, C .J. and Lyndon Hearst, Long Island. Please give us your full mailing address so we can ship a free copy of that book out to you, complements of Reformation Heritage Books and compliments of Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service.

So would you agree, and I've heard the same thing, and this is also my conviction, that there is indeed no one in the lake of fire, although I believe that people are in a place of torment where they await the lake of fire.

They're obviously somewhere right now, those who are damned, that is, before the final judgment.

But it seems to be chronologically inconsistent and illogical that if the day of judgment is on the last day where the damned are cast into the lake of fire prepared for the devil and his angels, it would seem to indicate that there is no one in the lake of fire right now, which is the puzzling statements about the rich man is that he is in the flame and wants, you know, a drop of water for his tongue and so on.

Yeah, obviously, here's what I would do with this. Great question, and I would go along with what you're saying here,

Chris. We build our doctrine from the clear, at least initially here, from the clear sections of Scripture, and we do believe that there is indeed, at the moment of death, there is a separation either to glory with Christ, which is far better, or it is in torment with all those who have not believed the gospel.

And so there's not some kind of interim soul sleep or some neutral place at all, purgatory, none of those things have any scriptural warrant at all.

And yet, the damned are not yet united with their bodies, and they will wait for that, just to use scriptural terms, until the general resurrection, in which the souls of the righteous will be united with their bodies, and also the souls of the unjustified will be united with their bodies, and then indeed they will be cast into the lake of fire.

That's the picture. But this does not at all take away from the fact that there is some kind of, that there is some immediate torment that comes upon the souls of all the damned immediately upon death.

And that is the point of the parable as well, because this is not speaking about the afterlife so much, the eternal state, because the rich man goes on to say, send

Lazarus to my brothers, so they're clearly still alive. So this is talking about the intermediate state, and again, the principle here, we shouldn't go, we shouldn't move away from this at all, is to interpret the unclear in light of the clear, otherwise we're going to go wrong.

Yes, and one of the things that occurred to me with that parable is how powerful it is, or that story,

I should say, whether it's a parable or not, obviously there's a dispute. To me, it's a clear proof or one of the proofs of unconditional election.

And the reason why I say that is that if men truly have a free will with the capacity to please

God before they are regenerate, and the way they would please God is by offering up a faith that saves them from out of their own dead, sinful soul, the

Arminian obviously believes it is not so dead, it is sick, but is still able to please

God by offering up a faith that saves them, that God is pleased enough to receive, to save the sinner.

The reason why this story seems to contradict that idea strongly is that, of course, if the

Arminians were right, someone rising from the dead to warn them about hell is going to, that would change the minds of multitudes.

Even when you think about the resurrection of Christ himself. But am

I right there? Do you think that that story lends itself to proving the doctrines of grace, at least in part?

Absolutely, Chris, that's an excellent point. There's nothing from our side that we can do to commend ourselves to God, neither can we prompt ourselves at all to seek after God out of our own, you know, depraved state, which you find yourself.

The other doctrine that's very much underlined here is the sufficiency of the

Word of God. When you put your ear to the multitudes out there, and even many

Christians, and we ourselves can relate to this, if someone said, hey, listen, here's someone who rose from the dead, he's going to tell you what heaven looks like, what hell looks like.

There's books being written, you know, supposed accounts of hell or heaven, things like that.

The Bible centers all that and basically says, Moses and the prophets.

Scripture is sufficient for salvation. If people are not going to believe Moses or the prophets, think of that.

Even the Old Testament is what Abraham is saying there, or Christ is saying there.

They're not going to believe that someone rose from the dead, and indeed, Christ rose from the dead, and what happened?

People tried to suppress that whole thing, and many turned against Christ even at that point.

Great, and we have Seth in Randleman, North Carolina. Hold on, Seth, we're going to get to your question after we return from the break.

If anybody else would like to join us, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com. That's chrisarnson at gmail .com.

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USA. Don't go away, we're going to come right back, God willing, after these messages with Dr.

Gerald M. Bilkus and more on Glory Veiled and Unveiled.

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Pastor Bill Shishko of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. If you've just joined us, our guest today for the full two hours is

Dr. Gerald Bilkus. We are discussing right now his book, Glory Veiled and Unveiled, about Christ's parables.

The second hour, we'll be talking about Mercy Revealed, a book about Christ's miracles.

If you'd like to join us on the air, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com.

And we do have Seth in Randleman, North Carolina, who wants to know the most difficult parable that theologians have interpreting.

Dr. Bilkus? Hello, Dr. Bilkus. I think that Dr.

Bilkus somehow got disconnected. Chris, I'm right here. Oh, did you fall asleep,

Dr. Bilkus? No, this was my fault. I hit the mute button during our break there, and it never turned it back on.

Well, do you want to hear something funny? I did the same thing just a few minutes ago, if you noticed there was a long pause of silence after we were talking about the rich man and Lazarus.

Yeah, yeah. Sorry about that. I was going on lecturing, and then I realized that no one was hearing me.

Well, if you could address our brother Seth's question from Randleman, North Carolina.

Absolutely. Listen, I think the most difficult parable probably is

Luke 16, 1 through 18, the parable that's known as the parable of the unjust steward. Most people know the, at least that are familiar with the parables, they know the general outline.

Here's a man who's been unjust, and he's fired. At least he's given a notice here that he is fired, and he starts negotiating with the creditors, or the debtors, excuse me, and he cuts their debt into parts, and he's commended by his lord and master for doing that.

And then various applications flow from that, and the big problem for interpreters is, how could

Christ have taken someone whose actions here seem to be very shrewd at best, and even on the surface just self -preserving and wrong?

How could this be set forth as a model for us? And so that's typically what scholars would at least agree that that would be a very difficult parable to interpret.

I've spent some time with that, and here's what I've come to, and I don't think

I've totally reached the bottom of that parable, but there's a number of applications that Christ draws from that.

I don't know if you want to hear that at this time, Chris. Oh, sure. One of them is that Christ says their children in this generation are wiser than the children of light so often, and that one is fairly easily applicable.

Worldlings, to put it frankly, they often know how to live more in light of their principles than believers do.

A lot of times they are not as...living as harmoniously with their principles, they're not making as much of a difference in the world as worldlings are.

If you kind of take the two different ways of living, Christ is saying to children of light, to believers, listen, look over your shoulders at those who are children of darkness, children of this world.

They give it their all. They're living it up. They put themselves to this head over heels, and yet those who profess faith, they're often just fledgling.

They're living, they're halting into opinions and the like. There's one very obvious lesson that comes from that.

Another lesson that I argue in my book comes from that lesson is that even if we don't approve morally of the actions of the unjust steward...by

the way, there are people who say that what he did was entirely legitimate given the system at that time, but I'll just for this moment just assume that it wasn't legitimate because that does seem on the surface to be the case.

I think what Christ is saying here is what marked this unjust steward was a sense of the moment that the only way out of the situation was for him to act this way in order that he would be received into the houses of these people who would be very indebted to him.

And should not we who realize that we have been unjust towards God and towards our neighbor, when we learn to live in light of the kingdom, which calls for a reckoning, should we not do what the

Bible enjoins us to do? And that is to seek God, to repent of our sin, knowing that the time is short.

Can we learn this, at least from the unjust steward, to really oversee our life, look at what awaits us, and act in light of what

God tells us to do? Now that doesn't mean that we do anything morally wrong or anything like that. That's not where the parable is going here.

But rather that we would, like that prodigal son in the previous parable, see this comes right on the heels of Luke 15, that he looked at his life.

There he was in the pig's die. He reckoned with the fact that he was about to die. He didn't have anything to eat, and he wasn't even allowed to eat the food of the pigs.

And he came to himself, he came to his senses. And should not we do exactly the same?

So there's one lesson. You can read more about that in the book here. I'm not the only one who's thought of that.

Calvin actually has an interpretation that's going that direction very clearly, and others have as well.

So that would be the most difficult one, Chris. Well, thank you, Seth. And you have also won a free copy of the book,

Glory Veiled and Unveiled, Complements of Reformation Heritage Books and Complements of Our Friends at cvbbs .com,

Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service. So expect that in the mail, God willing, within a week or so.

We have another listener from North Carolina, and it's really interesting.

I think by far, most of my listeners are south of the Mason -Dixon line.

I seem to have a lot of listeners in North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas, Georgia, all over the place, down south

Mississippi. I do have them up north, too, and other parts of the world, but it just seems uncanny that I have a lot of listeners down south, even though I am in the heart of Yankee territory in Pennsylvania here.

We have Pastor Sterling Vanderwerker from Greensboro, North Carolina, who says, thanks for another great show,

Brother Chris. My question is, it's certainly easy to take a purpose to the text that makes its interpretation objectively wrong.

Could the author tell us what the most dangerous ways that the parables are used?

Very good question, Pastor Sterling. Thank you. Yeah, that's an excellent question. Obviously, all sorts of scriptures have been rested, and the

Bible warns against that being twisted one way or the other. I can think of, for example, a use of the parable in Matthew 25 there towards the end, the parable of the great division, where the sheep and the goats are divided.

And you read there about how the righteous, who are welcomed into eternal glory, are commended for what they've done here on the earth, such as feeding the hungry and visiting the sick and clothing the naked and helping those in prison and the like.

And that parable has been abused by making the judgment and our just state before God at the judgment dependent on our works.

And that is an abuse of the parable. And that parable is not teaching that at all.

It is giving a judgment scene there, and there's lots in that parable, but certainly we cannot use that parable to take away from the fact that salvation is by faith alone, and that justification and our state before God is based on faith and not works.

Indeed, there are works that flow from faith, and they will show the ferocity of faith and the genuineness of faith, but we cannot take a parable like that in that direction.

There are other cases like that. We have to guard against that at every turn. Theologians like myself,

Bible scholars, pray for us because the Bible says, be not many masters, you will receive greater condemnation.

Whenever I handle the Word of God, I need to remind myself of that. Twisting the scriptures is something that the human heart is very capable of, and may

God keep us of that. Well, thank you very much, Pastor Sterling, and you have also won a copy of the book we are discussing right now,

Glory Veiled and Unveiled, A Heart -Searching Look at Christ's Parables. So expect that in the mail, compliments of Reformation Heritage Books and also compliments of CVBBS .com,

Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service. We thank you so much for participating in the show, and we ask of you to please continue spreading the word about Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, not only among the folks in your congregation, but all over the

North Carolina area and everywhere else the Lord leads you. Thank you very much for that.

And our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com. That's chrisarnson at gmail .com.

And we have Arnie in Perry County, Pennsylvania, who wants to know, were the parables ever given as a way of, in some sense, masking the truth to the reprobate, such as many of the

Pharisees and others, while at the same time revealing and opening up truth to the elect?

That is an awesome question, and that is indeed what Matthew 13 is saying, Mark 4, a parallel passage.

Here's how I think this works. I think at some level this applies to all the parables.

It doesn't mean that the reprobate cannot understand the parables at just a basic intellectual level.

They can even understand, for example, the main point of the parable. However, what happens for those who are not believers, as they listen to the parable, they never find this applied to themselves in the proper way, in the way that God has designed, that Christ is aiming for as he's teaching this parable.

In fact, if anything, they excuse themselves. Take, for example, the parable of the four soils, or the sower, as it's most commonly known.

Here you have four soils, and the seed falls on four soils.

Only one of them bears lasting fruit. Now, believers are going to listen to that parable, and among other things, going to realize that that's what's happening all over the world all the time.

The Word of God comes. There are four soils. There are four kinds of people, and they are the good soil.

True believers are. However, they will ask themselves, and this is good to ask, to what extent does something in my life maybe mirror some of these other soils as well?

There are times, certainly, when I listen to the Word of God, and I'm not engaged, and the devil comes and picks it away.

That's a reality of my heart and life. Now, that's not happening fundamentally and eternally all the time, but that is something that I should examine myself on, or that I accept it with joy, but when tribulation comes, yeah,

I get offended. Now, again, that's not a sin here that I will go lost for, but it is a tendency in my life.

Just as the old man, I'm contending with him. The remnants of sin, unbelief is in my life. Do you see here how the believer takes this parable seriously and asks the

Lord, as it were, on his knees, is it I, Lord? Is it I? Is this me? Whereas the reprobate, reads over this parable, and doesn't for a moment imagine that he's one of the three soils, or if he even does, it doesn't lead him to repentance.

He just brushes this away from himself and just, in the end, it doesn't bring him to true repentance.

It hardens him. I'll give you proof of this, Chris. In the parable of the wicked husbandman,

Jesus tells that parable, and he's aiming that parable, especially at these leaders, these religious leaders.

In the end, when they hear this parable, at an intellectual level, they can get it, but it never translates into true faith, true repentance, in fact.

They are all the angrier because they have been identified by this parable, but no lasting fruit is born in their life unto

God. Rather, they're hardened all the more. It's a principle that Paul speaks about in 1 Corinthians 2, where it's a savor of death unto death and not of life unto life.

Thank you, Arnie and Perry County. Please give us your mailing address because you've also won a free copy of the book,

Glory Veiled and Unveiled, by our guest Gerald Bilkus, compliments of Reformation Heritage Books and compliments of CVBBS .com,

Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service. We have an anonymous listener using an alias,

Lam Lam. I always chuckle when she writes in, and I'm assuming Lam Lam is a woman.

I'm not 100 % sure about that. Lam Lam in Valley Stream, Long Island, New York, is

Professor Bilkus' book, Glory Veiled and Unveiled, aimed to help readers in understanding each parable individually or see the connectivity among the parables.

Did Professor Bilkus include the background and or biblical customs related to the subject of the parable used in order to help readers understand more?

Yeah, that's a great question. I did do that. I spoke about the biblical customs, biblical worldview, some of the things that we might not get.

And as contemporary readers, many of us Western readers, I've learned a lot myself from other cultures, people who've read the parables in rural environments, which no doubt

Jesus was speaking to most of the time here. And there is a lot of insight. Now, there are books devoted just to that question, and this is not a book devoted just to that question, but I do bring it to bear on the parables where it's relevant.

For example, the 10 virgins, how would it have gone with the wedding? How do we make sense of this?

Our weddings are usually different. How do we see the connection here? When it comes to the Good Samaritan, for example, what can we learn about the geography of the

Jericho, Jerusalem road, and all the rest of that? So oftentimes I'll bring those nuggets to bear on the parables.

I don't so much connect all the parables together, though at times I make references back and forth between parables.

What I do is every parable is treated according to four categories. The one is the setting, the scenario, that's where the scenery actually is what

I call it. I look at some of these social customs. Then the substance, what's the main meaning of this parable?

Then I speak about the Savior, conveniently four S's here. So scenery, substance,

Savior. How does Christ present himself in this parable? That's some parables that's easy to discern.

Other parables you have to look for a bit, but I was really keen on discerning how does Christ unveil himself to the eye of faith in each of these parables.

Then the last category is search light. How does this search our lives, our hearts, our trust, our confidence, and all those sorts of things?

That's more application. I have a few questions at the end to help us learn, take the learning even further.

So that's how I do this, Chris. Well thank you, Lam Lam, and you've won our last copy of the book

Glory Veiled and Unveiled, a heart -searching look at Christ's parables. So please give us your full mailing address in Valley Stream, Long Island, New York, and we'll have

Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service ship that out to you. And thanks again to Reformation Heritage Books for supplying those free books.

And their website, by the way, if anybody listening would like to purchase copies of Dr.

Bilkus' books or other authors that they offer, heritagebooks .org

is the website. heritagebooks .org. And you can also go to Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service's website.

They carry many titles by heritage books, Reformation Heritage Books, and they are more than happy to order anything that you don't already see on their website.

CVBBS .com. CV for Cumberland Valley, BBS for Bible Book Service .com.

A thoroughly reformed and Christ -honoring book and Bible ministry, and I thank

Todd and Patty Jennings for their support and their faithful encouragement over the years for Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

And I would like you, Dr. Bilkus, to close this first hour by giving us a summary of what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners on the subject of the parables before we move on to the second topic.

Yeah, I would encourage all our listeners to really make a study of the parables, along with the rest of Scripture.

David, in the midst of his sin, was confronted by Nathan, most of your listeners will know that truth, with a parable of a man who had lots of sheep.

And in the moment when he needed a sheep, he stole a lamb from his neighbor.

After he told that parable, David got all furious, and he recognized the injustice of that situation.

It was at that point that Nathan pointed the finger at David and said, David, I'm talking about you.

You're the man. And what happened in that moment was that little parable that Nathan told searched

David's heart, brought him to his knees, brought him to true repentance, brought him to that confession of his sin that we have recorded for us in Psalm 51.

And though that's a particular incident, and the parables of Christ do much more than that, that is something that we need, all of us, again and again in our hearts, and that is that the

Word of God comes powerfully to us, strips away all the calluses that build up over time, seemingly just time does it.

And we need that stripped away, we need to be tender before God, and we need the Savior. And the

Savior shows Himself to us in these parables and throughout the Scriptures. And I want that kind of a close reading of the

Bible in every faithful true Christian. It grows us, it settles us, it keeps us humble and at God's feet, and that's what

I long for as the result of this book. Well, praise God for that.

And it is remarkable if you read that passage from the Old Testament about when

Nathan is confronting David, that when God is speaking through Nathan, how he,

God, is saying that he is going to rise up evil within David's house.

And all these horrible chastisements that David will receive as a result of what he has done, the wicked things that he has done, both involving adultery and murder,

God is saying, I will do this, I will do this. And it's in contradiction to the

Arminians who say that God never is in control over calamity and evil occurrences on this earth.

They try to distance and separate God from those things, but God is saying that He is going to do these things.

Absolutely, Chris. That's a lesson that we need to learn again and again in our lives, is to bow under the complete authority of Jesus Christ.

Arminianism, I believe, is just the human heart that is still in a place where it has not bowed to the total authority of God in Jesus Christ.

And even true believers, even Calvinists need that again and again, to bow under God, so God is in His rightful place, which

He is, no matter what we do. But let's bow before Him and not be broken by Him.

Amen. And by the way, if anybody wants to look up those passages that you will be, if you haven't read them already or have not really considered the weight of them, they're in 2

Samuel 12. And quite a shattering text,

I think, that dismisses the idea that God is not in control over everything.

Absolutely. And we are going to our next break right now. If you would like to join us on the air with a question for our next topic, which is

Mercy Revealed, A Cross -Centered Look at Christ's Miracles, 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 of the

USA. Only remain anonymous, please, if your question is of a personal and private matter.

Perhaps you're a member of a church and you disagree with your pastor on something, or whatever the case may be.

We would prefer that you remain anonymous, and I will actually, in cases like that, make sure that you're anonymous because we don't want to identify folks by name and we don't even know what the circumstances are.

But other than that, if you could please give us your first name, at least, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside the

USA. We're going to be right back after these messages with Dr. Gerald Bilkus, so please do not go away.

Chris Arnson here, and I can't wait to head down to Atlanta, Georgia, and here's my friend Dr. James White to tell you why.

Hi, I'm James White of Alpha and Omega Ministries. I hope you join me at the G3 conference, hosted by Pastor Josh Bice and Praise Mill Baptist Church, at the

Georgia International Convention Center in Atlanta, January 19th through the 21st, in celebration of the 500th anniversary of the

Protestant Reformation. I'll be joined by Paul Washer, Steve Lawson, D .A. Carson, Vody Balcombe, Conrad M.

Bayway, Phil Johnson, Rosaria Butterfield, Todd Friel, and a host of other speakers who are dedicated to the pillars of what

G3 stands for, gospel, grace, and glory. For more details, go to G3conference .com.

That's G3conference .com. Thanks, James. Make sure you greet me at the

Iron Sharpens Iron exhibit booth while you're there. Paul wrote to the church at Galatia, For am

I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man,

I would not be a servant of Christ. Hi, I'm Mark Lukens, pastor of Providence Baptist Church. We are a

Reformed Baptist Church, and we hold to the London Baptist Confession of Faith of 1689. We are in Norfolk, Massachusetts.

We strive to reflect Paul's mindset to be much more concerned with how God views what we say and what we do than how men view these things.

That's not the best recipe for popularity, but since that wasn't the Apostles' priority, it must not be ours either.

We believe, by God's grace, that we are called to demonstrate love and compassion to our fellow man, and to be vessels of Christ's mercy to a lost and hurting community around us, and to build up the body of Christ in truth and love.

If you live near Norfolk, Massachusetts, or plan to visit our area, please come and join us for worship and fellowship.

You can call us at 508 -528 -5750, that's 508 -528 -5750, or go to our website to email us, listen to past sermons, worship songs, or watch our

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that's providencebaptistchurchma .org, or even on sermonaudio .com. Providence Baptist Church is delighted to sponsor

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Hi, I'm Pastor Bill Shishko, inviting you to tune in to a visit to the pastor's study every

Saturday from 12 noon to 1 p .m. on WLIE Radio, www .wlie540am

.com. We bring biblically faithful pastoral ministry to you, and we invite you to visit the pastor's study by calling in with your questions.

Our time will be lively, useful, sometimes controversial, but never dull. Join us this

Saturday at 12 noon for a visit to the pastor's study, because everyone needs a pastor.

That's 12 noon to 1 p .m. Eastern time on WLIE 540am on the radio dial if you live in the

New York Tri -State area, but also if you live anywhere on the planet Earth and have a computer, you can hear it via live streaming at wlie540am .com.

And we hope that you tune in regularly and call in regularly to a visit to the pastor's study hosted by Pastor Bill Shishko of the

Orthodox Presbyterian Church. If you've just tuned us in, our guest today for the full two hours with an hour to go is

Dr. Gerald Bilkus. We are now going to be discussing as our second topic today, his book

Mercy Revealed, a cross -centered look at Christ's miracles. If you'd like to join us on the air with a question, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com,

chrisarnson at gmail .com, c -h -r -i -s -a -r -n -z -e -n at gmail .com.

And please give us your first name, city and state and country of residence if you live outside of the good old

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Please mark your calendars. If you are a man in ministry leadership, whether you're a pastor or in leadership in a parachurch organization, or perhaps you are a deacon or some other sort of leader in your church and you're a man, you are welcome to attend a free luncheon.

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This is an old bank from the early 20th century that has been transformed into a gorgeous catering hall, hence the name

The Vault, and they have been so gracious and generous to us to provide us this catering hall at a much less expensive cost than the general public would be paying to rent this facility.

We are going to be blessed with a guest speaker named Dr. Tony Costa. He is

Professor of Apologetics at Toronto Baptist Seminary. Then, the very next day, 7 p .m.

on Friday the 13th, January 13th that is, Dr.

Tony Costa is going to be debating a Roman Catholic theologian, Dr. Robert St.

Genes, on the theme, Mary, Sinless Queen of Heaven or Sinner Saved by Grace.

That's going to be held at the historic Carlisle Theater, another beautifully restored building from the early 20th century.

It's an old -fashioned theater but restored to brand new quality, although retaining the historic architecture of the building.

It's absolutely breathtaking. It's one of those old -fashioned theaters with the very high ceilings that some of you may have just seen in movies.

But the debate will be held 7 p .m. to 11 p .m. and that is

Friday the 13th in January. The tickets to that event are $5, unlike the pastor's luncheon, which is absolutely free of charge.

So if you would like to attend either of those or both of those events, please email me at chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

Dr. Bilkus, Mercy revealed a cross -centered look at Christ's miracles.

What was the motivation behind you writing this book? Yes, Chris, thanks once again for letting me be on your program.

Yes, I wrote this as a follow -up volume after my parables volume, which is entitled Glory Revealed and Unveiled.

I took a look at Christ's miracles, which, like the parables, are windows into especially the heart of God in Jesus Christ as he has come in the flesh, in Jesus Christ, and he has performed many miracles during his time here on the earth.

I call them windows because they show more than just a remarkable happening where someone who's lame or blind begins to walk or receive sight.

They're signs of the kingdom, as I argue here. And more than that, when we trace them through, we find that the gospel is contained in each of these and points to the cross, which is the ultimate foundation for our salvation.

So I was aiming in this book to open up the miracles for all that they are and really seeing their function in the

Synoptic Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, as well as John, and opening them up and making them applicable for believers in our day as well.

We have B .B. in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, who wants to know if you believe in modern -day miracles.

B .B. says, I am not Pentecostal or charismatic, and I do not believe in modern -day miracle workers.

I do not believe in the gift of performing miracles as the apostles had, but I do believe

God continues and will always continue to do the miraculous.

What is your guest's opinion of this? Yes, great question. I get that question a lot as soon as we touch on the issue of miracles, and it's a good one.

And we have a lot of people out there today who are claiming all over the world really to be able to perform miracles, and in many countries, not only our own but throughout the world, and especially in Africa and in Asia, we have people who are making that really a central aspect of Christianity, performing miracles and all the rest.

The Bible has a view of miracles that is really stunning, and we need to see it for what it is.

And in the Bible, the miracles are divine acts outside of normal occurrences.

You know, God is acting in everything. From the moment He spoke this world into being in six days,

He's upholding everything through the Word of His power. His actions are governing everything, and His actions are no less behind the normal processes of the world as they are in what we call miracles.

Now, the terminology, the language of miracles is used by the Bible, and it's used for things that take place outside of or different from what is normally expected.

So, for example, the fact that Israel could cross the Red Sea was a miracle, that the water was parted there, and made a path for people to pass through.

Now, that's no less of a divine act as keeping the continents in their place, or making sure the oceans, the seas, the rivers, and all that are operating in a way that we call normal.

All of those are the acts of God, but miracles are those things that are spectacular, where God really puts on display

His power in a way that we sit up, take notice. Now, indeed, the

Lord continues to do things that, from our perspective today, are stunning, that draw attention to some of His abnormal activities.

But they don't have the function that they had in the Bible. I think we need to make a difference there. Now, they do draw our attention.

They make us sit up and take note. We glorify God in that. But the miracles in the

Scripture were a special configuration of God's power to witness to the

Kingdom, to witness to His glory, to His power, to what Christ had come to do. We can't say that exact same thing about the things that we see happening around us, though we should always sit up and take note.

And we should do so even for the everyday processes. We've just passed through Thanksgiving season, and we've once again received a harvest, and things have gone in such a way that God's actions have been there, and He's proved

Himself faithful to His promise. Season after season comes, we should glorify Him for not just that which is spectacular, but also that which comes as less spectacular.

It's all His glorious work. So I would agree with the questioner, absolutely, in how she worded that.

By the way, I don't know if B .B. is a she either. I have assumed that too, but B .B.

Warfield was a woman. No, no, no, absolutely. And B .B.

Warfield was very respectable. I consult him often. A few points he and I would disagree, but he was a glorious theologian.

He really, yeah, he was at Princeton far earlier than myself, but he was a great man.

Well, guess what, B .B.? If you give us your mailing address, you are getting a free copy of Mercy Revealed, a cross -centered look at Christ's miracles, compliments of Reformation Heritage Books, and compliments of Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service, cvbbs .com.

We have Harrison in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, who wants to know, is the devil capable of actually performing a miracle, or are his miracles merely a charade or a counterfeit?

That's interesting. A very good question, Harrison. In fact, it's interesting that in Revelation 13, starting at verse 13, when it's referring to the beast, it says he performs great signs so that he even makes fire come down out of heaven to the earth in the presence of men.

He deceives those who dwell on the earth because of the signs which it was given him to perform in the presence of the beast, telling those who dwell on the earth to make an image to the beast who had the wound of the sword and has come to life.

And it was given to him to give breath to the image of the beast so that the image of the beast would even speak and cause as many as do not worship the image of the beast to be killed.

And he causes all the small and the great and the rich and the poor and the free men and the slaves to be given a mark on their right hand or on their forehead, and he provides that no one will be able to buy or sell except for one who has the mark, either the name of the beast or the number of his name.

But it's talking about bringing down fire from the sky. Do you think that this is actually physically happening, or is the beast making it an appearance that fire is coming from the sky, but it's not in reality something that is occurring?

That is a great, great question. And Chris, your path, going to that path, that's exactly where my mind was going as you mentioned that.

We must think along the same lines here. That is a great path. I think it helps your questioner a lot.

Here's what I'd say about this. The deal with Satan is there's two things, two dangers that we have.

The one is to overestimate his power, and the other is to underestimate his power. And a lot of times we fall into the one extreme or the other extreme, or we can flip back and forth between the two.

Satan is powerful. God has accorded him a measure of power, obviously under him and under his control, absolutely.

But he is not all -powerful. He's not omnipresent or any of these attributes that belong to God alone. When it comes to miracles, this is what

I would say. The Lord has allowed Satan to be able to do great things. I think much of the time, the things that appear to be miraculous are indeed charades.

In ancient cultures, a lot of that was going on. We still have magic today, as people speak about it.

A lot of it's just deceit. But there is demonic power, and a lot of these ancient religions engaged in this, whereby indeed remarkable feats were accomplished.

Some of the actions of the magicians, for example, in the Book of Exodus, seem to belong in this category. Now, there's always a limit to them, like you see with those signs and wonders that they tried to perform to mimic what

Moses and Aaron were doing. There's a limit. And yet, and here's the rub,

Satan can do miracles. He has a certain capability to do that.

So the question is not, look at the miraculous and follow it. No. You need a discerning mind.

Just because something is happening that appears to be miraculous, or even can verifiably be called miraculous, doesn't mean that God is at work in this.

We need to test everything by the Scriptures, whether these things are so. Paul says that even an angel of light, if they would come and preach another gospel, if you and I, Chris, had an angel of light appear to us, or while we were preaching, or whatever it was, we would take note, wouldn't we?

Now, here's the danger. That may very well be the devil in disguise, or some other dark force in disguise.

Just because you have an angel of light, just because you have a miracle, doesn't mean that we have God verifying something.

He comes sometimes to test us, whether we will obey his word, whether or not the things that we see around us are stunning or not, spectacular or not.

Great question. Yes, and thank you, Harrison, and I'm in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, and please give us your full mailing address, because you have also won a free copy of Mercy Revealed by our guest today, compliments of Reformation Heritage Books, and compliments of Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service.

In that same line of thinking, one thing that baffles me that I have brought up a number of times on this program to different guests, and I do not receive harmonious answers, sometimes

I do, but it is when Saul had the medium conjure up Samuel, and this is in 1

Samuel 28, I believe. And the medium actually successfully, from what we can read, does conjure up this spirit or soul of Samuel who had been deceased, and this is nowhere mentioned in the scripture as a fraudulent or a charlatan scam.

In fact, the medium herself was terrorized by this. Yeah. Yeah, well, the way

I take that, I realize there are different positions about that. I do believe that that was demonic power at work, but it came in such a way that, indeed, the medium was frightened.

I think it came with such power. I think it was a message, you know, that the devils can even relay messages.

But I still think, given my eschatology, my biblical eschatology, I don't think we have here

Samuel being conjured up from the grave at all. That goes, in my mind, against what we have about the intermediate state.

The souls of believers are immediately in the presence of Christ. They are at rest. I would have a real problem with that.

I realize that interpreters go different directions on that, but I would say that's an instance of demonic force that shows itself to be very powerful, and yet that's not

Samuel. That's where I come down on that. And, of course, I'm assuming you believe that not even that could occur without the sovereign power of God.

Oh, absolutely. The Lord permitted that, indeed, and His power is behind that.

Absolutely. Here's the deal with Satan. He cannot move an inch without the permission of the

Lord. The Lord's power is overall. Look at Job chapter 1. Satan has to request, and even then the

Lord puts limits on that, and that's true in everything and everywhere. The wrath of men shall praise thee, that the

Psalms say. And concerning the devil, too, he cannot take a step, he cannot go a millimeter further than what the

Lord allows. Amen. Well, I'd like you to go through some of the miracles that you list in your book.

You obviously have far too many for us to cover during the course of the next 45 minutes or so, but one of the miracles, in fact the first that you list in Exegete, is the great catch of fish, if you could explain.

Yes, that one takes place. It's recorded for us in Matt, in Luke 5, and it's a great instance of, it's just so instructive.

What happens there is that Peter and a few other disciples are fishing, and they've spent the whole night not caught anything, and Christ is on the shore waiting for them, and He tells them to cast the net on the other side, and they will catch.

And Peter enters into that, quick to speak as he is, and he protests initially there, and says,

Lord, we have toiled all the night, and we've caught nothing. Nevertheless, at thy word, I will let down the net.

It's just a very interesting, Luke 5, verse 5, there's the language of unbelief there at the beginning.

Lord, we've toiled all the night and caught nothing. It's almost like he's resisting what Christ is saying there. Yet, at thy word,

I will let down the net. And I think all true believers can recognize something in their own hearts there, where there's their own wisdom, and then there's that subjection of their mind and heart to the

Lord and to His wisdom. So, you obey the Lord, and indeed, so many fish are caught that the net is just a breaking point.

The ship almost sinks there. They need to bring in extra help. And when

Peter recognizes that, he says, Luke 5, verse 8, depart from me for I am a sinful man.

There's a profound effect that this miracle has on Simon Peter's life, and yet the

Lord raises him up. He says, fear not, you will also catch men. This is a powerful display of Christ's ability, and he does this in order to show the disciples here that he's not simply another man, and that he's come for gracious purposes, and that he's raising up people like Simon Peter and other disciples to catch men.

He's come for a great task, and that miracle is just radiant, full of the grace of God, and it captivates

Simon. It shows Simon his own heart, his own sin, and yet in the end, it wins him over to follow the

Lord into the ministry here. And I quote at the end of the chapter, Calvin, who in his commentary on this says something very interesting.

He says, thus Christ sinks his own people in the grave, that he may afterwards raise them to life.

He sees a miracle going on beneath the miracle of the fish, and that is in the heart of Peter.

He sees Peter just coming to that realization of the sovereignty of God, the power of God, the majesty of Christ, and he just sinks down before Christ.

But Christ himself raises him by his word, and makes him to realize, don't trust yourself, don't trust your own instincts, rely on my word, and you'll be safe.

Amen. We have Joe again from Slovenia, who has a question about this topic.

He says, thank you so much for this timely topic. Andy Stanley is sadly continuing his shameful slide into postmodern deconstructionism.

Because we are into the Christmas season, his topic is denying the virgin birth of Christ.

Wow, I didn't know anything about that. Here are two quotes from a recent talk he gave at his church.

If somebody can predict their own death and then their own resurrection,

I'm not at all concerned about how they got into the world. Christianity doesn't hinge on the truth or even the stories around the birth of Jesus.

And he says, I'm personally of the persuasion that the virgin birth of Christ is a crucial part of Christianity.

This, by the way, is our listener saying this, Joe in Slovenia. Isn't it a fact crucial to the gospel?

If Jesus has not been miraculously born of a virgin, then how could he have been free of original sin, lived a perfect human life, and died the perfect atoning death on the cross for my sin?

If the incarnation did not happen, how could Jesus be fully God and fully man?

If the virgin birth did not happen, then how could prophecy have been fulfilled?

And how could Jesus escape being tainted by original sin? Isn't the whole nativity a crucial part of Christianity?

Amen, really great question. Although I'm not sure, even though I am not a fan of Andy Stanley at all,

I'm not sure that those quotes explicitly prove that he denies the virgin birth.

He just apparently doesn't think it's very important. But anyway, if you could comment. Yeah, our questioner is right on here.

I've seen many who have started to throw this miracle and that miracle overboard.

And their motivation, in most cases, has been to become more acceptable with academia or with people's own views of the world.

And it's ill -fated from the very outset. I can't go there at all.

People have tried to explain naturally some of the miracles in Exodus, you know, the burning bush and things like that.

Again, the Bible makes very clear what is a miracle. And we need to hold to this.

Matthew, the other gospel authors, the whole scriptures make clear that the birth of Christ was absolutely astounding.

And unlike anything in all the world, it was the birth by a virgin, as Isaiah prophesied, and as Matthew confirms without a doubt,

God manifest in the flesh. Paul says, born of a woman, and indeed that woman was a virgin.

All the prophecies come together in the birth of Christ. And absolutely, we're not going to move an inch away from that.

Our faith, I believe, does stand and fall on that. As the questioner says, if we do not have a

Savior that is born of a virgin, not only is prophecy not prophecy, not true, not infallible, but we have a

Savior who indeed is the fallen son of Adam. And everything, the whole thing is nothing but a house of cards that falls in.

Instead, we have a firm building in the scriptures. Our foundation, the foundation of salvation is secure in God.

He has ordered this. Yes, it's in a way that's past finding out, but that's what we need to realize.

God is God, and He's not a man. His thoughts are higher than our thoughts. Let us bow in the dust before Him and realize that God who made the heavens and earth in six days, six 24 -hour days,

He can do whatsoever He pleases, and that He has done it is just amazing.

It'll take an eternity to praise Him for that.

Yeah, I can remember a Jewish friend of mine, Orthodox Jewish friend, who said he was trying to throw a monkey wrench into the virgin birth.

And he said, you know that the Hebrew word that is used in that prophecy for the virgin birth of Jesus, all's it means is a young girl.

And I said, oh really, Bob? Well, that may be true, but how on earth could that be a sign when young girls were giving birth by the thousands?

And he said, you know something? You're right. He hadn't realized the nonsensical response that he had for what it was, because that could not be a sign when the average age,

I think, of women being mothers back then, they were in their early teens. Yes, for sure.

That was a great response, by the way, and indeed. And what corroborates that is that before Christ was born, the

Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament, which was probably second century, if not before, it used a word to translate there in Isaiah 7.

It used a Greek word that is very distinctly and very exclusively virgin.

And so even before the miracle of the incarnation took place, interpreters,

Jewish interpreters, those who were basing it on the Hebrew Bible, the Old Testament, they were using the word.

They understood that this meant a virgin birth. Yes, in fact, they would all have been

Jewish prior to the birth of Christ, other than those who were one to the faith, the

Jewish faith prior to Christ. So before Christ's birth, they would have all been of the religion of the

Hebrews, of the Jews. But anyway, we have to go to our final break right now.

And thank you very much, Joe and Slovenia, for the excellent question and even your comments as well. We're going to our final break right now.

If you'd like to join us on the air, I would send your email in as quickly as possible, because we've only got about 25 minutes left or so, because we have commercial break time here.

So send us an email at chrisarnson at gmail .com. chrisarnson at gmail .com.

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Join us this Saturday at 12 noon for a visit to the pastor's study, because everyone needs a pastor.

That's 12 noon eastern time to 1 pm eastern time on WLIE 540

AM on your radio dial if you live in the New York tri -state area, but you can hear it anywhere on the planet earth via live streaming at wlie540am .com,

wlie540am .com, and we hope that you continue listening to a visit to the pastor's study hosted by Pastor Bill Shishko of the

Orthodox Presbyterian Church, a dear friend of mine for approximately 30 years.

If you'd like to join us on the air now with a question, you can email us at chrisarnson at gmail .com,

chrisarnson at gmail .com. Our guest for the last 90 minutes and the next half hour today has been and will continue to be

Gerald M. Bilkus, Professor of New Testament and Biblical Theology at Puritan Reform Theological Seminary in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

And by the way, before I forget or run out of time, I just want to announce the website for the

Puritan Reform Theological Seminary. It's prts .edu. P -R for Puritan Reformed, T -S for Theological Seminary, dot edu.

prts .edu is the website for the seminary where our guest,

Dr. Gerald M. Bilkus, is a professor of New Testament and Biblical Theology.

We're talking about his book Mercy Revealed during this last half hour, and if you'd like to join us again, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com.

And what are some of the most compelling examples of the miraculous

Jesus's miracles in the New Testament that you would like to cite today within the next 20 minutes or so?

Yeah, Chris, it's hard, some people have asked me what's your favorite miracle, and that shifts from time to time.

I love the Bartimaeus miracle. It's dear to many people, this blind beggar outside the city of Jericho, and Christ is on his way.

It's one of the final miracles he does before he dies on the cross, and here's this blind beggar, and everyone tells him to be quiet, but he cries the louder,

Jesus, stand still, what do you want? And that I might see, and the light of the world opens the eyes there of this blind beggar, and he follows him in the way.

That's so captivating, such a glorious picture, and there's so much saving significance there.

The miracle of the demon possessed man who's just ravaged with a legion of devils lives in caves, that's a very gripping one as well.

Two thousand pigs go over the cliff there, and it's just a remarkable thing that's happening there, just to free this man, and the people don't even want

Jesus to stay around. It's remarkable that this man sits at Jesus's feet, clothed, and in his right mind.

A miracle that's really captivated me as well is the healing of that son of the widow of Nain, Luke 7, and of course, that was a spectacular miracle.

There were three people Jesus raised during his lifetime, the daughter of Jairus, and Lazarus, of course, spectacularly there at the end of his ministry there,

John 11, but this son of the widow of Nain is very gripping, and he seems to have gone a number of miles out of the way just to visit this city.

We don't read of any other purpose that he did this for, except that he meets this procession there, this funerary procession, and he comes with his own procession, and they're outside the gate of the city of Nain.

These two processions meet. One is really, it has been called by commentators, a procession of death, and of course

Christ is at the head of the procession of life, and there they meet, and Christ is a conqueror there over death, and what an event that must have been.

No wonder the people said, we have seen wonderful things today. All this was a message of what

Christ had come to do. He had come to destroy him that had the power of death, even the devil, and to bring life and mortality to light in the gospel.

Praise God. We do have a Christian in Cumberland Valley, Pennsylvania, who says, some of my

Arminian friends have told me that our faith is hinged on whether or not our prayers are answered.

These Arminian friends would typically be charismatic or Pentecostal, and they will cite some of Jesus's miracles that describe the miracles occurring after Jesus told the person to do something.

If you could explain whether or not this disproves the fact that our faith, the strength of our faith is not required for a miracle to occur in our lives.

Yeah, that's a great question. Now, let me say from the outset that Arminians, I think they have it all wrong in terms of the doctrine of salvation, and it can be that God's leading you along here.

There's a great article by John Murray, who is a staunch Calvinist, and he talks about Arminianism in the pilgrimage of the soul.

You can find this article online. It's wonderful. A lot of times when God saves us, he does so in a way in which we're not totally aware that we are absolutely corrupt, depraved, thoroughly unable to do anything.

But as God leads his true people, this becomes more and more of a burden in our life, that in me dwelleth no good thing, and we cast ourselves wholly and solely in Jesus Christ.

So that's an interesting article to read, by the way, that whole question of Arminianism. I know it's a bit of a sideline, but there is, in the natural heart, there's the tendency to make a lot of man, and man's actions, and man's works, and man's doings.

And the Bible says that we are dead in sins and trespasses. You have me quickened, he says, in Ephesians 2, which we're dead in trespasses and sins.

That's not flattering to the human heart and to the human mind. The Holy Spirit regenerates us.

He illumines our mind. He makes us to reckon with that. That's humbling. That's like a knife in our soul.

We don't like that. Man, by nature, does everything to resist that. Now, why do I go into this?

Because in terms of the greatest miracle that the Bible speaks about in terms of ourselves, it's the resurrection of the dead soul to life in the gospel.

People say, do you believe in miracles? We talked about this early in the program. And I do believe that we can see the spectacular still today.

We shouldn't court this. We shouldn't. This is not what we are called to do in our world. But we do, when our eyes are open, we see

God working in many different ways. But the central miracle that takes place the world over is life being granted to a dead soul by grace through the power of the

Holy Spirit on the basis of Christ's work on the cross. And that miracle takes place without our instrumentality whatsoever.

Indeed, we are said to believe, but regeneration is not through faith. We believe upon regeneration.

That is the act of the newborn soul. Obviously, by grace and by grace alone, it's empty of all merit.

We believe that on the basis of the scriptures, but that's the miracle that we all should seek for and that we all must have if we are going to be heirs of eternal life.

Now, a lot of these miracles of which your questioner is asking, well, there was like this man who had to dip in the pool of Siloam seven times.

Yeah, the gospel comes with all kinds of obligations. It calls us to repent and to believe, to cast aside our own righteousness.

And all these things, when we by grace do them, they're ultimately not our works.

They're God's work in us. Yes, we are mobilized. We are energized by his spirit. But without his grace, without his

Holy Spirit, none of these things would take place. So all of it is a miracle. Even the prayer that you pray, even that look to Christ that saves all of that has its origin in God and God alone.

I hope that helped. Well, thank you very much, Christian, in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania. And you too have won a copy of the book,

Mercy Revealed, A Cross -Centered Look at Christ's Miracles by our guest, Dr. Jerry Bilkus.

And if you could give us your full mailing address, we'll have that shipped out to you by Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service.

Keep your eye open for an envelope that says CVBBS .com on it.

And that gift is compliments of our friends at Reformation Heritage Books. So thank you very much for contributing to the program.

We have Murray in Kinross, Scotland, who says,

I was greatly helped by the explanation you gave of the purpose of parables.

Do you see a governing purpose for miracles too? Apologies if I missed this.

Luke 5, the great draft of fishes, surely another miracle was that experienced fishermen went all night without catching a single fish.

Would this be the sovereignty of God in fashioning events to fulfill his purpose?

That's Murray in Kinross, Scotland. Excellent. Well, I'm very glad with this question, and greetings to our friends in Scotland.

We're very thankful for the heritage that comes from Scotland. We long for days of revival once again, if the

Lord would grant that. Now, I deal with the purpose of miracles on page four of my book, and I narrow it down to four, and I'll just list them here.

One is to announce the arrival of the Christ coming. Isaiah prophesied of this, then shall the eyes of the blind be opened,

Isaiah 35. And so it's announcing the kingdom. And then secondly, it's to illustrate what

Christ does in redemption. If you look at these miracles, especially the healing miracles, what takes place is you have a man or a woman in need, and the need speaks of their misery and the effects of sin in their life.

Take, for example, this woman with the issue of blood. There she is. She's hemorrhaging. She's losing her life.

Life is ebbing away from her. She's unclean. She's in great misery. No one is able to help her.

Doctors, she's spent all her livelihood, and she's none the better. But it's one touch of the hem of Christ's robe.

By faith, she's healed. And virtue goes out of Christ. That's what we read in the text, strength, power.

And she's healed. She's restored. And she confesses her faith in Christ. And she joys in God.

And the crowds as well, they joy in God. So it's a picture of what God does in redemption. And it foreshadows therein the benefits that Christ would accomplish on Calvary, whereby he took away the cause of our misery, namely sin, and he secured for us our righteousness and life forevermore.

These things are pictured in various miracles as well. And ultimately, all the miracles combined together is showing forth the glory of the

Son of God in our nature, Jesus Christ. So there's four purposes there. In a way, you could just say it glorifies

God's work of redemption, which is all to his glory.

Well, thank you very much. Murray and Kinross Scotland keep spreading the word about Iron Sharpens Iron in the

UK for us. Let's see, we have Bob in White Plains, New York.

Bob in White Plains, New York says that I have friends who take a strict prohibitionist interpretation of the consumption of alcohol, or should

I say against it. They do not believe that the miracle at the wedding feast of Cana involved water turning into fermented wine, but merely grape juice.

The reason being is that for the massive quantities of wine that were brought about from this miracle, people would have been getting drunk left and right.

What is your guest's take on this? This is an interesting debate in Christendom right now, and there's various schools of thought about that.

I certainly think that a lot of damage has been done in our world through alcohol, and Christians are called to be very modest and moderate at best in their consumption of alcohol.

I know many people who will stay away from alcohol just because of the pernicious influence that it has in many circles.

This is a posture that's taken by some in order to guard themselves, their children, their families, their churches.

But yet to say that this is the biblical teaching, I think, is different.

And so if that is your opinion, if that is your stance, I certainly commend it in terms of really wanting to stay away from what

I see so many succumbing under. On the other hand, is this exactly taught in Scripture? I myself am not convinced of that.

As it regards the miracle of the changing the water into wine, here's what

I would say about that. Simply because the Lord, in a miraculous way, gives a provision of wine does not mean that that wine ought not to be dealt with very responsibly.

You could go from this scenario to the Lord allows us, for example, to cultivate grapes and to produce wine.

But the very fact that we are able, especially in certain regions, to produce a lot of grapes and a lot of wine does not mean that God somehow, in His creative design, is warranting us to abuse that in any way.

So too, this miracle or any miracle in the Bible is to show forth its power.

It has a redemptive significance. But to take this or that and to abuse this in a direction that Christ in the rest of the

Scriptures would certainly censure would be foolish and wrong. I hope that helps.

Thank you very much, Bob. And you are also getting a free copy of Mercy Revealed, a cross -centered look at Christ's miracles.

Please give us your full mailing address in White Plains, New York, and we'll have Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service cbbs .com

ship that out to you. And we thank, once again, our friends at Reformation Heritage Books for providing these free books.

Yes, I happen to have been, by God's grace, delivered from alcohol addiction myself, drunkenness.

And that is a damning sin, and it does disturb me at times when some of our

Reformed brethren who typically believe in the liberty to drink alcohol sometimes cross the borderline of responsible, moderate consumption of alcohol to boasting about it and rubbing it in the faces of their brethren who have a different point of view.

And I happen to agree that a Christian does have a liberty to moderately and responsibly drink alcohol.

I do not believe I have that liberty anymore. And I was leading some there with that, and I completely flew out of my head here.

Oh, this is what I was going to say. I have heard, and perhaps you can disagree, but I have heard that the strict prohibition or abstinence view or teetotaling view amongst

Christians did not even rise up within Christianity until the 19th century, and that Christians of all denominations and branches believed in the responsible and moderate consumption of wine and alcohol, barring drunkenness, which all unanimously believe is a damning sin to habitually be a drunkard.

But do you know of that historically? I can't speak about the history of it.

It rings kind of true, but if someone could present evidence to the contrary, I certainly would look at that.

I would agree with your viewpoint entirely here. And I do think, especially in our day and age when drunkenness is celebrated and pushed, unless the

Lord really would return and revive us once again, we are going to face days in which this is going to come into the

Christian community with greater force and with greater damage. I think we need to stand on our guard. But again,

I gave you my position there. I think we have to be careful that we don't force the Scriptures simply out of reaction, but we have to remain truthful and indeed warn very much against the sin of our days, which certainly includes drunkenness.

Well, I really want you to summarize what you most want etched in the minds of our listeners about the miracles of Jesus over the next five minutes or so before we close the program today.

Well, Chris, let me thank you so much for the opportunity to be on the air with you. It's been a great privilege, and it's been a delight to hear from your listeners and the things that are living in their hearts.

Very good questions, very stimulating. I love interacting with people, with everyday believers who are going face to face with the

Scriptures, and I just want to commend your listeners for doing that, and I pray that they would do that. That's the means of grace, together with faithful attendance among the people of God, to hear

His Word. These are the key things that we need to grow in grace and in the knowledge of our

Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, and to be a light in the midst of our world, which is dark and seems to be darkening, at least here in this section of the

Western world. Nevertheless, our faith in God is firm, and the

Word testifies of what God is able to do in the midst of gross darkness and in great misery.

And the miracle that I referred to just a moment ago about the man who had this legion of demons, he was possessed with them, really has a great message to not only ourselves individually, personally, but to our culture as well.

That particular man was hiding about in caves. He was involved in all kinds of darkness.

He was cutting himself. He was just on the brink, teetering on the brink of hell.

And there may be someone listening to us who finds himself in exactly that position.

If I'm speaking to anyone here like that, I'm glad you're listening, and I pray

God that he would work with his almighty power. He can redeem our lives from destruction.

He speaks of that in his Word. He can crown us with loving kindness and tender mercies.

He can renew our youth like the eagles, as he says. These are all quotations from Psalm 103.

We need to fall on our faces before. We need to heed his Word. We need to confess our sins.

We need to be in his Word with the prayer, Lord, that I might see, like Bartimaeus did, and that we would see the

Lord Jesus Christ and all his willingness to save and all the glory of his person and of his work.

He's come as a full savior of sinners. He can save to the uttermost. No bondage is too great, but the

Lord can save from it by the power of his Holy Spirit. We just spoke a moment ago about drunkenness and how it is a damning sin when continued and when habitual.

We need deliverance from this and like sins. And if there are people in your audience who are struggling with that, my friend, if this is you, seek help from the

Lord and also from the body of faith. Confess your sins. Do not go into a lifestyle of drunkenness or into any drunkenness again, because with the

Lord, there is mercy to cover the sins of the past, but there's also strength to defeat sin in the present.

The basis of what Christ has purchased for us is Spirit in dwelling us.

And so we need to be in the Scriptures. We need to take hold of the promises. We need the work of the

Spirit to apply this to ourselves. There's great hope when we cling to the Savior. The miracles, they feed that hope, because what

God did to each of these sinners lost in sin and in miserable conditions, he can do in our lives as well in terms of sin and salvation.

And it would be my heart's desire that someone who would hear this broadcast would indeed be motivated to seek

God, to seek his truth, to not build on a sandy foundation, to not simply rest on a decisionism or whatever, but to cast themselves wholly and solely in Jesus Christ in the gospel.

He can save to the uttermost. That would be a great miracle that would come forth from this program if the

Lord would bless his word to that end. Amen. And I'd like to mention a text that also further bolsters my belief in God's grace in saving sinners through unconditional election.

In John 5, when we have the man healed at the pool of Bethesda, I remember hearing an old landmark

Baptist, a Calvinist landmark Baptist from Texas, preaching a sermon.

And he said in his very thick Texan accent, uh, he said, uh, uh, let's see, uh, now a certain man that was there who had an infirmity 38 years.

And he said, a certain man, he said, there were men, men all over the place that were sick, but there was a certain man there that Jesus wanted to heal and did heal.

And I think that I'd never heard that application of that miracle in that way before, but that is interesting that there were many, there were a multitude of sick people as the text said, and Jesus is not healing everybody there, but he sees a certain man.

Yeah. Wonderful. He must need to go through Samaria. You know, his divine purpose is such that he will reach every center and he will do so with the sovereign grace.

Amen. Well, I know that the Puritan Reform Theological Seminary website is prts .edu.

Do you have any other contact information? No, that's great. If anyone wants to be in touch with us, our email addresses are there and phone numbers as well.

It's been a great privilege, Chris, to be with you on the air. God bless you and everything. And don't forget about heritagebooks .org,

heritagebooks .org, and cvbbs .com. I want everybody to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater savior than you are a sinner.

We look forward to hearing from you and your questions for our guests tomorrow on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. God bless.