The Church II: More than a Story | Behold Your God Podcast

Welcome to the Behold Your God podcast, I'm Teddy James, content producer for Media Grazie. This week, not with John Snyder. This week again, we have Jeff Johnson. If you missed last week's episode, Jeff is the author, host, and narrator of Media Grazie's latest project, The Church.

Jeff, first off, man, thanks for coming again. I appreciate you taking time to be with us. And again, in case somebody missed last week, would you introduce us to yourself and kind of tell us who you are and what you do?

Yeah, thanks, Teddy. I'm Jeff Johnson, live here in Conway, Arkansas, where I'm at at the Grace Bible Theological Seminary, where I'm the president of, it's a ministry of the church that I pastor, Grace Bible Church.

So here I am a pastor, president of a seminary, I teach at the seminary as well. Also, I oversee a publishing company called Free Grace Press and hang out with Teddy and Steven at Media Grazie every now and then.

Yeah, and you are a board member of Media Grazie as well. I forgot to mention that last episode.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's been great to be a board member of MG, so it's, I think it's going on a couple months now.

Well, Jeff, last time we were together, we really talked a lot about the church, the importance of the church, the vitality and necessity of the church. This week, I want to take a slightly different angle.

We spend a great deal of time in the church project talking about church history. And anybody who has ever listened to this podcast before knows that we really love and we really love talking about church history.

So I wanted to take a few minutes because I think one of the things that we've done is we've simply assumed that people understand the importance of church history and really diving deep into it and understanding the story of how we got from first century Christianity to the Roman Catholic Church to the Reformation all the way up until 2020.

But I don't know that we've ever really sat down and had a conversation articulating why these things are so important and the impact that they have on our lives and on our families and on our churches and our cultures today.

So that's really what I'd like to talk with you about. So, Jeff, first off, when we talk about the church, we're talking about ecclesiology. Can you articulate for us very briefly the role of understanding church history?

And let me just leave it there. Can you just help me understand and articulate why it's so important that we understand?

The Role of Church History in Theology

Yeah, if you read almost any theologian, you're going to read church history mixed into their theology. And there's an important reason why that's the case. Even Paul said that there needs to be divisions or controversies among you, and he is explaining that there's going to be heretical beliefs popping up.

But that's important and necessary because God's going to use what the devil intends for evil, for good. It's it's error that helps us clarify truth. It was through kind of the controversies of the person of Christ.

Is he divine or is he human? And how did the hapistotic union develop at all? That controversy led the church to have to go to the scriptures and determine the exact biblical doctrine of Christ. And then the next controversy was the Trinity and and so forth.

And it's as if these heresies brought about clarity to truth. And thus, we see the development of theology takes place through church history. And it's important for us to understand the role of church history in the theology and doctrines that we we believe.

Yeah, so why do you think there's and maybe this is just my perception and perhaps I'm wrong, but growing up, I didn't know a lot about church history. I didn't read a lot about church history. I certainly never heard much about church history.

And so I kind of feel like there is a lack of knowledge and understanding of church history. Why do you think that is? So first of all, am I right? Do you think do you agree? Is there a lack of church history knowledge?

And if so, definitely, you know, you know, most definitely people think church history started starts with the founding of their own local church. And we don't realize that, you know, the churches have existed.

I mean, we know that the church has been around for 2000 years, but we know little to nothing about it. We may know a little bit about a man named Martin Luther, or we may know a little bit about, you know, Spurgeon or some key figures.

But the overall contours of church history is pretty much lacking in the average Christian's life. And I don't think necessarily Christians need to be church historians per se, but I do think there is something missing in not having a basic understanding of the history of the church.

Let's talk about that for a minute, because what what do you think are the ramifications and the result of neglecting church history?

You know, we've always heard, you know, we're doomed to repeat the same mistakes if we don't study church history or history in general. And I think there's a lot of truth to that because the church has dealt with so many heresies, problems, issues throughout history.

And they've had to come to conclusions on these things. And we don't understand that a lot of times we neglect that. And we are dealing with some similar issues in our own day. And we're just kind of having to relearn these things that could save us a lot of problems, a lot of difficulty if we just go back and say, look, we've solved this problem before.

There's no need to reinvent the wheel. Let's just go back and look at how the church has dealt with this in the past.

The Sufficiency of Scripture Against New Errors

Yeah, you know, and I'm even going back right now, I'm reading Christianity and liberalism, Christianity and liberalism by Jay Gresham Machen. And one of the things that I'm finding now, this book was written in, I think, 1923.

And what is amazing to me is that the statements he's making in this book, written about 100 years ago now, they're as if they were written last week. I mean, this book might as well have come out, you know, in 2020 because it's so relevant.

But what he's quoting and what he's speaking of and what he's pointing to are things that have happened decades ago for him. And go ahead.

I think, you know, the devil has one main attack that has many ramifications, but he's attacking and has throughout church history the sufficiency of scriptures. And that leads to the undermining of the authority of scriptures.

That's what we show in the documentary, how the church did not have a clear view of the early church, left sola scriptura, the sufficiency of scriptures, and added to that tradition and apostolic secession.

And we explain that in the documentary. But so you end up having kind of three branches of authority, and it's not just scriptures alone. And that took place initially saying the scriptures are not sufficient to give us direction as a church.

I think that's the same attack we're under today with the critical race theory and various other, you know, if it be psychology being brought into the church, there's so many ways that we're adding to scriptures.

Well, the scriptures did not address this. Thus, we're looking at these experts or we're looking at this body of knowledge over here to help guide us. And for long, we end up adding to scriptures. And then that, in the long run, undermines the authority of scriptures.

Yeah, it absolutely does. Undermines the authority, the impact of scripture. But ultimately, it's an attack on the authority of God. That's right.

Yeah.

So if we, if someone is hearing this and they're saying, wow, okay, so maybe the things that we're facing today, they're not new. Maybe there are things that we've, that the church itself has fought before, maybe through councils or maybe through, you know, various methods over the last 2 ,000 years.

But you had even mentioned before, not everybody needs to be a church historian. Not everybody needs to have really dusty books on their bookshelves. But where would you recommend someone get started understanding the story of church.

History?

I mean, really, the documentary is a good place to start because it's a big overview of the key figures in the story of the church throughout church history. It's kind of a unique thing because we're looking at the doctrine of the church as that developed through church history itself.

And so you go through 2 ,000 years within one setting. So that, and then the book that is attached to this documentary, probably if you haven't, if you know little to nothing about church history, that would be a good introduction.

And then, you know, one of my favorite church historians is Dr. Dr. Malcolm Hinkin. He's, I think, extremely good on the early church, even the 17th century era. So, so, Michael Hinkin's a great place.

And then if you want to graduate from that, go to Philip Schaaf. He's got a, he's got a eight-volume set on church history and, you know, working away through each volume would be very interesting, helpful stuff.

So yeah, reading church history books, the Philip Schaaf book is, it is a beast to get through because it is really, really long. But the, to me, one of the strengths of it is that the passages, the sections of the books are fairly short.

And so you could sit down and read in about a 10, 15 minute bit and slowly work your way through church history. You know, and Jeff, one of the things I've, I've done a lot of reading on church history, I say a lot, I've done some reading, but one thing that I always wondered and was always kind of fascinated about was the development of the Catholic church, because there's not, as far as I can see, there's not just like a starting date to say, okay, well, this is where the Catholic church was birthed.

And then that history began. So how did we end up with the Catholic church and with the Pope and all of those different types of things? Can you tell us very succinctly?

The Development of the Catholic Church and Apostolic Succession

Yeah, yeah, that's a good question. Everybody wants to know who's the first Pope, you know, in the Catholic sense. I mean, when did the Catholic church start? And there's not a starting date because in my position and understanding of church history, that when Christ established the church, the devil had two attacks on the church.

He went to work immediately. And he had a short-term strategy and a long-term strategy. And he's pretty clever. It's amazing how clever he was. The short-term strategy was to persecute the church initially and maybe stunt the growth of the church.

And just, you know, it's kind of like he become unhinged and just attacked the church. But that didn't work. But with that said, he had a long-term strategy. Even Paul talked about this, that Christ wasn't going to return until the falling away or an apostasy or a counterfeit church arose.

There would be another church that looked like the church, but it would be kind of an anti-church or a counterfeit church that looks similar but completely different. And that is a greater strategy of Satan saying, I'm going to reproduce the church, but in my own image, and I'll be the head of that church.

And that was a long-term strategy that took place in steps. And I think he introduced errors through good intentions within godly people. That's why the documentary starts off with, you know, Ignatius and Aaronaeus, and then we went to Cyprian, and we look at these key figures that are godly men, and many of these men were martyrs.

And we look at them as heroes of the faith. And definitely, they are our heroes. And we appreciate these men of God that were faithful pastors to the very end. But even in their good ministries, they had subtle errors.

And how the Catholic Church really developed is, think about Christ laying the foundation of the church on the Scriptures. He is the chief cornerstone, and the apostles, which are his official messengers, that he would communicate the truth to, and so the apostles would speak on the behalf of Christ.

So the foundation of the church is the authority of Christ's word. That's the New Testament. The Old and New Testament is the foundation of the church. And think of that foundation as white bricks. And the white bricks are laid, and not only does it set the fortification of the infrastructure, all the building be laid upon those white bricks, those white bricks also set the parameters or the boundaries of the church.

And the church is not to build off those white bricks. They're not free to move its foundation over or extend it or, you know, do any lean to's. But here comes the early church, and they sowed the seeds of tradition, apostolic tradition, and this other doctrine called apostolic succession.

And that really was developed by, or the first seeds of it, by the pastor of Leon, the bishop of Leon, Irenaeus. And Irenaeus was battling right around, you know, 180, 190, he wrote a book called Against Heresies, and he was battling the heresy of Gnosticism.

And Gnosticism says it had special truth that had been handed down from the apostles through apostolic tradition. And they had this knowledge. And based on that knowledge, there was a secret way of salvation.

Well, Irenaeus says that can't be the case because tradition is safeguarded. It's not just, you know, anybody can say, hey, I've heard this from the apostles, from, you know, it goes back to the apostles.

Irenaeus says, no, if tradition has come down from the apostles, it came through these major churches that the apostles appointed their successors and those successors appointed their successors. For instance, Irenaeus says the church at Rome, we can trace its pastors all the way back to the apostles.

If there's any place where tradition would be safeguarded, it would be there. And the church of Rome knows nothing about this Gnostic heresy. Therefore, we don't believe the Gnosticism is actually apostolic.

Well, that's a good argument, but it laid the foundation of tradition. And think of tradition being yellow bricks and apostolic succession being red bricks. And as the church developed, those yellow and red bricks began to be extended more and more in the church foundation.

The church began to be reconstructed, not on the white bricks, but upon the yellow and red bricks until finally the Reformation came and they attacked those yellow and red bricks and said, no, we got to exclusively build back on those white bricks, the scriptures and scriptures alone.

And so that those yellow and red bricks were slowly added over a five, six, seven hundred year period.

Yeah, but that's so fascinating telling the story of Irenaeus because he was a godly man and he had many, many right and correct ideas and thoughts and he was fighting the right fight. But he had some wrong conclusions in that right fight.

Yeah, I mean, I think that he was defending the faith, but.

You know, he introduced something that would later just be detrimental to the faith, but.

There's no way for him to know, right, there's no way that he would know that that was going to be that he was going to be used to develop that idea a couple hundred years later. But it does show how important it is for us to go back, for us to understand church history, because we can see the ramifications.

OK, here's what they got right. And here's where they were just slightly off. And because they were slightly off, well, that trajectory a couple hundred years later leads to some pretty large errors.

Yeah, the consequence of ideas, what R .C. Sproul would talk about was a bullet comes in small, but it leaves a big gash in the back, you know, and so these little minor errors are benign at the time.

It's not like everything falls apart at that particular moment. But if those little errors are maintained and develop, the consequences are devastating. And that's why we as pastors and churchmen, we've got to be careful to safeguard the truth and stay safe on scriptures and scriptures alone and not add additional truth or knowledge, even if it's, you know, good stuff.

We have to say, no, it's scripture and scripture alone or otherwise generations that come behind us could really suffer for small errors.

The Documentary's Application for the Local Church

Now, Jeff, just to bring it back, so the where I really learned a lot of this stuff because I didn't know any of that was from the church documentary. And what I don't want to see happen is that somebody listens to the podcast and they look at the church project and they say, oh, well, this is just an academic thing where they talk about history and how people got some things right, how they got some things wrong.

There is very real life application and really even Christian growth and discipleship realities portrayed in the documentary. So how do we go from talking about church history to really living out the Christian life in the documentary?

This is the beauty of the documentary. At least the thing I was really pleased with is, especially towards the end of the documentary, there's just a blast of application, blast of just showing the beauty of the local church.

And you have men like Paul Worsher and Votie Bauckham and these guys, Mark Dever, these guys are just Steve Lawson. They're putting in such pregnant application there at the end that at the end of the documentary, at least for me, because, you know, I'm emotionally invested in this project.

But at the end, it just makes me all the more thankful for the local church. And for the church itself and want to dedicate myself even more fully to it and safeguard it the best that I can. And and so it's an amazing thing.

And we had a you guys came and did a premiere at our local church two weeks ago. And one of the ladies in our church came up to me afterwards and she was just filled with tears. And, you know, and she just said, thank God for the church.

And that's when I knew like, OK, the documentary has at least attempted to do what we wanted it to do is give a greater appreciation for the importance of the of the.

Church.

Absolutely. And really, we do pray that that is the end result of the film and the end result of the study. Now, very quickly, because we're just about out of time here, it's not just the film that we do.

But Jeff, you take a lot of these things that we've talked about, a lot of the theological realities particularly, and you put them into 12 teaching sessions where you teach them in Tunisia, in Rome, actually on location.

You bring in where you are. So I know we filmed in in front of Spurgeon's grave where he's buried in the meeting house of Benjamin Keech, where he pastored for a couple of years. So one, I do want to just tell the listeners and you who are viewing that this is not just a film, but there's also a lot of teaching that's involved.

And so, Jeff, very quickly, can you summarize those 12 sessions and kind of let us know what what that aspect of the study is really about?

The Church as an Assembly Called Out by Christ

Yeah, that's the 12 sessions are based upon the book, The Church, Our Nature, Purpose, Authority and Worship. And and then that that book is divided into 12 chapters. And each of those major divisions are dealt with with three chapters per division.

And so it nicely lays out to 12 lessons. And basically, we took the content of that of those chapters and added historical illustrations and application that so we're on site that we can tie in where we're at with the content.

And so you're getting a basic overview of what the church is, her authority and what she's to be doing and how she's to worship. And so you're getting kind of what does the Bible say about the local church?

What is the biblical doctrine of the church? And you're getting him in 12 neatly packaged, short, condensed, pregnant lessons that's filmed on site in wonderful locations. So I've been doing a lot of thinking about what a church is and what you need to build it.

And it's not brick and mortar and reclaimed wood. The Greek word we translate as church in our English Bibles is the word ecclesia. The word simply means an assembly. The church is an assembly of God's people called out of the sinful world to be with him and with his people.

That's the church.

The church is the pillar and ground of the truth. If we go to and we believe for another purpose or a different purpose and the Lord has assigned to us as a church, then we can be whatever we want. But we are not a church of God.

We are not a church of Christ.

You take Christ out of Christianity and you have removed everything. We just become a glorified country club.

What we are to do and the way we are to live flows out of what God in his grace has actually done for us.

If I could redo seminaries, I would probably take out the missions department. And instead of having them have a missions department, I would have them have an ecclesiology department and teach them what it means to have a biblical church.

And the local church is the way Jesus set up for us to help get the sonar pinging back on what we're really acting like and behaving like. I know we think I think I'm a follower of Jesus, but I'm committed to you guys.

You're in my life. You're seeing it. Am I really following the Lord here? Help me out in this.

What is the difference with a church that will stand? And one that will fall. And why does that even matter? Well, this will sound controversial to some, but let me say it as clearly as I can. It matters very much if we build our churches on the wrong foundation, because the church is where people find salvation.

In all those ways, the church is about the truth business and it is the place that God has assigned to that particular work.

To order the Church, Pillar and Ground of Truth, visit MediaGratia .org and click the link in the description of this episode.

Well, Jeff, again, I want to say thank you so much for your time. I appreciate the work and the effort that you put into the project as well. I know that I've benefited greatly from it. I know that my family has, and I pray that it's going to be a true blessing to so many.

Others. I appreciate that, Teddy, and I appreciate Media Gratia and all the hard work that's behind the scenes. I feel like I've done some work, but the real work is with you guys that are putting it all together.

It's amazing.

As we do with every week, we want to end with a with a prayer. And as you, in case you missed it, we spoke with Ryan Bush, who is a compiler of the Guide to Family Worship. It's where most of our prayers come from.

And this week's is from Isaac Watts. Oh, Lord, God Almighty, my God, my refuge and my strength, incline my heart to seek you in the name of Jesus Christ and hear my prayer for his sake. It is one of my highest privileges and of my greatest mercies that your ear is ever open to the prayer of those that call upon you.

Oh, Lord, though I have sinned, I have an advocate with you, Jesus Christ, the righteous, who is the propitiation for our sins. Oh, grant me faith in him that I may be justified freely by your grace through his redemption, be accepted in that beloved son and be a partaker of his spirit.

Amen.