Reasonable Latino Reads Josh Buice's Baptist vs Christian Government Article

AD Robles

Subscribe

Download

Share

00

00:00

All right everybody, welcome back to the channel. I am The Reasonable Latino and we are going to be reading a

00:06

Josh Bice article in today's video and responding to it. Now Josh requested that I do this and I want to just kind of introduce how this happened because I thought it was so weird.

00:17

It was very weird the way Josh kind of challenged me to read this article and respond to it. If you remember from yesterday's video or earlier today,

00:25

I don't know when I'm going to post this, but if you remember, I went over this screenshot, right?

00:31

He has this screenshot with this poster with all the faces and he says that one reason he's not a

00:37

Christian nationalist is because most Christian nationalists aren't reformed evangelicals. Yesterday we kind of tore into that about how stupid that is, how illogical that is, how dumb that is, how ridiculous that is, and how much

00:49

I don't like that attitude. We don't have to repeat that here. But what happened was, this is a, let me show you, this is a standalone tweet, right?

00:57

There's no thread here. There's no link here. This is just an isolated tweet.

01:04

And so I had responded to that isolated tweet in a quote tweet. And so on my

01:10

Twitter feed, I sometimes I'll do that, right? And I just made the point that I mentioned yesterday that the overwhelming majority of Christians, forget the nationalism, just Christians are not reformed evangelicals.

01:22

So is this, is your logic apply there too? Like, it doesn't make any sense, Josh. And he responded to that and it was so weird.

01:31

Like he makes it seem as if I'm changing the subject or that I'm like running and hiding from his article, like refusing to engage.

01:40

But it's like, this is my Twitter feed. Like I only saw this tweet. It's not connected to anything. There's no link here.

01:45

I didn't even know it was part of an article. That was just very weird. Look at, he says, he says, what about the actual substance of my article yesterday or a week ago?

01:52

Do you have anything to say about the positions? It's like, dude, like this is, but by the way, this is projection for sure, because they they've been doing this for weeks.

02:02

They've not been engaging for weeks. They're just putting out their lame, you know, Protestant Pope, you know, saved by the government, you're racist, all that stuff, refusing to accept correction, refusing to be corrected.

02:12

Oh, it's just post -millennialism. It's like, yeah, but but, you know, the guy's book you're responding to actually isn't a post -millennial.

02:19

What are you talking about? It's still post -millennialism. It's like, what are you talking about, bro? So this is this is him telling on himself here.

02:26

But I just thought that was so weird. Josh, why did you do this? Why did you make it seem like I'm dodging you? You're dodging me.

02:33

That's what's going on. G3's dodging me. Maybe not me. Oh, man.

02:41

Anyway, so we're going to read. I'm happy to engage your articles. I mean, I don't read G3. What can

02:46

I say? I didn't know you made an article. I didn't know you wrote. I don't read articles. Let me take that back.

02:52

I hate read articles. So if I'm reading an article, more often than not, it's from my gospel coalition or something like that.

02:59

I'm not I don't really read a whole lot of content that I agree with. I don't even read Doug Wilson articles. I wait till it comes out on video and then

03:05

I listen to it. Sometimes I don't even listen to all of them. So anyway, I don't know if I'm allowed to say that.

03:11

I'm on the Fight Last Feast Network. I actually don't follow Doug Wilson that carefully. I do like him, though, that's for sure.

03:19

All right, Josh, let's boogie. Let's read your article. Now, because your tweet here doesn't link anything and I didn't even know it was an article,

03:26

I'm not 100 % sure this is the article you want me to respond to. Something, I mean, it was published the same day.

03:34

That makes me think it is the article and it's about Christian nationalism. That makes me think it is the article. But it's called Baptist Doctrine and Christian Nationalism, and that makes me think it might not be the article you're referring to, because surely you're not asking me to respond as a

03:47

Baptist. That wouldn't make any sense, Josh, but I mean, maybe you don't know that I'm not a Baptist. I don't know.

03:52

Who knows? All right, Josh Boice, Baptist Doctrine and Christian Nationalism.

04:00

Let's just read it. Let's get it. I'm the reasonable Latino, by the way, and I'm going to be reasonable today.

04:05

Okay. As we look at the world around us, especially the world in America where I live, become more and more perverse and openly pagan, there's a natural temptation to feel the growing tension and look for an immediate solution.

04:19

In many cases, it leads to Christians to embrace a muscular version of Christianity that stands against drag queen story hour and the latest

04:28

LGBTQA pronoun madness. I don't think that's muscular Christianity that stands against that stuff.

04:33

It's just standard, you know, authentic Christianity, because this is the thing like, those of us,

04:39

Josh, maybe I can help you out here because I don't think, I think you're kind of out of touch a lot of the time. I do.

04:45

I do. Regular Joe Christians who haven't had their minds turned into goo by seminary yet, you know, we read the scripture and we see a

04:56

Christianity on the march. We see a Christianity that's victorious. We see a

05:01

Christianity that is kicking down the gates of hell. Like the gates of hell can't stand against the church.

05:08

We aren't meant to be doormats. And even if, and this is, this is not necessarily about post -millennialism because there's a lot of people that don't necessarily have a lot of optimism in their eschatology that likewise see this.

05:23

It's like, look, I don't know how much time we have here. And I don't know when Christ is going to come back. And I don't know what's going to happen in the next couple of years, but as long as I'm in the game,

05:32

I'm going to play to win that game. Because I see in the scripture, it says the gates of hell can't stand against the church.

05:38

So let's try kicking those things down. I don't know if that's really muscular version of Christianity. I just think that's just a non -feminized version of Christianity.

05:49

A non -cisified version of Christianity. That's like, yeah, let's stand up against this. We don't have to let the, the, the drag queens have those children.

05:57

Who says? Says who? We don't have to, we don't have to let LGBT become the de facto religion of our country.

06:05

Says who? Let's get it. Let's get to work. You got that right.

06:10

People are looking for that. Anyway, let's continue. For this reason, many

06:18

Christians are attracted to the ideology of Christian nationalism without the first thought of where it arises from, much like people who, after the death of George Floyd, began posting black squares on Instagram as a sign that black lives matter.

06:34

This is, this is the strategy. They, they think it's like the new wokeness. I know that I've seen, I've heard some people explain a little bit about that.

06:42

If that, that's another one that's, it's like the, you're a racist argument. The, you're a racist strategy.

06:47

It's not really an argument. It's just a strategy. That, if this is your rhetoric, I mean, good luck to you in, in your, all your endeavors, but that's, this is not, this is not going to work.

06:57

It's not, it's not like the, the black lives matter thing. It's not, it's not like that. Oh man.

07:06

It's like, yeah, you know, black lives matter because this, this, this, this fentanyl addict got choked out by a cop because he was, he was aggressive and completely crazed by fentanyl.

07:17

And, and that's, that's very similar to, to people saying, yeah,

07:22

I'm sick of the trannies ruling everything. How about we do something about it? How about we do something about it?

07:29

I don't know. It doesn't really seem to be the same thing to me. I don't know. I mean, it's like the problem with wokeness wasn't that they were politically engaged.

07:37

The problem with wokeness was that they were bringing the intersectionality into the church. And, and, and when they were politically engaged, they were politically engaged in an evil way, top to bottom, they were voting for evil candidates.

07:50

They were, they were promoting evil doctor, um, uh, policies. It was evil, their, their political engagement.

07:57

So it's not like the Christians being engaged politically is the problem. And maybe he's not saying that.

08:03

I don't know. He just, he just kind of puts this out there, but it's the way they were politically engaged.

08:09

It was the fact that they, that they tied, you know, you know, intersectionality and, and, and, and socialism to the gospel.

08:16

They said, this is the gospel. It's the gospel to get reparations. That's the gospel, or at least part of the gospel.

08:25

It wasn't like, yeah, you know, we're Christians here. And, uh, you know, we've got a lot of, of fellow

08:30

Christians in various jurisdictions. You know, we actually don't have to allow the trannies to have the kids.

08:36

We don't, that's very different. I don't know. Call me crazy. Call me crazy. I'm just too reasonable.

08:41

I think that's my problem. Soon enough, those same people were publishing the language of BLM on social media without the slightest clue where BLM originated in the baggage that it brought with it.

08:54

In a recent article titled the different shades of Christian nationalism. I attempted to point out that there are various different shades of Christian.

09:11

I had to stop it. I had to stop it. Oh man. I don't know. In the real world is 30 seconds later.

09:19

I've been laughing for 30 seconds. That's that sentence is funny. I'm sorry.

09:24

I don't know why it's just funny. It's like, it's like saying in my article, the three best flavors of Mountain Dew, I explained that which the three best flavors of Mountain Dew were.

09:39

It's like, what's the point of that sentence? Obviously that's what you did. If the article's titled different shades of Christian nationalism,

09:45

I'm assuming that you pointed out that there are different shades of Christian nationalism. Why write that sentence?

09:53

Josh. Oh, Josh. Oh man. That's a weird. I mean, there's nothing wrong with the sentence.

09:59

It's a totally fine sentence. It just, I don't understand why it's there. Okay. In a recent article titled the different shades of Christian nationalism.

10:07

I attempted to point out that there are various different shades of Christian nationalism. The largest base of Christian nationalists do not live in Moscow, Idaho.

10:15

In fact, they're not even reformed in their theology. The largest base of Christian nationalists are followers of general

10:20

Michael Flynn, Michael Flynn, and operate in the political sphere. For instance, in 2021,

10:27

Michael Flynn led a prayer at one of his rallies where he repeated the same prayer that the false prophetess, Elizabeth Clare popularized in 1984, as he asked for attendees to commit themselves to the ideologies of Christian nationalism.

10:39

Michael Flynn. General Michael Flynn is the most important Christian nationalists out there.

10:49

Okay. I mean, he just says it like it's self -evident. I don't know. I don't know, man.

10:55

Maybe then you should have started with refuting Michael Flynn. Instead, you claimed that you were only going to respond to Stephen Wolf because he's the most important leader, and Doug Wilson is the most important leader, and you weren't going to respond to every

11:08

Tom, Dick, and Harry, and then now Michael Flynn is the most important leader. I don't know. Maybe you guys should have got your story straight.

11:16

I've heard that you spent a lot of time and energy and time and talk and discussion on planning out how to unroll this anti -Christian government thing that you're doing, whatever it is you're doing.

11:33

As Christians, you're against Christian government. I've heard you spend a lot of time thinking about this.

11:39

I'm just curious, maybe you should have planned it out better because it certainly seems like you're flying by the seat of your pants.

11:46

I'm just an observer. I'm just a reasonable observer. I don't know. Seems like that to me.

11:53

Let's continue. I have problems with the Christian nationalist movement on the basis of several ideological and theological points.

11:58

First of all, the Christian nationalism movement is language that was weaponized against the church by progressives as a pejorative label that conflates white nationalists with Christian nationalists, and suddenly it becomes white

12:09

Christian nationalists. Christianity is a big enough hurdle to our pagan world, so why would we need to embrace another pejorative label such as Christian nationalists to hinder the work of Christ?

12:20

Why would we embrace another pejorative label such as Christian nationalists to hinder the work of Christ? Even if you could convince me of the teaching of Christian nationalism,

12:27

I would not be willing to accept the name badge. This is so interesting. This is so interesting because as a reasonable

12:34

Latino, a reasonable observer, he kind of tries to distance himself from trying to identify

12:39

Christian nationalists with white nationalists, Nazis, that kind of thing. But him and his little crew have been doing that.

12:47

You've been participating against that. You're the one weaponizing this pejorative label.

12:53

You're the one that's embracing it, and you're joining the progressives in doing this. You're the one who decided to go with, you guys are racist, you guys are

13:01

Nazis, you guys are this and that. You guys are doing that. Don't distance yourself from that, Josh. You've got to own that.

13:07

It's not the progressives doing it. Maybe they started it, but you're participating in it. You're in that propaganda war.

13:13

Your allies are like CNN and MSNBC when it comes to Christian nationalism. Those are your allies.

13:18

And Young Turks. Those are your people. Kyle Howard. That's the thing. That's what's so crazy about this.

13:24

You're doing that. Not them. Well, I mean, they are too. But he puts this out there, and this is what

13:30

I think is interesting too. It's like, he says, if you embrace this pejorative label, it'll hinder the work of Christ.

13:36

And he just puts that out there as if it needs no explanation. It's just self -evident. It's apparent that embracing this pejorative and not caring what they say about you anymore, that's just automatically hindering the work of Christ.

13:51

I don't think that's self -evident at all. You need to explain that one, Josh, how that hinders the work of Christ in the civil realm.

14:01

To say, I don't care two rips what Alexandria Ocasio -Cortez says, what that fat guy from CNN says, what the black guy from CNN says.

14:12

They're all the same. I don't care what those people say. They can say whatever they want. I'm not going to run from this.

14:18

I'm a Christian, and I'm a nationalist. I'm going to own that. That's fine. You want to associate what that's racist, that's okay with me.

14:27

Why would that hinder the work of Christ? You need to explain that, Josh. It's not self -evident at all. I could easily see that helping the work of Christ because finally, finally, we're not just reacting to what the pagans say.

14:38

Oh, we don't want to appear as racist, so let's just do things that don't appear racist. That's what woke white people do.

14:46

That's what woke white people do. Anything to not appear racist, so I guess I'm going to put the black square in my profile.

14:52

Anything, whatever you say. I don't care about Black Lives Matter. I'm not racist. You've seen that meme with that progressive church with Black Lives Matter on their billboard burning in flames during one of the riots?

15:04

It's like, that doesn't work. To constantly be reacting, oh, this, oh, I don't want to, the pagans are like, go over here, go over here, and you go over there because you don't want to appear racist, and the pagans say, don't go over there.

15:15

You don't go over there because you don't want to appear racist. That little game, I think that hinders the work of Christ.

15:21

That makes more sense to me, that when you let the progressives and the pagans own you so much that anything that they don't want you to do, you run from.

15:30

Anything they do want you to do, you don't run from. When you're constantly worried, what are the pagans going to think of me? I think that hinders the work of Christ.

15:38

Now, I've got to prove that as well, but he just presents this like it's just obvious. It's not obvious.

15:44

It's not obvious at all. He says, even if you could convince me of the teachings of Christian nationalism,

15:51

I would not be willing to accept the name badge. Within the sphere of theology, I have some concerns with Christian nationalist movement on the basis of theological distinctions.

16:00

One such concern is centered on historic Baptist theology. For instance, 1689

16:05

London Baptist Confession on the Civil Magistrate only contains three paragraphs, where the Westminster Confession of Faith contains four paragraphs.

16:12

It would be good to examine the reasons for this difference in light of the current discussions on Christian nationalism. When a person examines a 1689

16:20

LBC in Westminster Confession, they can see the obvious difference with regard to paragraphs. However, the real question is, why did the

16:27

Baptist determine to omit this paragraph? I'm starting to remember why I don't read blog posts. Oh, man.

16:36

It doesn't seem like it's at odds with much of Baptist distinctives. However, the history of that paragraph matters. In 1788, the

16:42

American Presbyterians revised the Westminster Confession. They changed the paragraph to align with true biblical theology and Christian liberty that the

16:49

Baptist had already embraced. The original reading of the third paragraph of the Westminster Confession reads, yeah, the

16:55

American version is inferior, in my opinion. I mean, I've thought that for a long time.

17:00

The original Westminster was way better. That's just my opinion, but hey, you know, obviously that's just my one man's opinion.

17:10

The civil magistrate may not assume to himself the administration of the word and sacraments or the power of the keys of the kingdom of heaven, yet he has authority and it is his duty to take order that unity and peace be preserved in the church, that the true

17:23

God be kept pure and entire, that all blasphemies and heresies be suppressed, all corruptions and abuses in worship and discipline prevented or reformed, and all the ordinances of God duly settled, administered, and observed.

17:35

For the better effecting whereof, he has the power to call synods to be present at them and to provide that whatsoever is transacted in them to be according to the mind of God.

17:44

I like that paragraph. I do. If I really think about it and think it through, would

17:52

I take exceptions to some of this stuff? I think potentially there could be some exceptions that you could take to this paragraph, but in general,

17:59

I like this paragraph. I think it's a good paragraph. I should have kept it. He continues.

18:04

This is now Josh. He says, The third paragraph of the original Westminster denies the civil magistrate the power to administer word and sacrament.

18:11

That's good. But it crosses a line by extending to the civil magistrate the power to punish heretics and blasphemers in order to correct corruptions and abuses in worship and discipline.

18:21

The Baptist rightly viewed this as a violation of the civil magistrate's sphere of duty and operation. If this paragraph stands, the civil magistrate places his hands on both the sword and the keys.

18:30

No, it doesn't. That's not correct. It doesn't. Or at bare minimum, is given the responsibility of using the sword to correct the human heart, which would not be possible.

18:40

No, that's not that's not that's not it at all. I could easily see a way for the the civil magistrate and the church to work together, but not blend right to work together, but not blend, because the church would have the authority on some of these matters and the civil magistrate would have the the authority on actual actually carrying out the punishment.

19:02

And it's not unlike, like, for example, let's just say let's just say adultery was banned.

19:08

Right. Let's just say adultery was banned. And it should be. Let's just say adultery was banned.

19:13

And let's just say there was a fine or something like that associated with it. Right. So the church finds out that some someone committed adultery, a lady committed adultery against her husband.

19:24

Right. And the husband brings it up. And there's evidence on two or more witnesses and stuff like that. And so it's it's

19:30

I mean, this happened, right. This actually happened. The church would have a responsibility to, you know, do church discipline and find out if there's repentance and things like that and all of that kind of thing.

19:44

The civil magistrate has a separate responsibility. So it's the church has their thing and they you know, they might have to excommunicate or do church discipline or or some kind of reconciliation or something like that.

19:56

But the civil magistrate has a different thing. And so if the husband brings charges against the woman in court, in the civil realm, they've got a separate thing and they're going to, you know, they'll give them the fine or whatever it is.

20:08

Or, you know, if it was a death penalty offense, they would be the ones carrying that out. But they could work in tandem.

20:13

Right. They could work in tandem there. Or if there was some kind of of someone stealing or something like they could work in tandem, like the church has their realm and their responsibilities and the civil magistrate has their responsibilities.

20:26

I don't I don't see how that's automatically combining the sword and the keys. That doesn't make any sense at all. And I think that just thinking about it for a few seconds, you could see how that would wouldn't necessarily be the case in any case.

20:41

But but yeah, this is this is this is debated. Right. And this is something that you need to debate. It's not just self -evident that this is not correct.

20:48

I mean, and again, it's obviously not automatically a inappropriate combination, because, again, the nation of Israel had this right where, sure, they had their ecclesial authorities, so to say.

21:02

But then they also had their civil magistrate. They also had their their judicial branch, so to say. And so they would they would punish blasphemers.

21:10

They would punish. They had they had laws for people that were trying to commit treason against this against Yahweh and how they would handle that with the civil magistrate.

21:20

Like, obviously, there is there's a way to do this in a right way. And we need to consider that.

21:26

Does that mean that we need to have Leviticus as the law of the land in the United States? No, it does not mean that. But it does mean that we need to really take a good hard look at Leviticus and a good hard look at Deuteronomy and a good hard look at Exodus and say,

21:38

OK, well, how can we draw the general equity from that here in our situation in the United States or maybe in individual states?

21:44

Right. Not every state needs to work the exact same way. Not every state has to work in the exact same way or have the same polity or things like that anyway.

21:52

But it's just like he just puts this stuff out there like it's just obviously it's like, well, no, this this really wasn't obvious to hardly anyone until very recently.

22:04

You know what I mean? Anyway. The third paragraph of the original Westminster confession.

22:10

Oh, sorry. That's that's I already read that part. The Christians who were leaving England for the new world had witnessed

22:15

Queen Mary the first use the sword to enforce the doctrine of transubstantiation, resulting in the burning of Protestants in the streets.

22:22

And within a few generations, entire families sailed across the ocean to pursue religious freedom. As Sam Waldron points out in his commentary on the 1689, the

22:30

Baptists were the earliest reformed Christians to uphold religious liberty. Soon enough, the American Presbyterians followed in the footsteps of the

22:36

Baptists, who rightly applied the teachings of Christian liberty, creating a necessary distinction between church and state.

22:44

Anyway, so the American Presbyterians. Right. Anyway.

22:50

So this religious liberty thing is interesting, too, because we also have to consider how it applies to to to to pagans, right, to pagans, people that don't they're not

23:02

Trinitarian. They don't honor Christ in any way. They're not even trying to. They're against Christ. Like is religious liberty up until very recently, like we we

23:12

Christians knew, obviously, that that's it's different for like a Satanist. It's different for a Muslim.

23:17

It's different for for something like that, like like up until very recently, like we need to consider that as well.

23:23

And so is is the difference between a Presbyterian and a Baptist and an

23:28

Anglican the same as the difference between a Christian and a Hindu and a and a Satanist and stuff like that?

23:34

Well, not even close. Not even close. And so we need to consider that for those talking about Christian nationalism.

23:42

When we study God's word, we must not embrace the error of the Anabaptists who resisted Christian engagement within the civil government.

23:48

The Baptists, when drafting a 1689 LBC, expressed clear distinctions from this incorrect view by writing the following first paragraph of chapter 22.

23:56

God, the supreme lord and king of all the world, has ordained civil magistrates to be under him over the people for his own glory and the public good, and to this end has armed them with power of the sword for the defense and encouragement of them that do good and for the punishment of evildoers.

24:11

Yes, I agree. That's good. The biblical basis for this paragraph is clearly Romans 13.

24:17

The Christian should come to see that governmental authority and leadership is a good thing, since the authorities are literally referenced as servants of God, deacons.

24:25

I've made this point many times. A land that does not have civil magistrates established for the good purpose of upholding justice, establishing peace, and rewarding those who do good will be filled with anarchy and the vileness of human depravity.

24:36

In short, the Christian should see government as a good thing, so long as government remains true to his job and refuses to blur the lines between the two spheres of the state and the church.

24:45

Yeah, I mean, that's all fine and good, but the thing is, like, again, you know, the big problems we have right now are we have pagans running the show, and they're making their doctrine, their pagan doctrine of baby killing and baby diddling the law of the land.

25:04

And so, no, we should not hide away from the fact that, no, we're Christians here, and we're not going to allow that anymore, because that's what the

25:11

Lord said. Why would we shy away from that? Why would we shy away from that? I don't care what you say about religious liberty.

25:18

No, you can't kill your baby. I don't care if you're a Jew and you think that that's part of your religious heritage. No, you can't do it.

25:26

Robert Haldane comments, Alright, there must be this clear distinction between the sword and the keys.

26:05

The civil magistrate is given the sword, but the church is entrusted with the keys. To further this point, a clear reading of Romans 13 drives the point home.

26:14

In the text, Paul is referencing the second table of the Ten Commandments with regard to the civil magistrate. As Sam Walden observes, why is the civil magistrate not to enforce the first table of law?

26:22

Because he is somehow not subject to the Word of God? No, because it's not his job. Well, again, it's not his job to define these things.

26:36

I could see that, where it's like, okay, we're not the ecclesial authority. We're not going to define what the doctrine of the church is.

26:45

But it definitely is his job to dole out punishments. That's for sure. And so if there are punishments attached to treason against the state—so here's something that maybe will help you out.

26:59

So in the United States, if you plan a coup, you try to get people to join

27:04

China or Russia or something like that, the full weight of the state would be against you. You'd be arrested and you'd go to trial and you'd be put in prison or maybe you'd even be executed.

27:13

You could be executed for treason, right? And in a state where it's like, okay, well, Christ is our ultimate authority.

27:20

We're a Christian nation and all of that. To sort of entice someone away from Christ, in my view, that would be tantamount to treason.

27:31

You'd be trying to entice someone over to the Hindu side or to the Muslim side to try to undermine the order of the nation by doing that.

27:41

So why wouldn't there be a punishment attached to that? Why wouldn't there be? And I think that's why there was a punishment attached to that in Israel, where it's like, even if your brother comes and secretly entices you to serve other gods, that was a death penalty offense in Israel because you can't allow people to have insurrections against your order.

27:59

You can't allow it. It's just not something—if you're going to have an order, you definitely have to have that baseline of order.

28:06

And so if we had a nation of Christians and someone's trying to get you to serve

28:12

Satan or get you to serve Allah or whatever it is, you can't allow that.

28:18

And why wouldn't the state be involved in that, right? Why wouldn't it? I don't know. I mean, he just kind of assumes that that's not how it should be.

28:26

I'm not really sure. Okay. The original framers of the United States Constitution understood what would inevitably happen if civil magistrate had access to the sword and the keys, and there was no clear separation between the sphere of the church and the sphere of the state.

28:38

That's why they penned the following in the First Amendment. This is just like basic—this is like a basic misunderstanding.

28:48

It's just basic stuff here. Here's what the First Amendment says. Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press or the right of the people to peacefully assemble.

29:00

Congress won't make a law establishing a religion. Okay, fine. So in our society, the

29:07

Congress of the United States was not allowed to do that. That means literally any other body was able to do that.

29:13

And they did. And they did do it. So states could do it. And it wasn't a problem. Cities could do it.

29:19

And it wasn't an issue. People could do it. And there's no issue. This is the thing.

29:26

I think O 'Fallon said this in the very early stages of this whole controversy.

29:31

Well, if we have blasphemy laws in the United States, then the United States ceases to become the United States. And it's like, so I guess the

29:38

United States never was the United States because they had blasphemy laws at the inception. I'm the reasonable

29:44

Latino here. I'm being as reasonable as I can be. Congress shall make no law.

29:50

That's right. Josh is right. Congress shall make no law. What does that have to do with what we're talking about? Nobody here, well,

29:57

I shouldn't say that. Some people don't like the Constitution. And I think the Constitution could be improved upon. And it should be improved upon.

30:03

That's my opinion. But not everybody says you have to do away with the Constitution. In fact, most people that are Christian nationalists don't want to do away with the

30:09

Constitution. And I understand why they say that. Because it's pretty good. Congress shall make no law.

30:15

Okay, great. Granted, Josh, Congress will make no law. What about the state of New Hampshire?

30:22

We can make, why not? What about Vermont? They did. Vermont did. They had it established.

30:31

The United States will cease to be the United States as long as we let governments establish religion.

30:38

Then it never was the United States. I'm sorry, you have to deal with that. You just have to, Josh. You have to.

30:45

Therefore, when Stephen Wolf makes the case that the civil magistrate has the responsibility to enforce both the first and second table, it causes concern.

30:52

Why? Why would that cause concern? Because I don't think, listen, I don't talk to Stephen, but I'm pretty sure

30:59

Stephen doesn't mind the First Amendment. I'm pretty sure he probably likes it. Because Congress won't make that law.

31:05

That's okay. I'm sure he's okay with that. Maybe not. Maybe he isn't. But I'm sure that if we had a situation the way it was earlier in the

31:16

United States, where Congress wasn't making those laws, but, you know, Vermont was able to, or Maryland, or, you know,

31:21

Connecticut, or something like that, was able to do those things, which they did do. They availed themselves of that because they understood what

31:28

Josh apparently doesn't understand, that the United States Constitution was not a repudiation of the government being involved in this kind of way.

31:40

But Stephen Wolf wouldn't have a problem with the First Amendment, I think, if we had a situation that was more similar to that.

31:51

Sometimes it feels like we're talking to ourselves here. I'm not going to lie. It feels like we're talking to ourselves. And I've just told

31:56

Josh this, and Michael Fallon heard it too at the time when he said, oh, blasphemy laws, the

32:02

United States would cease to be the United States. It's like, well, I guess the United States never existed in that case. They've heard it, but they won't change their opinion.

32:10

They just don't listen. They don't think we have anything meaningful to say in this topic. I like that.

32:45

I don't think that anything that Stephen Wolf wrote there would be anti what the First Amendment was about, which was about Congress not doing that.

32:54

It was about Congress not doing that. Josh, hear me. It was about the Congress, the

32:59

United States Congress, the House of Representatives and the Senate. It was the Congress.

33:05

Like, oh, I guess it's just the House. Whatever. Anyway, it was about the Congress. It wasn't about the idea of it in general.

33:14

It wasn't about the like the you guys get it. You guys get it.

33:22

In concluding words of a chapter on liberty of conscience, Wolf argues against what he calls second table only ism.

33:28

According to Wolf stated position above the civil magistrate, which he refers to as the Christian prince, has the duty to enforce both tables, which overlaps the spheres of authority and diminishes necessary separations between those two distinct fears established by God.

33:40

No, it doesn't. It definitely doesn't. It doesn't. It definitely does not.

33:48

Not only do I find this troubling, but I find it to be a contradiction to Romans 13, where no mention of the first table appears in Paul's words to the church in the city of Rome.

33:57

But the thing is, Josh, like this is the thing that I think a lot of people are so frustrated with you,

34:02

Josh. And let me just be as reasonable as I can be, because I had no expectations of you, Josh, because I don't really know how you write and what your thoughts are.

34:10

So I'm not frustrated with you about this, besides the fact that it seems like you never listen. Congress.

34:17

But it's like, okay, Romans 13 is a critical passage here. But there's a whole lot of other

34:24

Bible that applies here as well. There's a whole lot of other Bible that applies here as well.

34:32

And it's like, there's a huge book of law in our book, right?

34:38

There's a huge book of law. Like, we really need to take that a lot more seriously than we do.

34:45

I need to take it more seriously than I do. You need to take it more seriously than you do. And we need to figure out what the general equity of those laws that you would say seem to blend the spheres of authority.

34:57

Like, we need to really consider, how do we apply that today? What do we do with that today? How do we take care of that today?

35:04

Because I just don't think that you're really taking that seriously at all. Like, Romans 13—we're not Romans 13 -only -ists here.

35:10

It doesn't make any sense. It doesn't make any sense. The idea of enforcing—back to the article—first and second table has been a common thread within the conversation about Christian nationalism.

35:19

It appears in the work of Stephen Wolfe and men like Timothy Kline, who has argued that the civil magistrate was given the responsibility to lead his people to the gates of eternal salvation.

35:28

As a pastor and Christian who is committed to the authority of God's word, and one who lives in America with the current

35:34

First Amendment of the United States Constitution—Josh, you don't understand. You don't understand

35:39

America. You don't! Congress shall make no laws. Everybody knew what that meant at the time, and we know what it means now.

35:49

It means that Congress shall make no law. It doesn't matter what revisionist jurists later decided how we should apply that, but everybody knew what it meant before.

36:03

It did not ban Vermont from naming Christ in their Constitution. It did not ban

36:09

Maryland from establishing a religion. It did not ban any of that. It was about Congress.

36:15

You don't get the First Amendment, Josh. The First Amendment isn't like a—okay.

36:21

You guys get it. You guys get it. I find these positions to be in contradiction to God's word and the

36:26

United States Constitution. It's not in either case. Definitely not the Constitution. I think that's very clear, even from the part that you quoted from it.

36:36

But the Scripture—I mean, it can only be contradictory to the Scripture, in my opinion, if you really don't take the

36:43

Old Testament seriously. We ought to. We ought to. Therefore, in order to reach this goal of this new

36:48

Protestant project, the Constitution will need to be altered. No, it won't! You don't get it, Josh.

36:53

I'm sorry, but you don't get it. Maybe you should stay with exegeting the Bible, but obviously there's issues there as well.

37:06

A lie was something the Bible does not explicitly teach. To remain consistent—this is so long, man.

37:11

I'll just try to read this quickly. To remain consistent with the historic 1689 LBC beliefs is not effeminate or fearful.

37:19

No, that's not effeminate or fearful, but the whole idea of, like, oh, the liberals are weaponizing.

37:25

They're going to call us racist if we call ourselves Christians. That's effeminate and fearful.

37:31

Big time. Big time. And participating in their smear job? You guys are racist

37:37

Nazis, like you guys are. That's effeminate and fearful. So, no, it's not trying to be consistent with the 1689.

37:44

That's effeminate. No, Josh. But what you're doing with this whole, oh, the pagans are going to call us racist.

37:49

That's effeminate and fearful. Not that I think you're going to take correction on that, but hey, whatever.

37:55

Historic Baptists were not winsome pietists who embraced loser theology in the view of civil sphere.

38:01

The historic Reformed Baptists held to a robust theology and were faithful, measured, wise, and courageous, and understood the clear distinction between the spheres of life that are clearly established by God.

38:10

Historic Baptists have stood upon the authority and sufficiency of Scripture, unlike many modern evangelicals who have embraced cultural ideologies as analytical tools.

38:18

We don't need any more analytical tools, or in this case, submission tools.

38:26

Oh my goodness. Finally, as Christians who know a little about Church history, I find this new Protestant project concerning when

38:31

I consider the role the Civil Magistrate played in the burning of John Rogers, Oxford Meyers. Okay, a little more of a pity party here.

38:38

Okay, overcorrection is always a danger. If the Christian community in America reacts to the woke movement by embracing another reactionary movement without considering the underlying ideologies, it could be disastrous.

38:48

We'd be foolish to believe that history could not repeat itself again. There comes the inferiority complex of many

38:58

American Baptists. We're going to be oppressed by the Christian government.

39:04

That's the thing. You guys are playing right into their hands.

39:09

You're joining the propaganda. Oh yes, the Christian nationalists would be so oppressive, and they'd be racist, and they'd be

39:16

Nazis, and stuff like that. You guys, it's pathetic that you're doing it and trying desperately to take the high ground in it.

39:24

Oh my goodness. It's actually kind of satisfying to watch you squirm because you're so obviously joining the propaganda march.

39:33

You're so obviously joining it. I saw the same thing during COVID with certain people. They're so obviously desperate to be a propagandist just like CNN about COVID.

39:43

It was embarrassing then and kind of a little bit satisfying for me. It's the same thing here, except not in COVID.

39:50

You're desperate to turn Christians into oppressors, de facto oppressors. No matter what, a

39:55

Christian government would be oppressive, and racist, and Nazi. And it's just like, there's a strange satisfaction

40:03

I get from watching someone do that and then squirm to try to maintain their integrity. That's what

40:08

I take this article to be. See, the 1689s are robust. We're doing exactly what

40:14

MSNBC is doing. I don't know if you want to hang your hat on your robustness on that kind of thing.

40:22

The Christian, the London Baptist Confession, we have a robust stout theology.

40:28

That's why we know, just like Alexandria Ocasio -Cortez said, is that Christian nationalists would be oppressive.

40:36

That's where you're going to hang your hat. Okay. Okay. Anyway, Josh, I don't know why you wanted me to read this article.

40:43

I mean, I think I have to assume that Josh thinks I'm a Baptist, and so I would have to respond to his concerns about the 1689.

40:51

Now, I know many 1689ers don't agree with you and have responded to a lot of this stuff already, so I know it's possible.

40:59

I'm not against 1689ers, but I'm not going to defend the 1689 Confession.

41:05

Why would I? It doesn't make any sense for me to have to do that. I preferred the original

41:10

Westminster, so I don't know why you wanted me to read this and respond to it, but I was happy to do it.