May 6, 2019 Show with Terry L. Johnson on “The Case for Traditional Protestantism”

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It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next two hours, and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions.

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Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, Lake City, Florida, and the rest of humanity living on the planet Earth who are listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com.

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This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Monday on this sixth day of May 2019.

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And I'm thrilled to have joining us for the very first time today on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Terry L.

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Johnson, who is an author, conference speaker, and senior minister of Independent Presbyterian Church of Savannah, Georgia.

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He's actually going to be on twice this week. He's going to be discussing today his book,

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The Case for Traditional Protestantism, and then we have another subject coming up on Wednesday that we will have

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Terry explain for you in just a bit on the attributes of God. We're also going to be promoting a conference coming up very soon where Terry is going to be on the roster of speakers, the

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East Coast Ministers Conference of the Banner of Truth right here in Pennsylvania at the Elizabethtown College in Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania, and I will be there,

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God willing, in attendance. So I'm looking forward to meeting many of you for the first time and becoming reacquainted with many of you that I've already met in the

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Iron Sharpens Iron Radio listeners' audience. But it is my honor and privilege to welcome you for the very first time ever to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Terry L.

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Johnson. Thank you very much. I'm glad to be a part of the broadcast.

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Oh, I'm thrilled to have you a part of the broadcast, and I know the folks at Banner of Truth are a very discerning lot, very finicky and rightfully so, so I know that you will be a guest today and also a speaker that is well worth hearing when you are going to be speaking at the upcoming

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East Coast Ministers Conference in Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania. But before we go into the subject at hand, the case for traditional

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Protestantism, and also before we go into a little bit of an explanation on the

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East Coast Ministers Conference, tell us something about the Independent Presbyterian Church of Savannah, Georgia.

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The name is a very unusual name because it sounds somewhat oxymoronic, Independent Presbyterian.

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So tell us something about that. Well, you're right. It is oxymoronic.

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To be a Presbyterian means that you are not independent. Right.

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Under normal circumstances, there would be a presbytery to which the church would be connected and accountable, but this congregation was the first Presbyterian church in Georgia.

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Its foundation goes back to prior to 1755, and there was no presbytery at the time.

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And so it remained independent until there was some impetus to start a presbytery, which came in the 1820s.

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And you know how things go in church life. Once they had been on their own for about 70 years, there was some resistance to yielding up any of their own control or their own congregation to anyone else.

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And then also, your listeners may be aware that there was quite a bit of exchange between Congregationalists and Presbyterians going back to those days.

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There was even a plan of union where they cooperated with each other in the evangelizing and church planning in the

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Western territories, and they were agreeable to do that because there was so much in common.

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There was hardly a shade of difference between New England Congregationalism and Presbyterianism.

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And so they worked together, and so there were ministers that moved from Congregational churches to Presbyterian churches back and forth.

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Jonathan Edwards is an example of this. After he graduated from Yale, he served a

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Presbyterian church in New York and then was called to Northampton to his grandfather's

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Congregational church, and I think that was fairly common back then. And so when there was some opportunity to then participate with a

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Presbyterian, you know, just one of the accidents of history was that the church had

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Congregational or Congregational -inclined ministers at the time who didn't have an interest.

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So it's independent but Presbyterian. Well, I want to let our listeners know, and hopefully

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I'll remember to repeat this later on, but if you live in the Savannah, Georgia area, or if you have family, friends, and loved ones in that area, or if you're visiting that area on vacation, the website to find out more details about the

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Independent Presbyterian Church of Savannah, Georgia is IPCSAV .org.

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IPC standing for Independent Presbyterian Church. SAV, which is an abbreviation for Savannah, dot org.

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IPCSAV .org. And also, I'd like you to give a teaser for our upcoming interview this

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Wednesday, God willing. On Wednesday, May 8th, we're having Terry back to discuss his new book,

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The Identity and Attributes of God, a publication of Banner of Truth. If you could let our listeners know something about our next interview.

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Well, I was very profoundly influenced by J .I.

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Packer's book, Knowing God, when I was a college student at the University of Southern California back in the 1970s.

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And a few years ago, at the start of an academic year, I thought that for the sake of the college students in Savannah, that I would do a series of 10 sermons on the attributes of God.

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That 10 -part series turned into 82 sermons. And it did, because as I read,

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I just got more deeply into the subject. Deeper and deeper I went, and I was enjoying reading

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Stephen Charnock, his Existence and Attributes, and George Swinnick's The Incomparableness of God, and Richard Baxter's The Divine Life, and a host of other

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Puritan and Reformed authors. And the series just expanded and expanded.

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It went over a three -year period. And so I thought that it might have some value.

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The studies that we shared might have some value beyond my own congregation, and so sent them off to the banner of truth, but in the end they agreed, and there you have it.

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It's really just the current book is just half. I'm hoping the second volume will be published.

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This is just half of those messages. Well, I want to read...

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Oh, go ahead. I'm sorry. There's just so much that one could say about the attributes of God.

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I mean, you cannot plunge the depths of the Almighty, as Job says.

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Right. There's just always more to be said. Well, I'm going to read a brief commendation for that book from Carl Truman, who has been a guest a number of times on Iron Sheriff and Zion Radio.

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I look forward to Carl returning to the program. But Carl says, This book is both profound in its theology, lucid in its exposition, and deeply pastoral and practical in its tone and intention.

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Anyone wanting to dive into the doctrine of God who wants to see how classical theism connects to everyday

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Christian life and what is therefore practically at stake when such theology is abandoned should read this book.

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That's Dr. Carl Truman. Also, I'd like you to let our listeners know something about the

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Banner of Truth and the conference that the Banner of Truth is hosting. In just a couple of weeks, they are hosting this conference from Tuesday, the 28th of May, through Thursday, the 30th of May, in Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania, at Elizabethtown College.

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This is a phenomenal conference that all men in ministry leadership are welcome to register for.

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It's going to be on the theme, I Believe in the Holy Spirit. But if you could tell our listeners, I'm assuming that most of my listeners are familiar with Banner of Truth, since most of my listeners appear to be

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Reformed, judging from the correspondence we have with listeners. But there are listeners in our audience who are not even

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Christian, let alone Reformed. So why don't you tell our listeners a little bit about Banner of Truth and specifically also about this conference where you are on the speaking roster.

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Well, one of the reasons I sought to publish the Identity and Attributes with Banner of Truth and why prior to that I sought out publishing the case for traditional

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Protestantism with them was because in my own growth as a young Christian, the

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Banner of Truth played an indispensable role because of their reprints and a number of their contemporary authors as well.

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They had a significant impact on shaping my own understanding of who

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God is and who we are as sinners and who we are as saved by Christ.

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And in other words, my whole understanding of Christianity was probably could say was shaped more by Banner of Truth and its authors than by any other single entity.

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So I'm very grateful for it. They always produce beautiful books. And it was a goal.

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I think they're the gold standard in publishing. And so I always wanted to have a really high -quality book published in a high -quality way that might endure, that wouldn't be just something with passing for, you know, of interest for a temporary audience or just for the times, but would be of enduring value.

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Yeah, that's a part of their philosophy, actually, that they don't want to print books that are just on current controversies.

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They want something that has a timeless value to it.

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Yes. And so at this conference, I'm to speak on the subject of the

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Holy Spirit. There are several different speakers, and I'm going to be speaking on the

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Holy Spirit, particularly in connection with the Spirit's work in connection with the ministry and how a biblical understanding of the work of the

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Holy Spirit will impact the way you go about doing ministry. Great. Well, we will be repeating this again,

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God willing. But if you want more details on the Banner of Truth, not only on its publications, but on the East Coast Ministers' Conference coming up May 28th through the 30th, go to banneroftruth .org,

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banneroftruth .org. If you're specifically looking for information on the conference, click on Events and then scroll down to East Coast Ministers' Conference, and you'll have all the details that you need to register.

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And now, what we do here on Iron Trip and Zion Radio, we have a tradition that when we have a first -time guest on the program, if that guest happens to be a genuinely regenerate

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Christian, sometimes we have, on rare occasions, guests that are not Christians because they've written something that may be of value to the body of Christ, even if they are not personally a

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Christian. But the vast majority of times, our guests are Christians, such as yourself. So if you could give us a summary of your salvation testimony and include with that testimony something of the religious atmosphere you were raised in, if any, and what providential circumstances our

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Sovereign Lord raised up in your life to draw you to Himself and save you. I was brought up in a

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Christian home. My parents were members of Baptist churches when

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I was growing up, and so I was in the environment of faithful, gospel preaching of the,

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I guess we could call it the revival tradition, so that we heard an evangelistic sermon every

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Sunday, and at the end of the service, we would sing multiple stanzas of Just As I Am.

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That was the environment I grew up in. I'm very grateful for it. I was blessed to hear good preaching, good evangelistic gospel preaching every

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Sunday, year in and year out. As for my own testimony,

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I don't remember a time when I didn't believe. As far back as I can remember, I had an implicit faith that the

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Bible was true, that the gospel was true, that Jesus was all that He said He was, that I was a sinner, that I needed

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Christ to be saved, but I could not be saved by my good works but only by faith.

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At an early age, I can recall being worried about friends who were not believers and what their eternal destiny might be and even questioned some of those friends about the condition of their soul.

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I provided friends to church and to youth groups. So I would say that there was a steady progression.

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There's no crisis conversion, but there was a steady progression, a steady growth in knowledge and commitment over the years, which were punctuated by spikes in growth that took place periodically.

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For example, at the age of 14, I became very concerned about my soul, talked to the minister, and ended up being baptized and making a public profession of faith.

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Then something similar to that happened again when I was 18. But the real turning point in terms of the depth of commitment, again, took place over time, but there was a two -week period between my sophomore and junior years where I entered into that two -week period.

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One person came out the other end with an entirely different outlook. It's one of those things where I don't know how and why exactly it happened, but part of the context was strong Christian friends at the

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University of Southern California. I got in with a crowd that was very zealous, very bold, outgoing, part of the fraternity, sorority, and athletic environment at USC.

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And then the other part was that we started attending the

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Grace Community Church in Panorama City, California, John MacArthur's church. Oh, yes. This would have been about 1974, 75.

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And we started attending. As I recall, he was preaching on 1

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John on Sunday nights, and we started going on Sunday nights. And what

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I recall is that the first time I went, he was preaching through several verses in 1

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John. When we walked out, I walked out just thinking in my mind, you know what? What he just did, that's what the preacher is supposed to do.

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He's supposed to explain the Bible to us, and that is what I had not heard growing up in the church that I grew up in.

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Again, the sermons were always directed at those other people who weren't saved. MacArthur was preaching to everybody and challenging everybody, and it was tremendous.

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And the way I speak of those months that extended even into a couple of years was similar to what

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I was just saying about that two -week period. Every week, I would walk into that church, one person, and walk out a different person.

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It was just powerful, life -transforming preaching. And at the time,

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I wasn't much of a Sabbatarian. I've become one since then.

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But what we would do is, after the service, we would go down to In -N -Out Burgers, just down the street from Grace Community.

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And then this group of guys that I ran around with, we would order up our burgers, fries, and milkshakes, and then we would discuss and debate the sermon and just talk about it and argue about it.

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And it just was a critical time in my own spiritual growth, spiritual development, was between those guys at USC, that I was going to church with, and other

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Bible studies with, and then MacArthur's preaching really made the life -changing and decisive direction -setting, outlook -determining impact on me.

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Well, praise God, yes. And I do uphold our brother

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John MacArthur as one of my greatest heroes of the 20th and 21st centuries.

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I, as a new Christian, thankfully was nurtured on his writings, including

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The Gospel According to Jesus, which was a very controversial book that was published in my very early stages of Christianity in the 1980s.

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And it's truly amazing how, even though our brother John is a dispensationalist, the vast majority of Reformed Christians, including

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Presbyterians and Reformed Baptists that I know, uphold him as well as a great hero of the faith.

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And, of course, he is today, and has been for a number of years, a thoroughgoing Calvinist, in spite of being a dispensationalist.

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So he is certainly somebody to highly recommend to read and listen to. Yeah, and he's a great lover of the

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Puritans. Yes. Amen. And he's certainly not a stereotypical dispensationalist.

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No, no. And to round out the picture, I was a history major at USC, and at the same time, one and the same time,

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I was reading Calvin for a Reformation history class.

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And I was reading Knowing God by Packer on my own. And I was introduced to Francis Schaeffer, whose books

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I devoured between my sophomore and junior years at USC.

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To kind of footnote that a little bit, I spent the summer living just off of the

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UCLA campus, which, for people who aren't from the West Coast, I think they're about maybe,

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I don't know, six miles apart. Maybe it's nine miles apart. But you can see the

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UCLA campus from the upper floors of the dormitories at USC. So I spent a summer living at Hal Lindsay's of Lake Great Planet Earth, a little school that he had established in the

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Kappa Sig House just off of the UCLA campus. He called it the Light and Power House.

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So I was working at Beacons in Santa Monica moving furniture during the day to make up the difference between my tuition bill and living expenses and all that I needed to earn during the summer.

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And then at night I was taking these classes from Hal Lindsay and several of his associates. And what Hal was teaching was not all that valuable, but what one of his associates was teaching was right out of Francis Schaeffer.

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That was my introduction. I was devouring that. So by the time I was a senior, I just felt like there was something qualitatively superior to the popular brand of Christianity that I was familiar with, that I was encountering reading

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Packer and Schaeffer and Calvin.

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Of course, the common element is they were all Calvinists, and they were covenantal in their theology.

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And so I decided then I was going to write to J .I. Packer and see if I could study in England with him.

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And it all ended up working out. So I spent two years at Trinity College in Bristol, England. And then

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I spent two years finishing up my degree at Gordon -Conwell up in New England and then spent five years as an intern and then an assistant minister at the

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Granada Presbyterian Church in Coral Gables. But I've been at my current church, the Independent Presbyterian Church, for 32 and a half years.

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Wow. Well, praise God for that. That's not something you hear very often, a brother who has faithfully served in one church for that many years.

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Now, I'm not trying to denigrate anybody who is called to another church after a shorter period of time, but it is just an unusual thing and a wonderful thing to hear.

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And also, it's amazing, God being sovereign, how many people I have met who were saved through the late great planet

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Earth in spite of anything extremely flawed in the thinking and teaching of Hal Lindsey.

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And I could say the same thing about Billy Graham, the late Billy Graham, how many people

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I know who are theologically reformed today who are even opposed to the

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Armenian invitation system, who came to faith in Christ at a Billy Graham crusade.

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So God does what he wants to do. Yeah, well, he blesses his word. Yes. And so even the flawed presentations, which

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I guess all of us to one degree or another are flawed in our presentation, but he blesses his word even when it's very flawed.

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The gospel message gets through and converts people. Amen. Amen. Well, when we return from the break, we're going to get right into the heart of our subject today, which is the traditional, or should

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I say, the case for traditional Protestantism, the Five Solas of the Reformation. This is a book by our guest,

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Terry L. Johnson, and it is our theme of discussion today. If you would like to join us on the air with a question of your own, just send us an email to chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

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C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com. And please, as always, give us at least your first name, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence if you live outside the

25:18

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

25:25

Let's say you disagree with your own pastor or your own church on something that we're addressing today.

25:32

Obviously, I would want you to remain anonymous, if that was the case. Or perhaps you are a pastor yourself, and you disagree with your denomination about something we are discussing.

25:43

Well, I could also readily see that being a reason to remain anonymous. Perhaps you disagree with your spouse, or whatever reason that you have that you are wanting to remain anonymous, as long as it's a personal and private matter, perhaps you're going through a transformation in your own thinking and you'd rather not call attention to your identity.

26:04

You're perhaps an Armenian, or a Roman Catholic, or a Muslim, or someone outside completely of the

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Christian faith, and you are being drawn, perhaps, and you're considering these things, but you don't want anyone in the public to know yet about this.

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Well, please remain anonymous. But, if it's just a general question, please give us at least your first name, city and state, and country of residence.

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Don't go away. We're going to be right back after these messages with more of Terry L. Johnson and the case for traditional

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Protestantism. I'm Pastor Bill Shishko, host of A Visit to the

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Pastor's Study, and I am so thankful to be part of the advertising family right here on Iron Sharpens Iron.

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My name is Steve Lawson, founder and president of One Passion Ministries, as well as teaching fellow for Ligonier Ministries.

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I serve as professor of preaching and oversee the doctor of ministry program at the Master's Seminary in Los Angeles.

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I would like to recommend the church where one of my preaching students, Andy Woodard, serves as the pastor.

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It's called New Covenant Church, NYC. They are a reformed Baptist church that meets in midtown

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Manhattan. You can find their service times and location on their website, which is www .ncc

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.nyc. They believe in a sovereign God who commands all men everywhere to repent and believe the gospel.

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If you're looking for a church that believes in expository preaching, which is simply biblical preaching, in New York City, I'd like to recommend that you visit

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New Covenant Church, NYC. Again, their information can be found at www .ncc

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This is Chris Arnson. If you just tuned us in, our guest today for the full two hours, with a little less than 90 minutes to go, is

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Terry L. Johnson, author, conference speaker, and senior minister of Independent Presbyterian Church of Savannah, Georgia.

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We are addressing one of his books today, The Case for Traditional Protestantism, and we're also discussing and promoting the

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East Coast Ministers' Conference of the Manner of Truth, coming up this May 28th through the 30th.

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That's Tuesday through Thursday, 28th through the 30th.

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And that's going to be held at the Elizabethtown College in Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania, on the theme,

35:52

I Believe in the Holy Spirit. If you'd like to join us on the air with a question in regard to The Case for Traditional Protestantism, or on any theological matter, since Terry is both a theologian and a pastor, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail dot com, chrisarnson at gmail dot com.

36:12

This is an interesting title in the 21st century, The Case for Traditional Protestantism, because as you may know,

36:22

Pastor Terry, Protestantism has become a dirty word for quite a while amongst a number of people.

36:30

In fact, people on opposite ends of the spectrum. You have those that are fundamentalist brethren.

36:38

Very often they will have a disdain for the term Protestantism. They will automatically equate it with either liberal mainline

36:47

Protestantism, or they will even focus on some of the unfortunate manner with which the magisterial

36:56

Protestants of the 16th century, and even more recent in history, have treated those who were

37:03

Anabaptists or Baptistic, and so on. So you have these people who have a hostility towards Protestantism from that camp, and also you have the mushy -gushy, squishy -wishy evangelicals, who are so focused on not offending people today, that they perhaps have modern day ecumenism as a hallmark of their philosophy, and they don't really want to identify with Protestantism that sounds too sectarian to them.

37:32

Why did you choose to use this term in the title of your book? Well, I did so because I was concerned about the blurring of the distinctions between classic

37:47

Protestantism and Roman Catholicism. I was concerned that, in a couple of ways,

37:54

I was concerned that something valuable was being lost in the blurring of the lines, and I was concerned that there were too many people who were brought up Protestant who were tempted to convert to Roman Catholicism.

38:17

And my own experience was shaped by the shocking departure of a number of my closest friends and classmates from Gordon -Conwell to Roman Catholicism.

38:33

This would include people such as Scott Kahn, Jerry Matatix, Steve Wood, Marcus Grodi.

38:47

These are guys I went to church with. Wow. Almost every Sunday. Yeah, Jerry Matatix, I don't know if you're familiar with the theological debates that I've organized, but my dear friend

38:58

Dr. James R. White of Alpha Omega Ministries, who has a long history of debating

39:03

Roman Catholics, for a decade on Long Island I arranged debates between Dr.

39:10

White and Roman Catholic apologists, and Jerry Matatix was the very first one who debated on the

39:15

Marian dogmas, and he has since become, as you may know, a state of vacantist, so he's even outside of the norm of Roman Catholicism these days.

39:26

And all of those names I am very familiar with, and Scott Kahn has refused to participate in any public debate

39:33

I've invited him to be involved in, and Marcus Grodi the same thing, but if you could, I'm sorry. Yes, well,

39:41

I went to church with them every Sunday. They were on the right wing of the Presbyterian faction at Gordon -Conwell.

39:49

They were, most of them were theonomists, and remarkably they went from theonomy all the way over to Roman Catholicism.

40:02

And Scott Kahn wrote a book called, I think it's Rome's Sweet Home, in which he described his conversion.

40:10

And so my concern that one could graduate from a Protestant seminary like Gordon -Conwell and end up a

40:17

Roman Catholic motivated me to try to reinforce in a semi -popular way the distinctives of Protestantism that are worth preserving.

40:33

And I did so around the mottos of the Reformation, Sola Scriptura, Sola Christo, Sola Fide, Sola Gratia, Sola Deo Gloria.

40:44

And I don't know that those five mottos had ever previously been brought together in a single publication.

40:56

I don't think they were ever utilized that way before, certainly not before the 20th century, and I don't think until that was published,

41:09

I don't think there's even a single book in which that was done. Wow. But the reason why I did it was

41:15

I thought it was a very convenient handle with which to explain and to remember what the issues of the

41:26

Reformation were and why those issues are worth continuing to fight about or to maintain and why the doctrines that separate it are worth continuing to teach.

41:47

And you can really sum it all up with the answer to the question, what must I do to be saved? And the answer the

41:53

Protestants give is very different than the answer the Roman Catholics give. That's right. Our answer is you must look to Scripture alone, which directs us to Christ alone, whom we receive by faith alone, as enabled by grace alone, also the glory of God alone.

42:10

And when you begin to elaborate on those, you come out with a very sharp distinction between a

42:19

Roman Catholic understanding of the answer to that question and a Protestant one. And that makes it a salvific issue.

42:24

That actually makes it a matter of spiritual life or death, doesn't it? Well, I think it does.

42:31

And I think Galatians 1, I think the Apostle Paul there with the Judaizing tendency to affirm the necessity of faith in Christ but to add to it the keeping of the ceremonial law.

42:46

I think that that is, in principle, the mistake that Roman Catholicism made and codified it, the

42:54

Council of Trent in the middle 1500s, when they insisted that justification is by faith plus works.

43:03

And in the process, it really lost the purity of the

43:08

Gospel. So I felt like those basic principles needed to be re -articulated and made available to people so that they could have an easy handle on what the differences are.

43:24

I mean, people today just look at the two and they don't see any difference at all. Maybe a little bit different form of worship, but I think it was a big to -do about nothing.

43:34

Yeah, I am continually troubled, to put it mildly, by the number of people that would share our, at least they would outwardly share our love for Reformed theology.

43:49

They might even be confessional. They sometimes are pastors or leaders or authors representing the

43:57

Reformed faith. But how often I encounter, even some who

44:03

I would consider my favorite authors or speakers, I will occasionally be shocked when

44:10

I hear them speaking in a very ecumenical way in regard to Roman Catholics and speak to them generally as our brothers and sisters.

44:20

Now, I of course know that there are regenerate Roman Catholics, but that's because they are believing and trusting in a biblical gospel in spite of the heresies of their own denomination.

44:34

But I'm assuming this concerns you just as much as it concerns me. It almost appears at times that those who want so desperately to be recognized academically and in the world of scholarship, they are afraid of looking too much like fundamentalists or separatists, and they will be very soft in their opposition to Rome.

45:02

Does this trouble you as much as it troubles me? Well, I think that if we, in a process, are going to water down those important gospels that we've just mentioned, yes, it does trouble me.

45:22

I don't think there can be any compromising of those, any watering down of the difference.

45:28

I think that's a mistake. I just think that they are what they are, and we are what we are, and we can respect each other in that way, but I don't think that there should be pressure to try to, or an

45:42

Orthodox Roman Catholic to water down what he or she believes, or for an Orthodox Protestant to water down what we believe.

45:49

But I think it's helpful to note that, you know, we do hold a lot in common. We both affirm the

45:57

Apostles' Creed, the Nicene Creed, the Chalcedonian Creed. We believe in the doctrine of the

46:03

Trinity, the dual nature of Christ. We have a lot in common. And so there's a great body of truth that's summarized in those creeds that we agree upon with Roman Catholics and with Eastern Orthodox, and I think that with Western civilization getting more and more secular and hostile to all forms of Christianity, I think we find ourselves being co -belligerent with the

46:29

Catholics and the Orthodox in our quest to protect the rights of Christians to practice

46:37

Christianity without interference from the government, and to protect the life of the unborn. So we're working together more than ever, but I don't think that working together should ever involve watering down the doctrinal differences.

46:49

Yes. We can work together in certain social issues and moral issues, and I'm all for that.

47:00

In fact, in some ways, in spite of this book, I'm like the Roman Catholic's favorite

47:05

Protestant in my part of the country. Because we understand each other.

47:10

For that matter, the Orthodox Jews. We understand each other. We understand where we're coming from. People, secular, you know, pagan

47:17

Americans just think we're ridiculous because of our practices and our beliefs, and they just scorn them.

47:26

But if you encounter an Orthodox Christian of another stripe or an

47:31

Orthodox Jew, you know, they don't agree. We don't agree with each other, but we understand each other.

47:37

And that mutual understanding can be valuable. Yes. And to clarify for our listeners who are unfamiliar with the term co -belligerence, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, but that's basically when you are uniting with someone that you have serious differences with, but you share a common cause that you believe it is appropriate to unite with them on those areas.

48:04

Like, for instance, to give you an example of the right and wrong way to do that, my friend that I mentioned before,

48:12

Dr. James R. White of Alpha Omega Ministries, he used to belong to a specific pro -life organization that he had to resign from by his own volition because they did not want him to ever evangelize the

48:31

Roman Catholics that were involved in the same public events where he was, and there would be people reading the

48:38

Rosary and praying to Mary at these events, and he was forbidden to, in love, correct them in any manner or evangelize them, so he had to resign.

48:48

Now, that's where co -belligerence would really lose its meaning when you are forbidden to actually share the

48:56

Gospel with those that you are working with on other social and moral issues. Well, the way it has worked out for me has been this way.

49:09

Twice I've been asked to give the opening prayer for the March for Life in Washington, D .C.,

49:15

which is an annual event that takes place on the anniversary of the

49:21

Roe Wade decision, January 22nd, and there's tens of thousands, even into the hundreds of thousands of people that participate.

49:31

Well, it's dominated by Roman Catholics. There are Protestants, you know, they're there, but it's dominated by Roman Catholics.

49:39

All of the leadership is Roman Catholic. But twice they've asked me to come and to do the opening prayer, which

49:45

I've been happy to do. And one time they asked me to address the subject of Kent.

49:54

The subject was, quote, you can't legislate morality.

50:01

But what they have is they have this conference immediately following the March, and so I was one of the featured speakers, and so my subject, you can't legislate morality.

50:11

So I was able to speak to them on this general theme, and my argument was that all law legislates morality.

50:23

Law is simply the expression of morality. So we were able to work together at that level.

50:30

We could never work together in an evangelistic crusade. Right. Because we don't understand the evangel in the same way, and I would not be happy for any converts to begin to go to Roman Catholic churches where I think that they will only get confused.

50:45

So I think that's how you decide who you can work with. You work with them at the level at which you can work and not compromise anything where you have confidence in each other when it comes to moral issues, pretty much.

50:58

When it comes to the Gospel, pretty much not. Right. In fact,

51:03

I was very puzzled when somebody who I would also consider my hero, the late

51:10

Dr. D. James Kennedy, he very rightfully joined forces with John MacArthur and R .C.

51:18

Sproul to oppose the Evangelical and Catholics Together Peace Treaty that was drafted by the late

51:26

Charles Coulson and others. Dr. Kennedy very rightly opposed this, but then, confusingly, before he went home to be with the

51:34

Lord, he orchestrated a conference and cruise called Reclaiming America for the

51:40

Gospel and had a Roman Catholic priest as a part of the roster. Now, if it was just about what you were talking about, a co -belligerent event that involved the corruption of America through the failure of morality and other social aspects that have been destroying this country, that I could understand, but when he included

52:06

Reclaiming America for the Gospel, that's where I had some serious problems.

52:12

But the Lord took him home before that event ever manifested or became to be.

52:20

But we have to go to our midway break right now. This is a longer than normal break because Grace Life Radio, 90 .1

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FM in Lake City, Florida, requires of us a longer break in the middle of our show because we, or should

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I say they, air their own public service announcements and commercials that localize

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Zion Trip and Zion Radio to Lake City, Florida in the middle of our show, while we air our own commercials that are heard globally.

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So I ask of you to please not only use this time wisely to write down questions for Terry Johnson on our subject today, but also please use this time to write down the information provided by our advertisers because we depend on our advertisers to exist.

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The funding financially that they provide through their advertising dollars is required for us to continue on the air.

53:12

So please write down the information provided by our advertisers so that you can more frequently and successfully patronize them as often as you can.

53:21

But we're going to be back after this break with more on the case for traditional

53:27

Protestantism with Terry L. Johnson, Senior Minister of Independent Presbyterian Church of Savannah, Georgia.

53:33

Our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com chrisarnson at gmail .com

53:38

And as always, please give us your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside the USA, and only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter.

53:48

chrisarnson at gmail .com Don't go away. We'll be back after these messages. Tired of box store

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I'm Dr. Gary Kimbrell, pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church in Laurel, Mississippi. God tells us in James 127 that pure and undefiled religion is a visit to fatherless and widows and their affliction.

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Johnson, if you've just tuned us in, we have been discussing his book, The Case for Traditional Protestantism.

01:08:55

Before we return to that discussion, we just have some upcoming announcements that you need to be aware of.

01:09:01

First of all, why don't you mark down on your calendar that Terry L. Johnson's returning to IRONSHARPENSIRON Radio, God willing, this

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Wednesday. We're going to be discussing the attributes of God, which is also a part of the subject, or the main theme of the subject of a book.

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He has written a newer book that he has written for Banner of Truth. So, mark your calendar for this

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Wednesday, 4 -6 p .m. Eastern for Terry L. Johnson's second interview with us this week.

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Also, coming up in May this month, a couple of weeks away on Thursday, May 23rd, 11 a .m.

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United States and the United Kingdom. So, in other words, you're going to be getting a couple of dozen free books, perhaps even three dozen books, absolutely free.

01:10:41

And there is no hidden agenda, there's no ulterior motive. This was a brainchild, this pastor's luncheon, was a brainchild of my precious late wife,

01:10:50

Julie, in the 1990s. And we have been continuing these luncheons in her memory after she went home to be with the

01:10:57

Lord for eternity. So I continue to do this in her honor and to bless the pastors, which was what my precious late wife's goal was.

01:11:07

She wanted pastors to be treated to a day of rest, relaxation, fun, fellowship, refreshment, and to bless them with free books.

01:11:17

And she knew that pastors very often are not invited to things that don't have a hidden agenda or an ulterior motive behind them.

01:11:28

And so this was her gift to the pastors that I knew, and I'm continuing to do it in her honor.

01:11:34

And if you would like to register for free, just send me an email to chrisarnson at gmail dot com, chrisarnson at gmail dot com, and put pastor's luncheon in the subject line.

01:11:44

As long as you're a man in ministry leadership, whether you're a pastor or an elder, and I believe those are the same office, by the way, a deacon, a parachurch leader, whatever leadership position that you hold as a man, you'll be welcome to this luncheon.

01:12:00

And just to give you an interesting bit of trivia, although my wife is the one that came up with this luncheon, and although I told her every year, you know, you can come to the luncheon because you're my wife, number one, and number two, you're the one that came up with the idea for these luncheons, and my wife, because she strongly believed in a complementarian understanding of headship in the church and in the home, she did not believe in women in the ministry, she would never come to the luncheons.

01:12:31

So I just thought I'd let you know about that interesting bit of trivia. But send me an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com,

01:12:37

chrisarnson at gmail .com, and we will register you for the pastor's luncheon if you put pastor's luncheon in the subject line.

01:12:45

And then, right after that, Dr. Tony Costa, the speaker at the pastor's luncheon, and I are heading to Long Island, New York for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, immediately following the luncheon.

01:12:57

That's Friday, May 24th, through Sunday, May 26th. And he will be speaking at a number of different churches on different themes, including

01:13:07

New Hyde Park Baptist Church in western Suffolk County, Long Island, New York, including

01:13:12

Wading River Baptist Church in central Suffolk County, Long Island, New York, including

01:13:17

Hope Reform Baptist Church of Coram, Long Island, New York, and including Missio Church in eastern

01:13:24

Suffolk County in Ridge, New York. If you want an itinerary, a complete itinerary for Dr. Costa, please send me an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com

01:13:33

and put Dr. Tony Costa in the subject line. I will send you his complete itinerary. Then, as soon as that's finished,

01:13:39

I'm heading back to Pennsylvania for the Banner of Truth East Coast Ministers Conference that we have been discussing. That's Tuesday, May 28th, through Thursday, May 30th at the

01:13:49

Elizabethtown College in Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania. The theme is, I believe,

01:13:54

In the Holy Spirit, and the speakers include our guest today, Terry Johnson, and also

01:13:59

Jeff Kingswood, and David Vaughn, and Steve Nichols, and Michael Morales, and Chad Vegas.

01:14:06

If you would like to register for this conference, the East Coast Ministers Conference, as long as you're a man in ministry leadership, the same qualifications for my pastor's luncheon, you will be able to register at banneroftruth .org,

01:14:20

banneroftruth .org, click on events, and then scroll down to East Coast Ministers Conference. Then, after that, a few months after that,

01:14:29

I am going to be packing my bags and heading back to my old stomping grounds in New York City to the

01:14:35

Foundations Conference. This is a conference orchestrated by Sermon Audio, sermonaudio .com.

01:14:43

It's being held December 19th and 20th in the heart of Manhattan.

01:14:50

And I hope as many of you join me there as possible. It's Wednesday, I'm sorry,

01:14:57

Thursday, December 19th, and Friday, December 20th. And the speakers are also phenomenal at this conference.

01:15:04

They include Dr. Stephen J. Lawson, who you've been hearing advertising New Covenant Church NYC, one of the sponsors of this program.

01:15:13

He is the founder of One Passion Ministries and one of the most profound preachers alive today, in my opinion.

01:15:18

Paul Washer is another one of the amazing preachers on this lineup. I'm looking forward to hearing him again.

01:15:25

Reverend Jeff Thomas, somebody who everybody who's familiar with Banner of Truth is likely very familiar with this brother.

01:15:34

Not only an author, but a profound conference speaker. And he was a pastor at the same church for over half a century in Aberystwyth Wells.

01:15:44

You will be extraordinarily blessed by this brother. And also Rev. Armand Tomassian, who

01:15:50

I think is going to become a household name over the next decade in Reformed circles. He is a powerful, powerful preacher with gifts far beyond his youth.

01:16:02

And you will be blessed by him, I'm certain, if you love the doctrines of sovereign grace. It's Rev. Armand Tomassian.

01:16:08

Richard Caldwell and Anthony Quigley are also on the lineup. I do not know these brothers, and I've never heard them preach, but if Sermon Audio selected them,

01:16:16

I am sure they are going to be magnificent, and I'm looking forward to hearing them. If you'd like to register, go to thefoundationsconference .com

01:16:25

thefoundationsconference .com and you can register for this event Thursday and Friday, December 19th and 20th in Manhattan.

01:16:32

And I would strongly urge you to do so quickly if you'd like to go, because they can only manage to hold less than 200 people at the venue that they're using in Manhattan, so please register soon if you want to attend.

01:16:45

And then, I'm going to be heading in January, once again to Atlanta, Georgia, more specifically

01:16:52

College Park, Georgia, a suburb of Atlanta, to the Georgia International Convention Center.

01:16:58

And that is the home of the G3 Conference, which is going to be on the theme Worship Matters.

01:17:05

And that is going to be held from Thursday, January 16th through Saturday, January 18th in College Park, Georgia.

01:17:16

And they also, as they do every year, have an amazing lineup of speakers, which includes

01:17:22

Kosti Hinn. And if that name sounds familiar, it probably does for a very bad reason, because Kosti's uncle is the notorious charlatan

01:17:31

Benny Hinn. But Kosti has renounced the Word of Faith movement that he was raised in and has become a

01:17:36

Reformed Baptist and a cessationist. He is a part of this roster. What a precious brother in Christ he is.

01:17:43

I've interviewed him a couple of times and I look forward to many more interviews with him. David Miller is on the roster.

01:17:50

He's a really profound preacher as well. Derek Thomas, who I'm sure many of our listeners today are very familiar with, especially if you love the

01:17:59

Ministry of Banner of Truth. My friend, Dr. James R. White of Alpha Omega Ministries, who I've mentioned a couple of times today.

01:18:06

He is going to be on the roster. Joel Beeky, who is another name very familiar to Reformed Christians, a good friend of mine since the 1990s.

01:18:15

Josh Bice, who's the founder of the G3 Conference. Paul Washer and Stephen Lawson once again will be at this conference.

01:18:22

My dear friend of many years, Dr. Tom Askell, the executive director of Founders Ministries.

01:18:29

And Voli Baucom, who is also one of the most extraordinary speakers in our day and age.

01:18:35

If you'd like to register for the G3 Conference, go to g3conference .com g3conference .com I strongly urge you, if you want to promote a business, a parachurch ministry, a church, or anything else that you believe is a blessing to the

01:18:48

Body of Christ, I would urge you to register for an exhibitors booth, just like I will be manning at the

01:18:54

G3 Conference because they expect over, well over 5 ,000 people again.

01:19:00

Every year they have over 5 ,000 in attendance at the G3 Conference, so it's an ideal place to promote whatever it is you want to promote.

01:19:08

So you can register to attend and also for an exhibitors booth at g3conference .com g3conference .com.

01:19:14

Last but not least, if you love this program, Iron Sherpens Iron Radio, you don't want it to disappear from the airwaves, please go to ironsherpensironradio .com,

01:19:22

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01:19:35

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01:20:09

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01:20:25

click support, then click click to donate now. If you have a hard time finding a church home if you do not currently belong to a church, if you're not prayerfully seeking for a bible -believing church near you, you are living in rebellion against God.

01:20:40

You need to rectify that. I can help you. I have lists of biblically faithful churches all over the world. Send me an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com

01:20:48

chrisarnson at gmail .com and put in the subject line, I need a church home, and even if you're looking for a church to attend while you're on vacation,

01:20:56

I can help you. I've already helped quite a number of people in our audience find good churches, so I can help you too.

01:21:02

chrisarnson at gmail .com and put I need a church home or something similar in the subject line. If you'd like to advertise with us, we urgently need your advertising dollars, so send us an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com

01:21:12

and put advertising in the subject line, and as long as whatever it is you're promoting is compatible with what

01:21:18

I believe, we will help you launch an ad campaign immediately, and you don't have to believe identically with me, but you need to be promoting something that's compatible with what

01:21:26

I believe. That's chrisarnson at gmail .com, put advertising in the subject line. That's also the email address where you can send in a question for our guest,

01:21:34

Terry L. Johnson, on the case for traditional Protestantism. chrisarnson at gmail .com

01:21:39

chrisarnson at gmail .com We look forward to hearing from you and your questions. Well, we have a question for you,

01:21:46

Pastor Terry. We have a question from Grady in Ashboro, North Carolina, who's been a long -time listener of our show and a very generous contributor to Iron Sherpa and Zion Radio as well.

01:22:01

Grady in Ashboro, North Carolina. I have to enlarge his question because the font is microscopic, but he says,

01:22:10

Chris, you never cease to amaze me with your guests and the information they provide. Brother Terry, we hear and read about the

01:22:17

Reformers, Luther, Calvin, and Zwingli, but seldom hear about John Hus and others in his era that stood up for the faith.

01:22:26

Does your book cover that part of the Protestant history? Yeah, I guess we call that the Proto -Reformation.

01:22:34

Jan Hus, John Hus, it's pronounced different ways, the Bohemian martyr who died for his faith before the

01:22:41

Protestant Reformation, but if you could address Grady's question. No, it really doesn't.

01:22:49

Hus is burned at the stake a full hundred years before Luther.

01:22:56

He was fighting the corruption of the

01:23:03

Renaissance Church and was executed for his troubles, but he didn't he didn't really anticipate the doctrine of justification by faith.

01:23:18

So he's not, I don't think he can be cited as at least on that principle as an example of an early

01:23:32

Protestant. He was opposed to the corruption as I you know,

01:23:38

I'm a little hazy on Hus. As I recall, he was a conciliarist. In other words, he argued for the supremacy of Church councils over the authority of the

01:23:48

Pope. He, along with conciliarism, were condemned in 1415 by the

01:23:56

Council of Constance. So you know,

01:24:02

Hus and Wycliffe is known as the Morning Star of the Reformation. They both anticipate certain elements of the

01:24:09

Protestant Reformation, but really the clarity of the doctrinal distinctions between Roman Protestants really don't come out until Luther and after Luther.

01:24:24

So in terms of the book itself, I didn't write a whole lot. Hus had quite a bit of influence on Luther himself and Luther ends up saying that Hus was right and that the

01:24:35

Church was wrong when he is on trial at Worms.

01:24:42

But otherwise, no, I don't have a whole lot to say about Hus. So, you know, I would love to know more about him and admire the stand that he did take.

01:24:54

It just wasn't a specifically Protestant stand except in the areas that I just mentioned.

01:25:04

Well, thank you, Grady. You have won a free copy of the book that we are discussing,

01:25:09

The Case for Traditional Protestantism, Compliments of Banner of Truth. So if you send us your full mailing address in Asheboro, North Carolina, we will have cvbbs .com

01:25:22

ship that out to you. Thanks so much for the excellent question. Before I go to any other of our listener questions,

01:25:31

I just, well, first of all, let me repeat our email address. It's chrisarnson at gmail dot com. And please, as always, give us your first name, city and state, and country of residence.

01:25:41

But the evangelical faith is a chapter in your book and today the word evangelical seems to have lost its meaning because that would be an umbrella term encompassing people that you and I would be very much in disagreement with.

01:26:01

But what do you mean and what did history mean by the evangelical faith? Well, the historic use of the term was synonymous with Protestant.

01:26:12

So especially in Germany and in Lutheran circles, to be an evangelical was to be a

01:26:18

Protestant. To be a Protestant was to be an evangelical. In the

01:26:24

American scene, it's been the more serious kind of Protestants, the more biblical kind of Protestants that traditionally have been known as evangelicals.

01:26:36

They were Protestants that were strong on the authority of Scripture, who gave emphasis to the evangelizing of the lost.

01:26:50

So that, you know, in other words, Bible -believing, gospel -preaching

01:26:57

Protestants are evangelicals. And when you get, by the time the use of the term evolved into the 20th century, they're often set in opposition to liberals.

01:27:10

There are liberals and there are evangelicals. That comes about really in the post -World

01:27:17

War II part of the 20th century. And evangelicals were attempting to distance themselves from certain aspects of fundamentalism.

01:27:30

So, I mean, the history's a little bit complex, but if you go back to the 1920s and the Scopes Monkey Trial, you have fundamentalists and modernists.

01:27:38

That terminology ends up evolving, and modernists come to be called liberals and fundamentalists a few decades later because of the separatism that was characteristic of fundamentalism, and because of elements of legalism where rules and restrictions that were extra -biblical were imposed on congregations.

01:27:59

Serious Protestants who believe the Bible and are eager to evangelize instead take on the name of evangelical rather than fundamentalist.

01:28:11

And Carl Henry and Harold John Ockingay Harold Gensel were among the leaders who were advocating dropping the fundamentalist label and instead utilizing the term evangelical, both because they wanted to distance themselves from fundamentalism but also because they wanted to use a historic term that was rooted in the

01:28:36

Reformation itself. But like you mentioned, I think in modern times, I'm fewer and fewer times than inclined to use it, because I'd rather speak of myself as a

01:28:48

Reformed Christian. The problem with that is that the world here is

01:28:53

Reformed Christian, and they think, what are you Reformed from? You know, so we're really caught.

01:29:02

Are we mere Christians? You know, the early Puritans right through to John Owen, they wanted to be known as Catholics.

01:29:13

They weren't willing to surrender the term Catholic to Roman Catholics. They thought that was a very good, important, historic word that speaks of the universality of the

01:29:21

Church and its belief and practices and that the innovators were really the

01:29:27

Roman Catholics. They are the ones who embraced all of the innovations and novelties that had developed during the

01:29:32

Middle Ages over the 1 ,000 -year period from the early Church and the

01:29:39

Church of Late Antiquity through the time of the Reformation, and so they were claiming to reform the

01:29:46

Church and really return it to Catholicity of practice and of belief.

01:29:52

That was characteristic of the early Church, and so they didn't want to surrender that word. They wanted it to be known, like Richard Baxter speaks of himself as a mere

01:29:59

Catholic, small C. So I don't know. The terminology is ambiguous in no matter what direction that we look.

01:30:08

Evangelical, Reformed, Catholic, Orthodox, that's another term.

01:30:14

You know, we have Orthodox Presbyterians. We also have Eastern Orthodoxy, so there's confusion with that term.

01:30:23

So, you know, I think every label requires some explanation. I don't think there are any good labels anymore.

01:30:29

I think everything that you use to try to identify yourself is Bible -believing Christian. I mean, that's a

01:30:37

Bible -believing historically rooted Christian. That about sums up, you know, where I stand.

01:30:45

Yeah, and of course, people that call themselves Biblicists, in order to avoid the trappings of labels, they fail miserably because there are cults that call themselves

01:30:56

Biblicists. Right, and so we, in our church,

01:31:01

I'm not saying this needs to be the practice of every church, but we recite the Apostles' Creed every week. One reason why

01:31:07

I like the fact that we do that is that it connects us with the mainstream of Christendom over the last 2 ,000 years.

01:31:15

A cult is not going to recite the Apostles' Creed. Right. These are the basic foundational doctrines,

01:31:20

God is the Creator, Christ is the Redeemer, the Holy Spirit is the One who applies redemption, and so you have a

01:31:27

Trinitarian Creed, and what we're doing is we're linking hands with 20 centuries of Christian history, belief and practice.

01:31:37

So, that means that, you know, we're not a cult. We didn't discover the truth.

01:31:42

We didn't just spring out of the ground whole yesterday. We owe something of our identity, our convictions, to the church.

01:31:51

Historic. Amen. And that's also... And I'm not willing to surrender the history of the church to the

01:31:58

Roman Catholics. Right. Yeah, we share much in common with many of the church fathers.

01:32:04

The patristic evidence would prove that very often the church fathers would be more in agreement with the

01:32:11

Reformers than with Rome. Well, this is the background to Hughes' old groundbreaking book,

01:32:19

The Patristic Roots of Reformed Worship. You know, every one of the Reformers, of Reformed Protestantism, did what they did on the basis both of the

01:32:33

Bible, its theology and its exegesis, and historic practice. So when they were looking for reforming the preaching of the church, they had both the

01:32:42

Bible to look to, but they also had the sermons of Augustine and the sermons of Chrysostom, which were verse by verse, expositions of books of the

01:32:53

Bible. So when Zwingli decided January 1 of 1519 to begin preaching through Matthew's gospel, he had in hand

01:33:02

John Chrysostom's freshly published sermons on Matthew. He saw that and he said, what a great idea!

01:33:08

And so he began to preach verse by verse. It was something of a novelty then, but what it really was was a restoration of patristic practice.

01:33:18

And so, you know, I don't think it's really proper to speak of Roman Catholicism until the

01:33:27

Council of Trent and the Counter -Reformation. Prior to that, you know, there are

01:33:33

Christians in the Middle Ages that we would share much in common with the evangelistic zeal of the

01:33:38

Irish monks, for example. Yeah, they were monks, but my Old Testament teacher at Trinity College in Bristol called them anti -papal evangelicals, these early monks.

01:33:54

They were gospel preachers, and they were opposed to the power of the papacy, and it took a couple of centuries, but eventually they were brought into line, but not initially.

01:34:06

So I'm not willing to yield all that history to somebody else. Calvin quotes

01:34:12

Augustine on almost every page of the Institutes, and he frequently quotes

01:34:18

Bernard of Clairvaux, and that would be true of many of the Puritans as well. They loved

01:34:23

Bernard of Clairvaux. So, you know, there's much to be gleaned from the whole history of the

01:34:34

Church. I'm not compromising our faith in the process. Amen. Yeah, I'd like to throw in a plug for a massive, groundbreaking, 900 -volume work in three volumes, 900 -page,

01:34:49

I should say, 900 -page work in three volumes, Holy Scripture, the

01:34:54

Ground and Pillar of Our Faith, co -authored by Reformed Baptist William Webster and Presbyterian David T.

01:35:03

King, and amazing three -volume set on the very issue of the belief in Sola Scriptura by the

01:35:11

Church Fathers prior to the 16th Century Reformation. Interesting.

01:35:17

I know David King. He was pastoring a Presbyterian church in this area.

01:35:23

Yes. And he is now attending a member of a church in Katy, Texas.

01:35:30

Not pastoring the church, but he does fill the pulpit a lot. I see.

01:35:36

He's a dear brother of mine. Let's go to another listener here.

01:35:45

We have John in Bangor, Maine, who wants to know, since this is the 400th anniversary of the

01:35:54

Synod of Dort, can you explain, at least in summary form, how the Westminster Standards might be different from the

01:36:02

Synod of Dort and the canons thereof, if there are any significant ones?

01:36:07

I am not familiar if there are significant differences, but perhaps you know. Yeah, I don't think that there are differences per se.

01:36:20

I don't have any particular expertise on Dort. Dr. Godfrey is a great expert on Dort.

01:36:27

That was the subject of his doctoral dissertation. Yeah, he just wrote a book recently, but I think it's fairly new on that subject.

01:36:36

Yes. But I think the difference is that the Westminster Confession is a far more comprehensive statement of faith.

01:36:45

Dort was primarily taken up with rebutting the Armenians in the Dutch Church, and it was a semi -international conference in that Calvinists from Scotland and England and Germany and Holland and France all participated in it.

01:37:01

But it was mainly concerned with rebutting the five points of Arminianism, which is how we got the five points of Calvinism, which it did.

01:37:12

But the Westminster Confession is arguably the most comprehensive

01:37:20

Reformation era confession that was written, and it covers the whole span of theology and practice.

01:37:29

And it's a much more pastoral document, rather than strictly doctrinal.

01:37:38

For example, it has chapters on assurance, and on the place of the law of God in the

01:37:47

Christian life, and it has sections on prayer, and in other words, and then through the catechisms, lengthy expositions of the

01:38:00

Ten Commandments and the Lord's Prayer. So the work of the Westminster Divine was far more comprehensive than that which was produced by Dort.

01:38:16

Well, thanks, John and Bangor, Maine. Give us your full mailing address in Maine and CVVBS .com

01:38:24

will ship you out a free copy of the book that we are addressing, The Case for Traditional Protestantism.

01:38:29

Compliments of our friends at The Banner of Truth. Thank you very much for contributing an excellent question to our discussion today.

01:38:37

Let's see, we have Bobby in Hartsdale, New York, who asks,

01:38:44

What do you think are the primary solas of the Reformation that Rome opposes?

01:38:56

Well, I think that Rome primarily opposes the first four, certainly.

01:39:04

The final authority in Scripture is the final authority of the

01:39:09

Church. Is there equal authority in the oral tradition, so that you have a holy tradition as well as holy

01:39:18

Scripture? And the Church as the arbiter that synthesizes the oral tradition with the written

01:39:28

Scripture, and therefore the Church ultimately is determining faith and practice, or is it

01:39:35

Scripture that is the final authority in all matters of faith and practice? A practical application of that?

01:39:43

Why do Roman Catholics believe in the bodily assumption of Mary? A Protestant will go to a

01:39:48

Roman Catholic and say, Now, hey, where do you find that in the Bible? Well, that doesn't trouble them at all. It's part of the oral tradition of which the

01:39:55

Church has been the caretaker over the centuries, and part of that oral tradition is this teaching about her bodily assumption.

01:40:01

She didn't die. She was co -redeemer, co -mediator. She was sinless at the time of the conception of Jesus, so that we have an immaculate conception, not just a virgin birth, but an immaculate conception.

01:40:17

So that's based on Sola Scriptura. So yes, they come out with different answers to the basic questions to a significant degree, because they have a different source of authority.

01:40:29

They have multiple sources of authority, whereas we're going to limit ourselves to Scripture. So, I think that's the foundational difference there.

01:40:37

Sola Christo, Christ alone, if you believe that the death of Christ is final and complete and atones, that has a radical impact on the ministry of the

01:40:51

Church, because at the center of Roman Catholic practice is an understanding of the Mass as a sacrifice.

01:40:58

Right, a propitiatory. Yes. Trent defines it, Council of Trent, the defining council of Roman Catholicism, defines it as a propitiatory sacrifice.

01:41:08

So that means what happens in the center of the life of God's people is a sacrifice is offered by a priest on an altar that propitiates, as opposed to understanding the

01:41:27

Atonement and its finality, which forbids that we would think that a sacrifice was being offered.

01:41:34

So there's this contrast of, we say it's a meal, they say it's a Mass. We say it's a supper, they say it's a sacrifice.

01:41:42

We say that piece of furniture is a table, they say it's an altar. We say that the clergyman is a pastor or a preacher, they say he's a priest.

01:41:50

We say that you should receive the sacraments in the posture that one assumes when eating a meal, they say you kneel and offer adoration to the elevated host and the elevated cup, because Christ is physically and carnally present in the supper.

01:42:14

So with solo Christo, out goes the sacrificial Mass, out goes prayers for the dead, out goes the doctrine of transubstantiation, out goes the belief in purgatory.

01:42:26

I mean, really, the whole structure of Roman Catholic practice collapses at that point.

01:42:35

Solo Christo. And then that's further reinforced by Sola Fide. If you believe in justification by faith alone, you're going to fill your worship services with Scripture, and you're going to the service is going to be conducted in the vernacular, so that people don't understand what's going on, because unlike the

01:42:55

Roman Catholic Church teaches, implicit faith is not enough. You must have personal faith, and faith comes by hearing the

01:43:01

Word of Christ, Romans 10, 17. We're born again by the living and the Holy Word, we grow by the pure milk of the

01:43:07

Word, we're sanctified by the truth, so Scriptural content is crucial, the service will need to be in the language of the people, and the

01:43:16

Word will be at the heart of the service, it'll be read, preached, sung, prayed, and even a sacrament will be understood using

01:43:25

Augustine's terminology as visible words. So it's not going to do for people to be sitting in a service in which a service is conducted in Latin, and people are sitting in straight rows, going all the way back in the distance, where all they can hear is the mumbling of the service, and they're going to need to understand what's being said, so that they might exercise saving faith.

01:43:50

Grace alone, you know, the whole prayer life of the Church expanded because of the principle of sola gratia.

01:43:57

If we are dependent on God's initiative, we better be praying for God to act. And so normally we don't think of the

01:44:05

Reformation as a revolution in prayer, but it really was. The Reformers restored the prayer of praise to the ordinary services of the

01:44:13

Church, the prayers of intercession, the prayer of illumination, the benediction, these were all added to the ordinary service of the

01:44:20

Church because of the conviction that prayer should be at the heart of the

01:44:27

Church's life when it gathers. Jesus said, my house shall be called the house of prayer. So every one of these principles, both doctrinally and in practical application, separates

01:44:44

Rome from Protestantism. That's right. In very significant ways.

01:44:49

Yes. And in my experience, you do have Roman Catholics that are more ecumenically minded who

01:44:57

I think redefine some of the solos and claim them as their own. Like they may say they believe in solo

01:45:05

Christos, they may say they believe in solo gratia, but they certainly, the vast majority, would be openly and specifically and vociferously opposed to solo scriptura and solo fide.

01:45:19

That's where they have a hard time hiding behind a redefinition of the other solos.

01:45:28

Right. The other interesting thing is, after basically 500 years of resisting the

01:45:38

Reformation, Vatican II, they restored the vernacular services that are now conducted in the language of the people.

01:45:45

They gave fresh emphasis to preaching, fresh emphasis to congregational singing.

01:45:51

They restored the cup, which had been withheld, to restore that to the laity, so they were allowed communion in both kinds thereafter.

01:46:03

And they restored the prayers of intercession to the ordinary services of the

01:46:08

Church. So it's interesting. It took 500 years, but many of the worship reforms were finally embraced by Rome at Vatican II.

01:46:19

While they continue to cling to their sacerdotalism and sacramentalism and their priestly understanding of the clergy and the role of the sacraments and their understanding of the sacraments.

01:46:35

Yeah, I find it amazing on those occasions when I have been in attendance at a Catholic church after my conversion.

01:46:42

I was raised Catholic and I'm now a Reformed Baptist and have been since the 1980s.

01:46:48

But if I'm attending some kind of a funeral service or a wedding in a

01:46:55

Catholic church, it's amazing how often I will hear Protestant hymns that they really have no business singing if they really believed in the words like Amazing Grace and other things.

01:47:07

They're being very inconsistent, just like anybody who denies particular redemption.

01:47:14

For them to say that they believe in substitutionary atonement is also ironic that you'll have many

01:47:20

Armenians claiming that phrase for themselves when they really can't consistently and logically believe in that.

01:47:27

But we are going to our final break right now. It's a much more brief break than the last one.

01:47:32

If you want to ask a question, do so now because we're rapidly running out of time. ChrisArnsen at gmail .com

01:47:38

ChrisArnsen at gmail .com. Don't go away. We'll be right back after these messages from our sponsors. ...

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Spread the word about FirstLoveRadio .org. Welcome back.

01:57:00

This is Chris Arns. And this is the last few minutes of our interview today with Terry L. Johnson. And if you could,

01:57:07

Pastor Johnson, if you could summarize what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners today when it comes to the case for traditional

01:57:16

Protestantism. I would hope they would not allow themselves to be enticed by Roman Catholicism.

01:57:31

It sometimes is appealing to Protestants who are tired of the divisiveness of Protestantism, and they imagine with Rome you have a unified church that has a 2 ,000 -year history and which is undivided in 2 ,000s of groups as are

01:57:54

Protestants. But I think that unity is more imaginary than real.

01:58:01

That's right. And that the doctrinal distinctions are not trivial.

01:58:10

They're not petty and small. They are central, they are crucial, they are vital, and the distinctives of Protestants are worth preserving and strike right at the heart of the gospel itself.

01:58:22

And so there's no relief to be found at Rome. We can admire the strong moral stance that they have taken, but the theological errors, they remain attached to, and those errors are intolerable if you care about preserving the gospel itself.

01:58:48

Amen. Well, I want you folks to remember this Wednesday, Pastor Terry L.

01:58:54

Johnson is returning, God willing, to Iron Sheriff and Zion Radio to discuss his book, The Identity and Attributes of God, a much more recent publication of Banner of Truth.

01:59:04

And don't forget that you can order that book from BannerofTruth .org. BannerofTruth .org, you can also find out more information about the

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Banner of Truth conference coming up May 28th through the 30th at that website, BannerofTruth .org.

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Also, don't forget that if you live in Savannah, Georgia, or if you have friends and family and loved ones in that area, or if you're visiting there for vacation, go to IPCSAV .org,

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01:59:42

I want to thank you so much, Pastor Johnson, for being my guest. I look forward to you returning to the program. I want to thank everybody who listened, and I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater