Scott Meadows Interview

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ, based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the Apostle Paul said, �But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

In short, if you like smooth, watered-down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn�t for you. By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we�re called by the divine trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King.

Here�s our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth.

Interviewing Scott Meadows and the Value of Precision in Ministry

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry. My name is Mike Abendroth, and I usually interview authors and theologians on Wednesdays, as you know, and I usually do that over the phone. But once in a while, we get people in the studio, and I give them the tour and all the no-co swag and everything else and try to impress them.

Today, the person I�m trying to impress is D. Scott Meadows. Scott, welcome to No Compromise Radio. Scott Meadows, Jr. Thank you. Pleasure to be here with you. Scott, all the joking around, I have known of you for quite some time, and seriously, when I think of you in your ministry, here�s what I think of.

I think of Christ-centered, I think of trying to keep the integrity of the text, I think of a joyful sobriety to gospel ministry. Do you think that just describes your gospel ministry? Scott. Well, I would hope so.

Self-evaluation is probably not too reliable, so it�s interesting to me to hear how you perceive me.

Well, I don�t think you�re a guy who�s just sober only and dour and the typical kind of stoic Calvinist and fatalist. I don�t mean that. But maybe I�m thinking about measured, that you want to be precise.

Tell me about the mandatory nature of precision in dividing God�s Word.

Scott Well, I know I�m prone to say many stupid things, and I don�t want to do that. When I preach or teach, I understand that I�m a steward of this biblical message, and it�s a rich and intricate message.

It�s easy to get it wrong. So when we have a very high view of Scripture and the sober-minded responsibility to open up the Scriptures for God�s people especially, it makes one very careful to cut it straight.

Jared See, I can tell you�re even being careful.

Now in what you�re saying. Scott Laughs Jared. Now, Scott, you are a pastor here in New England, and sometimes I think I�m the old-timer. I�ve been here since 1997, but you�ve been in New Hampshire for how many years?

1991 you got here? Scott. No, 89.

Jared 89. Same church? Scott Nope. I was in a church in York, Maine for two years and three months. Then God called me to the church in Exeter, and I�ve been there since June of �91, which is coming up on 29 years this summer.

Jared That is amazing. What are they going to do for your 30th?

Scott Laughs I don�t know. Jared Well, I�m on sermon audio. If people want to listen to your sermons, they can go to sermon audio, D. Scott Meadows, and it says you�re an elder at Calvary Baptist Church.

It says reformed of Exeter. Do you have a website, or is just this it for sermon audio? Scott No, we have a website.

Jared. Okay. You want to give it? Scott. I think the web address is cbcreformed .com.

Jared Okay, and if they want to pull up your sermons, what have you been preaching lately? I know on sermon audio it says religious nobility.

Scott That was a short series on Acts 1711. These were more noble than those at Thessalonica. Jared Oh, good. Scott That�s what that was based on. Jared Nice. Scott The main series I�ve been addressing is an exhaustive exposition of all 150 psalms, and I finished Psalm 90 last, so Psalm 91 is my next.

Jared Oh, that is excellent.

Preaching the Psalms Christocentrically

Tell our listeners a little bit about a proper approach to the psalms. Of course, there are different types of psalms, and I think generally we can think about laments or praises and petitions and precatory psalms people know about.

Many people would say the only messianic psalms would be psalms like Psalm 2, Psalm 22, and Psalm 110. How, Scott, do you approach the psalms to both interpret them and then preach them on a Sunday when it comes to the Lord Jesus and viewing them through the lens of Christocentric, Christotelic?

How do you do that?

Scott Yes. I very much appreciate the Christ-centered nature of the whole Bible, and so my approach to the psalms begins with a grammatico-historical exegesis of the text, but it doesn�t end there. It�s a canonical interpretation of the psalms.

Intertextuality is extremely important to notice how the words and phrases and even whole verses appear in other parts of the Bible. The principle, the analogy of Scripture is indispensable when interpreting any part of God�s Word, but this is richly illustrated in doing work in the psalms.

So, I think the psalms are about Christ. The psalms are also Christ Himself speaking in the psalms so often, and this comes out in the way I treat the psalms.

I was just reading Bob Godfrey, not a commentary on all the psalms, but something about learning to love the psalms or something, maybe a Reformation, not Reformation Heritage, but I think maybe Ligonier.

And he was talking about Psalm 1 and 2 and how they were linked to Psalm 1, 1, �Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked etc. And then it�s at the end of chapter 2, �Blessed are all those who take refuge in Him.

And he was trying to point out some of the links within the psalms and talking about the man of chapter 1 and the same man of chapter 2, etc. So, I appreciated that.

Yes, when I preached Psalm 1, I expounded the literal sense of the text and then brought the church to consider the question is, who is this perfect man being described in Psalm 1? And Augustine�s commentary on the psalms is immensely helpful if you�ve ever read him.

He comes back to Christ again and again, and Christ is the blessed man fundamentally in Psalm 1. And then in Christ, we�re called, of course, to follow him. And there�s a sense in which the psalm, the first psalm, which begins by talking about an individual man, then at the end of the psalm, it talks about the congregation of the righteous.

So, it goes from a singular focus to a corporate focus. And this is, I think, encompassing all God�s elect in Christ that come to be transformed to be like this blessed man of Psalm 1.

You know, I�m just thinking, Scott, how God providentially works in our lives, even as unbelievers, and prepares us, and certainly, of course, as believers. Maybe some of your precision and desire to echo and proclaim the exact meaning of the text comes from your engineering background.

Would that be fair to say? Scott Gottfried.

I guess that�s possible. Although I was an electrical engineer from before my pastoral ministry, and I feel as one who has been groping toward the truth all this time, and I wouldn�t think that my earlier preaching was as precise, you know, in terms of the interpretation of the text as I hope it would be in the later part of my life and ministry.

Chris. That�s so true. I think our people even probably notice that, not in a critical fashion, although I guess they could, but in a fashion where the Lord�s Word is changing our pastor, too. And he�s learning, and he�s growing, and we can see that growth in him, right?

We as pastors get to see the growth in the people that the Lord has allowed us to shepherd, and that�s a wonderful thing to watch people learn and grow in Christ Jesus as they walk in a manner worthy of their calling.

That�s our, you know, great joy as pastors. But I think it�s the joy of a congregation to see a pastor grow, too, through suffering and through God�s Word. It makes me think of Psalm 15, �Who shall sojourn in your tent?

Who shall dwell on your holy hill And then it gives the answer, walks blamelessly, speaks truth, doesn�t slander, does no evil, vile person is despised, honors those who fear the Lord, etc. I think, Scott, when I first would read that as a new Christian, Psalm 15, I would walk through it and say, well, Lord, I want to be that.

I�m sure there�s nothing wrong with that. And I think I tricked myself into thinking I was that, maybe in light of my licentious lifestyle before I was saved, compared to what I then did, there was probably some truth to that.

But ultimately, when I look at that now, and I�m honest with myself, I�m really glad I have a Savior, because I would have no hope of sojourning in the Lord�s tent or going to His holy hill knowing what I really am like.

Some years ago, The Banner of Truth published a book called The Imperative of Preaching by Dr. John Carrick. And I did a book review when it was a new book, and I very much appreciated the book. It was, I think, meant to curtail excesses in the redemptive historical school of preaching, excesses in some quarters where moral exhortation was almost completely lost.

But for me, when I read the book as one less familiar with the redemptive historical method of preaching, that was the new thing. I was very familiar with moral exhortation out of the Bible, but less familiar with this Christocentric approach.

So Carrick�s book introduced me more to this and really helped balance my ministry so that when I come to Psalm 15, the first thing, having expounded the literal sense of the words in the text, is to point out that in the whole scope of this biblical message, this man who is qualified to worship in God�s holy hill is Jesus Christ.

So there has to be a declaration of the person of Christ as foundational, then, to the moral imperatives that flow out of the psalm.

Preaching Through the Psalter and the Role of Church History

How many years has it taken you to preach through Psalm 90?

I've been preaching through the psalms for about four years, I think now. I took a course by Steve Lawson down at Reform Theological Seminary in Orlando, and he was exhorting us to preach in and from the psalms.

And one of the things he did was preach through all 150 psalms. Well, while I was sitting there in the class, I thought, I accept the challenge. I want to do that. So I've been working my way through the Psalter.

And by the way, these messages are being featured on the website Exposit The Word. So this is a website that has familiar preachers. Your hearers would recognize their names. And when they do through entire books of the Bible, they'll give one book of the Bible to this man and one book of the Bible to that man.

And you have the psalms. And I have the psalms.

Excellent. All right. Well, imagine if you're preaching for four or five, 10 years through the psalms and Jesus really isn't the focus. And, you know, you run upon him in chapter two, like I said, and 22 and 110 and maybe some other places.

Sometimes I'll tell my young students, preaching students, I'll say, you have to be careful, men, not only that you don't preach like an unbelieving Jewish rabbi, but also I want you to talk about Jesus more than a fundamentalist, you know, kind of Jack Hiles guy.

At least he'll talk about Jesus at the end of his sermon, right? Believe in the Lord Jesus and be saved and repent and all this stuff. They, to their credit, they'll at least talk about him more than some other students.

What's the best way to approach a text in the Bible, Scott, where you're in there digging away and your head's down, you're looking at authorial intent. What does the writer mean? What's the best way to kind of back up away from the text to see the grand sweep of redemption?

Is there a way you do that? A philosophy or a method? Walk us through that.

Scott Gottfried. Yes. Okay. One of the more important books I've read in the last year or so is a book called Interpreting Scripture in the Great Tradition by Craig Carter. Are you familiar with the Bible?

I've read it, yes. So, he uses a couple of texts in Isaiah as a test case for our hermeneutical approach to understanding Isaiah. And what he shows is that in the rich 2 ,000 year history of Christian preaching, it has for the most part been standard operating procedure to see Christ in all of Scripture.

And then in the last couple centuries, with a somewhat different, less kind of canonical and supernatural approach to Bible interpretation, turning Bible interpretation into more of a science without faith in the reader.

Chris Turning away from supernatural views. Scott Gottfried. Right, exactly.

The message to understand Isaiah as prophesying the Lord Jesus Christ and his saving message has been progressively lost in the scholarly community. And this is not just theological liberalism. This has infiltrated even evangelicalism.

So, Carter calls us back to the tried and true tradition of Christ-centered preaching in all the Scriptures, and Augustine is one of his exemplars of this approach to Scripture.

Scott, I don't know if you did the same thing that I did, but in the old days, I'd work through a passage and I'm preaching through it, and there would be some kind of problem. I don't mean inherently in the passage, but my problem of interpretation.

And so, I would read a bunch of different commentaries, and I know where they would come from, from the liberal persuasion, or conservative, or evangelical, or critical theory, blah, blah, blah. And then I would say, well, you know, it's 50 -50.

And so, I would kind of just say, well, who's my favorite Bible teacher today? And I'll take his view, right? My favorite commentary, favorite study Bible, or whatever. I don't do that anymore, although I'm happy to read modern writers.

I go back and I say, what, in fact, did early church history say? You know, what did Augustine say? Did Anselm write anything about it? What did Luther and Calvin and some of the Reformers say about it?

And then, you know, you go to England, and what did Perkins say about it or someone else? That has helped me because I'm trying to see that sweep of interpretation throughout time to help me so that I just don't say, well, my favorite Bible teacher is Chuck Swindoll, and he said it, therefore it must be true.

Does that make sense?

You're not guilty now, it sounds, of chronological snobbery to use C .S. Lewis's term.

Jared Oh, we don't mention C .S. Lewis here on the show.

Petey. Well, not everything he said was wrong.

Jared That is true. And many things he said, he said well. He even said wrong things. Well.

Petey. But I love this one because, you know, I think it was Charlie Schultz did the Charlie Brown cartoon.

Jared I take back what I said about sobriety, joyful sobriety. Petey. Okay.

So, there was a Charlie Brown cartoon where it's just a couple panels, and I think it was Lucy or Sally Brown that was asked to write a paper on church history, and she says, Schultz has her saying, to understand church history, one must go all the way back to the beginning.

My pastor was born in 1939 or something like that.

Jared. That is good. And I think, you know, I can understand and anticipate what our listeners are going to say. What about some of the errors that the great patriarchs had, and church fathers, and has not the Holy Spirit been maturing the church through the last two, you know, 2 ,000 years.

I understand all that. But still, he, the Holy Spirit, was working in these men, and it's good to see what the church has taught throughout the centuries so we're not coming to something new.

Petey. One of the downfalls of modernity is a philosophical commitment to the precept that newer is better. And that sounds a little modernistic to me, a little condescending toward the past to think, well, those guys, they didn't understand so much as we do now.

There is development and understanding in Christ's church over the centuries, but just because a writer writes in the later century doesn't mean that they are sounder in their views on any given subject.

Absolutely.

Worship According to Scripture and the Regulative Principle

We're talking today on No Compromise Radio with D. Scott Meadows, pastor up in Exeter, New Hampshire, and author. Scott, you just gave me your new book on worship. Tell us the title. Tell us why you wrote it and essentially what's in it.

You've got four minutes.

Scott. All right. Yes, just the English language version of this book was just printed months ago. The title is A Call to Pure Worship. And the Spanish translation version has gone to the printers and should be available in a couple months.

Wow, do you speak Spanish? No. Oh, okay. But I have friends that do. All right, good. So it is a book of, I think, only 90 pages. It's the fruition of four messages I preached at a pastor's conference.

The topic... Which pastor's conference? It was the Hispanic Pastors Conference at the Iglesia Bautista Reformata de North Bergen, New Jersey.

Oh, well, I don't know Spanish, but I could probably figure that out. Okay, please.

And so I had a chance just to preach there for 10 years in a row to a group of pastors from an international group of Hispanic pastors. And this was my topic one year. And essentially, it is a call to return to Scripture when we think about the question of what does God want us to do when we worship Him?

So that's the basic premise of the book. Let's get back to the Bible and the substance of our worship we offer to God. He knows how he wants to be worshiped better than any of us do. And let's listen to his voice and do what he says.

Well, Nadab and Abihu had some of their own ideas. Yes, they did. Only for a few minutes, though. It's interesting, Scott, some place in social media in the last few days, in light of some crazy things going on in the name of worship in evangelical churches on Sundays, someone was trying to counsel believers who are stuck at some of those churches to go to their pastors and ask them a question, nicely, of course, where do we find that in the Bible?

Where do we have the precedent for doing the high wire act from the Bible, or the smoke and the fog machines and everything else? And I am not against entertainment, in general. I'm against entertainment, though, on a Sunday.

Yes, there's this major philosophical divide that I address in the book between the Calvinist tradition and essentially what was the Lutheran tradition in the Protestant Reformation when it comes to worship.

On the Calvinist side, the question that is asked is, Lord, what do you want us to do in worship? And we go to the Bible and do what it says. On the Lutheran side, the question is, Lord, what will you not criticize us for doing in worship, basically?

And as long as the scripture doesn't say it's wrong in the Lutheran tradition, it's essentially allowable. So the Calvinist tradition is more conservative. It's called the regulative principle of worship, where you could say very, I could oversimplify and say, whatever's not commanded is forbidden.

Now, that's an oversimplification, but essentially, the Lutherans then essentially say whatever's not forbidden is allowable. So in many evangelical churches today, I think it's really Lutheran in spirit because a pastor might feel offended if a member said, where does scripture say we should be doing this?

His question is, well, where does scripture say we can't do this? So that's the big battle in essence.

Scott, do you think it's fair to say that using this principle that we've kind of now coined as a Lutheran principle, that the Lutherans early on, as they thought about what does God require or forbid in worship, they would have all been against the uses of that principle as they see modern churches?

In other words, when they asked the question, what does the Bible allow? What does it condemn, et cetera? I think if they saw some modern churches today, they'd say, well, we need to reframe that question because this is crazy.

Tom Hanks. Probably so.

Historically, there was a tendency for the liturgy in Lutheran churches to look more like Roman Catholic worship. They were maintaining the traditions as much as they could with a good conscience of the Roman Catholic liturgy.

But in the Calvinist churches, worship was extremely simplified, the ministry, the word, and prayer, and the Lord's Supper, and baptism, and so forth. So it tended to be simpler worship, whereas in the Lutheran context, it was more elaborate worship.

Okay, good.

Public Reading of Scripture in Corporate Worship

Good insight. Scott, we don't have too much time left. I'm thinking about corporate worship and what God requires. It seems to me that public scripture reading, I mean, good doses of scripture, long sections and chapters, that seems to be lost today.

And maybe because people say, well, people can't follow along. They have different Bible translations. You can't read these long chapters. There's too many names to pronounce. How important is public reading of scripture for the worship of the triune God?

Tom Hanks. Extremely important in the public worship of the church. It's ordained expressly in 1 Timothy, give attention to the public reading of scripture. It might be translated.

Well, we have a New Testament reading in the morning that serves as a call to worship, forgiveness, confession, forgiveness. And then we have an Old Testament reading, and we're reading through Genesis in the Old Testament, chapter by chapter.

And last week, there was a bunch of talk about mandrakes and a bunch of deception, and I thought, this is God's word, and it should be read publicly as a worshipful event. And maybe it's the truest form of worship on a Sunday, because if we're just reading the scripture, we're not messing anything up.

Does that make sense?

My custom in our services is to announce the text to be read, give a one or two sentence prelude to what's the substance of what we're going to hear, read the scripture text, and then give a five to 10 minute exposition of what's in this text with application.

And the sermons now are in the morning are 40 minutes, only about 40, 45 minutes, and in the afternoon service about 35 minutes. But some people will tell me afterward that the scripture reading really impacted them in a way that was more than the sermon.

Excellent.

Well, I've had a pleasure today to have D. Scott Meadows in the studio at No Compromise Radio. You can pull them up. Calvary Baptist Reformed Church, Exeter, New Hampshire, right? That's the name of the church.

And I'm sure if you search online, Sermon Audio and other places, you can hear more from Scott. Scott, thanks for being on No Compromise Radio today. Thank you.

No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life-transforming power of God's word through verse-by-verse exposition of the sacred text.

Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at 6. We're right on Route 110 in West Boylston. You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.