Being a Calvinist Before it was Cool

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Today on the program, I am welcomed by my friend, fellow pastor, and man that I respect very much, Dr.
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Ronald McKinney.
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Stay tuned.
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Conversations with a Calvinist begins right now.
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Welcome back to Conversations with a Calvinist.
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My name is Keith Foskey, and I am a Calvinist, and I am excited today to be joined by, as I said before, a friend, a fellow minister, and a man that I respect, Dr.
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Ronald W.
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McKinney.
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He has pastored the Kinsey Drive Baptist Church for 29 years in Dalton, Georgia.
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He and his family moved to Dalton from Dallas, Texas.
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He graduated from Bellhaven University in Jackson, Mississippi with a Bachelor's of Arts in Business and Art and a minor in Bible and Greek in 1967.
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He received a Master's of Divinity from Reformed Theological Seminary in Clinton, Mississippi in 1974, and after seminary, he was the Executive Director for Multicommunication Ministries Inc., an international ministry that produced radio and television programs as well as publishing books and periodicals.
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He served as Editor-in-Chief of The Sword and Trowel, an international theological journal that had 28,000 subscribers in 48 countries, and he has published more than 800 articles and essays.
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He and his wife, Dr.
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Bonnie McKinney, a high school English teacher, have been married for 44 years.
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They have three children, they are married, and ten grandchildren.
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Well, brother, thank you for joining me today on Conversations with the Calvinist.
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Thank you, Keith.
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Glad to be with you, brother.
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Glad to be with you.
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Yes, sir.
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And, what, it's interesting how we came to know one another.
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You and I both share a theological distinction among Baptists, and that is that we are both on the side of what might be referred to as New Covenant theology.
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Is that correct? Is it okay if I tell the world that? It's fine.
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I've told the world that a long time ago and continue to tell them, but yes, I believe in the grace of God, without doubt, and I also believe that we're living in the New Covenant.
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There are a lot of things that God has fulfilled that we're no longer under the old covenant or the law in any sense.
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We are free because we are in Christ Jesus.
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He's our all-in-all.
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Amen.
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Amen.
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And, it's interesting because I believe that I, I don't remember how we first became acquainted on Facebook, but I believe it was regarding New Covenant theology.
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I was reaching out, talking to people, reaching out, asking questions, and your name came across as somebody else recommended you to me, and so I reached out to you.
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Yes, sir.
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I believe that's how it happened.
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I don't remember the person, but I do know that I was given your name, and immediately, I think I responded to you recommending a couple of books by John Reisinger.
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Yes, sir.
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Yes, sir.
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It's interesting that you mention Mr.
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Reisinger because just last night, I was telling one of my fellow elders, Brother Andy Montoro, that I was interviewing you today, and I said, I'm interviewing Ronald McKinney, and he goes, I know that name.
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How do I know that name? And I said, well, I began to talk about John Reisinger.
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I began to talk about your relationship with him.
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He goes, oh, I know that guy.
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I don't know how I know him, but I know him.
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And Andy was a pastor in Long Island, New York.
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Yes.
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Yes.
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And back, he knew Al Martin and those guys.
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Is that someone you're familiar with? Oh, yes.
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I knew Al Martin and Walt Chantry and a number of men there in the Northeast.
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And when we first came to Grace, and that was back in actually would have been closer to the late 60s, early 70s, we were looking for brethren that believe something like we did because we couldn't find anybody locally.
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I mean, in the city where my father, who also became a Calphanist, he couldn't find anybody to fellowship with because the Presbyterians didn't believe it.
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And there were no other groups that believe that the Lutherans didn't believe it.
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I mean, so he was kind of left alone, and he began to reach out and he found John Reisinger, who was in Pennsylvania at the time.
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And John was an itinerant evangelist, and they finally got him to come down to Lake Charles, Louisiana.
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That's where my dad had been pastoring.
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And it started a new church.
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He left a very large church in the city because he was of another denomination and started a new work.
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And he got John Reisinger to come down and speak for him.
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And quite an interesting story how John came down to Louisiana.
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And one of the things that happened is he preached to this new group who had come to understand the amazing grace of God.
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And I'm telling you, they were so excited.
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They wanted to meet all of the time.
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And they found a place in an old building that they rented and they redid and filled.
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I mean, the people came and they were having teaching and preaching continuously.
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And John Reisinger came in and he said, I've never seen a group who have grown so fast in such a short time.
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And but they were hungry for the grace of God.
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And you have to remember, we came out of a denomination, the Similes of God.
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It was Pentecostal, but it also was very Arminian, and they did not like the grace of God.
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I say the grace of God because when it got down to it, because we were teaching that God is the one who initiates salvation and God will draw you, that they felt that that was just not right.
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And so they excommunicated my dad and my brother, who was an evangelist, and my uncle, who was also a teacher.
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And so all of us went through the process of having to leave a denomination that we'd been in for many, many years.
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My dad was an early preacher in the Similes, and he had, I think, a great influence.
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And they were so upset because he was one of the better preachers, I'll say.
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And he was called in, well, just to give you a little bit of that background, because that's so very important to everything I will tell you, is dad was in Lake Charles, Louisiana, and he was getting ready.
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They were getting ready to build a new church that was expanding.
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And he had begun to preach on total depravity.
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Now, he didn't identify as just total depravity, but that's what he was preaching.
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And man, there was so many things that were going on.
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But when he got on the subject of election, he preached a sermon that is actually available for people to hear on Sermon Audio.
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It's one of the best sermons I've ever heard on the subject of election.
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But he preached on election, and immediately there was rebuttal and there was, well, it caused discord.
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In fact, the Sunday that he preached that he had two or three of the deacons who got so upset, they ran up to him, they grabbed him by the lapels and just kind of shook him.
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He said, what are you doing? What are you doing? That is wild.
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He had threats on his life even.
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It was but nobody had heard this before.
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This was so new, and yet it's so much in the Bible, you know, and we found Spurgeon.
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He did read Spurgeon prior to that.
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And my uncle, who had been converted, and if I may go back to 1956.
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Yeah, I want you to tell the story about your uncle.
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You told me the other day, I told my wife, I went, I've actually told a couple of people, it's a wonderful story.
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It is the most remarkable thing, and yet I know God saves all men the same way.
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But my, he had an experience that just was unusual.
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He had, he grew up in Los Angeles.
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He was in Inglewood, California.
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He did, his father died when he was very young and his mother was quite old even when he was born.
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So he didn't have a lot of upbringing.
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My dad, who left home when he was 17 and Lamar was only three, they were 14 years different.
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So they didn't have much to do with one another.
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But one day my dad got a call from my grandmother and she said, Don, she said, Lamar has been arrested.
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He's in jail.
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He's facing a long time in San Quentin.
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He said, would you help me? And so dad said, I don't know what I can do.
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But he took time off from a pastor of the church.
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And it's about 1800 miles to California.
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And we were taken out of school, went out there just waiting for the trial.
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And so the day that it came up, and I'm going to give you a picture of what it looked like, because this was a big courtroom.
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It's a one that we can see sometimes on television.
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It's a Los Angeles courthouse and it's large, has a large balcony for people.
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And anyway, the judge came in and he had been having several men come in who had been involved with drugs and so forth.
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And all of them got a sentence.
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They were sentenced almost immediately.
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And my uncle, who is a third time offender, when the jailer brought him in and the judge said to him, he says, well, I can see, young man, that you haven't learned your lesson.
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And with that, my grandmother, who is quite old at that time, she almost fainted.
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And she reached over and grabbed my dad's arm and said, oh, Don, do something.
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Well, he stood up in the gallery and he says, your honor, I'd like to speak to you.
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May I have? I've come from Louisiana and I'd like to have a talk with you.
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And he said, well, this is highly unusual, but come on.
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And so they went into his chamber, Lamar and my dad and the judge.
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And when they went in, my dad says to the judge, he says, now, I know he's guilty.
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I know that he's done wrong.
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And Lamar says, I was thinking in my mind, boy, you're really helping me out.
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You're helping me out a whole lot.
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But he began to appeal to him from the standpoint that his father had died, you know, when he was young and his mother was older and didn't have anybody to watch over him.
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And but the judge said this, which was to me the amazing thing, he says, now, I don't know why I'm going to do this.
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Listen, I don't know why I'm going to do this.
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And I can look back now and I say, I know why.
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God moved his heart.
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He moved his heart.
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And brother, we took him home, which was an unusual thing because it was really strange because we had a very simple life.
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We didn't go to movies.
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We didn't watch television.
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We were we were we go to church all the time, even Saturday sometimes.
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You know, I'm just saying it was a quiet life at home.
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We had dinner together and we would listen to the radio if it were news or something.
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And then we went to bed at eight or nine o'clock.
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It was just a very simple life.
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We brought this man in.
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Who was, you know, who was an offender, I mean, he was he had done some things terrible and it was frightening in one way.
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But my dad said he told my mother when we got home or he said to my uncle, he said, Lamar, he said, I've just got some rules.
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I said, you cannot you cannot touch my wife.
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And that was one.
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He said the second is, he says, you must go to church.
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You must.
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And even the the judge said you need to go to church to hear your your brother.
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So he started going to church.
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Now, here's a man who had never really attended church.
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The only time he ever went to church is a few times when my dad was out there and his mother would say, let's go and hear him, you know.
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But that was just, you know.
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But he he went to church and it wasn't a large church, but it was a sizable church.
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And Wednesday nights, my dad always taught.
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He was not one to kind of do different things.
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He was he was a Bible teacher.
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He had read the Bible when he was converted, which is another story in of itself.
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When he was converted, he was he just his whole life changed.
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And he read the Bible until literally I say he's like John Bunyan.
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If you prick him, he bleeds Bible.
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He just loved scripture.
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And but what happened was, he said on a Wednesday night, he'd been there 11 days.
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And on a Wednesday night, just something simple Bible teaching.
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He was in the back pew and he began to shake.
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I mean, the hold in the pew, he was he was under such conviction.
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I mean, it wasn't any powerful preaching or anything like that, but just the word of God.
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And he got out of the in the aisle and he ran down and he literally flung himself over the the altar that was there and he cried out to God.
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He couldn't he didn't know how to pray.
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He'd just say, oh, God, oh, God.
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I'm telling you, it was the most moving thing.
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And he prayed for the longest and he he couldn't seem to come get through it.
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Of course, there were people praying with him and so forth.
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Somebody says, let go.
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Another one says, hang on, whatever.
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But the thing was with him, he wanted release from his burden of sin.
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And brother, I saw it so clearly when God broke through and here's a man that didn't know how to pray, laid me down to sleep.
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He didn't know how to talk the language.
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He didn't.
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All he did was you could see him with his hands raised and he was praising God for what he said.
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My sin has been relieved.
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It was well, it went on for a couple of hours.
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And I know that people will question me about all the kind of things that went on and so forth.
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But I'm going to tell you, brother, it was as real and genuine as it could be.
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I was a changed man.
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He stayed up all night with my dad.
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He took dad's Bible.
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He said, Don, teach me.
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And dad began to teach him and they stayed up all night and he began to read immediately.
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See, he was a felon or a criminal and it was hard for him to get a job.
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He was back in Louisiana and of course, he's from California.
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And dad gave him some work around the church and he would trim the trees and mow the grass and things such as that.
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And but the rest of the time he was reading and studying.
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I mean, immediately.
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It was like day and night or night and day because he came, he became so engaged with God and the word, prayed.
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He grew more in a month than most people do in a year.
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You know, and even he began to memorize the Bible.
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And he memorized the book of Hebrews first, because I sat there and I listened to him, Keith, and he would say, you know, God who's a hundred times and in diverse manners, spake in times past of the fathers by the prophets.
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After these last days spoken to us through his son, whom he's appointed heir of all things.
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And it became, I listened to him recite the whole book of Hebrews.
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And it was such an amazing transformation.
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He began to pray, seek God.
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Well, my, he grew more in a few months than most people do in years.
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He began to study.
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He studied different theological things, but he was guided by my dad.
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So, but what happened was he wanted to, he wanted to go back to California and study.
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Well, he was, he had to pay his fine and all that and three years made application to go back to California.
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The judge who had given him permission to be out of state probation, thought he had done a wonderful job in rehabilitating LeVar.
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And the truth is he had nothing to do with it.
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God had made the difference in his life.
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So he went back to study, went to a school in Los Angeles.
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It was an Arminian school.
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And he was going through the classes.
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Well, let me tell you how he, he had to take some English because he didn't have enough points or whatever for getting in.
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So they wouldn't let him take Greek.
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And, but he said, if I take the Greek test at the end of the semester and I pass, will you allow me to continue on? And they laughed and they said, well, yeah, that, that would be all right.
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Well, he took the test at the end and he had made a hundred on his paper.
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They said, how can that happen? Well, what had happened, he had to go by the trolley to go to school and back as he memorized the first 10 chapters of the text for the Greek textbook.
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And he could, he could write it down.
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Man, they were amazed, but he, he just, he lived to study the scriptures and he loved church history and all this.
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Well, he had a professor there, the Greek professor, I think his name was Dr.
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Walken, if I remember correctly.
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And he would say, Lamar, he says, you need to, you need to check this out.
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You need to read Charles Hodge.
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You need to see, read Augustus Strong, or, you know, he mentioned these theologians, these older theologians that were all dead, but he said, get, he would go get the books and he would read them.
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And he began to read about the absolute sovereignty of God.
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He said, that's the God that I know.
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That's the God that I experience.
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He changes you by his grace.
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He just makes you a new man.
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You know, he's, he's, and he was just so involved with that.
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And he began to study.
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Well, he was learning something about election.
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And even he wrote to dad and dad said, well, wait a minute, I just, but he began to give him verses.
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Well, dad began to study too.
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He began to see this.
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So when my uncle graduated from the school, he graduated with, uh, in, in languages.
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He studied Greek, Hebrew, and, uh, uh, what's the other one I'm trying to think of.
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But anyway, he, he, he was a Latin or Aramaic.
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It was Aramaic.
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But he probably knew a lot of Latin as well, because he, you can't read any of those without getting some Latin.
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But he, he, he loved, he would go into the depths of what the word meant and, you know, where, what historically meant.
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Well, he came home and, uh, of course dad was thrilled and everything.
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And dad, by that time was studying.
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And, uh, we had a meeting at the church and there was a young lady that was playing the piano.
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And, uh, she was probably, she was, she wasn't a teenager.
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She was probably in their mid twenties or so.
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And, uh, Amar at that time was probably 28, something like that.
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Well, he met her and they fell in love and they ended up getting married, which was also another story in itself because her father wasn't happy about it.
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He wasn't in the church.
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And so he was, he was upset that she was marrying someone who had yet Lamar's life had changed so much.
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You didn't, he was two different people, but they married.
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And, uh, he, he did in, went to Texas to try to pastor.
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He's, he had done several different places where he prayed pastor, but he became a teacher and he would help people be able to see this from, uh, the scriptures and how it all could.
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And he dealt with the difficult problems that you have, you know, everybody brings up John three, 16, or they bring up, you know, verses, you know, God is not willing that any should perish.
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Well, those are taken out of context and you got to see where they're, they are in this Bible and what the context is.
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And he would figure that out.
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And he would work with that until he, he was able to be satisfied.
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He says the scriptures will not deny itself.
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It's not going to be a conflict.
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And, uh, he taught us about the analogy of scripture and things such as that.
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I tell you what, he was a tremendous teacher.
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And, uh, my dad at some point, I don't remember after he'd come home, it was obvious that there was disruption in the church because Lamar was teaching a class and he was teaching election.
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So all of a sudden dad then preached this sermon on election.
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And I'm telling you, it was like a bomb went off.
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You can imagine.
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They got so angry.
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They were angry.
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The scriptures, it was right there and he was quoted, but they became so angry that God is, is sovereign.
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He can do as he pleases.
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He has every right to do that.
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You know, what year, what year would that have been? Uh, brother, that message was preached.
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I think it was in March 3rd of 1970, I believe is March 3rd, 1970.
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See, I want to, I just want to mention here while I'm thinking, I'm listening to this story and I know we talked the other day and you told me some of it.
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And I have just been thinking about, um, the, the fact that so many of the people I know that call themselves reform that call themselves Calvinists are relatively either new believers or they're at least new Calvinists.
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I mean, they've only become Calvinists in the last few years, maybe the last 10 years.
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I remember back in the, um, early part of the two thousands time magazine talked about the most, most influence, most influential religious movements.
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And one of them was the young Calvinists.
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That was time magazine.
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I got that copy.
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So I think about you and your father and your uncle Lamar.
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And I think about the fact that you guys, y'all were preaching this truth before.
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And when I say before it was cool, I don't know if it's really cool, but nowadays guys look at, you know, John MacArthur and R.C.
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Sproul and, and Paul washer and all these guys, and they have people to look up to you guys.
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I mean, you were looking up to dead guys.
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That's what, that's the truth.
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Everybody that we had an interest in had already died, you know, Spurgeon and Sibbs.
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And I can go down the old Puritans.
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We were pulling that out.
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You couldn't buy them then there were no books.
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You had to get them from England in old libraries.
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That's how you got some of those books.
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I mean, we were having to have people search over there for certain pastors who were writing, you know, way back and being able to get them.
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So it was, it was a difficult time because nobody wanted to hear this.
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It wasn't a popular message and it's still not popular.
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I mean, I, I have difficulty here in my city because they don't like what I preach.
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They don't like what I preach.
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And I preached it clearly, I believe on television.
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So they are without excuse.
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They are without excuse.
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And so anyway, there's a lot more that could be said about all this.
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And I came along and I had been in a large church in Memphis.
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It was the largest church, I think, in the Assemblies of God.
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It was called First Assembly and they had thirty five hundred members.
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And I mean, we had everything under the sun.
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You had gymnasium, roller skating and all the kind of stuff.
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It was just full of activity.
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And I was involved in that.
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But at the same time, I was reading and studying.
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And I remember that I had an experience, Keith.
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I went outside, had a football with me and I went to a football field close by and it was getting, it was getting dusk and it was beginning to get dark.
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And I was just kicking the ball, just running, doing a few things.
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And I began kicking the ball and I saw the stars come out already.
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And I looked up there and I began to think.
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That's just what I've been reading about.
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I've been reading A.W.
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Pink's, you know, The Sovereignty of God.
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You know, that was one of those things that all of a sudden my mind went to the fact that before God made any of that.
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Made any of the stars and the moon.
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That he had me.
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On his heart, God, the father, had chosen me as one of his children before time began.
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Before the foundation of the world.
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I tell you what, brother, I was so overwhelmed.
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I fell on my knees and I began to praise God and worship him because he was my great creator.
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From that time on, everything was changed.
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And of course, I finally, I was dismissed from my responsibilities at this church.
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And then I went back to Reformed Theological Seminary.
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Reformed Seminary had just begun.
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I remember when it was first begun.
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I was in the fourth class to graduate from Reformed Seminary.
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And my.
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What a wonderful experience I had, you know, I didn't I didn't become a Pater Baptist, though, that was I couldn't be convinced of that.
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Amen.
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And I pray that that never happens.
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I don't think it ever will.
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It was just something, you know, I just.
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I just it just did not ring true with me and I didn't accept the whole foundation of that.
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I just didn't.
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There's not a that's not a place where you find that to be true.
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But anyway, I went from there to working with John Riesinger.
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And we had multi-communication ministries, which just simply meant we we had radio programs, television programs.
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And we also published books and a newspaper.
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And the newspaper was called The Sword in the Trial.
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And John Riesinger, after a few years, was in an accident and I was asked to continue with it.
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And I stayed with it till about 90.
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When I moved to to to Dalton, Georgia, I'd been in Dallas, Texas for about 13 years.
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We started work there.
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But I felt it was God's moving me here.
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And I know it was we had a school that we started in the church here, Christian Heritage School.
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And I was on the board for 25 years or 20.
33:30
Anyway, what happened was is that they built a new facility.
33:37
They have 60 million dollar campus and it's all debt free.
33:42
And my wife still my wife's the oldest, not the oldest teacher there, but she's been there longer than anybody else.
33:51
She would die knowing I said that.
33:53
I was going to say, good catch, sir.
33:58
Legend, the legend.
34:00
And she didn't like that because she doesn't and she's not that old.
34:05
She's she's done well.
34:07
She has been a rock at the school.
34:10
And, you know, God's God prospered things here in ways that I can't explain other than it's just God.
34:19
You don't despise the day of small things.
34:23
God can make of it what he desires.
34:27
We had a man come here from Maryland, Gene Lindauer.
34:34
He and his wife were from Maryland.
34:35
They moved down here to Ringo and he came to church.
34:42
And so I asked him to go to lunch and we met them and found I asked him, what did you do? He says, well, I was a musician.
34:49
I taught music.
34:52
Well, come to find out he was a maestro.
34:55
He conducted an orchestra.
34:59
And then what happened was we had his wife is a she can she does scores for orchestras.
35:08
She's she's very brilliant.
35:10
I mean, just amazing.
35:12
So I said, well, what are we about us having a fine arts school? So I started another school called Labrie Academy of Fine Arts.
35:24
And so now we've got an orchestra.
35:27
And well, we had a small orchestra, a string orchestra, and then that grew in 25 years.
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We had a full 60 piece symphonic orchestra.
35:39
They perform four times a year.
35:41
I mean, God just amazingly brought this man to our little church and then God used him.
35:50
And we saw this this beautiful music being played.
35:54
Labrie, of course, I took that from what's what's the name of Labrie? Trying to think, I'm not sure.
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Sorry, I have trouble with with that from time to time.
36:11
But anyway, I'll remember it sometime.
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But he was it was something that we did to give glory to God, to praise God.
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And now we have all these kids that are playing instruments all over this town.
36:28
Just God was in it.
36:30
He made of it, you know, it's just we did I started the with two other men.
36:38
We started the Fellowship of Christian Athletes in 92.
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Well, Christian Athletes Fellowship was not it's not always that good as far as I'm concerned.
36:51
They don't preach the gospel.
36:54
They preach a gospel, but it's not the gospel.
36:57
And so I got involved with it and we began to work in in that time.
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At that time, there were not one was that one what they call huddle groups in any of the schools, not one.
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We were able to see over these years.
37:19
There are now 68 schools, 68 schools having huddle groups with a leader, and they have also they meet they meet in the.
37:35
We meet in the we meet at the they meet in the mornings and they'll have anywhere from, you know, 100 to 200 that attend all over the four counties that are here.
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I'm just saying God is was at work in that.
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And the man that was head of it was Chuck Harris, who happened to be a friend of mine who visited my dad in Lake Charles.
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When he was in seminary at New Orleans Baptist Seminary and he became a Calvinist.
38:11
So we had a Calvinist who was leading the Fellowship of Christian Athletes.
38:16
How about that? That's awesome.
38:19
And that also God has been good.
38:23
It's interesting that, you know, we have some similar our heart is knitted more than you may realize.
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I've I have I have long desired to to have a school.
38:38
We our church actually years ago wanted to start a school and it just never it never was where we were financially able.
38:47
But we ended up starting a seminary.
38:51
We have a we have a what we call a seminary for layman that we that we offer.
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It's a two year program.
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But my wife and I have prayed many times about whether or not the Lord would ever give us because on our side of town, we live in Jacksonville.
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Jacksonville is a big city, but it is a city that doesn't have very many private schools on our especially Christian.
39:17
The only school near us is is a Catholic school.
39:20
Yeah.
39:21
And I would love if the Lord would open the door for us to be able to have a school.
39:27
It would just be an amazing thing.
39:29
So seeing you and seeing what you've done is inspiring.
39:32
So, you know, I tell you what, because it's not something anything that I did or anybody else.
39:39
It was God, because we struggled.
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We struggled.
39:43
And I was here this morning with three men and one of them was from Romania.
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And the reason he came to visit me with two pastors, he's interested in starting a school.
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And his hometown in Romania, now they have some problems that that are with government.
40:02
It's going to be difficult, but they're wanting to begin a school.
40:07
I've served on several other Christian school boards.
40:12
And I know that it's when you think of having a school, it looks like it's almost, you know, impossible.
40:19
It's too much money.
40:20
It really, in the long run, it pays for itself.
40:26
And the results of having children under the gospel is to me the most vital thing of all.
40:33
I just pray that God will answer your prayer and give you, you know, the strength to go through that.
40:42
Because, you know, it's tough, but it can be done.
40:46
Don't despise the day of small things.
40:50
I've learned that you never know what God can do and he does it well.
40:57
He does it well.
40:58
Amen.
41:00
I want to ask you a question and I thank you for sharing your history and your story and all the things that God has done.
41:08
Like I said, just talking the other day on the phone, it was an encouragement to me.
41:13
I know it's going to be encouragement to people who are listening.
41:17
Knowing that you were a Calvinist and you've been a Calvinist now for longer than I've been alive, knowing that you were a Calvinist before it was in any way popular, what would you say about the state of the modern reformed church now? And I know I didn't prepare you for this question, so it's okay if you don't have a lot to say, but I'd love to hear your thoughts about the state of the modern reformed church.
41:45
About where you think the church, especially churches that call themselves Calvinists, are today and where do you think that maybe there are some areas that need to be repaired or just what are your thoughts? And I thank you for asking the question because it's something I think has to be answered.
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Because we live in a day when there are people popping up everywhere who say they're Calvinist and they're hold to this or hold to that.
42:22
And there's not a lot of consistency of those that use the name Calvinist.
42:29
Some of them I wouldn't want to be identified with.
42:34
And some of them can be obnoxious and they can be difficult to deal with.
42:41
Their attitude is we go ahead and just pound away and forget about.
42:48
My thinking from what I know of scripture, and I'm saying that I want to base everything on scripture, but I know God saves people who are not quote unquote reformed.
43:03
God saves people when he desires to save them.
43:07
And I can prove that with my uncle.
43:09
He didn't have an atmosphere of reformed teaching.
43:14
But I do know this, they recognized that it was God and they gave God the glory and the praise.
43:21
But I think we have a lot of people who come to it and intellectually can say yes to it.
43:29
And yet their heart has not been brought to a place of real humility.
43:37
I believe that we have to, you know, having a broken heart and I'm not talking about emotions, which people sometimes will say, oh, you're too emotional.
43:48
I feel like some of the reformed people need a little emotionalism in them.
43:53
They need to have some sense of their joy being exposed.
43:59
In other words, when they pray and sing and everything, they sing from the heart.
44:04
Amen.
44:05
There's a praise that comes.
44:07
I mean, I love to sing congregational, the people singing, you know, and rejoicing and giving joy to God.
44:18
And a lot of it can be very staid and dry and stodgy.
44:27
I don't think that's necessary, but there are those that they hold to that.
44:35
I love God's people, but some of God's people, it's not as easy to love.
44:44
That'll be the quote of the show.
44:46
I think that talking about wisdom of the years.
44:50
That's true.
44:50
I love God's people, but not all God's people are easy to love.
44:54
That's for sure.
44:56
That's for sure.
44:57
But that's, you know, he told us that that's the way it's going to be.
45:01
That's why we have to love our brother.
45:04
You know, we were commanded to love.
45:07
And yeah, I'm grateful.
45:10
I had a man in my study today.
45:14
There were two men.
45:15
There was a man from Romania and the other two men from a local church and pastor.
45:21
And we don't see eye to eye on everything, but I know them well enough.
45:29
I know they have a heart for God.
45:32
They're wanting to help this man start a school in Romania.
45:36
So there, I mean, the heart of man is what tells if you're really in Christ.
45:43
You know, I love Calvinistic doctrine because I believe it's true to the scripture, but I'm not one to knock everybody over with it.
45:54
I want to give them, first of all, I want them to know what they are like me.
45:59
I'm lost, undone.
46:02
I'm a sinner.
46:04
I have a sinful nature.
46:07
I need God to change my heart.
46:11
And they've, you know, that way we can, we can have fellowship when I want somebody, you know, a fellowship with it.
46:18
I want, but I want somebody that knows that being in Christ is a, there's joy, joy and speakable and full of glory.
46:28
Oh my, I have a, uh, you know, I'm here at the church sometimes and I'm not trying to praise myself, please.
46:37
I'm not trying to glorify myself, but you know, I feel overwhelmed with the joy of what God has done.
46:45
I get up and go out in the sanctuary there or the auditorium and I had my hymnal and I start singing and brother, I can stay there for hours.
46:58
I don't always, but I could stay there because I just get overwhelmed with the joy of praising God.
47:07
That's, that's, that's true.
47:09
That's true religion.
47:12
Amen.
47:12
That's what the gospel does to you.
47:16
It makes you, uh, have a heart for others.
47:21
Uh, you know, I'm just, I'm just kind of rambling now, but I just want you to know that no, it's great.
47:29
I love the Lord and he's my savior and I can depend on him.
47:34
I'll tell you the story of my, my daughter who had cancer, but we don't have time today.
47:42
Well, I do want to have you back on.
47:44
It's interesting.
47:45
You mentioned about the sanctuary.
47:49
I, I know that I, one of the, one of the strange benefits of my job that people probably don't ever think is I get the church to myself, you know, several hours a week, you know, many hours a week I'm there all by myself and I can walk into the sanctuary and I can just sing and get down on my knees right before the, right before the chancel and pray nobody sees me, but I'm there and I'm, and I, and it's nice.
48:17
So yeah.
48:17
When you talked about going into the sanctuary and singing.
48:20
Yes, sir.
48:22
Yes, sir.
48:23
Well, I can, I can, I love the fact that wherever I am, I have fellowship with God.
48:30
I can fellowship with him at all.
48:32
I just, you know, I come from maybe my, my dad was that way.
48:37
He was a praying man.
48:39
Oh, he, he, when I was a kid, when I was about six, my mother would say, Ron, go over and get your dad for lunch or whatever.
48:50
And I'd go over to the fellowship hall and his office was off in the corner.
48:56
And when I went in there into there, I could hear him.
49:01
And I'd go over there to his door and I'd put my ear to the door.
49:06
Then I'd listen to him.
49:09
And here he was.
49:11
He was literally weeping, not uncontrollable, but he was weeping and praying and calling out names of people that had come to the church or that he knew who were not in Christ, who were not believers.
49:28
And he's praying, God come and overwhelm them and draw them to yourself.
49:34
And I'd sit there at the door and I wouldn't dare knock on it.
49:40
I wouldn't.
49:41
I'd wait if it's 30 minutes till he was finished to call him.
49:46
But that kind of thing impressed me.
49:51
It marked me that if we're going to have fellowship with God, we need to spend time in prayer.
50:02
And I just, you know, I praise God that for that.
50:07
That is such a blessing.
50:09
That is such a blessing.
50:10
I guess my dad was not a minister.
50:14
My dad got saved after I did.
50:17
And it really is an amazing thing, you know, to know that you grew up with a dad who you got to watch.
50:28
And I pray that my children see that in me.
50:32
I really want my children to see me praying, hear me reading the word and not just as a daily ritual, but as a life.
50:43
Yes, sir.
50:44
That you got to see your dad do that is that's a blessing.
50:49
Yeah, parents have such a responsibility for children.
50:54
I tell I tell fathers all the time, I said, listen, you're responsible.
51:01
You're responsible.
51:02
And I said, God's going to call you into judgment.
51:09
You must take time.
51:12
And I said, not take quality time.
51:14
You must take time, lots and lots and lots of time.
51:21
Because you that's the only thing that you brought into this world that will live in eternity is your children.
51:30
So that's another that's another quote, this just filled with quotes.
51:34
The only thing you brought into this world is going to live forever is your children.
51:38
I tell you what, Ron, I just need to start a book with.
51:42
Brother, I just God's taught me through this through the years, but I did have a father who was so consistent.
51:53
Do him.
51:54
I knew his frailties.
51:57
You know, no man is has perfection, but my he had a heart.
52:04
And one of the things that he did and I've noticed this about you, you spend time with your children.
52:10
I know you teach them the the martial arts and things like that.
52:16
Well, you know that that's so valuable for them.
52:20
My dad played basketball with me.
52:23
He'd pick me up after school.
52:25
We go find a sandlot and play basketball together.
52:28
And some of my friends who played basketball became Christians through playing basketball.
52:36
I mean, I've got stories that, you know.
52:39
How God used that.
52:41
And my dad was responsible.
52:44
He would he would he just loved people and he wanted to see them know Christ.
52:50
And I need to tell you his his experience, too, sometimes was his was remarkable.
52:57
Well, like I said, I do want to have you back on one day, we're getting getting close to the hour mark here.
53:02
So what I'd like to do, if I could run as we begin to draw this, like I said, I'm gonna have you back because I really I'm enjoying this.
53:09
I think I'm getting as much as the audience as far as encouragement.
53:13
But if I could have you as we begin to draw to a close, could I have you just share? There may be somebody listening who does not know the Lord.
53:22
There may be somebody who and I know this is a Christian podcast, so it's probably Christians listening.
53:27
But there may be somebody who thinks they're a Christian and really have not come to Christ.
53:32
I know I from the age of eight to the age of 19, I thought I was saved, but I wasn't.
53:37
Yes.
53:38
And so if you would take the next couple of minutes and just be draws to a close by sharing the gospel, what is when when you tell when you talk about somebody coming to the Lord, what does that mean? Yes.
53:51
May I say this, first of all? That without Christ.
53:58
You have nothing.
54:00
You are lost.
54:01
As someone said, with Christ and you have nothing, you still have everything.
54:11
Christ is our everything.
54:14
And if you do not know him and I say no, him is not just an intellectual knowledge of him.
54:22
You can know all about him and not be in Christ.
54:27
But God works in the heart and he draws you by his Holy Spirit.
54:35
And he brings you to the place where you say, I am nothing in and of myself.
54:41
I have nothing to offer.
54:43
I have no goodness.
54:45
I have no works of righteousness that I've done.
54:49
I have nothing to offer.
54:52
But I have everything by receiving Christ as my Lord and Savior.
54:59
To believe in Christ is to have union with him, to be in him.
55:05
He says, if any man be in Christ, he's a new creation.
55:10
All things have passed away.
55:13
Behold, all things become new.
55:16
That's the working of the Lord Jesus Christ to change a heart.
55:23
May God be with you and that you receive him as he is.
55:29
In Christ's name, I pray.
55:31
Amen.
55:33
Amen, brother.
55:35
And thank you so much.
55:36
Thank you for being with us today, sharing your experiences, sharing your wisdom and sharing the gospel with us.
55:44
I do want to also thank our audience who has been with us.
55:50
I pray that today has been a blessing to you.
55:52
And I do want to say, if you are in the area of Brother Ron's church, I'm sure they'd love for you to visit with them.
56:02
Can you tell us where your church is, brother? Oh, brother, I'm in Dalton Church.
56:06
That's 30 miles south of Chattanooga, 60 miles north of Atlanta.
56:12
It's the carpet capital of the world.
56:16
OK, so it's a it's a very small town, but thank God we have the gospel here.
56:24
I have a couple of brethren who come to see the sovereign grace of God.
56:29
In fact, I think there are four, maybe five men who are preaching sovereignty in our area, which I praise God for.
56:38
But there's a gospel message here that you can hear.
56:42
And I think it'd be one that you'd be delighted to hear.
56:47
Amen.
56:48
Well, awesome.
56:48
I love Chattanooga and my niece actually lives in Knoxville.
56:53
So we come up through Atlanta to go see her a couple of times over the year.
56:57
So I may have to come see you next time up in your area.
57:01
I hope you do, brother.
57:02
I hope you do.
57:04
I thank you so much.
57:06
Well, thank you, brother Ron, for being with me today.
57:09
And thank you, listener, again, for listening to the program.
57:11
If you have any questions that you would like me to address on a future program, please send me a message.
57:16
You can email me at Calvinist podcast at Gmail dot com.
57:21
Again, that's Calvinist podcast at Gmail dot com.
57:24
If you're listening to this on YouTube or Facebook, please like and subscribe.
57:28
And if you don't mind, share it with some friends so that they can hear the program as well.
57:32
Thank you again for listening to Conversations with a Calvinist.
57:34
My name is Keith Foskey and I've been your Calvinist.
57:38
May God bless you.