November 18, 2016 Show: A Discussion with Summer White of “Sheologians”

Live from the historic parsonage of 19th century gospel minister George Norcross in downtown

Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron, a radio platform on which pastors,

Christian scholars and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

Proverbs 27 verse 17 tells us, Iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

Matthew Henry said that in this passage, we are cautioned to take heed whom we converse with and directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better.

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

Now here's our host Chris Arntzen. Good afternoon

Cumberland County, Pennsylvania and the rest of humanity living on the planet earth who are listening via live streaming.

This is Chris Arntzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron wishing you all a happy Friday on this 18th day of November 2016.

Summer white, is that a popular wine for women that comes in a box?

Is it a trendy color in the world of fashion? Is it the daughter of a world -renowned theologian and apologist or is it a sheologian?

It's all of the above or should I say she is all of the above and it's my honor and privilege after years of knowing her and seeing her grow up for the first time ever to interview on Iron Sharpens Iron Summer White, host of the

Sheologians podcast and blog and it's a delight to have you on the program today Summer White.

Thanks so much for having me. I'm so excited to talk to you Chris. Yes and in fact this is actually

I believe the first time I am hearing your voice since standing in the lobby of the

Huntington townhouse on Long Island when you were visiting during one of your dad's debates.

I think it may have been, I don't know if it was with Peter Stravinskis or with Robertson Genesis.

I don't know you know back then I think I was really just in it to hang out with my

Long Island friends, you included. Who knows what debate it was? Yeah but I vividly remember that and I have communicated with you via email and Facebook and things like that but I have not heard your voice since then and I just have to ask you,

I know I brought this up a couple of times on Facebook but do you remember nagging me to repeat the word coffee over and over again because you just thought it was a hysterical

New York pronunciation of that word? It is and I think it's enchanting and I love my

New York friends accents and your laugh is obviously you know legend.

There it is, there it is. So yeah I mean I'm really just in this to get to talk to you because it's been so long since, let's see didn't you pick me up from the airport when

I was like eight years old and was that the time we drove around New York City in a limo?

Yes, in fact I picked, your dad and your mom and your dad did not know that I was picking you up at the hotel in a stretch limo and I believe

I had the limo driver lower the window when he pulled up at James and say totus tuus which is the phrase totally yours that John Paul II the

Pope had on his costume there that meant basically a devotion to Mary, just a little inside joke between your father and I and then when we went into Manhattan we went to the

Jekyll and Hyde's restaurant. Yes, oh I forgot that was like one of the highlights of my childhood.

It was you, you did that. Yes, yes and I remember seeing a famous Hollywood actress eating in there when we were there that day and then we went to the

World Trade Center, we went to the observation deck and the World Trade Center and I remember actually thinking this was only about,

I don't think it was much longer than a year before the attack on the Twin Towers, I don't think it was.

No it wasn't, yeah it was sometime around 2000 I want to say. Yeah and I can remember thinking in my head while I was looking out that window that there would be nothing that could bring this building down.

I remember for some reason thinking and you sound like the men who built the

Titanic. Yeah right, that's right, that's what the unsinkable ship but it was such a fun time

I remember and you and your brother and your parents and so well tell us first of all what it was like growing up in such a hateful bigoted mean -spirited family.

Right, it was horrible, my childhood was awful, was filled with traveling the world and getting to meet

Christians all over the place and being catechized in my church and it was the patriarchy was overwhelming.

You were forced fed taco time every day? No, you know what, it wasn't taco time, it was

Taco Bell for sure. Oh really? Yeah for sure and don't tell anyone but my mom is a huge fan of Taco Bell, I had a lot of Crunchwrap Supremes growing up.

But no, I get that question a lot, what's it like being James White's daughter and the simple answer is

I don't really know what's it like being your father's daughter or your father's son because it's all

I've ever known and I think I had to get a little bit older to discover that it wasn't exactly normal or average you know because growing up you just you know what you know and that's it but I think the coolest thing about, well there are a lot of cool things, that's hard to answer,

I could be here all day but one of the coolest things about growing up you know with the family

I grew up in and the church that I grew up in is that just everything it was like a very holistic like everything was always brought back to Jesus, like there was never really anything that I faced like whether it was biology at school or having to learn my multiplication times tables that like didn't have anything to do with Christ and being a

Christian and you know so I have people ask me how are you gonna you know raise your kids like you were raised and what catechism are you using and kind of they want like material they want like physical material what are you going to use to raise your kids to model after your parents but at the end of the day like it really wasn't about I think the magical thing is that it wasn't really about what materials were used it wasn't really about like a specific we used this catechism or not this catechism it was really just about the

Christian worldview and a gospel lens was how we viewed everything and so that's something that I want to bring to my kids and when

I raise them is just to remember that yes like family time is important and I do spend time going through a catechism with my kid but really having that kind of everything has to do with the gospel thing that's one of my favorite things about how

I was raised that's definitely something I want to do for my kids and you know

I do realize that it's strange that you know by the age of 12 I had attended all kinds of debates and I traveled all over the place and I'd met all these

Christians from different churches but I didn't know that when I was a kid you know it was just part of life and so now looking back on it

I can see what a blessing it was but it was really the day -to -day Christian worldview soaking in everything that I think was the most important.

Yeah and in fact I forgot to announce that our guest today Summer White although when

I first met her I think she was I don't know eight or nine yes she is now a mother herself of two beautiful little daughters one is

Clementine and one is January and how old how old is

Clementine now? Clementine will be four next month and January turned one last week.

Wow and I tell you you have to I think you have to write a book about your conversations with Clementine because they they are truly hysterical

I think that she is going to have a career in comedy writing because she is absolutely hysterical.

I mean I actually I literally find myself laughing roaring out loud alone in my apartment fearing

I'm going to wake up my landlords. Yeah I'm pretty much never bored when she's around so yeah she's a hot mess and I love it.

And has your dad is he still punkle or is he finally grandpa?

No so what happened was you know by the time she was 16 months old she could say she could pronounce fictitious for example but for some reason if you told her to say grandpa it would come out punkle and my mom just loved it so much my dad had to embrace it

I mean he has been waiting for so long to be called grandpa he was so excited and of course she couldn't say it she could say everything else but she couldn't say grandpa and so one day it clicked with her and she said grandpa and my mom freaked out and she was like no no no no no it's punkle it's gonna be punkle forever and she convinced

Clementine that it's actually just punkle so it's stuck and my dad has wanted to be grandpa forever and now he will never be.

Well and just in case there are a handful of people listening who don't know who

Summer's father is because I have been noticing that I do get new listeners every week almost on Iron Sharpens Iron and or at least ones that I've never heard from before and some of them are not even

Christians so Summer's dad is Dr. James R. White he is the founder of Alpha and Omega Ministries he is globally known as a force to be reckoned with in the arena of apologetics and debate

I know of no other debater alive on the planet Earth who

I would prefer defending what I believe against the opponents of Reformed Protestant Christianity and even more specifically

Reformed Baptist theology and he has written I don't know how many books by now is it 30 or something like that?

Oh I've lost count. Well over a hundred public moderated debates.

Oh yeah I think he's over 150 by now for sure. Yeah and they started out being almost exclusively with Roman Catholics I did 10 of his

I arranged I should say 10 of his Catholic debates I also arranged a debate with a oneness

Pentecostal that your dad had I had your father's first debate with a

Muslim I arranged on Long Island although he doesn't count that one because it was a debate when he knew very little about Islam and he had to defend a major tenet of Christianity so he defended the deity of Christ against Hamza Abdul Malik.

Yes I was there. Oh that's right you were there and Hamza has since even morphed into a different kind of a

Muslim he's a Quran only Muslim which is a very tiny minority of Muslims and I arranged a debate between your dad and Barry Lynn the director president of Americans United for Separation of Church and State who was defending he was defending homosexuality as being compatible with biblical

Christianity and of course your father was opposing that very very strongly and that I was there at that one too.

Wow and and so you remember Barry Lynn's meltdown from the pulpit at the end when he didn't even bother to give his final summation he just scolded the audience and called the audience bigots and hateful people and said we should be ashamed of ourselves and then he went on to threaten a lawsuit against your father if he were to distribute the video and I got your dad in touch with the

Alliance Defense Fund which I think is called Alliance Defending Freedom today and yes and they represented your dad and the case was thrown out because Barry Lynn and his attorney didn't even show up at the hearing so.

Oh he really wanted it didn't he? And let's see

I well a number of other debates on all different issues even in -house debates I arranged the now infamous debate that your dad had with my friend

Bill Shishko on infant baptism. Ah yes that was you thanks a lot.

What you've gotten negative feedback for that? Oh just you know my Presbyterian friends love to tell me that my dad lost to Bill Shishko.

Oh please. It's okay it's okay it's all right everyone's okay. I love

Bill he's one of my closest friends but I could hardly say that your dad lost that debate but I better I better keep my mouth shut because still

Bill is still a very good friend is in touch with me regularly and maybe listen in fact

Bill is going Bill I'm sorry. Shout out to you Bill. Well Bill is actually going to be hosting his own 90 -minute show that I sold the air time to him for on a local

Long Island station not local to me but WLIE radio on Long Island so I will be making announcements about that he has a weekly 90 -minute show every

Saturday 12 p .m. to 1 30 p .m. called a visit to the pastor's study and you'll be able to hear that anywhere in the world via live streaming as well as on Long Island in the

New York tri -state area on 5 40 a .m. on the dial but I will announce to you folks listening how you can listen to it over the internet as soon as I have all that information in front of me

I wasn't expecting to bring that up today but you're welcome let me announce our email address for our listeners if they would like to join us as well with a question it's chris arnzen at gmail .com

c -h -r -i -s a -r -n -z -e -n at gmail .com please give us your first name your city and state and your country of residence if you live outside of the

USA and you know we who are reformed baptists typically have a lot more of an emphasis on a conversion experience in the life of a child to deem them as a brother or sister in Christ as a truly born -again regenerate person as a proper candidate for baptism and so on but but being raised in a

Christian home it may be more difficult for you to trace the the journey that you went through to that that dramatic moment of actually becoming born again some people especially those who have been raised as in a

Christian home a solid Christian home a very actively involved Christian home you might not remember a time when you were an enemy of Christ or an opposition of the gospel but maybe you do tell us something about your own childhood and as far as your understanding of the gospel and of your need for Christ and if you even know of an approximate time anyway in your life when a light switch went on by the grace of God and you realized

I need Christ as my savior I need to repent I need to follow him and you know when you cried out to the

Lord etc right so yeah you know I know in some baptist circles not particularly reformed baptists but in a lot of baptist circles there is a lot of emphasis on that moment you know this big bright shiny moment that you had and you had this like I don't know conversion experience

I've heard a few of those stories and I just haven't related to any of them for me you know and then a lot of conversations and dialogue is what

I get into people will tell me well you know you're only a Christian you only have the faith that you have because of how you were raised and they're saying it as an insult but it's not an insult being raised in a

Christian home and having the Christian faith handed down to you is a privilege and I think we need to take hold of that and not allow anyone to look down on our faith if our parents have the same faith because ultimately it's a blessing if your children are saved and so I hear that one a lot but I think there was definitely a time period in my life when my faith became my own it became more than just this kind of intellectual faith that I had so growing up in a

Christian home I always would have consented if you had asked you know is the Bible true did

Jesus really exist was Jesus God you know intellectually I knew all of those things and I believed the

Bible but you know so do demons it wasn't a saving faith it wasn't um a faith that had changed my heart always and I knew that um there was also never a time when um

I didn't have a saving faith that I thought no I'm fine

I go to church everything is good um I just think the kind of theology that I was brought up with would not have allowed me to deceive myself like that um or to believe that my works could count um before God and so there was definitely a time in my life and and I can

I can kind of look back on the time I can't I don't have a bright shiny moment I don't have like this experience um that was singular it was really over a course of time that I experienced um a brokenness over my sin and a brokenness over my position before God that I had never experienced before and it was true like just looking at myself and saying like wow this is this is disgusting this is filthy rags this is bad there's nothing

I can do um and obviously God had to grant me that sight um into my own depravity first for me to even be able to see it um and then through that season you know

I think I experienced true repentance and obviously repentance is a lifelong thing that we have to do but in terms of actually coming to a saving faith there was that season where um

I truly repented and my faith became my own not just an intellectual consent but you know a new heart and like actual true desires um to glorify

God as opposed to maybe check off some works boxes like I go to church and I don't use certain language and you know whatever else you can do to dress yourself up to make yourself feel holy um and so you know like I said it really wasn't a moment in time it was

I think it was a season of repentance that God granted me and just gave me new sight and nothing's been the same since well praise

God for that yes I strongly disagree with some of my Baptist brethren who say that if you do not know the exact date of the day that you were born again you're not born again

I think that's an absurd uh litmus test it's absurd yes yeah especially when you're talking about somebody raised in a

Christian home that has been by I mean this doesn't always happen the children of believers aren't always preserved from overt rebellion but very often they are by God's mercy and um and for somebody who has been preserved from that open really scandalous type of behavior uh it is a it may be a harder thing to determine when that happened um and uh

I I could still vividly remember when I was a new believer uh I was telling a a

Christian girl about my testimony and she was born and raised in an

Orthodox Presbyterian home and she said to me you know sometimes I wish that I was not raised in a

Christian home so my testimony would be more compelling uh about the and and more uh uh you know fabulous more uh provocative more amazing uh when

I witness to people so that they can see the grace of God in my life and how he transformed me and I and I told this young lady

I said I think that's absolutely ridiculous because because it's it's just as much of a miracle that God preserves someone in in in in godliness and prevents them especially in the 21st century the the miraculous work of God to preserve a person and protect them from venturing out into uh the rebellion of the world that is so much more easy in this day and age because of the media and the easy access to ungodly things and so on so I think well and I think

I mean it kind of misses the point of you know the fact that whether or not you um lived a life of just complete open rebellion and whatever and came to God or whether or not you lived a life of faithful church attendance that was hypocrisy both are um going to earn you the same place in eternity uh both require um

Christ on the cross to save you from it and uh you know it's not really apples to oranges because at the end of the day you know it's like when uh the parable of the shepherd who went out for for the one sheep and left the 99 behind you know

I mean I understand that because sometimes you know I do get this question a lot like tell me your conversion story and I always wonder are they expecting you know lights coming through the clouds like what do they want um what are they hoping they're going to hear because I I don't have that but what

I do have is the fact that um I was a wretched sinner whether or not it was you know whether or not the things

I did were as open and rebellious as anyone else um it was all filthy and I was going to go to the same place as any unrepentant sinner um so yeah

I don't I don't buy that at all and I think it totally undermines um just how abhorrent sin is to God whether or not it's open sin or hidden sin

I personally I mean hypocrisy is a big deal and we hear

Jesus talk about it a lot and I think a lot of people that that grow up in the church um they might be clean cut on the outside but it's a lot of hypocrisy um and I know you know

I could say that of myself at one time so anyway sorry there's no strobe lights in my conversion story

I'm really I'm really not sorry so uh well you what you just described reminds me of a very excellent book by the late

Jerry Bridges called uh Respectable Sins and I actually had the privilege of interviewing him on that uh years ago and that on the old program uh and I have to have eventually all of those old programs uh the mp3s posted on my website but my my webmaster has enough to deal with right now without going back into the ancient days of the beginnings of iron sharpens iron your dad by the way was the very first guest that I interviewed on iron sharpens iron and uh how did your show get off the floor uh well

I had uh went on my own as an independent ad agent uh leaving wmca and which was a still is a a station within the largest christian network in the world uh radio network in the world salem media and um

I had already tasted what it was like to to host a talk show because the in -house talk show host

Andy Anderson who is now with the lord uh I used to get him a lot of guests and if if you ever heard a reformed person on a show it was because I got him there and I always wrote all of Andy's questions for him when

I got him a guest including your father and um Andy began to realize wow this guy really is capable of doing this so he started to request when he when he would go on vacation or if he was sick he would say why don't you have

Chris Arnson fill in for me and then when he passed away uh I believe of stomach cancer uh which was quite a shock to many of us because he kept a lot of things uh secretive about his symptoms and so on uh he they had me for the first two weeks after his passing

I hosted the program for him and in fact your dad was a guest again a couple of times during that two -week period and then when

I left WMCA I was driving around saw a little tiny christian radio station in Babylon Long Island pulled into the parking lot and went to the door and said to the general manager that I'd like to sell advertising for them as an independent ad agent she said wow do you you have a good voice have you ever hosted a talk show

I said yeah I used to fill in for the talk show host at WMCA well we have the two o 'clock slot open you want it that's exactly how it happened so uh and then she she initially hated the show because she said all you do is talk

I want you to play music and I said well that's not what I'm not a dj that's not what I'm about and I don't like the music you play anyway and uh so she first was she hated my show she hated the fact that I was the topics were very often offensive to modern -day evangelicals and fringe charismatics and so on and she would get really upset with me but then when she started to realize because they were live streaming that that we were getting phone calls from all over the

United States and even England and Ireland and Sweden she said this is incredible so she she fell in love with my show after that and right the rest is history amazing well we do have a listener but um who has a question for you

I'm going to take his question after our first break so Pastor Sterling in Greensboro North Carolina if you could be patient we'll get to your question after this station break so don't go away we are going to be right back after these messages with Summer White of Sheologians.

Chris Arnzen here and I can't wait to head down to Atlanta Georgia and here's my friend Dr. James White to tell you why.

Hi I'm James White of Alpha and Omega Ministries. I hope you join me at the G3 conference hosted by Pastor Josh Bice and Praise Mill Baptist Church at the

Georgia International Convention Center in Atlanta January 19th through the 21st in celebration of the 500th anniversary of the

Protestant Reformation. I'll be joined by Paul Washer, Steve Lawson, D .A. Carson, Votie Balcom, Conrad M.

Bayway, Phil Johnson, Rosaria Butterfield, Todd Friel and a host of other speakers who are dedicated to the pillars of what

G3 stands for gospel grace and glory. For more details go to G3conference .com

that's G3conference .com. Thanks James make sure you greet me at the

Iron Sharpens Iron exhibit booth while you're there. Charles Hedden's once said give yourself unto reading the man who never reads will never be read he who never quotes will never be quoted he will not use the thoughts of other men's brains proves he has no brains of his own you need to read solid ground christian books is a publisher and book distributor who takes these words of the prince of preachers to heart the mission of solid ground christian books is to bring back treasures of the past to minister to christians in the present and future and to publish new titles that address burning issues in the church and the world since it's beginning in 2001 solid ground has been committed to publish god -centered christ -exalting books for all ages we invite you to go treasure hunting at solid -ground -books .com

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forward slash iron sharpens today thrive in financial is not your typical financial services provider as a membership organization we help christians be wise with money and live generously every day and for the fourth year in a row we were named one of the world's most ethical companies by the ethosphere institute a leading international think tank dedicated to the creation advancement and sharing of best practices in business ethics contact me mike gallagher financial consultant at 717 -254 -6433 again 717 -254 -6433 to learn more about the thriving difference we know we were made for so much more than ordinary welcome back this is chris arnzen if you just tuned us in today our guest for the full two hours is summer white who is the daughter of dr james r white of alpha omega ministries and she is co -host of the blog and podcast sheologians and we're going to hear more about that and how you can listen to that and also read the blog in a moment if you'd like to join us on the air with a question for summer our email address is chris arnzen at gmail .com

chris arnzen at gmail .com c h r i s a r n z e n at gmail .com

and we have a listener pastor i usually don't give people's full names but i figured since he is a pastor and has given me the name and location of his church i might as well give him a plug for that his name is pastor sterling vander worker and he is the pastor of shepherds fellowship in greensboro north carolina and he says i love your dad's ministry and look forward to sending a link to your program to my wife and two daughters my question is since dads like me often embarrass their daughters enough to get the proverbial eye roll what does dr james white do to get the eye roll from you what doesn't he do that deserves enough let's see this morning he threatened to come on my show and sing john denver songs no thank you dad no but um i have to i have to pretend like he's annoying um because he's my dad but really he's like the coolest dad that's ever dadded like he's so cool um we did so much fun stuff when we were little and he always tried to involve us and he's like santa at christmas time except better um so you know yeah he does a lot of eye roll things like i don't know he drinks skim milk who drinks skim milk um i would never have guessed that ew it's gross right you know for the most part i have i mean for the complete part like he's the least embarrassing dad in the entire universe i'm pretty sure so don't tell him on your show don't let him listen to this well i your dad has gotten the eye roll from me uh the number of times i can vividly remember i can vividly remember being invited to someone's home on a beautiful summer afternoon for lunch after his morning service when he was speaking at a church in in suffolk county and we were sitting on the back porch enjoying the weather and the wife came out on the back porch and said hey it's such a beautiful summer day why don't we have for for lunch a nice delicious cold and refreshing fruit salad your father your father had the look of panic on his face like he had just heard that the united states got involved in world war iii and uh then it was you could sense the tension and the the the dead silence hanging there in the in the hot summer air and the wife the wife said or i could order a pizza your father just totally cheered up after that yeah way more up his alley right there i'm sure he loves me telling that story um we have a listener all the way in slovenia wow joe in slovenia says please ask sister summer to address what she thinks is the most important theological topic or issue for women today very good question oh wow that's not a tall order at all not at all uh you know okay so one of the biggest issues i engage with is just the issue of feminism um which is not on the face of it a theological topic except that um if you're going to deal with the presuppositions inherent within feminism then you are dealing with theological topics um and so that's one of the things i like to talk about because it's it's confusing so we are currently living in a generation of third wave feminists um there have been the first and second wave before them and what's confusing about feminism is that um there are many points in which uh feminists are right um feminists in the turn of the century you know what they really wanted was uh women to have the right to vote uh nothing inherently wrong with that um they were majorly against uh pornography they were the biggest group that fought the rise of pornography in the media there's nothing wrong with that um obviously they were against the prohibition of alcohol i don't appreciate that um and then you had your second wave feminists which were responsible for what we what happened in the 60s the sexual revolution um that ultimately ended in the ruling in 1973 known as Roe v

Wade um that allowed for um the holocaust in the womb that we see today obviously we don't agree with that if you look up feminism and just the basic definition it's the idea that um women have as much worth or value as men but that's really not what feminism that we know today that we see in the culture is so we can just take it back to scripture um obviously the the bible is radical in its treatment of women especially for the time that it was written in um no honest person can read the scriptures and believe that there's any christian basis christian teaching that um women are less valuable than men um so there's really nothing that needs to be fought against there it's really how it's lived out practically in life so we know that men and women have different roles they've been given um i mean we've been commissioned differently in different ways god created two genders and they are not the same um they are not a mirror image of each other they are in opposite to each other and they're complementary so i think for women um one of the most important things to really get a grasp around theologically is um what what are women for what did god make women for if you're unmarried if you're single if you're a mom if you're not a mom you're a woman you're a christian what does that mean um what does embracing being a woman mean at whatever stage in life that you are and there's so much confusion about that because the world sends one message and then the church i think oftentimes tries to like swing the pendulum so hard the other way that you know they end up um trying to make us all dress like we're in jane austen novels and no i'm serious this really happens yes i know and i've seen i see it really you've seen it it's terrifying um and so i think we're living in a time and uh joy and i did an episode on this we interviewed uh rebecca merkle who wrote a book on this topic um and we have a whole episode on it and i highly recommend it if you are a female or a male and you're completely unsure what women are for but really once you get that under your footing i think a lot of fears um theological fears can can disappear and so that's really one of my one of my favorite things to talk about and something that i'm really passionate about women understanding who they are being made in the image of god and being made as a female well thank you uh joe from slovenia keeps spreading the word about iron sharpens iron in slovenia which actually is the native land of the new first lady um and right and by the way uh and you could pay me for this later summer but but uh one of the most important things about summer white and she elogians is that they are specialists in her minutics i've been waiting for a week to tell you that really no i have to tell you because because there's a blog called her minutic really do it yes and um i don't think uh i don't think i should share my opinion on the air go ahead yes please no no we're gonna we're gonna just iron sharpens iron iron sharpens iron is not afraid of offending anyone unless it's not unless it's slanderous well they're just not my favorite website let's say they would be feminists perhaps uh i don't know okay go to sheologians .com

how about that okay yeah well that's a good thing i don't think we have done that yet uh sheologians .com

in fact uh sterling pastor sterling who sent us the email earlier wanted to send the link to his wife and daughters sheologians .com

tell us about the genesis of sheologians okay so um i have a really good friend um who is a brilliant producer and he and some other friends were uh they were over one night and he's really passionate about christians and the arts and i am also very passionate about christians and the arts and i have a lot of strong feelings about um how involved we should be in them um how bad the current state of a lot of christian art is um and so pretty much if you get he and i in a room we're going to end up having this conversation and so we were discussing uh specifically christian literature because that's what i feel the most passionate about and at the end of our conversation he goes i think you should do a podcast and i said okay uh will you record it for me and he said uh yeah show up whenever and it's pretty much worked like that every week since um he helped me um put together the website and that's where my blog lives um and that's another thing i love to do uh i love to write and then um the best part of that all is my friend joy who is the third co -host of apology radio um she blessed me by joining me and being a co -host she is she's the girl she's like she's the girl okay uh there would be no show without her no one would tune in without her so um you know basically she and i just get together every week and we discuss theology our um our conviction kind of like our starting line for every episode um we want it to be short because i know for women it's hard to listen to a longer program um especially moms and working women and it's just it's hard to find time for an hour long program or two hour long program so we wanted it to be short and our underlying conviction is that a lot of times christians just can over complicate matters um and take worldview issues cultural issues political issues and just over complicate them and so we want to simplify them we want to equip women to be able to think scripturally biblically simply about issues and be able to respond to whatever is happening in life whether it be a day -to -day issue in their home or dealing with um political news cultural news so that's kind of our our goal and we want to be light -hearted because both of us believe like life is so hard you can either like laugh or cry and we prefer laugh so we like to inject some of that in there too now what specifically uh what is your complaint about the arts in relation to the christian church in the 21st century oh boy do you have an extra hour we'll highlight some things highlight okay um i think if you turn on christian radio right now you're going to hear a lot of really bad stuff um i think that you know i actually i had an interaction um a couple weeks ago with nicole nordeman um she saw something that i did and disliked it so much that she wrote me a novel and i really appreciate that she um she's a in case you don't know i don't know recording artist okay she's a christian recording artist um i wasn't super familiar with her i'd heard one or two songs but um the internet was super familiar with her um and you know she basically um was coming out in defense of um jen hat maker when jen you know let us all know that she's an apostate because she uh supports homosexual marriage and believe it believes it can be holy just like amy grant did a few years ago right um and i had something to say about that so she and i had a minimal minimal dialogue but anyway um that's the kind of person that you can hear on christian radio um and that's not christian um there's nothing biblical about her stance and i think we're seeing more and more christian you know quote christian artists coming out for you know just complete um they deny the inerrancy of scripture they put emotion over truth um it's scary and i think it's actually kind of exciting too because it's like well finally there's kind of like this culling that's happening um in the christian music world um and it's happening usually on the issue of gay marriage we're kind of getting to see you know the dividing line there and um so yeah you turn on christian radio and this is this is what you get um you go into a christian bookstore you know what are you going to find um if you go into the christian section on itune um you know i hit number two but joel osteen will never be dethroned um and so a lot of what is quote christian is really just this label for kind of very vanilla boring we're going to give you a watered -down gospel in the form of a book or in the form of a song and it's kind of this um like moralistic therapeutic deism it's not really inherently christian and it's not even really good art um there's nothing unique about it and so in my opinion like god is you know he's he's the artist that's ever existed and we're made in his image to reflect that and bad art doesn't reflect good art it doesn't reflect what god's done and so you know obviously there's room for opinions about what qualifies as art or not however i just think if you kind of venture into the christian section of a lot of what's considered art um you're not going to find great stuff so actually our episode that we dropped today was on this topic um we talked about it kind of a little bit more in depth than i'm gonna do right now but um you know for instance on netflix a couple years ago there was like a christian section and so i perused that and i saw this movie and it was supposed to be the retelling of the story of esther which is a great story and it's told in an epic way and this movie was awful and i think that's offensive i think we can do better i think christians need to be um less afraid of being bold and telling bold stories they need to be less interested in whether or not a christian studio or a christian label is going to accept them and they need to go out there and they need to make art that's going to glorify god yeah i agree with you 100 percent uh i can remember even when uh my program was airing on a contemporary christian music station on long island uh how very often i'd be embarrassed by the music preceding and following my program because it was somehow identifying me with it a lot of it sounded like really bad sappy uh american idol ballad stuff that you couldn't really even tell for certain very often if it was christian or not um i had a very interesting conversation about six years ago with pete orta who was a member of the band petra during one of the decades that petra existed petra i don't know if you know who they were but they were very big uh christian rock probably a decade before i was alive or something yes yes well i think they started in the 70s and they were pretty big in the 80s and can they may they may even be around today i'm not sure but pete orta who's not with them anymore but he uh was telling me that he knows he was not even a christian when he was in that band and he was talking about the that the the being involved in the christian recording industry was an eye -opener and very saddening to him because a lot of the material that was being produced was really uh secondhand secular songs that were christianized just by sprinkling uh you know right and i'm not specifically talking about the band petra doing that i'm just saying what he saw in other what was happening in the studios with other groups so i don't want to just totally bash petra at all um but but in fact pete orta said when he did his solo album born again he knows he was not born again but he is now he is now praise god but uh right but yeah uh very very uh saccharine is i think one of the best ways to describe a lot of christian music today yeah very middle of the road yes and um it's it seems that modern -day christianity uh the only people that uh they don't that a lot of the christian music music industry doesn't care about offending is conservative uh bible -believing christians who who are strongly uh adherence to the inerrancy of scripture and so on they everybody else they don't want to offend with even with the gospel um right but we do have another listener in indianapolis indiana aaron uh who says thank you for interviewing summer what a treat and thank you for introducing her to me she is right about so much not the least of which is that your laugh and voice are legendary summer i stand in awe of your confidence in christ and his truths and your proclamation of them how would you advise someone like me an introvert of sorts who did not have a father like yours to gain the strength to speak up against the folly of lies and those who are being spouted obviously it starts by researching and doing your homework i would imagine thanks to your father and chris for being some of my heroes for your bravery and standing for truth wow well thank you for that aaron um number one thing so i do not believe that anyone has to be a scholar uh to spread the gospel so when christ gave us the great commission it was go to all the ends of the earth it wasn't um you know go to seminary read these books do this and then you're ready it was you know spread the gospel and we're given all kinds of examples in the new testament of people living holy lives day -to -day lives basic lives going to their basic jobs um and living faithfully and affecting the culture around them um that doesn't mean i don't believe that study is important or necessary obviously if we're going to speak the truth we need to know the truth um so i'm not discounting that but um the concept that uh you know maybe someone has more footing than you do therefore you're less called is untrue and and wouldn't be biblical so don't don't view yourself that way um whether or not you know you've had this many years of study or that uh know the gospel read your scriptures and um we are commanded to always be ready to give a defense for our faith and that's just something that every christian is supposed to be able to do and should be able to do and it doesn't require years of study if you know jesus you know the gospel if you're reading your scripture daily you know the gospel and that's what you're called to share so i understand some of us have had more practice but you don't get practice until you're out there doing it and so we actually just did a really great episode with trish ramos um of fish with trish her husband is emilio ramos um of red grace media and they they are awesome they do street evangelism all the time and so the episode we just did with her you know we basically asked her like how do evangelize we asked her a very similar question if you're an introvert if you stay at home if you're not used to having these conversations how do you get out there and get comfortable evangelizing and make it happen in your day -to -day and she gave us a lot of great advice better advice than i could give you um for sure but she was really inspiring and had a lot of really practical practical ways that you can do that but one of the things i'll never forget growing up from my childhood is my dad always took us out to the mormon temple because we live in arizona um so we have a big mormon population and he would take us out to the temple every easter and we would pass out tracks and i remember i mean i started doing that when i was like seven or eight and i remember asking my dad on on a drive out there to the temple once like um you know what what what part of mormonism do you think i should study so that like i could i could know what to say and he said no no no you're going about it all wrong you don't you don't study you don't need to study mormonism to be able to go out and have these conversations you need to study the gospel you need to know what you believe and why you believe it to have effective conversations and of course you know he's written books on mormonism the message wasn't don't know anything about mormonism before you talk to mormons the message was it is way more important that you have a foundation that you know the gospel that you can give an answer for your faith um when you're going to go evangelize deal with the cults or whatever so you know just bring it all back to scripture um we see paul i believe in acts and i can't remember the chapter off the top of my head um where he is out and he's engaging uh with people and he's uh super presuppositional we won't get into that um and he is just he is he is arguing from scripture so you don't have to read it i mean i'm telling i'm not telling you not to read a systematic theology i'm telling you you don't have to have to read one in order to share the gospel with people and um i i don't know i've i've never been an introvert so i can't really um sympathize with you there uh but i know the introverts do it all the time trish ramos says she's an introvert and she's passing out every day so i don't know hopefully that answers your question yes and in fact my pastor who actually is uh returning to the uk he's from scotland originally uh and is leaving uh uh the united states monday to accept a call to a church in england but he is has been my pastor here in carlisle for four years very introverted man but he overcomes that because he loves the gospel and loves the souls of sinners and he has a burden to reach out to them and share the message with them i believe the holy spirit can you know enable people to overcome that the shyness obviously he does it all the time but uh we have to go right now to another station break if you'd like to join us on the air with a question of your own for summer our email address is chris arnzen at gmail .com

chris arnzen at gmail .com please give us your first name city and state and country of residence if you live outside of the usa don't go away we'll be right back with summer white of shiologens i'm chris arnzen host of iron sharpens iron radio and here's one of my favorite guests todd friel to tell you about a conference he and i are going to hello this is todd friel host of wretched radio and wretched tv and occasional guest on chris's show iron criticizing i think i think that's what it's called hoping that you can join chris and me at the g3 conference in atlanta my new hometown it is going to be a bang up conference called the g3 conference celebrating the 500th anniversary of the protestant reformation with paul washer steve lawson d .a

carson voddie bachum conrad and bayway phil johnson james white and a bunch of other people we hope to see you there learn more at g3 conference .com

g3 conference .com hahahaha thanks todd i think see you at the iron sharpens iron exhibitors booth i'm james white of alphanomega ministries the new american standard bible is perfect for daily reading or in -depth study used by pastors scholars and everyday readers the nasb is widely embraced and trusted as a literal and readable bible translation the nasb offers clarity and readability while maintaining high accuracy to the original languages which the nasb is known for the nasb is available in many editions like a topical reference bible researched and prepared by biblical scholars devoted to accuracy the new topical reference bible includes contemporary topics relevant to today's issues from compacted giant print bibles find an nasb that fits your needs very affordably at nasbible .com

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that's wrbc .us charles heddens burgeon once said give yourself unto reading the man who never reads will never be read he who never quotes will never be quoted he will not use the thoughts of other men's brains proves he has no brains of his own you need to read solid ground christian books is a publisher and book distributor who takes these words of the prince of preachers to heart the mission of solid ground christian books is to bring back treasures of the past to minister to christians in the present and future and to publish new titles that address burning issues in the church and the world since it's beginning in 2001 solid ground has been committed to publish god -centered christ -exalting books for all ages we invite you to go treasure hunting at solid -ground -books .com

that's solid -ground -books .com and see what priceless literary gems from the past to present you can unearth from solid ground solid ground christian books is honored to be a weekly sponsor of iron sharpens iron radio welcome back if you just tuned us in and iron sharpens iron our guest today for the full two hours with one hour to go is summer white the daughter of dr james r white of alpha and omega ministries and co -host of the blog and podcast sheologians and you can hear more or learn more about sheologians at sheologians .com

that's theologians with an s and i hope that you discover that and share that ministry with others if you'd like to join us on the air our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com

by the way summer did you recognize the two voices in that last ad no i've never heard those jokers before well obviously from the the little jab there you know exactly who they are so we have they basically raised me so and we uh have uh harrison from mechanicsburg pennsylvania which actually i don't know if you knew this but that's a city where your dad spent a lot of his childhood um in fact he was baptized in mechanicsburg pennsylvania wow you know more about him than i do that's why you still love him anyway harrison harrison mechanicsburg pennsylvania is is there anything that you can share in which you and your father have departed theologically on an issue oh boy thanks for putting me on the spot departed on departed on well let me give you an example i know that like you are going to my friend jeff durbin's church who i know that your father has a very close relationship with jeff but jeff is a theonomist even though he's a reformed baptist he is a theonomist and there are probably other things that he believes that your father disagrees with but uh sure so well thankfully um being a theonomist is not a requirement for membership um not you know um the great thing about jeff is he knows what our first and secondary issues um i really like hanging out with um with uh their brand of of of being post middle theonomist it's very um it's just what's the word i'm searching for invigorating it's invigorating it's so positive it's so you know they have such a bright outlook for the future and i i love being around that um i would agree that you know i think before i've been going to apologia for about a year i think before this i probably would have said no i'm on now um let's just leave it and at this point you know i'm not really sure um i haven't done enough study um on eschatology to say um really where i would stand i know my dad's on millennial i know um uh jeff is post -millennial and um i would kind of just like to say that um i don't talk about eschatology so don't ask um you are certainly a chip off the old block i mean your father only came out with his eschatological position about five years ago i think i know i know um and i you know i don't know i think i think if i studied it um i don't know that i would be on millennial um i think there are a lot of things that my post -mill friends say that just makes a lot of sense um but i haven't you know i haven't really done enough study to say but i guess uh if i did uh hold the post -millennial theology then that would um i would be departing from my dad there um but other than that you know i really can't think of anything obviously we're we are two different people i'm not exactly my dad um i'm kind of like just i'm a lot like him just you know like better looking um yeah that's where you definitely take after your mother right yeah yeah for sure so uh no so far not yet and here's the thing if i ever did i would do the totally mature adult thing and never tell him right yes that would be the wisest thing to do i would love i would love though to see him i would love to see you and him in a live public moderated debate that would be awesome oh my word nope he is the there's one person on earth i would never ever debate and his name is dad yep i agree with you uh by the way do you know the difference between an optimistic and a pessimistic amillennialist um the optimistic ones eat more twinkies an optimistic amillennialist is an amillennialist a pessimistic amillennialist is an millennialist so that's a bad joke chris uh we uh do have uh bb in cumberland county pennsylvania who wants to know do you find it difficult being a woman using your gifts in public in the world of christian media where you are constantly trying to check yourself to prevent stepping over the boundaries of proper participation among women in the church knowing that you are not a feminist and from what i understand a complimentarian and believing in male headship does it ever make you nervous do you ever feel awkward about it no that's good that's good um no um okay so yeah i get this question a lot too um if our question is about female relationships in the church i think that would be um a whole other different topic um in terms of like how do you relate to other women or if the question is presupposing that speaking to women can be difficult um that's a whole other topic but for me um if the question is about uh okay so you're a woman and you believe that women can't be pastors or women can't hold authority over men how do you do what you do um i am i am a churchman church woman i don't know um i believe that everyone should be in a pew or whatever a fluffy chair whatever they have in your church um i believe that the role of the pastor is an ordained position and i hold it in extremely high regard um i am no one's pastor i am not a spiritual authority to anyone i have people coming to me all the time asking me questions that i have no business answering because i'm not their authority i'm not their elder and so when those come to my inbox i refer them to our local church if they're not a part of a local church um they need to be a part of local church number one um i believe that being a part of your local church being accountable to your local church is just so integral to the christian life um that if that's not something that you have that you're already off track please don't listen to me please spend time finding a church and getting yourself plugged in and being accountable to your elders and on that topic um my i am accountable um to my elders and what i'm doing um apologia studio uh produces my show they help me with my blog um my pastors listen to the show um and i have like this amazing safety net that i love um i love accountability what i'm doing is way too scary to not have accountability to not have elders over me um and if i was about to do something stupid or wrong or potentially dangerous i have people around me specifically spiritual authorities in my life ordained by the church um that would you know smack whatever out of my hand if need be um and so that accountability that i have um doesn't offend me it encourages me it strengthens me it makes me feel responsible you know it gives me the freedom to do what i'm doing because i know that i have that safety net so um is it hard no um i wouldn't do this if i wasn't under the accountability of my local church um i don't do it without their support um and honestly it's gone so well that really not a whole lot of it not a whole lot about it has been hard it's really just been enjoyable and fun i do feel called to it obviously um i think the lord is really blessing the podcast and my blog um i don't think we hit number two on itunes because i'm special or magical i do think my co -host is special or magical but i don't think that's because of her specialness either i think um god is blessing what we're doing because we really just want to glorify him and we really want to reach people specifically women um and help equip them um we both have just been extremely well discipled um which is not something a lot of people have had in their lives a lot of access to and so we don't want to waste that so for me personally as long as we are being faithful being responsible putting ourselves under accountability um and seeking to honor god there's really not a whole lot that is scary about it and um you know i we do not in any way seek to supplant the position in people's lives of their local churches we're no one's pastors and we would never claim to be so that's very impressive number two on itunes wow well i can i could proudly boast that iron sharpens iron is the number one christian live christian talk show in the southern portion of carlisle pennsylvania yeah pennsylvania between four and six p .m

it's the number one that's amazing you go chris you know i i thought we go ahead we we sat next to uh we thought next to austin for a while and it was like it was like watching a movie because it was so unreal um we're not there anymore we didn't hold that position for forever at all but we're still on the chart um and we hit that position you know right out the gate it was just crazy um and that kind of let me know you know the lord's blessing it it's a silly little podcast that my best friend and i do and the response that we've gotten has just been so encouraging i i could totally just be a woman right now and cry talking about it but we get you know just i get messages just day in and day out people saying thank you so much this was so encouraging i needed to hear this what i this is what i've been looking for um i wish i could respond to all of them it's just overwhelming but it's been um it's been just a huge blessing to me um to see that and to hear that so it's been great well praise god for that um we do have cj from lindenhurst long island new york who says have you ever struggled and do you still struggle with anger when you see people malicious maliciously attack your father for his doctrinal positions um okay so you know from my from my experience um the answer is yes and no um there is a very real sense in which uh like my father i have a very thick skin um especially when it comes to that i kind of just expect it it's going to happen um i think that's really helped uh in my own ministry because uh you know i i think i get more nice messages than mean ones but i get a whole lot of mean ones too um and it's never ruined my day uh not once um and so when i see um i mean he did say maliciously attacked yeah sure you know when someone attacks someone that you care about in a malicious way i think there's such a thing as a righteous anger um it never i never allow it to ruin my day it never owned my emotions um it's just kind of something that you get used to um when your dad's in the public eye um saying controversial things it's like his favorite thing to do um and so you know the answer is yes and no um the great thing about the internet is that um i don't have to see everything on the internet i can see what i want to see uh and so over time i've just learned don't go here don't look there don't listen to this hide this person and everything's fine and i totally do tailor um my social media that way i do like to be able to have interactions with people i disagree with but if it becomes malicious or um what really bothers me the only things that really bother me are um people that just get so hung up on secondary issues you see people that um they're not out spreading the gospel they're not debating muslims they're not um you know working to grow the kingdom with the cults or with other religions but they have all day long to pick apart other christians on secondary issues um i think i have a righteous anger towards that um because man it's not even personal at this point it's like you need to get out there and build the kingdom instead of building up your you know secondary issue doctrine thing um and it's not that secondary doctrine shouldn't be studied but if they're supplanting the spreading of the gospel and actual kingdom building i think you've got a problem i don't particularly like keyboard warriors that do that uh but yeah uh is it a struggle no it's kind of just honestly daily daily life um and i'm thankful for it because i think it will allow me to continue doing what i'm doing yeah i have struggled with a dec decades long uh anger and frustration over my deep -seated envy of your father of his brain of his gifts and it doesn't and facebook doesn't help like for instance your father can post on facebook this is the most delicious taco that i've ever eaten and he'll get 900 likes in three minutes i'll pour my heart out on something it takes a week to get five likes on it yeah i know it must be so hard to be my dad right we've got um we've got steven an optimistic omil guy from brooklyn and his question is brooklyn new york of course there are a couple of different brooklyn's there's a brooklyn and maryland but anyway um what materials would you recommend for youth today in order to encourage them to live godly lives scripture is a given right uh so my favorite book as a teenager um was john piper's don't waste your life um god really used that book in my conversion actually um it's very simple very accessible that comes with a cd doesn't or a dvd i think yeah yeah it did i don't know if it still does but the print that i had um had a cd in it and don't waste your life was was awesome it was really important um so in terms of living the christian life um my favorite book that i've read on that topic uh in the last several years was kevin de young's beholden our holiness um that was eye -opening convicting awesome um i really really am a huge fan um in terms of uh encouragement in your daily life um having a devotional uh so i know for a lot of you know it sounds kind of like old and a little bit of cheesy like devotional um i don't know i don't know if that was like a more popular thing in days gone by but i think having a devotional is great um because we all have you know the attention span of a microwave and we're busy and things are calling to us all the time and so for me setting aside a time every day that i'm in my devotional i'm reading um paul david tripp's new morning mercy right now uh and it's been just amazing i mean he can really like lay down the conviction and the encouragement in a matter of paragraphs that's great um i really like to encourage people to have a devotional um because it forces you daily if you'll be disciplined and there is you know discipline in the christian life and it's not my generation's favorite word but there is discipline that is involved and required in the christian life and so if you'll be disciplined enough to sit down with your devotional every day with your bible there should be a bible reading with it if you have a devotional it doesn't recommend a scripture reading please go get a different devotional um i think that's huge uh it can redirect your heart it can redirect your focus for the day and i know there are times when i need that um so even if i've already done my devotion for the day i'll just flip through and pick a random one um just because to refocus and be encouraged and be convicted so um yeah does that answer the question yeah sounded like it to me and uh steve from brooklyn also adds and you are much better looking than the get the great dr white thanks steve and steve since you are a compliment i'm sorry that's not really that big of a compliment oh man i hope he never listens to this it's like uh winning a beauty contest in a leper colony or something right i didn't say it i'm only only kidding um well anyway uh steve in brooklyn uh since you are a first -time listener or at least a first -time questioner you are getting a free new american standard bible compliments of the publishers of the nasb and that's going to be shipped to you compliments of cumberland valley bible book service cvbbs .com

cvbbs .com both of whom sponsor iron sharpens iron and we thank both the publishers of the nasb and cumberland valley bible book service for being faithful supporters of our program but steve we need your full mailing address we just have brooklyn new york so please give us your full mailing address so we can have that bible shipped out to you it's a really beautiful edition of the nasb it has an embossed cross on the cover it is a perfect size to carry around in a briefcase or perhaps a winter coat pocket it's not quite small enough to fit in a shirt pocket but it is uh just the right size where it's not too small where you can't read it especially when you're over 50 like i am but it's uh could fit a woman's pocketbook and purse as well very easily anyway i hope you enjoy that and make much use of this new bible so please give us your full mailing address and uh we are going to go to our very last break of the day time is just flying by like a bullet if you'd like to join us on the air with a question of your own as well our email address is chris arnzen at gmail .com

chris arnzen at gmail .com don't go away we are going to be right back with summer white of shiologens so don't go away iron sharpens iron radio is sponsored by harvey cedars a year -round bible conference and retreat center nestled on the jersey shore harvey cedars offers a wide range of accommodations to suit groups up to 400 for generations christians have enjoyed gathering and growing at harvey cedars each year thousands of high school and college students come and learn more about god's word an additional 9 000 come annually to harvey cedars as families couples singles men women pastors seniors and missionaries 90 miles from new york city 70 miles from philly and 95 miles from wilmington and easily accessible scores of notable christian groups frequently planned conferences at harvey cedars like the navigators intervarsity christian fellowship campus crusade and the alliance of confessing evangelicals find harvey cedars on facebook or at hcbible .org

hcbible .org call 609 -494 -5689 609 -494 -5689 harvey cedars where christ finds people and changes lives paul wrote to the church at galatia for am i now seeking the approval of man or of god or am i trying to please man if i were still trying to please man i would not be a servant of christ hi i'm mark lukens pastor of providence baptist church we are reformed baptist church and we hold to the london baptist confession of faith of 1689 we are in nofolk massachusetts we strive to reflect paul's mindset to be much more concerned with how god views what we say and what we do than how men view these things that's not the best recipe for popularity but since that wasn't the apostle's priority it must not be ours either we believe by god's grace that we are called to love and compassion to our fellow man and to be vessels of christ's mercy to a lost and hurting community around us and to build up the body of christ in truth and love if you live near norfolk massachusetts or plan to visit our area please come and join us for worship and fellowship you can call us at 508 -528 -5750 that's 508 -528 -5750 or go to our website to email us listen to past sermons worship songs or watch our tv program entitled resting in grace you can find us at providence baptist church ma .org

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that's solidrockremodeling .com solid rock remodeling bringing new life to your home linbrook baptist church on 225 earl avenue in linbrook long island is teaching god's timeless truths in the 21st century our church is far more than a sunday worship service it's a place of learning where the scriptures are studied and the preaching of the gospel is clear and relevant it's like a gym where one can exercise their faith through community involvement it's like a hospital for wounded souls where one can find compassionate people in healing we're a diverse family of all ages enthusiastically serving our lord jesus christ in fellowship play and together hi i'm pastor bob waldeman and i invite you to come and join us here at linbrook baptist church and see all that a church can be call linbrook baptist at 516 -599 -9402 that's 516 -599 -9402 or visit linbrookbaptist .org

that's linbrookbaptist .org welcome back this is chris arnson and if you just tuned us in our guest for the full two hours today is summer white we've got a half hour of that to go and if you'd like to join us on the air our email address is chris arnson at gmail .com

chris arnson at gmail .com and summer is not only the daughter of world -renowned apologist and theologian and debater dr james r white of alpha and omega minister alpha and omega ministries she is also the co -host of the sheologians blog and podcast that's she with an s and their website is sheologians .com

sheologians .com we have rj in white plains new york who wants to know who are your most prominent women heroes of the faith and they can be both those in glory with christ already or living okay um well you know not to be super sentimental or anything but my grandma my dad's mom i was actually named after her and i hope i'm a lot like her uh she was awesome and as for right now um honestly like my heroes of the faith are like the women that i go to church with um the women that i um you know i'm accountable to the women that um i serve and serve me um and they serve me so well and there's just so many ladies in my church that i i admire i look up to i want to be like um and getting to see their day -to -day lives and um just see how much they serve and how much they love their husbands and their families and the church um that's like that's real you know yeah there are you know women authors that i love um you know i think of cory tenboom and elizabeth elliott um rebecca merkle is one of my favorite christian um authors um right now i love to follow anything that she writes um but ultimately at the end of the day it's the women around me in my church um that i want to be the most like because they are like christ and because i know them and they know me and they're very encouraging um so you know i don't know if that's really the answer anyone's looking for but i feel so so incredibly blessed to be a part of a church um that just loves each other and serves each other so well um and getting to see that and everybody's day -to -day lives like that's the christian life man like that that's like the sweetness of fellowship and i'm just i'm blessed to have it and i don't i'm never going to get over it well i think that was quite a thorough answer obviously whoever rj and white plains wanted to know what you who your heroes were so you answered and that's a very very good answer and uh in fact why don't we give a plug to apologia church their website is apologiachurch .com

apologiachurch that's a -p -o -l -o -g -i -a -church .com and they are located in tempe arizona so if you're ever visiting the tempe arizona area or if you live there and you don't have a church home or you have a church home and it's horrible perhaps it's perhaps it's a cult perhaps it's abandoned the faith uh pay a visit to apologia church i really love interviewing uh the pastor jeff durbin in fact i'm kind of upset and hurt because he hasn't been on my program in a while and neither has your father i'm getting really ticked off about it actually so if you could bug both of them uh that i want them on the show soon and uh and of course your father is always ribbing uh or insulting pastor jeff about mispronouncing apologia he says it's apologia so i when i said to jeff well you should ask dr white are you then a reform baptist apologist is that what you are oh there it is i submit to my others and they say apologia so i'm gonna have to say apologia and uh this uh this new uh arena that you are now um getting your feet wet in of public apologetics and so on do you exclude or include a vision of perhaps even doing something exactly like your dad does debating people of those who perhaps either in in -house debates what people who disagree on secondary or tertiary issues within the faith or even people who are in cults or in false religions and would that include debating men in your opinion is that a sphere that you believe a woman in the church can properly entertain debating publicly a man um you know so uh all the time i'll be engaging in some kind of dialogue and people will chime in and say oh you guys should debate um and i want to say 10 times out of 10 the person that i'm speaking with has no interest in debating me um and i don't think that's um because i'm scary or anything i think it's just because um i think the art of debate is somewhat lost on people my age um i don't think it's that popular um with my generation uh you don't really see them engaging in a whole lot of public moderated scholarly debates um which i think is unfortunate uh i mean i would love to i would love to do a debate um if someone like a rachel held

Evans uh wanted to debate me i would put on my studying shoes and i know that i would have like the greatest mentor in the world to help me do that um and he would pour all of his time into it because he's such a nerd he would be so happy um but i don't know that i mean right now i'm just skeptical that that's even on the horizon uh just because there's really not a whole lot of uh women my age that are engaging in you know the opposite of what i'm doing or have opposite beliefs as me um that seem interested um in doing something like that uh have i ever considered debating a dude um you know i haven't really given a whole lot of thought to this honestly um the first thing i would do would be to ask you know my dad and jeff's opinion on that honestly um because i do you know they have spiritual authority in my life um my my just straight out of the gate answer is i don't see why there would be anything wrong with that because a public moderated scholarly debate is not to be confused with a church service um i don't think there's anything wrong with a woman proclaiming the gospel where other people might hear um or just engaging on some kind of secondary issue but you know honestly like i said i haven't really thought that through because in my head and in every time it's been recommended that i debate someone it was another uh woman so i honestly haven't really thought through that yet um and like i said the first thing i would do would be you know basically that i would i would want like permission um and support from from my church and my pastors if i was to debate anyone and so i would say that's a conversation i would have with them first and um if they said no then i wouldn't even i wouldn't even skip a beat the answer would be no and uh one thing i i definitely wanted you to uh speak about before i forget and the time runs out is i remember being very impressed about hearing years ago uh when you were in college about you standing firm in regard to a professor that was trying to fail you or i can't remember exactly the circumstances but if you could just because he had a hatred or an opposition to your worldview your biblical worldview if you could elaborate on what happened with that because it might be encouraging for college students especially or even high school students or students of any age who feel uncomfortable in the class because their teachers try to publicly embarrass them by because they're christians make them look like they're idiots or something so if you could tell us about what happened with that right um that actually happened twice so i'm not sure which time you remember well tell us about both of them uh i i uh i'm not a fan of kicking up the dust but it just seems to happen wherever i'm at um so in high school uh we were given this um project where we needed to write a letter to the president about a controversial topic that was currently in the news and um there were all kinds of requirements for the letter this was an english class so some of the requirements were silly it was like um use five of your vocabulary words from this week um it needed to be set up like a persuasive essay so that each paragraph had to be a certain kind of paragraph and um so it had to be modeled in a way that was basically teaching us how to take a standardized test but it needed to be on a controversial topic and so i chose to write about stem cell research because i believe this was in 2004 uh when that was in the news quite a bit and as it turns out um the teacher oh and we had to read it in front of the class and we were encouraged the class was encouraged if we really liked the letter felt it strong was to clap and and let the person know that they had really sold their point and so i read my letter and i got a standing ovation and i go to walk over to the teacher's desk and and uh what we're supposed to do after we wrote the letter was put it in an envelope and hand it to her so i walk over to her desk and i go to put it in an envelope and she said i don't want that see me after class uh to make a long story short um she was undergoing cancer at the time and and the story in the news was that stem cells might be the cure for cancer and um you know my whole point was a pro -life argument of um we shouldn't be destroying creating or destroying embryos uh for scientific research um and so i made a very strong pro -life argument against stem cell research um and she was going through cancer at the time and thought that it might be what saved her uh very long story short she refused to give me credit um she thought i plagiarized it so i had to prove i didn't plagiarize it um it was this long drawn out process that eventually ended up with me in the principal's office with the superintendent with my dad with her um and she just flat out refused to give me credit for the paper and it was so bad that um the principal offered to transfer me to another school because he believed that she would not allow me to pass her class wow um and i you know i'm not stubborn at all at all but i totally refused to um i refused to do that um i refused to leave the school and i um i stuck it out and i ended up on all kinds of radio shows for it um you know my dad obviously talked about on his show and then these radio stations wanted to talk to me and then um scott klusendorf put it in his his book um oh yeah i just interviewed him about a week ago yeah he wrote about it in his book and and it just kind of became this big thing um and then actually george bush um someone printed out my letter from the internet because my dad posted it and um they gave it to george bush and i actually got like a real letter from him not like one of the ones but like a real letter my mom framed it i think it's hanging in their house wow or what he said but anyway um so there was that situation and then in college i had this philosophy professor and he one of his favorite things to do was just try to destroy christianity and so he you know he would throw out um all the standard zeitgeist arguments and then he um one day i couldn't tolerate it but at the same time i kind of just wanted to get the class over with it was just a prerequisite um and i just wanted it to be over um but one day he just started going on about the new testament specifically the matthew mark luke and john and he just completely butchered i don't remember exactly what it was my dad would remember because he was like so proud of me but i don't remember exactly what he said but um he totally messed up what language they were written in and so he was trying to basically destroy the infallibility and inerrancy of the new testament based on a language that they weren't even written in and i just couldn't even tolerate it anymore so i raised my hand and i said um the new testament was written in greek and he about lost his mind um he got in face he grabbed my desk um we were having this this back and forth in the middle of class and i just um i don't know he wasn't really scary uh he was just kind of very angry and really wanted at that point it's like he couldn't take it personally like this isn't a personal attack he obviously spends his days in his classes trying to convince 18 year old kids that the new testament is this and that and that's his life's work and there i was um you know kind of embarrassing him a little bit because his claims were his claims were wrong um long story short you know my dad ended up writing him a letter the school offered to take me out of his class it was like history repeating itself um and i refused and i stayed in the class and uh drove him nuts for the rest of the semester and it was kind of just um a hobby of mine um and i got an a in the class for the record but wow uh you know it just it's like at the end of the day i think sometimes when people ask like oh how do you do that or like how are you like bold and it's like at the end of the day if you're a christian and you're defending scripture or you're preaching the gospel you're speaking truth like the truth you've already won like just you've already won if you're defending christianity you don't have to be scared because you're you've already won um and so for me there's just like so much confidence in that uh that you know speaking the gospel in the situations that might be perceived as scary it's like well you know i've already been told that if i love jesus the world's going to hate me and i already know that jesus is the truth and he's already won so it kind of like really takes out any kind of like fear that you might have like just speak the truth and whatever persecution you get for it i can guarantee you it's not as bad as any of the persecution anyone in like china or other countries are experiencing so i don't know roll your sleeves up and just get to it yeah well i thought that that story ended with your father taking him in a long drive into the arizona desert and him never having been heard from since right now we don't talk about we don't talk about that part um yeah that that's that's so disappointing because uh you know whether you're a liberal or conservative the the the academic world is supposed to be about challenging one another with uh ideas and um uh you know like for instance alan dershowitz who is a very liberal attorney uh and author and so on uh he had as one of his students had um ted cruz who was even back even back then was a conservative bible believing christian and though alan dershowitz as his professor was often on the opposite end of the spectrum uh in regarding to argumentation and so on he very highly valued and was very extremely openly impressed with uh ted cruz and said that he was like one of the greatest minds he has ever encountered so you would think that there would be more integrity and honesty even from a liberal but that's a that's a shame no they don't know college isn't anymore to teach you it used to be to teach you how to think now it's right to teach you what to think well uh i want to make sure before we run out of time that you leave our audience with what you most want etched in their hearts and minds before this program comes to an end and especially in regard to your uh new calling here with theologians and this work you're involved in sure so i mean i think you know i touched on it earlier i think it was the last hour um the foundation of what joy and i believe and the reason that we're doing this show is that we really believe that christians can um especially women really over complicate very basic issues and how to approach basic issues and we want to make it simple we want women to have a resource they can go to it's going to be solid it's going to be reformed um to face anything whether it's the arts culture politics discipleship things that are happening in the church um we've done episodes on feminism we've done episodes on why you should be confessional if you're not confessional we've done episodes like i said on art um on evangelism and so what we just really really want is for christian women to um have a resource to go to to be encouraged to get it quickly and hopefully be entertained on the way um joy and i are just naturally very light -hearted people and um we want that we think christians should be joyful and so we make fun of ourselves a little bit um i think so life is like i said earlier life is so hard you can laugh or you can cry and we choose to laugh um and so you know it blesses me i cannot even tell you how much when people write in and say like we've just been so encouraged and we're so thankful because that's like really all that i want to do um and i want to give people the tools to think through the christian worldview um in a very practical way that's what i try to do with my blog um is tackle an issue put the christian worldview on it and hopefully equip people to look at everything through a gospel lens um so yeah and we we do need support so it takes a lot of time effort energy um to put the show on and um we i have a account for it um so that we can keep the lights on and keep doing it and we do need more supporters um i think we only have like 50 or 60 right now we just started the account and we definitely need more people so if you go to patreon .com

sheologians um you can support us there and hopefully you know i hope god like continues to bless the show and to give joy and i the words to say to continue um just encouraging people particularly women and i'm really excited about it i don't know if it's ever going to end in a debate or get me there um but yeah we're excited we have a lot of really cool guests coming up um emily foams is going to be on uh one of my favorite christian bands citizens and saints is going to be on and we've we've already had a really great lineup of guests you know i guess i'll condescend to have dr james white on um and so yeah i really hope that god just continues um to allow us to do this because so far i've like never had more fun in my life and i love seeing just how god is using it and that we're we're really um helping build people up speaking of music have you ever heard of a group christian called my soul among lions yes of course i love them i i'd interview you oh yeah i had an interview with the the lead member of the group and uh that's amazing really uh love them and uh going to try my best to promote them as much as i can and i'd love to see them come out here to carlisle because we have a 900 seat old -fashioned theater from the early 1900s that has restored and is an active theater again it's also a place where i hope to see your father debating eventually they've i've already spoke to the owners and they are more than happy for me to use it for religious activities like debates so um great yeah and we do have christopher in county long island new york who says what loving rebuke and sisterly chastisement can you offer to your brothers in christ who you believe may have overstepped our boundaries in machismo in the church or misogyny or looking down upon our sisters unconsciously oh whoa that's the presupposes a lot doesn't it um okay uh um wow okay well if there are actual cases of misogyny then obviously that is a failure to appreciate that women um are made just as much in the image of god as men um and so shame on anybody who does that um there's no scriptural basis for that um before the cross there is neither male nor female we are all on the same plane and women don't have any less value um than men so i would say on a topic like that um if you believe that women don't have as much value as men um for me it's the same it's as vile as you know saying that someone of a different skin color um doesn't have the same value as you and um that's ultimately going to be a gospel problem so the the difficulty in approaching that um is that it's a heart issue and only god can change the heart um personally i think if a man in the church has an issue it is best for another man to approach him which is just going to go back to my whole potentially annoying to some non -denominational type feeling that um being accountable and active in your church is going to be huge for your christian life i think if you're not you're kind of going to be up a creek without a paddle um so get involved get to know your pastors uh get to know other people get discipled disciple others um because ultimately if there is a true misogynist in the church um he needs to be discipled his heart needs to be changed and the method that god is going to use to do that the primary means that we've been given um is our church body and so you know if he is not active and engaged in his church body it might be hard um for someone else to approach him so let's hope that that's happening if everybody could just get involved with their churches that'd be great uh perfect world right um so i would say if it's an unrepentant behavior and it's potentially a blind spot then bring it before his elders um i don't think a woman is going to be the best person to address that at the end of the day um so pray pray about bringing it to the elders uh maybe a family member that you're close to but um i would never sit down with i mean i wouldn't say never i guess it's situational i would not sit down with a man and say hey let's talk about the problem that you have with women um i don't think that it's going to be the most helpful and at the end of the day you just want to be the most helpful and so get the church involved and last but not least arnie in perry county pennsylvania says do you think that it is primarily the job or role for a woman to be giving private subtle or not so subtle rebukes and chastisements to the sisters in christ who are dressing very provocatively in the assembly oh wow okay well that presupposes a lot i think how you approach someone about their dress is going to be 100 situational i do think uh most of the time an elder might delegate that out to a female or a wife if the elders are trying to deal with it um which you i would agree with but you know it's going to be super situational um but kind of like in the last question that we talked about um i don't think a woman is the best to approach a man about his potential misogyny um i think i don't think a man is going to be the best always the best option to approach approach a woman um regarding how they dress obviously i think um issues of modesty or issues of discipleship um and so if this woman isn't being well discipled in her church with the other women then no wonder um this could be an issue um so i would bring it back to discipleship is she being discipled by other women how can we aid her in being involved in relationships or being discipled by other women and this is another great example of why it's important to be involved in your local church and we're out of time and summer's website is sheologians .com