Luke Abendroth Interview (2020) (Part 3)

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Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

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No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ, based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the

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Apostle Paul said, But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

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In short, if you like smooth, watered -down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn't for you.

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By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we're called by the divine trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her

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King. Here's our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio ministry,

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Mike Abendroth. And Luke Abendroth. I just posted a picture of you on the radio show,

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Luke, and then we got a little comment and it said, the mustache is strong on this one, or something like that.

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Well, why don't you have one? Because I don't really like the look that much. You know, maybe full beard

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I might, but I'm not the mustache guy. But I think it's propelled by your mother's, you know, your mother likes it.

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Yes, the woman in my life. I think about mom getting you guys up early to go surfing and skiing and all that other stuff.

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And then now you know how to do it all. That's true. You're going to have to sit up close to the microphone. I think it's maybe the bill of your rip curl hat.

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How does that all work out? I don't know. It's in the way. I'll take it off. Is that youth ministry? Is what youth ministry? The rip curl hats?

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That's what you have to stay relevant. That's what I learned from my mom. Oh, well, you gave me those special new native shoes. Yeah, those are cool.

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Those are more hip than you think, no matter what mom thinks. I'm going to wear them around the streets of LA. Maybe I'll wear those at the Shepherds Conference.

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Oh, that'd be good. You get some looks. I have a new shirt for the Shepherds Conference in light of Forever 21 closing, so I hope

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John sees me in it. I hope so, too. This will be an interesting Shepherds Conference this year because I have a lot of pastor friends that I want to see, and it's more of a local speaking group.

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I know Conrad's going to be speaking. I sure wish Sinclair would be there, but that's okay. And you know, the farther we kind of maybe fly, you should see.

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The farther you fly, keep going. Wow, that's a exaggerated laugh.

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That is. That's like, oh, how do you get out of that? It'll just be interesting to see the men, friends, where they are theologically, where they happen to be in life.

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Everybody's getting older, so how's that? Good. Yeah, I think it will be interesting to see.

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It's so funny, Todd, making some kind of face. No, I just can recognize your face. That's good.

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Anything going on in your life? Any updates you want to give us in case anybody didn't listen to the last two shows? Updates.

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You know, whenever I hear that update, there's this pro surfer, he always says update, and then he just takes a beer and drinks it in front of everybody, so that's not my update, but I always think of that.

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I just see it on the video all the time, so update. Hmm. I don't know. Now, just home, just trying to figure out work and build a book of business and sales and just -

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Romans 5? You're going to study that? I'm studying Romans 5 to teach that at a little conference, and so, yeah, just studying and working, and that's pretty much it.

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Perforated my eardrum a couple months ago and trying to get that checked out by an ENT, ear, nose, and throat doctor, and all kinds of stuff.

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Okay. Otolaryngology? That's right. I don't know what that is, but I just say, okay. That's ENT? Well, between your ear, your shoulder, my knee, esophagus, and prostate, we believe in the fall.

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That's right. Shouldn't we be getting better, stronger? You could paddle better? Nice. Yeah.

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Tell me about surfing. You love to surf. Do people, when they meet you, is there a disconnect for them,

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Luke, because, and I mean this in all sincerity, you, with as much as I can muster, of course, in light of two shows ago, when you're teaching the

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Bible, firm, passionate conviction that you have, earnest,

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Christ -centered. People don't, I don't think they think you're playing around, that you're playing loosey -goosey, that you think it's a joke.

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You think it's the opposite. But then out of the pulpit, surfing, skating, doing this, that, and the other, fairly crazy in certain activities.

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Do people not get that? How do they see you? I don't know if you're supposed to ask me how they see me.

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Well, okay, how do you coordinate that in your mind? How do you juggle that, balance that?

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Is this just shalom? This is the Christian life, a whole life, and you can have fun. You don't have to kind of act a certain way to keep up the facade or something.

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How does that work? I think you should ask David Van Droon in About Two Kingdoms. That's a good answer.

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No, I think, yeah, it's just, I mean, I think I've learned that from you and from mom and just the ability to enjoy life, and so,

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I mean, I think there's a lot of things I could take a lot more seriously and a lot of things I could take less seriously, and I think,

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I appreciate that you don't take yourself very seriously, and I know I'm a sinner. I know I don't have that much to offer, but I'm thankful for the gospel, and so I'm excited to live life and just enjoy, and so I think they go hand in hand, and what's the new

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Kanye song you were just playing upstairs? It's like, what is it? I knew life was going to be all right, but who knew it was going to be this good?

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I don't like that yet. I was surprised that that was such a good album, the new Jesus is Born. I know, yeah.

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I like that. So, anyways, I don't know. I think that I don't necessarily see a conflict there in my mind, and maybe that's because, you know, all this stuff, it's easy to, if you have fundamentalism, which is avoid this, avoid that, do this, and do that, although thankful for fundamentalists stand on scripture and pastimes,

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I think then maybe you find a little bit of a conflict there, but if when you really see, you know, what's the

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Christian life about? It's about me serving others, counting others as more important than myself, loving them, taking up my cross daily, denying myself, then

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I think that those things, you see less of a conflict. Well, maybe it's that surf culture too,

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Luke, that a lot of people just automatically think of as negative, and I see you,

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I don't literally see you, but I hear about it when you take the high school group that's under your care, as you're the under -shepherd there, under -under -shepherd, and you take them on a surf trip, and I know that while you're surfing on the way there, back, having lunch, or whatever, there are theological conversations going on.

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What's the difference between going to surf with a bunch of young men and pouring into them, or if I went on a bicycle ride with them, or if you went on a walk?

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Well, one of them is way more fun than the other two, I'll let you decide which one that is. Well, yeah,

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I think it may be more of a conflict if I was a really good surfer too, but maybe I'm good for being from New England, but then when you really see, then it's not much of a conflict.

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Well, I think you can hang with the guys, right? Well, you're from New England too. So with the ministry there at Grace, you're in the high school group, what's your technical title?

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Shepherd. Really? That's actually what they call him, yeah, Shepherd. Okay, and how many are there? I think there's like eight for the high school group or something like that, so we have two for each

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Bible study. So I'm with another guy, he's older and more life experience and more mature, and so he sort of helps the other staff and stuff so I can focus on the students.

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Okay, so when you went to university, the master's college now, university, I said,

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Luke, I don't want you to take Bible classes because you've got enough Bible and you can learn at other places. Do you think that you're at a disadvantage now?

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Was that good advice, bad advice? How does that all work? Because you're theologically adept, but maybe you didn't have some systematics or something.

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How's that work? You know, I don't, I don't know, because I don't think you said don't take Bible classes. You just said don't major in Bible.

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Yeah, that's right. Because I took a lot of Bible classes and I was really thankful for Dr. Abner Chow and just starting to see the

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Bible as one book, biblical theological strand all leading to Christ. So I was thankful for that.

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And, you know, I think that it's interesting because where I feel like I'm lacking now is just maybe

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I just need to spend more time expositing the text where I think the last couple of years through books and podcasts and all kinds of things,

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I've learned a lot about systematics. And so now it's just taking that and in the biblical theology and then learning more biblical theology as it connects to the actual text.

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So, I mean, I think I understand a lot of scripture, but I think that's where I see probably the most lacking now is, of course,

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I have a lot to learn in systematics and stuff like that. But I think it's interesting to see sort of where I need help the most.

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Probably what would help, you know, if I were your dad, I would tell you that. Nice. Biblical if.

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Yeah. That's right. Yeah. Third class conditional. That was good. That was a good rescue, by the way.

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See, I know. I know how to do that. I, if you, let's say, teach through a book of the

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Bible and you just have to go section by section and you'd have to craft sermons from each of those sections, some difficult, some easy, some easy to preach, some more difficult to preach.

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How then in the middle of all these imperatives, do you talk about who they are in Christ? How in the middle of all these gospels, do you talk about some kind of response to that and duty and then doing that week in and week out?

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Once you begin to do that, I think that's kind of your next step. Right. It's harder when you don't have, it's harder to be motivated when you don't have something to preach.

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Unfortunately, I wish I was more disciplined and self -motivated and it's just harder to study to that depth where, you know,

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I got to get up and teach this and proclaim this as God's word and a message for people. It's harder to study at that depth when you're just kind of on your own.

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So this Sunday coming up, December 29th, 2019, probably by the people, by the time people listen to this message, they can pull up on bbcchurch .org

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and listen to your sermon and it'll probably be posted on NoCo. You're going to preach Luke 15. First Sunday morning sermon ever?

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First Sunday morning main service, I think. Okay. And so then I tell people that if you can't, if you don't do well, this is nepotism.

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Right. But if you can do well, then it's just ministry. Right. It's true. So how many times did you sit in this very room when

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I had discipleship classes with men and we'd read books, Machen and Bettner and these others, and you had to read them all?

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I know. I don't, I don't know how that works. I was not regenerated. And I don't, I don't know. I think I liked being around all the guys though and stuff.

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And so. Well, you liked being around the men because I wanted to make sure this was not some church where it was just, you know, the ladies were the leaders and the men were just drug along by guilt or something.

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And I wanted men to be the leaders and I would try to make it encouraging. And you know, with discipleship with the men,

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I tried to hold them accountable and get after them if they didn't do what they said they were going to do. And then when they did do it by the grace of God, then

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I'd make sure I'd congratulate them. Right. You can succeed or fail. Congratulations are in order. That's right.

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I still remember Larry McLaughlin standing on that desk right there. I'm trying to make Bible verse recitation harder.

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And so I would make the men stand up and do their Bible verses. And I would say, all right, I'm going to pick one of you men.

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You all have to do the next 10 verses out loud, but I'm pick one of you men. And if you can get your memory verses down pat and you don't make a mistake, since I'm in charge of this class and I'm the sovereign,

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I will credit to everyone else's account by the doctrine of federal headship, your recitation to all these men.

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Once I had Larry stand on top of that table and then he was too tall. So his head was like jammed up into the ceiling tile and he did it.

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He got it right. So I was glad for that. I like that. That's a good federal headship example. I know.

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So you would read books, but at least you're getting the data, right? If saving faith is knowledge, assent and trust, you can always pour into your children who

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God is and the knowledge of God, the sovereign Savior. And then if he quickens, there's material there to draw from.

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Does that make sense? It makes sense. And I think that that was something that I always appreciated about you and mom and just the approach to teaching us and showing us what the

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Christian life was about. But I also think that there was a point where you kind of have to go like you, you sort of let each of us, not that I was, you know, living on the streets or anything, but let each of us just have our, have our own story with the

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Lord in a sense, and just allowed us to live our lives. And there were certain consequences to that, that, that Lord, the

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Lord arranged to bring salvation. But I think that's an interesting thing that I really appreciate about you was

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I never felt like, you know, later, I never really had the thought, well, is this faith my own? It was like, well, I mean, I kind of was just let to not, and I don't mean that you were hands off or anything, but I just think that you allowed us to sort of have our own testimony.

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Interesting Luke, I had forgotten this story. We were talking, I was talking to some families at church here on Christmas Eve service, and we were just talking about now the kids are back home for Christmas, and then you'll be back in California soon enough.

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And we are expanding our house so we can have visitors over because I didn't really have a lot of visitors over to our home when your kids were little.

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And there was one family that just said to me, oh yeah, we remember that you said to this particular family, after you've attended

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BBC for a few weeks, we like to have you old people over to our home and say hello. But since we're having problems with our son

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Luke now, and he needs my attention, I'm sorry, I can't have you over anytime soon. Wow. What did

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I do? And those people said, this is the church for us. If he's going to say no to us to spend time with his son

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Luke, this is the church for us. You know, that's one thing, I don't always have a lot to say to pastors because it's just like, well, what am

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I going to say to a pastor? But I think that's one thing I try to just bring up randomly in conversation, almost like some kind of discipleship for the pastor.

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The young guy is not through me, but through your example. And you didn't tell me to say this, but just,

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I always tell people, you know what, as a pastor's kid, I never felt like the church was in the ministry in air quotes was what was first.

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It was always the family first. We always had family time. You always spent time with each of us individually. And I think part of that was mom helping because of some experiences that she had growing up.

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But I always appreciated that where you get all these pastors, families. I remember at masters, Oh yeah, my dad's a pastor.

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So much pressure. It's so hard. And you kind of just give them the weird look. Like, I don't even know what you're talking about. I love my life.

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Go serve, do all this stuff, hang out with pastors who are usually pretty funny guys. Like, you know, it just was,

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I thought it was a great life growing up. And I think that was due to that emphasis. So I agree with that family.

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Today on No Compromise Radio, I have the privilege of having my son here, Luke Abendroth.

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Luke, let's talk a little bit more. It really is. I'm really proud of you. It's exciting to have you here.

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You know, Mr. Privilege. I am you. If you haven't seen What's Up, Doc, it's an

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Abendroth family favorite. Maybe our all -time family favorite show. We did enjoy

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White Christmas the other night though. No, it's a different genre, a different genre. Jean. Jean. What's that from? That's D .A.

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Carson. It's a different Jean. Jean. Monnet. Let's talk about pastor's homes and all that stuff.

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As you can tell, this is very scripted here, right? Additions and stuff like that. Luke said to me today, what are we going to talk about?

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I said, it's like with Steve Cooley, we just get in here and hit record and see what comes out. Yeah, everybody can tell. Yeah, that's why our ratings are so high.

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Tell me the best thing about living in a pastor's house, you know, being a pastor's kid, and the worst thing.

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You can start with either. Was there something bad? The best thing and the worst thing.

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I don't know. I think the best thing was, well, you know,

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I think we loved being able to, you worked at home a lot and you were always working on sermons. It wasn't like you weren't spending time on things, but I think one of the best things was you were kind of always around, which

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I think a lot of other families don't get to have that opportunity where you were home, you could be home, you're working from home.

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And so, you know, when I was in trouble and stuff and I had to be taken out of school and homeschooled, you know, I'd go throw the Frisbee together and hang out and go on bike rides, et cetera.

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So I think that was a great thing was just that being the pastor's family, just being able to do that.

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I think also just learning, you know, even though as an unbeliever, there were a lot of, Hey, this is what you do in this situation.

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This is how you prefer other people. We're here as ministry to these, this family. So here's how you act. Here's how you eat food.

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You don't like, that was a constant conversation, but didn't you like getting avocado when you were a kid? Yeah. Sweet potatoes.

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Still don't like them. But we have, we had avocado toast last night. Yeah. I love avocado now. We had the hipster toast together.

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So anyways, I think that that was great was, and so those two things, you know, having you around and then just learning kind of just, even though I didn't embrace it and I still struggle to embrace it, just trying to have an other's mindset.

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At least I know that's what I'm supposed to do when I don't do it. It's almost like common grace through the Proverbs, right? If an unbeliever got the

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Proverbs and just read them, never was regenerate, they could still live a wiser life. Proverbs eight.

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I don't really get it. When I was younger, as a pastor,

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I spent a lot of time in this building at church and then I started spending more time at home. But one of the things

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I had the privilege and the ability to do is I could work during the day and then

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I was home probably six nights a week for dinner, but I could always stay up late and study. Right.

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I didn't have to go to the factory to make widgets because the factory was sitting at home with my Bible and a computer working on sermons, right?

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Sunday morning. Clients are not on their phones at 10 at night. Right, right. But I could work at any time. And in those days,

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I stayed up till one or two in the morning, just cranking things out and working. And I had Sunday morning,

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Sunday nights, discipleship in those early days, taught Sunday school, et cetera.

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So yeah, that was important. And then what about anything negative? What didn't you like about being a pastor's kid?

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Let me pull out the list of my iPhone. Oh, alphabetical. Oh, negative. I don't know.

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You know, I'm not just saying that to be, you know, I don't know. I don't know. Yeah. You know what?

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I think there were a few people at church that wanted to try to, they wanted to get after me or Kim, but they really couldn't, especially to our faces.

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And therefore then they took it out on you guys and maybe expected more. But we shielded you from that for the most part.

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When anybody would try to say something about you kids normally, you know what, if I was a regular dad and like we had that one, you and some, one of your buddies broke something at somebody's pool or something and you had to replace it.

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I would have done that regularly. I mean, I don't think he did that and got after you because you were the pastor's kid, but there was probably some of that with some other people that I can think of.

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Yeah. Yeah. I don't, I don't know. I'm not sure. I honestly can't think of a ton of negatives about, about it.

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And maybe I just don't know, but there's nothing that comes to mind like, Oh, this is what I really hated about my childhood being a pastor's kid.

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I think, you know, but even some of the things I think that was positive, the higher expectations. First of all,

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I think they're, they're in the Bible. If a man's household is not in order, how's he going to take care of the Lord's house? So it's in scripture.

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And also I think there's some of those expectations stopped me from doing things because I thought to myself, well,

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I don't want my dad to lose his job. And, and you know what? We did say, as you kids got older, we expect this, that, and the other out of you.

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And by the way, if these things don't happen, it could affect our income, our jobs, our insurance and all that other stuff.

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And I did, I didn't want to overpressure, but I wanted you to realize this biblical principle, what you do affects other people and how you relate to people and how you do things affects your parents as well.

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Right. And that's for the good or for the ill. The other day, when I went into Sunrise Assisted Living in Massachusetts, Haley, my daughter is a, not a registered nurse.

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What is she? CNA. And she helps the people there. And so she arranged a time for me to speak to the folks and give a

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Bible study called The Christmas Story. And we're not talking rest home where people can't pay attention. These are folks that just live in there, they're older and they're sharp and they all love me the second

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I walked in. Now, how can that be? The answer is because Haley loves them and she has served them and she's kind to them.

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So since they love Haley, the testimony that I have walking in already, the platform is broadened if you will.

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Does that make sense? Yeah, it makes sense. Adorn the gospel. Makes sense. Make it more attractive.

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And that is the way, yeah, because you can adorn the gospel, but you can't live the gospel. How does that work?

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We'll preach the gospel at all times when necessary, use words. I have that tattooed in my back, you know that? You know what? I haven't shown you some things

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I haven't shown you yet. But when they misspelled preach though, I was sad for that, P -R -E -E -C -H.

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So weird. Preach. Preach. If you had to get a tattoo, what would you get the tattoo? Would it be sinner saint?

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Probably just your face, kind of inlaid over my face. Well, yeah, but I'm not dead yet. Oh, true.

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You know, you have the kind of like, yeah. I think I'd get the heart mom, the sailor little heart mom tattoo. Heart mom, yeah.

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What about like a teardrop or anything? Yeah, those are cool. Tell me when you were working in Santa Cruz with your uncle,

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Steve, Uncle Dunk, and you met the guy named Cappy. Why was his name Cappy? Yeah, roofing stuff.

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I don't know. He had been capped like five times. I think capped eight times he'd been shot and he was still doing work.

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Well, I think he was recovered by then. People must have been bad shots. Yeah, or he's a tough guy, one of the two.

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I was at the movie the other night with the family. We went to see Midway. I was there too.

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Yeah. And Luke, all those bullets flying anti -aircraft guns up to those, you know, it's just,

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I mean, you think random, but you know, every one of those things sovereignly controlled and all these other things.

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It was weird. It's true. I mean, it was a death mission. I thought the one guy was going to land on the aircraft carrier of the

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Japanese. Just get out and say hi. A little touchdown and off you go.

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Let's see. When you meet other pastor's kids, do you try to encourage them? Do you try to, how do you approach that?

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What's your strategy? Yeah, I think so. I think there's a little bit of a bond, you know, you kind of know what it's like being a pastor's kid.

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But you never thought, I'm a PK? No, of course I did. Oh, did you? Of course I thought about it. Yeah. We never wanted you to think about it.

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That's a tattoo I would get. PK. PK. What if you meet a girl and marry her and she's got an

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MK tattoo? Missionary kid. That'd be great. Yeah. Or money kid. That's what you'd prefer.

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Money kid. This just evolves. This is the third show. Yeah, this is nothing. Ain't just talk. Nothing talk.

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A show about nothing. This is the equivalent of Seinfeld. It's a show about nothing. Right?

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And you just talk. Festivus. Festivus. Yeah. Where's Dan Borvin when we need him? I know. He's out there celebrating.

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Are you going to go to the Westminster Seminary Conference in January? I am going down there to see

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Uncle Pat, but I don't think I'll be there. But doesn't Pat, you know, doesn't he kind of influence you in some kind of reformed way?

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I want to be careful. Well, I spent a couple hours in prayer on the way down there. I think it's like a 3K view he has. Ooh, three kingdoms.

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Abendroth, secular, and Abendroth, common, and spiritual. Maybe we should have some kind of Luke, Pat, and Mike conference.

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Oh, a conference. That'd be interesting. Yeah. Probably three people would show up. Right? Your two sisters and mom.

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Yeah, that's true. What would you think about mom being in the congregation this Sunday? Are you going to say something about mom teaching?

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I was going to say. I don't want her to do it. What? Yeah. Will you look over at mom while you're preaching? I'm sure I will. Yeah. Okay.

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I usually don't look over there too much just because my line of sight, she's in the far corner. So I don't usually look way over.

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How's your eye contact when you preach? Good? I'd say it's above the standard.

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Above the standard. Above average. Above average. Well, that's good. I hope your eye contact is better than when you're on the radio and you're playing with your mouth because the mustache is too long.

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Well, you got to give it the little twirl. I know. I know. Luke, glad you're my son. That was six minutes of nothing.

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I love you. No? No. Well, that was fun. That's all right. They don't have to listen anymore. Mike Abendroth, Luke Abendroth, NOCO Radio.

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No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

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Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life transforming power of God's Word through verse by verse exposition of the sacred text.

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Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at 6. We're right on route 110 in West Boylston.

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You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.