April 28, 2022 with Don Green on “John MacArthur: An Insider’s Tribute”

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April 29, 2022

April 28, 2022 DON GREEN, pastor of TRUTH COMMUNITY CHURCH of CINCINNATI, OHIO, who will address: “JOHN MacARTHUR: An INSIDER’s TRIBUTE”

00:04: Live from the historic parsonage of the 19th century gospel minister, George Norcross, in downtown
00:10: Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron. This is a radio platform in which pastors,
00:23: Christian scholars, and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.
00:31: Proverbs chapter 27 verse 17 tells us, Iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.
00:38: Matthew Henry said that in this passage, we are cautioned to take heed with whom we converse and directed to have a view in conversation, to make one another wiser and better.
00:50: It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next two hours, and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions.
00:57: And now, here's your host, Chris Arnzen. Good afternoon,
01:10: Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, Lake City, Florida, and the rest of humanity living on the planet Earth, who are listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com.
01:21: This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Thursday on this 28th day of April 2022.
01:30: And I am absolutely thrilled to have a first -time guest today. His name is
01:35: Don Green, and he is pastor of Truth Community Church of Cincinnati, Ohio.
01:41: And we are also going to be addressing a new biography that will soon be released,
01:48: John MacArthur, an Insider's Tribute. And it's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the very first time ever to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Don Green.
01:58: Thank you, Chris. You've given me an introduction that's going to be hard to live up to, but I'm glad to be with you.
02:05: And to interact with you in front of your audience today is going to be a great privilege. I've really been looking forward to it.
02:11: And I've been looking forward to it as well. And tell our listeners about Truth Community Church in Cincinnati, Ohio.
02:19: Sure. We are a 10 -year -old church. I attended the Master's Seminary in California and worked with John MacArthur at Grace to You for a number of years.
02:30: And I left California to come to Cincinnati to plant this church. So I am the founding pastor.
02:37: We are a Reformed Baptist, although we are independent. We are a Reformed Baptist congregation.
02:44: We have a simple ministry. We preach the Word. That's what we emphasize, and that's what we focus on without a lot of programs to distract from the attention of the
02:55: Word. And the Lord's been blessing us. We've had record attendance just within the past week even.
03:01: And so we're just very encouraged by the ministry and just want to put the Word of God forth and let the
03:07: Holy Spirit use that to glorify and honor Christ and bring people to Himself. Great.
03:13: And if anybody wants to find out more information about Truth Community Church of Cincinnati, Ohio, go to truthcommunitychurch .org,
03:22: truthcommunitychurch .org. And I don't know when you went to the
03:28: Master's Seminary. I have a friend, a very dear longtime friend, Pastor Chris Pandolfi of Calvary Baptist Church of Medford, Long Island, New York, who graduated from the
03:41: Master's Seminary I think sometime in the 1980s, if I'm not mistaken.
03:47: But I don't know if you ever bumped into Chris along your way. That was a little bit before my time.
03:54: My years at Master's were between 1993 and 2001. And then
04:00: I served as a Greek instructor for a few years, a few years overlapping with that also.
04:06: So that was a little bit before my time, and I haven't met Chris to my knowledge. Well, I know somebody after having read a bio of you on the
04:16: Internet. I know somebody that you and I share in common as a dear friend,
04:22: Doug McMasters. Yeah, that's exactly right. Doug actually was crucial to my original hiring to work at Grace to You in 1996.
04:32: We served together in the old counseling department answering mail for John MacArthur.
04:39: And so Doug and I go way, way back. He's been a dear friend over the years, and I have the highest regard and respect for him.
04:47: Yes, well, I played a very key role in Doug receiving the call to the pastor at New Hyde Park Baptist Church in Nassau County, Long Island, where he is currently serving.
04:59: I am the one that hardly recommended Doug to that church, and they very quickly ruled out everyone else who was a candidate.
05:11: And thanks be to God, they selected Doug, and he's been there quite a number of years.
05:17: And I've had not only the privilege of visiting there a number of times, but also arranging conferences, and I even arranged a debate with Reformed Baptist theologian
05:31: Dr. James R. White and a Muslim apologist at New Hyde Park Baptist Church.
05:36: So Doug and I and the saints at New Hyde Park go back a long way also.
05:43: He's a gentle giant and a fine theologian. Yes, he is.
05:49: He had a crucial role in my life at that time, and I'll be forever grateful to the
05:57: Lord for bringing Doug into my life. Yes, that's right.
06:06: She's a nurse and has been faithful alongside Doug through good times and bad. They're just a charming couple for those that know them.
06:18: We have a tradition here on Iron Sherpa's Iron Radio. Before we get into our major theme today,
06:24: Don, which is not only your new biography of John MacArthur, John MacArthur and Insider's Tribute, which has yet to be released, but also, of course, we're going to talk about your upcoming evening with John MacArthur in Kentucky right near the border of Ohio.
06:45: But before we do that, we have a tradition here where whenever we have a first -time guest on Iron Sherpa's Iron Radio, we have them give a summary of their salvation testimony.
06:56: That would include the kind of religious atmosphere, if any, they were raised in and what kind of providential circumstances our sovereign
07:05: Lord raised up in their lives that drew them to himself and saved them. And that would include you.
07:12: I'd love to hear your story. Yeah, well, I'll give you a thumbnail and you can fill in details with questions if you'd like.
07:22: I grew up in a nominally Christian home. What I mean by that is that my mother was a believer, but my father was not.
07:33: And so there was a certain spiritual dynamic to our home through my mother's influence.
07:40: But I was not a Christian at all. I said that I was, but I had not been born again.
07:49: I had no love for Christ or his word or anything of the sort. And so I was a nominal
07:56: Christian, but I was not truly regenerate. I was lost in my sins. And I went through high school and I went through college like that and eventually went on to law school at Indiana University.
08:10: And during the course of my first year at law school, something positively bizarre from a human perspective entered into my life.
08:22: And that was this. As a law student and as a prospective attorney, I started reading the daily newspaper column by Billy Graham.
08:34: And I was reading that column from the perspective that I was a
08:39: Christian. And so it was an advice column and his advice was always the same to the people that wrote into him.
08:45: Repent and believe in Christ. Repent and believe in Christ. Now look, let me just pause here.
08:51: I understand that as a theologian, and some of the associations that Billy Graham had in the course of his ministry were not things that I would endorse now.
09:03: But the Lord used that column to put the principles of the gospel into my mind.
09:09: Christ died for sinners. Repent and believe in Christ. All of that was preparing me for something that occurred a few months later when
09:19: I went out partying with a friend. And we partied into the night.
09:24: And the thought occurred to me, Chris, during that night of partying. It said, I am sinning against God.
09:31: And I don't care. And I drank my fill of sin late into the night.
09:37: And what happened was I woke up in the morning. And I remember this vividly in Bloomington, Indiana where it all happened.
09:44: I looked at myself in the mirror after that night. And I looked at myself in the mirror.
09:51: And I had a wicked smile on my face. Boy, you really tied one on last night. And then in the immediate next moment,
09:59: I was struck with an abject terror of God. The thought occurred to me, you call yourself a
10:06: Christian? How could you have done the things that you did last night? And Chris, I was immediately filled with terror and shame and guilt.
10:16: I knew I was, I knew I was, I deserved to go to hell.
10:24: And I went into my bedroom. I got down on my knees.
10:30: And I, in the best words that I knew with the thoughts of Scripture in my mind that I had been reading over the prior months,
10:38: I just, I asked the Lord to forgive me, to save me, to come into my life. At that time,
10:45: I knew nothing about Lordship, salvation. But I knew I was giving my life to Christ in an unconditional, irreversible act of faith.
10:55: And that my salvation depended totally on Him accepting me. And what followed after that, the very next day,
11:05: I went out and bought a Bible. I started reading the Bible. And I understood it for the first time in my life.
11:12: The Word of God became alive to me. And it transformed my life.
11:19: And, you know, in the years that followed, I finished law school. I had a legal career for a time.
11:26: But as my spiritual life was growing, Chris, there was an ever -increasing desire to study the
11:36: Word of God, to give my life to it, to go to seminary. And eventually the
11:41: Lord granted that to me, you know, many years later. And my life has never been the same since then.
11:48: So that was more than a brief thumbnail, but it gives you a little bit of the idea of the circumstances of my conversion.
11:54: It's always a delight to recount that to a new audience. And when was it, what were the circumstances surrounding your discovery and falling in love with the doctrines known as the doctrines of sovereign grace?
12:10: They've also been nicknamed Calvinism, although we believe that these teachings are directly from the inerrant
12:17: God -breathed scriptures. They're also nicknamed reform theology, sovereign grace theology, free grace theology.
12:26: If you could explain when you first heard of these things, when you came to embrace them and the story behind them.
12:34: Yeah, I would say that, you know, it was a process over a few years of coming to understand it in those categories.
12:44: As I read the Bible, you know, I understood, as I read the Bible as a young Christian, I understood the sovereignty of God in salvation.
12:54: It wasn't until I was introduced to the teaching of John MacArthur and books that his ministry introduced to me, you know, a few years later, where I started to understand it in those terms, by those important theological terms.
13:13: But it was pretty early, you know, I saw it in Scripture for myself from the beginning, and then
13:19: John MacArthur's radio teaching and book ministry is what really drew me into the terms.
13:30: And, you know, I can tell you that as I sit here today as a pastor, those are truths that I would gladly die for if the
13:38: Lord called me to do so. These are, the doctrines of grace, the five points of Calvinism are, as you said so well, this is just an expression of what the
13:50: Bible teaches. And what the Bible teaches is what we stake our life on, it's what we stake our eternity on, and it's what we give our ministry and the best of our faculties to proclaim these things and to defend them against those who contradict.
14:07: In fact, I would like to give a book recommendation to those listening, especially those who might be from independent fundamentalist backgrounds who may instinctively have a dislike, a disgust, maybe even a hatred for Calvinism as they understand it.
14:31: And even other Christians and evangelical churches who have the same lack,
14:38: I think, of understanding of what these teachings truly are. A book that may surprise those who think they despise
14:51: Calvinism, and it is likely just an invention in their own minds or the minds of the anti -Calvinist writers and preachers and teachers that they've heard, but a book by Dr.
15:04: Tom Nettles called By His Grace and For His Glory. I strongly urge our listeners to get a hold of that because they may be shocked to discover how many of the men that they uphold as heroes from the past were indeed thoroughgoing five -point
15:22: Calvinists. And, you know, from Spurgeon and far beyond that, there were many throughout history that I know that my non -reformed anti -Calvinist friends uphold as heroes and they don't even realize the depth to which these men embraced and loved and proclaimed the doctrines of grace.
15:49: Yeah, very good. Well, you have written a book, as I have said a couple of times in the program, that is soon to be released,
16:00: John MacArthur, An Insider's Tribute. What was it that compelled you?
16:06: And I know that there are many things that compelled you to write your own biography of this great man of God who also happens to be one of my first Christian heroes as a new
16:22: Christian in the 1980s. I remember someone gave me as a gift,
16:28: I think it may have even been my very first Christian girlfriend, gave me a gift of The Gospel According to Jesus by John MacArthur.
16:39: And I was reading it and absolutely astonished that there were
16:45: Christians, in fact, prominent evangelical Protestant Christians, many of whom rejected the necessity of repentance in the life of a
16:57: Christian, that there are many world -renowned names out there even who believe that all one needs to do to have a one -way ticket to heaven is to utter a prayer of some kind at their church service or at a
17:14: Christian camp meeting or revival meeting or whatever the case may be. And they think by that one profession that may even date back to their early childhood is guaranteeing them a place in heaven regardless of how they are living, regardless of how they are not bearing fruit to give evidence that they are truly born again.
17:38: And it's astounding, I can remember reading it thinking that what
17:44: Dr. MacArthur was writing was, as they say, a no -brainer.
17:49: If you had any cursory knowledge of the Bible, you see that repentance is a key factor.
17:55: But if you could pick up where I left off there, how did you first come to discover Dr. MacArthur and what drew you to him as a mentor and teacher?
18:05: Yeah, that's a great question, Chris. The Lord blessed me providentially with a friend in law school who gave me one of John's very early books titled
18:19: The Charismatics and pointed me in that direction because I was wrestling with some issues related to charismatic theology at that time.
18:29: And so that book was the first introduction that I had to John's ministry. It was a precursor to the better known
18:37: Charismatic Chaos and later Strange Fire. And so I read that book and it resonated with me.
18:44: And then the Lord introduced me to his radio ministry through rather humorous circumstances.
18:53: And I was attracted to the authority and the clarity of the preached word as a new
19:01: Christian. This was within the first few months of my conversion. And so from the very start, the
19:09: Lord graciously put John MacArthur's ministry into my life. And as I followed him on radio, read more of his books,
19:19: I realized that if I was going to become a teacher of God's word, I wanted to be able to teach like that.
19:26: I did not want to be the next John MacArthur. I never did. But the way that John handled scripture was distinct from what
19:37: I was used to in the local church ministries that I had been acquainted with as a new
19:42: Christian. And so that drew me. The authority and the certainty and the confidence in the word of God was what the
19:51: Spirit of God had already placed in my heart. And so John was just an extension of the work that the
19:58: Spirit was already doing in my heart as I read the word for myself. And that made it a pretty easy singular choice that if I was going to go to ministry,
20:09: I would go to the Master's Seminary if they would only have me. And that's what happened. Well, praise
20:15: God. What would you say are some of the unique features about John MacArthur that make him stand out?
20:25: And I don't think there's anything wrong. There are some people who have criticized me in the past for using the phrase
20:31: Christian heroes. I don't think there's anything at all wrong with having heroes, as long as you don't turn them into idols.
20:39: In fact, I think it is very commendable and biblical to have men that you uphold as mentors and teachers, not only those that are currently living that you actually know personally.
20:52: And, of course, your elders of your own congregation should be among them if you're in a biblically faithful church.
20:59: But even those voices from the past that may even date back as far as the
21:05: Protestant Reformation. And, of course, in the God -breathed Scriptures, we have heroes that we should uphold.
21:12: But what do you think some of the things are that mark out
21:18: John in a unique way? There are many faithful men of God who properly and even superbly handle the
21:28: Word of God correctly from behind that sacred desk known as the pulpit.
21:35: But there is something very unique about Dr. MacArthur's ministry. What would you say some of those things are?
21:41: Well, I'm going to answer a broad, stretch out the question, even beyond his teaching ministry.
21:49: You know, John has so many different avenues of ministry in which he serves.
21:57: He's been the past president of the Master's University, the Master's Seminary, he's the radio teacher on Grace to You.
22:05: But in my judgment of 25 years of acquaintance with, of personal relationship with him, and even longer that, reading his books,
22:15: Chris, my conviction is the overlooked aspect of John MacArthur's life and his ministry is that he is first and foremost a pastor.
22:27: He has been the pastor of Grace Community Church since 1969. Grace Community Church has had one pastor while the
22:37: United States has had ten presidents over the course of John's pastorate, to give you just some perspective.
22:44: And he has taught the Word of God in the context of local church ministry where he's doing weddings and funerals and giving counsel to people and leading elders in the life of the church.
22:59: And that context of pastoral ministry gives the, you know, gives the stamp of authenticity to his teaching.
23:12: And that, in my judgment, you know, I realize not everyone would agree with me, but I've been up close to John for a very long time.
23:22: And I think you don't begin to understand John MacArthur's ministry until you understand that first and foremost he was a pastor and has been a pastor all of these years.
23:32: Then as you look at his teaching, more specifically, you see his confidence in the
23:39: Word of God and the courage in which he leads. You know, you mentioned The Gospel According to Jesus.
23:45: That was a very courageous book when it came out, you know, because he was assaulting the, you know, what was kind of the accepted dogma of the evangelical church of the time.
23:56: And along with James Montgomery Boyce, you know, they taught against that.
24:02: And it just demolished that no lordship model of the gospel.
24:09: And books like that come out from a man who knows the Word of God deeply, from teaching it week by week to the same people week by week, from a man who has deep convictions about the authority of the
24:23: Word of God. And it's that deep conviction about the authority and the inerrancy of the
24:29: Word of God that distinguishes John and undergirds all of the teaching and ministry that he's done.
24:37: And I'm grateful to God to know him, to have benefited from his ministry. Chris, it is not too much to say that every sermon
24:46: I preach has been impacted in one way or another by the imprint of John on my life and ministry.
24:54: And I'm not ashamed to say that to the world, that, you know, I associate with John gladly and in an unqualified sense of honor that the
25:06: Lord has blessed me with my association with him for so many years. Yes, you were talking about how risky that was and how courageous that was of him to write the gospel according to Jesus because of the fact that he was seemingly in a minority.
25:30: It may have even surprised him initially how much of a minority, theologically, he was in at that time in the 80s, maybe still is, in basically declaring that repentance is an absolutely essential element for genuine conversion and salvation.
25:52: But I remember years ago having dinner with a visiting missionary who is a missionary in Brazil.
26:03: And this brother had one of his most prominent financial supporters.
26:14: I'm not going to mention the name of the individual who is very well known because he may have changed his position on the issue of repentance,
26:23: I'm not certain. But this person who is a global radio and television ministry and has written many books, extremely popular, he dropped funding for this missionary because he had translated the gospel according to Jesus into Portuguese.
26:47: And when Dr. MacArthur heard about that, apparently either
26:54: Grace To You or Grace Community Church basically matched whatever that renowned anti -lordship pastor was...
27:09: matched the amount that the renowned anti -lordship pastor was funding for this missionary's ministry.
27:17: So I remember thinking that was such a tragedy to hear that that ministry dropped a missionary over insisting in the necessity of repentance.
27:29: But it was such a blessing to hear also that Dr. MacArthur came to the rescue and did not let that missionary languish with insufficient funding.
27:41: Yeah Chris, that's a classic John MacArthur story and that ties into his pastoral office that I was talking about.
27:50: John does not teach in the abstract. John is a man who lives out his pastoral care for people.
27:58: He genuinely loves people and he sacrificially gives and works to support others in their ministry.
28:04: And he's done that for me and that's a great story that you just told. Well, we're going to also address some things that are sad and uncomfortable.
28:16: When we come back from the first break, I know that you wanted to at least in some fashion address some of the slanders and accusations that are being hurled against Dr.
28:28: MacArthur by a particular woman. I'll leave it up to you whether or not you want to identify her by name.
28:34: But because of the fact that so many people have asked me personally off the air about what my thoughts were on these accusations by this woman,
28:45: I wanted you to address that. In fact, you also brought up to me the idea of addressing it to some degree during this interview and I think that would be a very wise idea.
28:56: And I know that some of this reaction that you had to her is where your legal training came into place and also your study recently of the
29:13: Ten Commandments. That's right. Particularly, thou shalt not bear false witness against your neighbor.
29:20: And you're also reminding me of a very dear friend of mine for decades, Daniel P.
29:26: Buttafuoco, an attorney on Long Island, New York, who actually sponsors this program, who also was trained in Christian apologetics in seminary and uses his own legal experience when defending the truths of the
29:47: Scripture. So you two have to meet one day. I think that you'd make fast friends.
29:53: He actually was my most recent speaker at the Iron Sharpens Iron radio pastors' luncheon that I have twice a year.
30:01: That's Dan Buttafuoco, dear friend. But we're going to have you address some of those issues and your approach to addressing those issues when we return from the first break.
30:12: If anybody would like to ask a question of your own, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com,
30:18: C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com. As always, give us your first name, at least, your city and state, and your country of residence.
30:28: We'll be right back after these messages. Do not go away. I'm Dr.
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37:57: Joseph Piper of Greenville Presbyterian Theological Seminary sent you. Welcome back.
38:07: If you just tuned us in, our guest today for the entire two hours of the program is
38:13: Don Green, Pastor of Truth Community Church of Cincinnati, Ohio. We are addressing his soon -to -be -released biography,
38:23: John MacArthur, An Insider's Tribute. He's also going to be having an event called
38:28: An Evening with John MacArthur. And before we go into your defense of Dr.
38:35: MacArthur in the midst of accusations of a certain woman who seems to be running amok on the
38:41: Internet, perhaps you can let our listeners know about your
38:48: Evening with John MacArthur event. Yeah, I'm really excited about it, Chris. The event is
38:55: Tuesday, May 17. It's on the campus of Northern Kentucky University, which is just minutes from downtown
39:02: Cincinnati. We're at the basketball arena of that local university.
39:08: We have thousands of people that have registered to attend, and there's still opportunity for people in your audience to make it to join us that night.
39:18: The tickets are free, but you must register to attend, and they can do that at our church's website, truthcommunitychurch .org.
39:26: That's truthcommunitychurch .org. Registration closes Sunday, May 1, because we have to have time to get the tickets into the hands of the people.
39:37: But we have, Chris, it's really, it's a national event. It's turning into an international event, by which
39:44: I mean we have registrants from 44 different states, from North Dakota to Texas, from California to New York to Florida.
39:53: And we have registrants from 13 different countries, including the United States. So it's going to be an electric evening.
40:01: John will be there live in person. The theme of the evening is To the Glory of God. I'm going to interview
40:08: John, as I've done in the past, and he's going to preach. It's going to be a wonderful time of exciting fellowship, of great
40:17: Bible teaching. And the people that are there in person at the event,
40:23: Chris, I promise you, they will remember this for years to come and talk about it to their children.
40:29: So, if you could, let our listeners know how they can register, and I will, God willing, have you repeat this towards the end of the program, but how can they register for this before there are no seats left?
40:42: Yeah, they just need to go to our website, truthcommunitychurch .org. There's a link at the very top.
40:49: It's a simple process to register, and we will mail tickets to them, you know, next week after the registration has closed.
40:58: We do have our agreement with the arena requires paper tickets, so it's a little bit different that way, and that's why we need people to register by May 1st.
41:09: Sunday, May 1st is coming Sunday, and they can do that exclusively at our website, truthcommunitychurch .org.
41:17: And even though people have to register and get paper tickets, it is a free event, is it not? That's exactly right.
41:24: There is no charge to attend. You know, there's $8 that the university requires to park, but other than that, it's a totally free event.
41:33: We have freely received the benefit of Christ and of His Word, and the elders at our church wanted to make this freely available to everyone who could attend.
41:46: Okay, well, let me repeat our e -mail address. If anybody listening would like to join us on the air with a question of your own, it is chrisarnson at gmail .com.
41:55: chrisarnson at gmail .com. Give us your first name at least, your city and state, and your country of residence.
42:01: And as I mentioned before the break, you have some unpleasant business that you'd like to attend to during this program because of the fact that it's so well known that there have been slanderous accusations and exaggerations and all kinds of things floating around on the
42:22: Internet, and well -meaning people don't know what to believe on certain occasions.
42:28: These are largely due to gossip being spread by a particular woman. I'll leave it up to you if you'd like to name her by name since she is a public person.
42:39: But why don't you just pick up where we left off there? Yeah, of course. And Chris, what
42:44: I want to do, you know, I'm not going to persuade people who already hate John MacArthur and are doing everything that they can to tear him down.
42:54: I just want to say a few words to strengthen people that are well -intentioned
42:59: Christians that maybe don't know John that closely, and they're a little bit shaken maybe in their confidence.
43:07: And I think that there are four distinct ways of thinking about this that all point in the same direction.
43:15: And what I'll do here, Chris, you and I didn't really talk about this before we went on the air, but I'll just give one heading of thought briefly.
43:27: If you want to ask me for follow -up on that, I can, and then I'll just go through these four headings and try to keep it relatively brief.
43:37: First of all, Chris, there is a definite biblical issue that everyone in Christ must take into account when a prominent spiritual leader comes under attack.
43:49: And it's twofold. Number one, in 1 Thessalonians 5, verses 12 and 13, we are specifically commanded to think a particular way about established teachers of the
44:03: Word of God. The Apostle Paul said, We request of you, brethren, that you appreciate those who diligently labor among you and have charge over you in the
44:14: Lord and give you instruction. That's John MacArthur for the past 60 years,
44:21: Chris. He has given us instruction in the Word of God, and God's Word tells us to appreciate them.
44:29: And then it goes on in verse 13 to say that you esteem them very highly in love because of their work.
44:36: And so we are commanded by God's own Word to look at men like John MacArthur and appreciate them and love them and esteem them.
44:47: And love, among other things, what love does is it believes the best things about the ones that are the object of our love.
44:57: Now, alongside of that, Chris, from a more negative perspective, the
45:02: Bible tells us to reject a factious man in Titus 3. Reject a factious man after a first and second warning, knowing that such a man is perverted and is sinning, being self -condemned.
45:17: And so when you have a critic that is injecting disunity in the body and questioning the integrity of a man that is supported by his local church like John MacArthur is, you know, you need to turn away from someone like that and not even listen to the accusation.
45:38: There came a time, and I know, Chris, that you've responded this same way.
45:45: Once I saw the pattern of these accusations, I've just turned away from them, and I don't even pay attention to what's being said anymore because it follows a familiar pattern of half -truths and lack of context and innuendo.
46:00: And that is not, under these scriptures that I've quoted, that we cannot engage that.
46:06: We cannot give credence to it by even giving our minds over to it, let alone preaching or repeating the accusations to others.
46:15: So that's the biblical perspective that I have on it. I'll stop there, let you interact if you want, and then
46:21: I can go to my other three categories of response to it. Okay, well, we do have a listener who has a question that I think is very relative to what you just said.
46:32: But before I do that, are there any specific charges that you care to highlight, that you care to refute, or is there anything specific about a known agenda as being the reasons for these accusations and these constant attacks?
46:53: Before we move on to our listener question, and then to your other points. Yeah, I think
46:58: I'm content to just let it be nameless. If people aren't familiar with it, you know, there's no need to draw their attention further to it.
47:07: And if people are familiar with it, they know who I'm talking about without me having to mention anything by name.
47:13: And so what I want to do, what I'm trying to do here is to give people broad, general principles of understanding that give them the tools that they need to interpret these matters and these accusations for themselves.
47:28: And by the time we're through today, I think people are going to be very encouraged and strengthened, and by the help and grace of God, you know,
47:39: I've been given an opportunity to help the body of Christ because you asked me to be on your program today.
47:45: Okay, great. We have BB in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, who says,
47:52: I love John MacArthur and have benefited greatly throughout my life as a
47:57: Christian from his writings and from his preaching. But I have heard
48:03: Word of Faith Pentecostals and others involved in false religious movements defend their leaders in much the same way you are attempting to defend
48:16: John right now. Is there a reason why a Word of Faith Pentecostal who is defending some of the scandalous or blatantly heretical televangelists with using your same language should not be listened to while we should take your heed of counsel and advice?
48:39: Well, that's a great question, and what I would immediately say to that is that the Word of Faith preachers are disqualified from the protection of that verse because they teach false doctrine.
48:50: And Scripture is protecting the teachers of sound doctrine, not the propagators of false religion.
48:59: And so it's obvious why Word of Faith preachers would go to these same arguments and try to cloak themselves with Elijah's mantle.
49:10: But the teaching of Scripture, and even in the book of Titus, the qualifications of elders and the protection that elders are given is directed to those that are teaching sound doctrine.
49:25: And so you can't view these biblical principles in isolation from the doctrine that the man teaches.
49:33: And when a man's doctrine fails the test of the Word of God, then he forfeits the protection that these verses offer to the true men of God.
49:46: Well, thank you, B .B., and guess what? You have won a free copy of the book that we are discussing,
49:54: John MacArthur, An Insider's Tribute. You must be patient, however, because the books are not yet available.
50:01: They will be available on May 17th and afterward, so you will probably have to wait a number of weeks before receiving this book, but you will eventually,
50:14: God willing. And so make sure we have your full mailing address in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, and we'll have
50:19: Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service, cvbbs .com, ship that out to you.
50:24: And since they are also in Cumberland County, you may even want to pick up that book yourself when they are in the hands of the folks at Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service.
50:36: It should be only a couple of minutes away from where you live, if indeed you are in Cumberland County.
50:42: Thank you so much for the excellent question. Not to belabor that point, but you were saying that the
50:52: Word of Faith preachers, since they are heretics, since they are actually proven to be false prophets because they've made so many predictions that never came to pass, they are a far cry from a man the caliber of Dr.
51:13: MacArthur. But in the minds of those who are in agreement with these people because they are themselves deceived, can you see the logic of them wanting to defend those teachers in the same way you are defending
51:27: Dr. MacArthur? Do you understand what I'm saying? They would not view these men and women as being disqualified because they're still under a cloak of darkness and deception.
51:39: They don't see these teachers as being in a category of being false shepherds.
51:46: Yeah, I certainly see why they would do that. And that's why it is so important that all that a man is and all that a man teaches is tested by the
52:00: Scriptures. And so it is just essential for people in churches throughout the land to test things by the
52:11: Scripture rather than simply by the authority of the man who is held up to them as a leader.
52:21: By the way, we've already reached our midway break point. I can't believe it went by so fast. We're going to have to pick up where you left off when we return.
52:29: Please be patient with us, folks, because the midway break is always longer than the other breaks because Grace Life Radio, 90 .1
52:35: FM in Lake City, Florida, requires of us a longer break in the middle of the show because they are required by the
52:40: FCC to localize this program geographically to Lake City, Florida, and they do so by airing their own public service announcements and other local things in the middle of the show.
52:51: We simultaneously air our globally heard commercials. So please use this time wisely. Try to write down as much of the information as you possibly can provided by our advertisers so that you can more frequently and successfully respond to our advertisers, keeping in mind that we depend upon our advertisers to exist.
53:10: And also write down your questions for Don Green and send them to ChrisArnson at gmail .com.
53:16: ChrisArnson at gmail .com. We'll be right back after these messages, so please do not go away. Why can't we see
53:25: God? How do we know we picked the right Bible? Why do we go to church on Sunday?
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57:05: That's ptlbiblerebinding .com. As host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, I frequently get requests from listeners for church recommendations.
57:35: The church I've been strongly recommending as far back as the 1980s is Grace Covenant Baptist Church in Flemington, New Jersey, pastored by Alan Dunn.
57:45: Grace Covenant Baptist Church believes it's God's prerogative to determine how he shall be worshiped and how he shall be represented in the world.
57:53: They believe churches need to turn to the Bible to discover what to include in worship and how to worship
57:59: God in spirit and truth. Grace Covenant Baptist Church endeavors to maintain a
58:04: God -centered focus. Reading, preaching, and hearing the Word of God, singing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, baptism, and communion are the scriptural elements of their corporate worship, performed with faith, joy, and sobriety.
58:19: Discover more about Grace Covenant Baptist Church in Flemington, New Jersey at gcbcnj .squarespace
58:28: .com. That's gcbcnj .squarespace .com.
58:35: Or call them at 908 -996 -7654. That's 908 -996 -7654.
58:44: Tell Pastor Dunn that you heard about Grace Covenant Baptist Church on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. Hello, my name is
58:58: Anthony Uvino, and I'm one of the pastors at Hope Reform Baptist Church in Quorum, New York, and also the host of the
59:04: ReformRookie .com website. I want you to know that if you enjoy listening to the Iron Sharpens Iron Radio show like I do, you can now find it on the
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59:23: Just subscribe on the iTunes app and listen to the Iron Sharpens Iron Radio show at any time, day or night.
59:30: Please be sure to also give it a good review and pass it along to anyone who would benefit from the teaching and the many solidly
59:36: Reformed guests that Chris Arnzen has on the show. Truth is so hard to come by these days, so don't waste your time with fluff or fake news.
59:44: Subscribe to the Iron Sharpens Iron Radio podcast right now. And while you're at it, you can also sign up for the
59:50: ReformRookie .com podcast and visit our website and the YouTube page. We are dedicated to teaching
59:56: Christian theology from a Reformed Baptist perspective to beginners in the faith as well as seasoned believers.
01:00:02: From Keach's Catechism and the Doctrines of Grace to the Olivet Discourse and the Book of Leviticus, the
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01:00:14: And finally, if you're looking to worship in a Reformed church that holds to the 1689
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01:08:08: Before I return to Don Green and our discussion of his new biography, soon to be released,
01:08:14: John MacArthur, An Insider's Tribute, we just have a couple more special announcements, important announcements that we need to make.
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01:10:52: Earth, I may be able to help you find a church. I have extensive lists spanning the globe and have helped many people in our audience from all over the world and the
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01:11:08: So please, if you are in that predicament of not having a church home that is Christ -honoring and biblically faithful, send me an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com,
01:11:17: chrisarnson at gmail .com, and put I need a church in the subject line. That's also the email address where you could send in a question to Don Green, and we are discussing, as I have been repeating, the new biography that is going to be available soon,
01:11:36: God willing. The book is
01:11:42: John MacArthur, An Insider's Tribute. If you have a question regarding this, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com,
01:11:51: chrisarnson at gmail .com, and Don, you just actually emailed me a clarification.
01:11:57: It is not strictly accurate to call it a biography. If you could tell us, what is the genuine intent of the book?
01:12:05: Well, Chris, yeah, thanks for giving me the opportunity to clarify, because the book has much more modest aims than this, and to be honest with you,
01:12:15: I've never seen a book that's exactly like what I've done here. This is a coffee table kind of book.
01:12:22: It's a full -color book with a lot of photographs, a lot of graphics. It's filled with...
01:12:29: It's a relatively brief book. It's 80 pages. It's filled with personal vignettes of my interactions and observations of John MacArthur, and also contains the text of two exclusive interviews that I did with John, where he is discussing his family history, going back several generations, his philosophy of ministry, great encouragement for pastors, and so there is a lot of...
01:12:57: The book is biographical, and one commenter who heard about it said, this book is going to be a gold mine for future biographers, but the book itself is not intended to be a full -fledged biography of John.
01:13:15: The goal of it is much more modest than that, but I think that people are going to enjoy it and get insight about John that they certainly won't find anyplace else, because there are private stories of my interactions with John that no one else has to share.
01:13:32: Well, I appreciate that clarification, and I will no longer refer to it as a biography.
01:13:38: I'm sorry about that. No, no, it's fine, and I understand why you would. I just don't want to bear false witness about whether it is or isn't.
01:13:49: I just finished preaching the Ten Commandments, and so I'm pretty... I'm on edge about being strictly accurate with what
01:13:58: I say. Okay, and before I go to any more of our listener questions,
01:14:05: I'd like you to continue on some of the principles that you were intending to give that surround a proper biblical response to these scandalous gossip mongers on the
01:14:19: Internet that are seeking to tear down the reputation of one of God's finest servants in the 20th and 21st centuries.
01:14:28: So, if you could, continue. Yeah, let me just say this, and I'll be briefer on these other points and let you expand our listeners to ask questions as they want to.
01:14:40: I gave you a biblical perspective from 1 Thessalonians and Titus 3. There's also a moral perspective on this, and I alluded to the commandment that you should not bear false witness against your neighbor.
01:14:52: You know, and some of the things that are put out there about John may be in isolation factually accurate, but Chris, it is quite possible, people do it all the time, to tell, give facts that actually mislead, and that is a gross violation of the 9th
01:15:18: Commandment found in Exodus 20, verse 16. That you shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
01:15:25: Let me illustrate this just very briefly. I knew a man some years ago who was going to be interviewed by a government official, and he knew that he was not supposed to have guns on his property, and that that would come up in the interview.
01:15:43: So what he did was he hid his weapons across the property line on his neighbor's lot, came to the interview, the man asked, do you have any guns on your property?
01:15:56: He looked him in the eye and said, no, I don't. He told what was strictly the truth, but he worked a deception in order to do that.
01:16:06: And so as these accusations, you know, and decades old stories are coming out about John MacArthur, they are being used to paint a picture of him that is grossly false, that shocks my conscience,
01:16:22: Chris, that to picture a man who's been known to me for decades and known by others even better for even more decades, to paint a picture of him that these stories are attempting to portray, they're telling, they're giving facts and stories that are a complete misrepresentation of the man and his ministry.
01:16:48: And in doing that, they are a violation of the ninth commandment. Even if they are giving certain facts, they are not giving the context of facts in order for those to be properly understood and interpreted.
01:17:02: And it is scandalous, as you said, and your audience needs to interpret these things through the command of God's moral law.
01:17:13: You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. That's exactly what's happening to John MacArthur, and I'm grateful for the opportunity to raise my little voice against it.
01:17:25: Great. Would you mind if I went to one listener question?
01:17:31: Please. Okay, I'm going to have to enlarge the font on this email that this listener sent in because it's almost microscopic, so bear with me.
01:17:42: And while I'm doing that, let me give our email address again. It's chrisarnson at gmail .com. chrisarnson at gmail .com.
01:17:49: Give us your first name, at least, your city and state, and your country of residence. Usually I only give the first name, city, and state of those who write in questions, but since I happen to know this pastor, and he is a fine man of God, I will provide his full name and even the full name and location of the church in their website.
01:18:12: We have Gary George, who is pastor of Sovereign Grace Chapel in Southbridge, Massachusetts, who has a question.
01:18:24: And he says, prior to the 90s, and stated in his commentaries on,
01:18:30: I believe, both his Galatians and Hebrews commentaries, John MacArthur held to the temporal sonship of Christ.
01:18:39: Would you know why he changed his mind on that errant view and adopted eternal sonship
01:18:45: Christology? You know, I think that Phil Johnson has written articles that can be found on the internet about this.
01:18:54: If you Google Phil Johnson and that controversy, you could get a full statement of it.
01:19:00: You know, I think that the simple, brief answer is that as John continued his study, you know, he came to recognize that there was a more accurate way to express his views on that, and that's what he did.
01:19:15: And I respect him for that. Yes, and he was not always a five -point Calvinist either, and I respect him for changing his mind on that.
01:19:23: Yeah, that's right. You know, and it just shows, you know, that vindicates, that actually serves to vindicate his integrity as a teacher of the
01:19:32: Word of God, is that, you know, as he continued to study, you know, his views matured and became, you know, even more accurate as he taught.
01:19:44: And so that's a sign by which we would respect him at this later stage of his more mature ministry, and, you know, and that would be my brief answer to that.
01:19:56: I know that Phil's addressed that in substance and in detail in places, and, you know,
01:20:03: I would just give my general impression to it, which I just did. And I think we should clarify, in case there are listeners who are unfamiliar with the controversy that was brought up by Pastor Gary, they may think far worse of it than it actually is.
01:20:22: John always believed in the Trinity, and he always believed that Christ, Jesus, obviously before he received that name
01:20:32: Jesus, but always in eternity past through eternity future, has always existed as a part of the
01:20:40: Triune Godhead. So that is not something that was ever in dispute in John's teachings.
01:20:46: Yeah, it was just a matter of how we understand the relationships within the Trinity. Right, and the roles that are involved with each member of the eternally equal
01:20:58: Triune Godhead. Co -eternal, co -equal, and equally deserving of worship.
01:21:05: Amen. Well, thank you, Pastor Gary George. And we do have your mailing address, since you have contacted us in the past and also have been a guest on this program.
01:21:21: So we will have, as soon as it is available to us, we will have Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service ship out to you a copy of John MacArthur, an
01:21:31: Insider's Tribute. And so please be patient for a number of weeks until we are able to give that to cvbbs .com
01:21:41: to ship out to you. And I want to just plug the website of Pastor Gary's church, Sovereign Grace Chapel in Southbridge, Massachusetts.
01:21:49: It is sovereigngracema, the abbreviation for massachusetts .org.
01:21:56: SovereignGraceM, as in MichaelA .org. Well, if you could,
01:22:03: I want you to highlight some more reasons why our listeners, it's hard to believe that there would be any listeners at all in my audience that were not familiar with John MacArthur, since it seems the majority of the listeners in my audience, at least those that have interacted with me, because they say that less than 1 % of a radio audience actually contacts any given talk show.
01:22:33: So there may be many people out there that are not in theological agreement with me. I know that there are some, we even have
01:22:40: Muslims and atheists on rare occasion contact us. But tell us some more of the reasons why the average listener in the
01:22:50: Iron Trip and Zion radio audience should immediately begin reading the books by Dr.
01:22:57: MacArthur, listening to Grace to You via radio, or watching it via television, and discovering and making use of this profound teacher of Christ's Word.
01:23:09: Right. His teachings speak for itself, and so I can't add anything to that.
01:23:20: But when it comes to protecting his reputation from the insinuations that have been leveled against him,
01:23:27: I'm making a cumulative argument here. Each one is independently sufficient to turn away from these accusations, but there's a cumulative argument that I'm making.
01:23:38: And the third one is kind of based on my, it's based on my legal background.
01:23:45: You know, Chris, if you think about our system of jurisprudence, you know, an accused criminal defendant is presumed innocent until proven guilty.
01:23:59: And there is an adversarial system of justice that is designed to test accusations.
01:24:06: There are rules of evidence that exclude untrustworthy evidence for being considered by a jury.
01:24:16: And importantly, there is opportunity in a criminal trial for witnesses to be cross -examined, to expose their motivations, to expose their inconsistencies, and to expose the motives that they might have to tilt their testimony against the accused.
01:24:35: When it comes to this internet vigilante justice, none of those safeguards are in place so that a person can be both, can be the judge, the jury, and the executioner of the one that they are accusing because they're not accountable to any of the rules of evidence or the principles of law that guide the way truth is determined in a criminal proceeding.
01:25:02: None of those protections are in place, and so things can just be thrown out and accusations and questions raised that undermine or seek to undermine credibility, but they haven't been tested by the process that has been long established in our country by which principles of truth can be determined.
01:25:24: And so this internet vigilante justice violates all of those safeguards that the legal process is designed to ensure.
01:25:35: And listen, the criminal prosecutions that we're talking about are just dealing with temporal, earthly matters of human crime.
01:25:45: Here we're talking about a man who has been teaching for 60 years should be afforded the even greater protection because he's handling the eternal word of God.
01:26:00: And so from a legal perspective, you realize that all of the things that are designed to protect and seek the truth in a courtroom setting, none of that is in operation in an internet setting.
01:26:14: And that should bring concern to any reasonable mind who wants to have truth as the objective for which he is seeking.
01:26:25: You know, one of the reasons why I believe that Dr. MacArthur stands out as a leader and a teacher worthy of our attention is because I have always found it quite fascinating for decades of the broad appeal spanning denominational lines that he has, not the kind of appeal that an ear tickler would have, but the kind of theologically deep and profound teacher that he's even a popular author and preacher and teacher amongst those that have radically different understandings of eschatology who may be extremely opposed even to dispensationalism and overlook that aspect of Dr.
01:27:24: MacArthur's belief system because the majority of what he focuses on in his writings and his preaching and teaching are things that are held to be universally true amongst those that really, truly understand the word of God and exegete it correctly.
01:27:46: He has been a favorite of amillennial reform paptists as long as I've been a
01:27:53: Christian. And you don't very often find that with other teachers because sometimes they will let the unique positions they have overshadow everything else.
01:28:05: You might have a dispensationalist, for instance, that is a one -string banjo on that area of their belief system.
01:28:16: And you might even have a dispensationalist who is an extreme and serious error because actually,
01:28:24: Dr. MacArthur's book, The Gospel According to Jesus, was primarily targeting fellow dispensationalists who are totally in error on the area of their rejection of repentance.
01:28:36: Am I making sense here? Yeah, absolutely. John Gerstner, who is now deceased, made that same point in his book
01:28:43: Wrongly Dividing the Word of Truth. As he was critiquing dispensationalism, he accepted
01:28:49: John MacArthur from his criticism saying, you know, I can't remember the exact quotation now, it's been years since I read it, but he said
01:28:58: John MacArthur avoided the errors that he was critiquing the entire movement on. And so that's been recognized in print by established theologians for many decades, and it's an excellent point that you're making.
01:29:10: And, of course, R .C. Sproul is one of the most famous of the covenantal
01:29:15: Christians who would embrace covenant theology and also infant baptism in stark contrast to Dr.
01:29:26: MacArthur's beliefs, and yet they maintain a loving and very close and tight -knit friendship and exchange pulpits and had each other appear on the platform with them at different conferences and major events.
01:29:44: Yeah, that's right, and that actually comes out in my book, John MacArthur, an Insider's Tribute.
01:29:49: John speaks about that relationship with R .C. and how precious R .C.
01:29:55: was to him. That comes out in my book, so I'm glad that you mentioned that.
01:30:01: We do have another listener with a question. We have
01:30:06: Joseph in South Central Pennsylvania who wants to know,
01:30:12: I was wondering if you have read and if you enjoy and recommend the biography of John MacArthur titled
01:30:21: John MacArthur, Servant of the Word and Flock by Ian H. Murray, published by Banner of Truth.
01:30:28: Yes, absolutely. That is the standard for future biographies of John MacArthur.
01:30:35: I'm looking at it as I speak here in my library. I was privileged to have a minor administrative supportive role as Ian Murray put that book together, and so that's even more than my book for those who want to learn more about John MacArthur.
01:30:56: That is the go -to book. My book is a small supplement to the fine work that Ian Murray does.
01:31:05: Everything Ian Murray does should be read by everyone that is a
01:31:10: Christian, and I'm glad that that book has been mentioned because that is the biography to go to right now to learn about John MacArthur, so I'm glad that that book was mentioned.
01:31:21: Well, thank you for mentioning it, Joseph, and you have also won a free copy of the soon -to -be -released book by our guest,
01:31:29: Don Green, John MacArthur, An Insider's Tribute. Please make sure we have your full mailing address in South Central Pennsylvania so that Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service can ship that out to you.
01:31:44: And by the way, you can also purchase that biography by Ian Murray, John MacArthur, Servant of the
01:31:50: Word and Flock, from Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service, CVBBS .com.
01:31:56: They carry most of Banner of Truth's titles, and they can get them very quickly if they don't have what you're looking for in stock because they are minutes away from one another.
01:32:09: So that's CVBBS .com, CV for Cumberland Valley, BBS for Bible Book Service .com.
01:32:18: We're going to go to our final break. It's going to be a lot briefer than the other breaks, but I'd like to take the break now so that I do not need to interrupt my guest in mid -sentence.
01:32:28: If you have a question of your own for Don Green, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com,
01:32:36: chrisarnson at gmail .com. As always, give us your first name at least, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence if you live outside the
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01:43:56: Welcome back. Pastor Green, we have a listener,
01:44:02: CJ in Linenhurst, Long Island, New York who has a question for you. He says, I am typically drawn to preachers and evangelists that raise their voices and very passionately proclaim the
01:44:16: Word of God with great urgency. Dr. MacArthur is one of those exceptions where he doesn't often raise his voice and isn't really known as being a passionate speaker in the way that he vocalizes truth, but at the same time
01:44:35: I find him one of the most penetrating preachers I have ever heard.
01:44:41: I am always riveted to him. Why do you think his message and the manner with which he delivers it is still quite a riveting experience without the loud voice and the passion and the pacing back and forth that we typically will see from more animated preachers?
01:45:02: It's a great question. Let me just give a short answer in view of the time. It's because the
01:45:08: Holy Spirit is honoring the preaching of His Word being truly and accurately handled.
01:45:15: And so that is a mark of the Holy Spirit at work in someone's heart applying the truth of the
01:45:21: Word of God as it is preached. And that is the ultimate spiritual explanation of it.
01:45:28: The Spirit is illuminating the Word through the preaching of John MacArthur. Amen. Yeah, I would agree with our listener that I personally do not care for preachers that have a habit and maybe their in fact exclusive custom to lecture.
01:45:48: But Dr. MacArthur never sounds like he's lecturing to me. No, and yeah, his conviction you can tell that he is that he carries he's preaching from his own convictions and the convictions are he shows you where his convictions come from the
01:46:05: Word of God. And that's a separate kind of elevated compelling oratory that's taking place.
01:46:14: And it's a good distinction to recognize. And just because somebody just to clarify something
01:46:20: CJ said just because a person is not raising their voice and pacing back and forth doesn't mean that they don't have passion.
01:46:28: It's just manifest in a different way. Yeah, that's right. And by the way,
01:46:34: CJ, you've also won a free copy of John MacArthur an Insider's Tribute. Please make sure we have your full mailing address in Lindenhurst, Long Island, New York.
01:46:42: Well, if you could I'd like you to spend at least five minutes before we take any more listener questions.
01:46:51: I'd like you to spend at least five minutes to really hone in on what you most want our listeners to remember about your book,
01:47:02: John MacArthur an Insider's Tribute and the man himself, John MacArthur. And if you could do that before we do have other listeners sending in questions even as I speak.
01:47:14: Before we get to them, I'd like you to really hone in on those things that you find most pivotal and important before we go off the air.
01:47:22: Yeah, well, it's a transition. This is a good opportunity to transition from the defense that I've been making against those
01:47:28: Internet accusations against John. You know, I mentioned biblical and moral and legal reasons to reject them.
01:47:36: The fourth and final one is not something that I claim to be authoritative on the consciences of anybody, but it's just my personal knowledge of John MacArthur.
01:47:46: I've known John personally for 25 years and I've had access to John that has not been given to very many.
01:47:54: There are those that know him better than I do. There are a lot of people that know him better than I do. But I've had direct personal knowledge with him.
01:48:01: My office was immediately next to his at Grace to You for over 10 years. I sat immediately next to him on his left at dozens of elder meetings at Grace Community Church.
01:48:13: And so I have seen him up close in a way that has not been given to many. And I know
01:48:19: Chris, from my personal knowledge of John MacArthur, that the character assassination that has been made against him is absolutely false.
01:48:29: And that's not based on a casual observation and it's not an emotional reaction because he's my
01:48:37: Bible teacher or anything like that. I know the man and I know that those accusations are false and the portrait that people are trying to make of him is false and I have a responsibility to speak out against it when
01:48:51: I know those things, when I know what the truth is. And that leads into my book. You know, one of the reasons that I wanted to put forth this book,
01:49:01: Chris, is to just give and I have John, I spoke with John before I pursued the project and he gave me his personal approval of it.
01:49:11: He hasn't seen the content but he approved the concept before I did it. And I just wanted to give through my long interactions with John, I just wanted to give some personal stories and some personal evaluations of John and his ministry to let people see the private side of John, little windows you might say, into the private life of John MacArthur.
01:49:38: And that I think is what makes this book compelling. There are dozens of exclusive photographs from my friend
01:49:46: Will Moneymaker that populate the book. It's a beautiful, full -color book and...
01:49:53: Well, I'm glad that Will Moneymaker is not a Word of Faith Pentecostal. No, no, he's not.
01:49:59: It's quite a name. Yeah, he is the A .B. guy at our church and he was at Grace to You himself a number of years ago before he moved to Cincinnati to support me in my ministry.
01:50:12: But the... So the book has these personal stories, it has the interviews with John MacArthur, and you're just going to see a side of John that goes beyond the pulpit.
01:50:26: You're going to see something of John the private man and how he interacted with me over the course of many, many years.
01:50:37: And so I... You know, I think it's a winsome book. I think it's going to give a side of John that otherwise wouldn't be known.
01:50:45: And that's why I did it. I wanted to honor... I wanted to honor, first and foremost, the grace of God in John's life and the grace of God through John's ministry to so many.
01:50:56: That's first and foremost. And then I have a responsibility, I believe, to honor the man that I know.
01:51:03: And I'm blessed by God. I'm encouraged and so grateful to God to be able to say these things in print while John MacArthur is still alive to read them.
01:51:14: I stand with him, unqualified, without apology, and unconditionally
01:51:21: I stand with him. And this book is my public statement to that effect, and I believe that it will be an encouragement to all of those who have benefited from John's ministry to see that what they have heard from him in the pulpit is consistent, is lived out consistently by him in his private life as shown by one who was given the opportunity to be a witness to it.
01:51:47: That's me. And that's... You know, I felt like I had a stewardship of the life experiences that God gave to me to be able to put those things in print so that others would know.
01:51:59: A couple of things that have really struck me about his humility. One occurred in my early years of working for WMCA Christian Radio in New York, an affiliate of the largest
01:52:17: Christian radio network in the world, Salem Media, where Grace to You has been airing for many years.
01:52:25: Before I had my own radio program and was basically a nobody, I remember
01:52:32: I wrote a letter to John MacArthur with a greeting card because his wife was in a very serious automobile accident.
01:52:43: I don't know if you remember when that occurred. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. It was about over 20 years ago and she nearly died from that.
01:52:50: Yes, and I believe I even included with that card the booklet
01:52:57: Sickness by J .C. Ryle, the great 19th century Anglican bishop.
01:53:04: And John actually took the time to handwrite a note that he mailed to me. One of the things that I kicked myself over more than anything is that having lost that note in the process of moving a number of times over my life, but I could remember how that struck me that this world -renowned man would take the time to handwrite me a note, thanking me for the greeting card.
01:53:30: The next time that revealed to me his humility was when, this was more recent, a lot more recent, during a break at the
01:53:38: G3 conference where he was on the platform to speak, he got out of an elevator in the hotel lobby at the same time
01:53:47: I got out of a different elevator and I approached him, I said, Dr. MacArthur, you probably never remember me, all the times you've been interviewed by people, but I interviewed you back around 2006 on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, broadcasting out of Long Island, New York at the time and I don't know if you remember me but I just remember that was one of the greatest blessings of my life, especially in regard to my broadcasting career.
01:54:14: And he said, of course I remember you, Chris. I mean, that was probably the highlight of my time at that G3 conference, in fact
01:54:22: I know it was, that he would remember me with all the people that he's met and all the people who have interviewed him.
01:54:29: Yeah, that's John. You know, I've personally witnessed him write so many handwritten notes to people that wrote in to thank him and encourage him, and he has, and he also has a phenomenal mind, a phenomenal recall of people and events.
01:54:45: He really is a remarkable man, and your stories are just a furtherance of what
01:54:53: I've been contending for here in the past two hours. Now before we run out of time, do you have at least one anecdote or something that you might want to share about an occurrence with John that might bring a smile to our listeners face or maybe even a chuckle or whatever the case may be?
01:55:11: Yeah, there are several of those kinds of things. There are several chuckles to be had in the book.
01:55:16: But the one that comes to my mind, Chris, is a little bit more personal, a little bit more intimate, you might say.
01:55:26: When the time came for me to leave Grace to You, John asked me,
01:55:33: I had served at Grace to You for 15 years. I'd been an elder at Grace Church for seven or eight years.
01:55:39: I taught at the Master Seminary, and so there was a lot of history there. And John called me and asked me to go out to lunch with him, just the two of us.
01:55:51: And he came to that lunch, and he said, Don, I want to give you something to remember me by and to thank you for your time with me.
01:56:00: And he pulled out this expensive fountain pen, and he said, I want you to have this.
01:56:07: He said, this is the pen that I used to write my notes for my exposition of Isaiah 53, and I want you to have this and remember me by it.
01:56:18: And that's the kind of thoughtful man that he was at the departure, of my departure from Grace Community Church.
01:56:26: I'm looking at that pen now. I have it framed in my office with notes that John sent to me.
01:56:33: And that's just a picture of the kindness and the generosity of this man, that people will be reading his material a hundred years from now, just like we're reading the materials of Spurgeon a hundred years and more after his death.
01:56:49: Well, I want to once again repeat your website for Truth Community Church in Cincinnati, Ohio.
01:56:58: It is truthcommunitychurch .org. truthcommunitychurch .org. If you could once again let our listeners know how they can register for an evening with John MacArthur and the exact dates that that is taking place in Kentucky.
01:57:13: Yeah, absolutely. I know our time is brief. The date is Tuesday, May 17th, less than three weeks from now, starting at 7 o 'clock on the campus of Northern Kentucky University.
01:57:25: It's called Truist Arena. And you can go to that event for free, but you must register to attend.
01:57:33: You can register for tickets at truthcommunitychurch .org. It'll just take you a minute.
01:57:38: It's a seamless process. And then you can join thousands of people from all over the United States and all over the world to celebrate the exposition of the
01:57:48: Word of God as John MacArthur ministers to us through his preaching. That's wonderful.
01:57:55: And how do people keep in touch with you about the book that is yet to be released, John MacArthur, An Insider's Tribute?
01:58:02: Yeah, you know, Chris, the easiest way right now is to be watching my personal
01:58:07: Facebook page. You know, just look for me, Don Green, and I've got room for about a thousand more followers and friends.
01:58:17: And that's where I'm making things known. There'll be more information coming out in the next couple of weeks when the website goes live.
01:58:26: Great. And remember, folks, Don's last name is spelled without an E at the end.
01:58:31: It's just like you spell the color green. Well, I want to thank you so much, Don. You have been a remarkable guest.
01:58:38: I look forward to your frequent return to Eintrap and Zion Radio as a guest. And I'm looking forward to,
01:58:44: God willing, meeting you in person, unless you are overwhelmed by other attendees at your event, because I am intending to be there.
01:58:52: And thank you so much for the way you promoted this interview on my program and the wonderful things that you have said about the show.
01:59:00: And I hope that this is the first of many, many interviews, brother. I would look forward to that and welcome it,
01:59:08: Chris. Thank you for the opportunity. It's my privilege to have been on your show. And I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far, far greater