May 18, 2018 Show with John A. Miller & Simon O’Mahony on “What is a Reformed Baptist Church?”

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

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

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

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

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

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

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Now here's our host, Chris Arnton. Good afternoon,

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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.

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This is Chris Arnton, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Friday on this 18th day of May 2018, and I'm so delighted to have for the very first time on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio my two new pastors at Grace Baptist Church of Carlisle, I can't even say the word,

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Carlisle, Pennsylvania, John Miller, who is my new senior pastor, and Simon O'Maney, who is my new associate pastor there at Grace Baptist Church at Carlisle, and we are going to be discussing today, after hearing their own personal testimonies of salvation, our theme will be what is a

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Reformed Baptist Church, and first of all, let me greet my new senior pastor, John Miller.

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Hi Chris, good to be here with you. It's great to have you in studio for the first time, and also, now let me greet my associate pastor,

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Simon O'Maney. Hi Chris, good afternoon. And actually, is that actually grammatically correct?

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Is he my associate pastor or John, your associate pastor? Probably a bit of both.

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I guess he would be my elder, right? One of my under -shepherds.

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That's right. Right, but I guess I shouldn't technically say he's my associate pastor, because people will think I'm a pastor, and then of course people would be very terrified thinking that.

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But well, I'm going to give our listeners right away our email address, it's chrisarnsen at gmail .com,

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c -h -r -i -s -a -r -n -z -e -n at gmail .com. Please, if you have a question, give us your first name at least, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence.

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If you live outside the USA, please only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter, and we look forward to hearing from you at some point during the program.

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Uh, Pastor John Miller, I'd like to start with you, as I have a custom of doing here on Iron Trip and Zion Radio, when

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I have a first -time guest, I have them give their testimony of salvation. I have them let our listeners know what kind of religious atmosphere they were raised in, if any, and the providential circumstances our

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Sovereign Lord used to draw them to Himself and save them. Excellent. I'm delighted to talk about how the

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Lord did a sovereign work, and my life saving me is a wretched sinner, saved by grace. Amen.

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But so, I grew up, kind of, I guess, Gen X, I'm late 70s is when I was born, and I grew up near Atlanta, Georgia.

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Often, when I give my testimony, one of the things I say when people can see me is, my name is

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John Miller, but I look like neither a John nor a Miller. Ha ha ha ha ha ha. But the truth is, my mother is from Vietnam, and my father is a

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Caucasian American, and grew up on, kind of, the eastern side of the United States. And so, to understand some of the spiritual and cultural atmosphere in which

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I grew up in, it's important to understand my parents' background in that sense. My mother, growing up in Vietnam, would have been raised as a

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Confucianist, and so that was, kind of, her main understanding of things. Is that a dominant religion there, or predominant?

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It is. It, kind of, pervades the atmosphere. Of course, there's a lot of syncretism, so you have

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Confucianism infusing into the Buddhism there, and even the Roman Catholicism there, and other things that happen.

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But that would have been, kind of, the main thing, I think. Really? You mean Roman Catholic churches sometimes adopt the pagan culture's practice around them?

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Really? That surprises me. Of course. So, that would have been, kind of, her emphasis on the importance of scholarship,

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Confucianism. One of the things that emphasizes is the importance of, kind of, that scholarly study and understanding in that sense, respect for your elders, those kinds of things.

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Morality would have been a large part. My father was someone who was in the

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Southern Baptist Church growing up, and so when I was young, growing up, we were a church -going family.

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We went to a Southern Baptist Church for most of my upbringing. We did attend other churches, a Christian Missionary Alliance church, and some others during that time.

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But there was no real interest in my own heart, of course, being one who was born spiritually dead, though physically alive, had no concern for the things of God.

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And the real emphasis in our home was the importance of our academics. So, I'm assuming, then, your dad was a nominal

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Christian. It's difficult, honestly, for me to completely say. Well, he's

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Southern Baptist, so... I'm only kidding. My Reformed Southern Baptist friends totally understand that statement.

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But they were faithful to take us to church in that sense, I will say. But we didn't have a lot of conversation or instruction from the scriptures at home.

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He did teach us, for example, to recite the Lord's Prayer and those things as children.

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I remember that. But really, not a lot of instruction in the home, though he did take us to church.

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But the real focus, really, was, you need to do well in school. And that became kind of my driving force growing up, was seeking to do well, and sinful pride, just wanting to be recognized, to make a name for myself, and those kinds of things.

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And I lived for awards day at the end of the school years. I was growing up.

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I guess if you looked forward to them, you won things unlike me. Sometimes, not always, but sometimes that was the case.

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But the reality is, growing up and seeing the reality of my own sinfulness, the reality of brokenness in the world, our own family, other situations that were going on, the

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Lord used that providentially to show me the folly of seeking the things of this world. The praise of men.

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It's here today, gone tomorrow, and it's very flippant. It's not something even that brings true satisfaction of the soul, and other just realities of my own sinfulness.

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And it was during my kind of middle school years, I remember actually going through kind of an experience.

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Growing up in the South, you have a lot of religiosity, if I can put it that way.

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And one of the things I remember, an experience that I had was, a friend invited me to go to what was called a judgment house at Halloween.

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And it's a church that puts on these things on Halloween night, where you kind of, they walk you through the woods, and it's supposed to be scenes from the book of Revelation, and people pop out of the ground, and you walk through war zones.

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And I've seen those advertised. I've never been to one, but I've seen them advertised. Well, they can do pretty well at scaring you. So at the end, there's this big white throne, and it's supposed to be judgment day.

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And what happened is, they then, at the end of this, rushed us into a tent and said, anyone who wants to be saved from the wrath of God, or saved from judgment, just raise your hand.

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Well, of course, everyone in the tent raised their hand, and then they pronounced you a Christian. Well, I didn't have any real understanding of the gospel, of what those things meant.

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I had raised my hand. I talked to the pastor of the church where we were attending. So I was baptized, but I wasn't actually baptized as a believer.

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I didn't really understand. But over the next couple of years, the

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Lord really began to just work circumstantially to reveal to me the sinfulness of my own heart, to understand more of who he was, the reality of how

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I was breaking his law all the time. And it was the summer after my freshman year of high school, when my father took me to hear a man who was preaching kind of a week -long series of sermons, and it was there that the gospel was brought home to me in its clarity, the reality of how my only hope to be saved from the wrath of God is the work of Jesus Christ, his life, his death, and his resurrection.

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Amen. And before I ask you about your calling, how you knew you had a call from God to be a pastor,

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I wanted to ask you, why were you baptized? What was going through your mind now that you say that you were not really a believer?

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Was it that you were just frightened by the spectacle that you witnessed? Was it you trying to appease friends that were there?

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Or you didn't want to embarrass the minister who was giving a call to baptism?

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Or whatever the case, what was the reason? The reason, I would say, goes back to the sense of being afraid, of course, and then talking to the pastor's church, because the church that put on this judgment house wasn't the same church that I was attending.

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So when I went and talked to the pastor about my experience, his statement was, well, then you need to be baptized, without a whole lot of probing into my own understanding or really explanation of the gospel.

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So it was a sense of, this is the proper process, I guess, and this is what I need to do, and so I did.

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So tell us about when you reached a point in your life when you said, I really believe that the

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Lord wants me to enter into the ministry. Well, you know, it's one of those things. We, of course, speak about both the internal call and the external call.

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And in a certain sense, of course, after my conversion, my desires were changed.

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The Spirit of God regenerated my heart. And I say, pretty much right away, soon after being a Christian, there was a desire to serve

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God. And not knowing what that meant or what kind of shape it would take, I started to say,

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I think I should be in the ministry. Now, I was in a kind of, I could say,

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Arminian Southern Baptist Church, and talking to the pastors that I had there, they didn't give me a whole lot of guidance when

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I said that, but just kind of said, well, great, that's wonderful. But so I had certain desires in high school, didn't fully understand those things.

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And just to kind of go on from that, in my experience in high school, I was in a variety of different churches that I was involved in.

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One was this Arminian Southern Baptist Church. Another had some friends that were in a Chinese church. And so I was involved in that as well.

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Had somewhat more of kind of somewhat charismatic leanings in certain respects.

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So I had a broad range of, shall I say, exposure to false doctrine as a young believer.

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In one area, I was dealing with legalism and moralism. In another area, I was dealing with the idea of a higher life.

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Second blessing kind of teaching. Another area... Is that the Keswick? Yeah, Keswick, or even some of the

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Wesleyan thoughts. And then another area that I was, of course, wrestling with was the

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Arminian kind of theology. So I often say that the Lord used that time in my life, particularly those three years as a

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Christian in high school, to show me the impact and effects of false doctrine. Because I felt them and I experienced them in a real way for myself.

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And was wrestling through trying to understand them. So it was after high school when

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I went to college in South Carolina. I went to Furman University and had a friend at my town back in Georgia, whose brother was at this college.

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And so she put me in touch with him. And he invited me to go to a

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Reformed Baptist Church there in Greenville, South Carolina area. And that was the first time

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I ever entered into a Reformed Baptist Church. That was the first time I ever experienced expository preaching.

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That kind of just fellowship and warmth that was in that congregation. And it was there that I came to a clearer understanding of what is the ministry and how you really discern a call to the ministry.

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That it's not just because you have an internal desire, then you're definitely called. But the importance of recognizing gifts and graces that Christ gives and for his church to recognize those things and to affirm those things.

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So while I was in college, the pastor there had a group that he called Spurgeon's Club.

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It was a group for young men who were interested in learning more about the ministry. And so we would have these monthly meetings.

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He kind of put together a structured program in the Spurgeon's Club for two years. Where we'd meet once a month during the school year and have books that we would read in the summertime.

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Some of the books were pretty heavy books like Lorraine Bentner's Formed Doctor of Predestination, A .W.

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Pink's Sovereignty of God, and some other books like that. But each month we had a different topic that we would discuss.

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And some of the early topics, one was, what is a call to the ministry? And he would give us certain articles from the

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Banner of Truth magazine or chapters out of books. And so there's where I first learned, oh wow, there's much more to this than just my own desires, but the church recognizing these things and affirming these things.

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And then what is the actual work of a pastor? What does a pastor actually do? And the importance...

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Have you found out yet? Some would say I'm still learning or figuring it out.

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There's some truth to that, isn't there? But it is truly a high calling, a privilege.

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That's a wonderful thing. And certainly, as the Apostle Paul says, who's sufficient for these things?

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Certainly myself, I am not. But by the calling of Christ and the grace that he gives, seek to be faithful to that calling.

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But it was really through that time I came to that understanding of those things. The elders started to work with me in that church.

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As I was in college, I was involved also with college ministry. That was kind of a reformed college ministry.

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And I had opportunities to teach, lead Bible studies. Others began to recognize some gifts and abilities.

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So when I graduated college, continued to talk with the elders there. I wanted to stay in the Greenville area. I even had struggle finding particular work at the time.

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And what I graduated with, I was a computer science major. So there was a man in the church who was working on building an addition onto his house for his in -laws to live in.

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And so he asked if I wanted to come work for him for a while. So I did. Out of college, the first thing I did was do construction for six months.

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All for the purpose so I could stay in the area, be involved in the church that knew me, work with those elders.

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Those elders worked with me. So I worked with him. And I worked in the computer industry for a couple years, all the while serving in the church.

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And the elders continued to give me opportunities. And then they came to me and said, we do believe you should pursue formal theological education.

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And there was a school just down the road that was a solid school, Greenville Presbyterian Theological Seminary. So I attended there for four years, while still attending the church there in Greenville.

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Did you have to wear some kind of like an arm patch that you were Baptist? No, but my first year,

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I was the only Baptist in the whole school. Really? And so, you know, you certainly have a lot of opportunities to have conversations about being a

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Baptist in a Presbyterian school. But my professors were gracious, even though every class period, I think they were trying to convince me to become a

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Presbyterian. And one day in chapel, one of my professors, Dr.

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Wilborn, was talking about some kind of event that he was holding. Students were invited.

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And he even turned to me publicly and said, and even John the Baptist is invited to come.

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Well, that nickname stuck. And so I became known as John the Baptist in the seminary. And you, by the way,

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I have known Joey Piper for a long time. And I've interviewed him several times on the program.

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For those of you who don't know who that is, he's the president of Greenville Presbyterian Theological Seminary.

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Is he still the president? Yes, he is still the president. Yeah, I thought so. I think

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I'm confusing another seminary that's getting a new president soon. But, and I've also interviewed some of the faculty.

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I love interviewing Ryan McGraw. Oh, yes. He is a brilliant young guy.

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So we were in class together. He was just a year ahead of me. And my friend William F.

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Hill. I don't know if you know Pastor Bill Hill. Bill Hill, I know Bill. Yeah, I've had him on several times. In fact,

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I met him at a Banner of Truth conference when I got lost in the dark on the campus of Elizabethtown College.

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And I found my way back to civilization by following the smell of cigar and pipe smoke.

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I finally found about 10 Presbyterian guys hanging out on a porch or a patio, smoking cigars and pipes.

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And I was passing out flyers of my radio program, Iron Trip and Zion Radio. And all of a sudden

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I heard from behind me in the darkness, Why don't you interview me? That was

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Bill Hill. And that was the beginning of our friendship and our history interviewing

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Bill. A friendship forged in darkness. Yeah, I think that that could be accurately said on many levels.

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No, I'm only kidding. So I know that you also began from what I've learned of you as a church planter.

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True. But if I could take a step back, you talked about the Banner of Truth conference. That kind of is the connection of how

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I ended up getting to know the church here in Carlisle. While I was a student at Greenville, that's when they had scholarships for students.

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They still do this. I believe the Banner gives scholarships out to seminary students to come to the Banner of Truth ministers conference.

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And so it was in a conference. I had a scholarship from them to come. I came and it was there that I met former pastor of our church in Carlisle, David Campbell.

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Praise God. I love David and I hope to get him back on the program very soon from the

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UK. For those of our listeners who don't know who David Campbell is, he was my pastor for the first,

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I guess it was four years after arriving from New York to Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

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And he had been there for probably a decade before that, right? Right. He came in 2002. And he is now pastoring the

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North Preston Evangelical Church in Northern England. And he is a dear, precious brother.

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And I miss him dearly, even though I love having you as a new pastor. I'm excited about that. But obviously there was a friendship that developed.

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And I hope to have him on the program again soon. But continue. He is a dear brother still for me as well.

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And it was actually over the snack table. Our common love of food, as well as theology.

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That drew us together at that conference and got to know each other a little bit. And then from that, the next summer, he asked if I could come talk to the elders of the church down in Greenville, asked if I could come and be a summer intern at the church.

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And so I came as a summer intern to Carlisle in 2005. And then from that relationship that developed as well, he asked and the church asked if I would come after graduating from seminary for a few years to just gain further experience and to help with the ministry here in Carlisle.

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So I spent three years after seminary. What was called a pastoral assistantship or an intern.

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Became an elder in the church during that time. But as you said, I had a desire to see more churches, faithful biblical churches, planted in places that didn't have them.

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It was a great concern of mine. It really actually goes back even to my time at the church in Greenville.

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The church there was involved in planting a church in Commerce, Georgia. So even in my college years,

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I would go down with some of the church members there and help evangelism and other things in that church.

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And then in my seminary years, a good friend of mine at the seminary who came after my first year named Chris Powell, who pastors

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Covenant Baptist Church in Toronto. Oh yeah, in fact, I had Chris on the...

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Either I had Chris on the program or I just happened to mention Chris's congregation where he pastors.

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But he sent me an email saying that someone overseas was,

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I believe was a missionary who was reformed and wanting to connect with the church. And he found that congregation where Chris pastors through that interview that I did.

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And... Praise God. They had some kind of a connection. But Chris could clarify my errors in that story.

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But there was some kind of an overseas connection. Somebody hearing about him and then the person contacting

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Chris and having a meaningful interaction with him that has some kind of lasting value to it.

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Well, Chris is a dear brother as well. Good friend. He actually... I often talk about him as the answer to my prayer.

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During my first year of seminary as the only Baptist, I did pray that Lord would bring another. And Chris was the answer to that. Praise God.

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So we became close friends during that time. And one of the things while we were in seminary, I was trying to introduce him to the association churches,

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Arvka, that we were involved in. And Arvka had what was called a school of church planting that was put on down in Fayetteville, Georgia.

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So he and I, that was kind of our first trip together of many kind of road trips that we would take to these kinds of things.

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And we went down to the school of church planting and were greatly encouraged by it. Came back and just were thinking, wow, we'd love to see some of this put into practice.

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And we were talking to our elders there in the church in Greenville. And we had a family that was driving down from Asheville, North Carolina area to come to the church in Greenville, prayed and talked to the elders.

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And they gave us approval to start like a Bible study. And what began as what became what's

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I think Redeemer Baptist Church now there in Asheville, North Carolina. That's how that began while we were in seminary.

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So there was just a desire to see faithful Reformed Baptist churches planted. Also had a desire for overseas missions as well.

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Lord didn't open up those doors. But while we were here in Carlisle for those three years, we were thinking about those possibilities and came to know of a sister church who had started a work in Clarksville, Tennessee, a group that desired to see a

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Reformed Baptist church planted there. And eventually they are the ones that called us to come and to plant that church, which is now

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Covenant Baptist Church in Clarksville, Tennessee. Is that the

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Clarksville? Is that in a monkey song? Last train to Clarksville. That's right.

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Were they actually singing about that? They were. Oh, they were. Okay. That's exactly right. Well, I hope the city in Tennessee is better than the band was.

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No comment. Yes, I forgot. I think you had a poster of them on your wall that the elders forced you to take.

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Hey, hey, we're the monkeys. And it is interesting, and I'm not exaggerating, when I have been approached by a number of people from different locations in the

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United States who, to my knowledge, aren't even connected or friends with each other or even aware of each other.

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But I've had people, as soon as I say where I am a member, Grace Baptist Church of Carlisle, Oh, you're getting that guy,

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John Miller. Oh, wow. He's a great guy. This is, of course, before you actually came. And so it is,

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I immediately became aware that we were getting some kind of a celebrity. Maybe delusional people.

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Well, you were obviously greatly loved, and people, including my very first pastor, as a born -again believer after leaving

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Roman Catholicism and getting saved. Mike Adosh, who I know is a mutual friend of both of ours, was my first pastor.

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He was so excited when he knew that you were going to be my new pastor. And so he, in fact, every time

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I speak with him, he tells me to say hello to you. Well, thank you. And what we're going to do now is we're going to go to our first break.

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And when we come back from the break, we are going to hear the testimony of the new associate pastor at, or is it assistant pastor?

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Does that even matter? Pastor's fine. One of the new pastors at Grace Baptist Church of Carlisle, Pennsylvania, Simon O'Maney.

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We'll hear his testimony. And if anybody would like to ask a question, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com.

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chrisarnson at gmail .com. We already have several of you waiting to have your questions asked and answered.

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And please be patient with us because we want to get through Simon's testimony first before taking any questions.

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But our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com. Please give us your first name, city and state and country of residence if you live outside the

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USA. And please only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter.

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Don't go away. God willing, we'll be right back with Pastor John Miller and Pastor Simon O'Maney of Grace Baptist Church in Carlisle to discuss what is a reformed

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Eastern Time for A Visit to the Pastor's Study, because everyone needs a pastor. Welcome back, and that was a voice of a friend that I've known since the 1980s that also has a connection with the

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Greenville Presbyterian Theological Seminary in Taylor, South Carolina. John Miller, Pastor John Miller, do you recognize

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Bill Shishko? I do. He actually taught our pastoral theology class when I was there. Great.

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Yeah, he has been a friend of mine since I was a brand -new Christian, and a guest many times in this program, and also now a client that now that he is running the

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Reformation Metro New York Parachurch Organization and hosting the

31:33

A Visit to the Pastor's Study out there on Long Island, which is heard globally on the internet, just as my program is.

31:42

But he is also heard in the New York Tri -State area and parts of Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island on 540

31:49

AM on the dial. So I hope that you listen every Saturday, 12 noon to 1 PM Eastern Time.

31:56

And they are also going to be airing reruns very soon of that program at 1

32:03

PM Pacific Time on First Love Radio based out in Dublin, California, which also airs

32:11

Iron Trip and Zion Radio now live. But Bill's program will be aired at a different time because it will be pre -recorded.

32:19

But dear friend, and I highly recommend his program, A Visit to the Pastor's Study. He is a wonderful resource for deep biblical information, even though we do disagree over the baptism issue and church polity and some other things.

32:34

But he's a great guy. And I know that he, although was pastoring on Long Island before retirement at the

32:42

Orthodox Presbyterian Church of Franklin Square, he was an adjunct professor at Greenville Presbyterian Theological Seminary.

32:49

In fact, the first time I ever met Joey Piper was when he was a visiting preacher for a conference at the

32:55

Orthodox Presbyterian Church of Franklin Square. But now we are going to hear the testimony of my second new pastor,

33:05

Simon O'Maney at Grace Baptist Church in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. This is the first time that both

33:10

John Miller and Simon O'Maney have been on my program. And I'm looking forward to the remaining 90 minutes with them and hopefully to many more future interviews with them.

33:20

But Simon O'Maney, obviously you are not a native Carlinian as far as Pennsylvania is concerned.

33:30

You are, I don't even know if that's a real word, Carlinian, Carlisle resident. You're not a native of Carlisle, not a native of New York where I'm from.

33:40

Tell us about your upbringing, where you're from in the religious atmosphere you were raised in, how you were saved by God's grace, and how you became a believer in the doctrines of grace.

33:52

Yeah, that's right, Chris. I'm not from around here. As some of your listeners will probably guess from my accent,

33:59

I'm from the Republic of Ireland. And I don't have quite a stereotypical

34:04

Cork accent, as some of perhaps your Cork listeners might attest to. But I was born in Ireland in County Cork and I grew up in, my mother raised me, so I grew up essentially in a

34:19

Christian home. My mother had grown up in a Roman Catholic home, so she was raised

34:26

Roman Catholic and that was her experience. How she was converted is her brother was training for the priesthood and while he was away training and at the end of his studies, someone essentially challenged him and starts sending him

34:41

Bible passages to kind of challenge his thinking. And through that and through that correspondence, he eventually came to a right understanding of the gospel and scripture and his relationship with God.

34:53

And he actually left the priesthood. And of course, back then in Ireland, that was something very, very costly on a social level and that was very difficult for him.

35:02

And so then he would have gone back to his family and told my mother the gospel, share that with her and the rest of her family.

35:09

And so he's listening right now, isn't he? Because I want him to be a guest as well on this program.

35:14

That's a fascinating testimony that you've shared with me even before the program. Yeah, that's right. Well, he said he'd listen to my interview first to see how tough you were and then give it a shot.

35:25

So if you had any stronger an Irish accent, you should be in a box of cereal. I mean, nobody's going to mistake the fact that you're from Ireland, which also actually brings me to the question just quickly.

35:36

I'm sorry to interrupt you, John Miller. You don't sound at all like you're from the South. I mean, was this a did you rehearse getting rid of that accent or how did that happen?

35:47

I don't know what you guys are talking about. But I'm sorry.

35:53

You know, being in northern Georgia in the Atlanta area, and I guess you could say maybe

35:59

I have a southern Vietnamese accent. No, definitely not that either. You sound like a newscaster, like a midwestern, you know, all

36:07

American newscaster. Not that a southerner isn't all American, but devoid of accent is really what

36:15

I mean. Like my friend James White of Alpha Omega Ministries, he doesn't really have a detectable, at least to me, detectable accent.

36:22

But anyway, I'm sorry, Simon, I interrupted you. Yeah, so essentially, my mother was converted in her teen years.

36:30

And then so when I was born, she would have brought me to church. She would have taught me the scriptures from a very young age.

36:37

She would have taught me about Christ and the cross. And while it was more of an Armenian and a

36:43

Pentecostal expression of Christianity, the gospel was there and there was a love for God, a love for his word.

36:48

And so that was the really the environment that I was raised in. And so while I don't remember or I can't pinpoint an exact moment of my conversion,

36:57

I never remember a time where I wasn't memorizing, learning, hearing scripture, reading it when

37:04

I was able to read. I never remember a time where I wasn't praying. I never remember a time when I didn't have a desire for God and some knowledge of Christ and the cross.

37:13

Praise God. So when did you realize, hey, you know, I believe that the Lord is leading me into the preaching and teaching and pastoral ministry?

37:24

Yeah, well, even from quite a young age, I had a desire for ministry. And John spoke a moment ago about that internal, external call and the importance of that.

37:33

So I had that internal desire from a young age. So I would have grown up in Pentecostal churches.

37:41

And going into my teen years, I became gradually more and more dissatisfied with the emphasis that was there, the emphasis on the signs and wonders and speaking in tongues and all these kinds of things.

37:54

And a de -emphasis on the word as being central in worship and in our lives and the certainty that comes from the word as opposed to, you know, other kinds of forms of extra biblical revelation.

38:07

And so I would have come to have a greater appreciation and understanding of the word.

38:13

And so as I became dissatisfied with Pentecostalism, I would have moved then to a

38:19

Calvary Chapel. I don't know if you're familiar with Calvary Chapel churches. Yeah, definitely familiar. I've visited them.

38:25

I have friends in them. I've interviewed some Calvary Chapel folks, and I know that there are varying degrees of hostility to the doctrines of grace among them.

38:35

But there are dear brethren in that. I know that they hate being called a denomination, but let's face it.

38:41

Come on. They're a denomination. Anyway. Yeah, yeah, certainly. That's a good way of putting it.

38:47

There's a varying of degrees in terms of what they think of Calvinism, doctrines of grace, confessionalism.

38:54

But certainly, so I would have then started attending this Calvary Chapel, and it was definitely a step up from the churches that I had attended in the past.

39:02

There wasn't an overt kind of Pentecostalism. It tended to be more of a closet charismaticism, if you will, something not really spoken about openly.

39:12

And there was an emphasis on the word. So we were all encouraged to read our Bibles, to study our

39:17

Bibles. The word was something that was quite central. And it's interesting. The pastor in the church

39:23

I was attending actually encouraged me to listen to Calvinist preachers like John Piper and even

39:30

Mark Driscoll, if you remember him. This was the Calvary Chapel? This was the

39:35

Calvary Chapel pastor. Yes. So you think he was a closet Calvinist? Absolutely not. That's not the end of the story.

39:44

Oh, the end of the story is where you were excommunicated. Yeah, just wait. So basically, yeah,

39:51

I listened to guys like Piper and Driscoll and others, Matt Chandler, you know, a lot of the kind of gospel coalition type of guys, and they would have talked about guys like John Owen and other

40:02

Puritans, Sibbes. And so that piqued my interest in these Puritans. And so I began to find where I could, you know, in used

40:10

Christian bookstores, used Banner of Truth books. And so I would pick up these Puritans and read them and just be, you know,

40:17

I just fell in love with their doctrine and their piety, their practice. And eventually

40:23

I came to, I picked up a book by Michael Horton, who's a professor at Westminster Seminary, California.

40:30

Yeah, I've had him on the program as well. And he's written a very nice endorsement for the show, actually. Look forward to having him back and have met him.

40:39

And I've known Michael Horton so long that when he was a single young man, he used to ask me to help him find a girlfriend.

40:47

But anyway, go ahead. Yes, he's a good man. And so I would have,

40:53

I picked up a book by him. And in there, he talked about creeds and confessions and catechisms. And I had never really heard anything about any of those things, maybe in the context of the

41:02

Roman Catholic Church, something like that, but not in a Protestant, evangelical Christian type of setting.

41:10

And so I began to find these creeds and read them, the creeds of our church.

41:16

And then I would have come to the Westminster Confession. And as I was reading through the

41:22

Westminster Confession, I really just fell in love with it, just the way it was laid out and also the shorter catechism and larger catechism.

41:30

I guess I should say as well, around this time, I was listening to James White.

41:37

And my pastor actually had warned me against listening to James White. Yeah, he said that James White was dangerous and some other things that aren't appropriate for the radio.

41:48

Were you speaking to the deacons at his church? So more than anything, that just piqued my curiosity.

41:57

So I began to listen to James White, The Dividing Line, and also pick up Potter's Freedom.

42:03

And I was reading through that. And through that, that caused me to really wrestle with scripture. And this was probably over months, maybe even a year, just wrestling with those doctrines and wrestling with scripture until finally

42:16

I came to a position where I understood that this is what scripture teaches. And so then finally, so in addition to reading the catechisms and studying them,

42:29

I finally came to the London Baptist Confession, 1689 Confession, and really felt at home there.

42:38

And so then I went to my pastor and I kind of opened up to him and I said, well, you know, you've been encouraging me to listen to these guys.

42:46

Well, this is where I'm at now. I think I'm a Calvinist. And not only that, this is my confession, the 1689

42:52

Confession. And I said that I realized that the theology of the church hasn't changed. And I'm happy to abide by that.

43:00

I just wanted to be open and honest. So his response was OK. And he kind of gave me some exhortations, some warnings.

43:09

He told me about how the dangers of Calvinism, how many of his many men who he knew who became

43:15

Calvinists ultimately went on drugs and left their wives and these kinds of things.

43:21

And as a side note. Do you think that was true? Well, as a side note, I've heard other people that have had similar experiences with Calvary chapels, and they're given these similar kind of horror stories, unfortunately.

43:34

And so I guess the sad part of the story is several weeks later, we had a long conversation over coffee in Cork City.

43:45

And he basically at the end of this conversation told me that I was no longer welcome to be a member of the church because the church was bringing in formal membership, which is unusual for Calvary chapels.

43:57

And so he told me that my wife and I, we were no longer welcome at that church. And that was very painful.

44:03

And I asked him, I said, what's the reason why we're not welcome? What standard are we not fit for?

44:09

And his very words were, I haven't thought of that yet. Oh man, wow.

44:15

Yeah. I haven't thought of that yet. So that was and still is probably the most painful experience in my

44:24

Christian life. You know, I'd been in this church for about seven years. I'd been there when it was, you know, really small startings when it was, you know, this guy preaching to his wife and me and one other maybe.

44:33

So it was a very painful experience. Well, sure, I can imagine that. That's just, I can't help but think that he was frightened.

44:43

Didn't want to have to explain things to you that he couldn't explain. But that's just an assumption on my part.

44:50

But so continue with your story. Yeah, certainly. I don't know his motives. But this segues into,

44:56

I guess, the next phase of my life. So from there, my wife and I, we went to started attending a

45:02

Calvinistic Baptist church in Cork. And we really had a wonderful time there.

45:08

So we were there members for two years before ultimately going to seminary. And we just enjoyed the life of the church there, the vibrance, the community and the teaching.

45:18

And so the pastor there gave me some opportunities to teach. And so my internal desire for seminary or for ministry was essentially being tested and shown forth.

45:31

And I was encouraged in that. At the same time, I came into contact with Dr.

45:38

Renahan of the Institute of Reform Baptist Studies. Yes, he's just recently been a guest on the program.

45:43

And he has been previous times as well. But he and some of his faculty have just recently been on and promoting the fact that they are launching their new seminary in Texas this

45:54

September. I may even be there. They've invited me to do on -site interviews there.

45:59

I just don't know if I can afford to get out there yet. But I am excited about it as well.

46:05

Wonderful. So he began to put me in touch with some

46:10

Reform Baptists in Ireland. Because at this point, when I had come to the confession initially, it was completely on my own.

46:17

I mean, using resources. But essentially, I knew of no other Reform Baptists in Ireland or even around the world.

46:23

For all I knew, I was the only Reform Baptist in the world. Perhaps some of your listeners can relate to that experience of just feeling maybe isolated, almost like an island, and coming to the doctrines of grace, coming to a

46:35

Reformed understanding of the faith. And it can be difficult. And so essentially, I did what all people do when they want to find an answer.

46:44

I turned to Google. So I Googled Reform Baptist, and the name

46:50

Jim Renahan came up. And so I. Chris Arnzen didn't come up at all. Yeah, but that was on maybe the second or third page.

47:02

A flashing warning sign came on the screen. Exactly. And so I contacted him, and he put me in contact with several

47:11

Reform Baptists in Ireland and one or two in the UK. And so from that point,

47:17

I developed somewhat of a relationship with them. And an opportunity opened up to do some preaching at a

47:23

Reform Baptist church plant up in Limerick. And so for about 10 months, I went up there once a month preaching and leading worship and all of this kind of, again, confirmed that internal desire.

47:37

And so eventually, I moved with my wife out to California and started seminary at Westminster Seminary and the

47:46

IRBS. And we transferred membership to Christ Reform Baptist Church there. And then

47:51

I became an intern in the church there and eventually a gifted brother. And so I just finished my classes in January of this year.

48:02

Well, praise God. Well, I know that everyone I have spoken to at Grace Baptist Church is praising

48:07

God that both of you have come. And I thoroughly enjoy both of you preaching and the friendship that is beginning to develop.

48:15

And I'm just very, very thankful and grateful to God that he has brought the two of you to us.

48:23

And just as I said earlier about John Miller, with all the people that have said that they were delighted to hear that he was coming to Grace Baptist Church, I have told you this before,

48:35

Simon, that only about two people from Ireland that I've mentioned didn't know who you were.

48:42

Every time I've spoken to somebody from either the Republic of Ireland or Northern Ireland, and while I'm asking,

48:48

I'm thinking to myself, they're not going to know this person. I mean, it's an entire country we're talking about. I'll say, well, we have a new assistant pastor at Grace Baptist Church, Simon.

48:56

I'm like, oh, I know Simon. Tell Simon I said hello. How horrible of an accent was that that I just did?

49:04

It was a good effort. Another 10 for effort. Somebody who listens to the show from Scotland, when

49:12

I did a Scottish imitation on the show, he said, if you were in my presence when you were speaking that way,

49:18

I would call an ambulance. But we are going to be going to a break momentarily, but I want to let our listeners know, especially those who just joined us, that both

49:30

Pastor John Miller and Pastor Simon O'Maney are now, during the second hour, going to be addressing the issue, what is a

49:38

Reformed Baptist? And that is the primary theme. I'm not going to exclude all other questions that you may have on theology and doctrine and ecclesiology and so on.

49:49

But that is our primary theme. What is a Reformed Baptist? Because a lot of people don't know what that is.

49:56

I can still remember back in the 90s when

50:01

I had a friend, Ken Grimble, who worked for Family Radio before Harold Camping went completely off the deep end into apostasy.

50:12

And my friend Ken Grimble worked there, but he was not Reformed. He was a part of a fundamentalist, non -Calvinist

50:23

Baptist church. But I arranged an interview with Ken Grimble and my friend

50:29

James White of Alpha Omega Ministries, who played, by God's grace, a primary role in your coming to the

50:34

Doctrines of Grace, to understanding the Doctrines of Grace. So Ken Grimble, his first question to James White while interviewing him on Family Radio was,

50:43

You say you're a Reformed Baptist. What are you now? In other words, he thought that James reformed from being a

50:52

Baptist, like a Reformed alcoholic, a Reformed drug addict. And the thing that made it even funnier, just 15 minutes later, he said,

51:00

You say you're a Reformed Baptist. What are you now? He asked the same exact question.

51:06

He must have either had a mental drift or something and wasn't listening. But we will find out what a

51:12

Reformed Baptist is after this break, for those of you who don't know. And of course, there are

51:18

Presbyterians and Baptists who say there's no such thing. That's quite annoying to hear from our friends and brethren on occasion.

51:29

But if you would like to join us on the air, there are already several of you waiting for questions to be asked and answered.

51:36

So please be patient with us. Thank you for the patience you've already demonstrated. But we'll get to you as soon as possible.

51:41

If anybody else would like to join them with a question of your own, send us an email. ChrisArnzen at gmail .com.

51:47

ChrisArnzen at gmail .com. C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com.

51:52

Please give us your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence. If you live outside the USA, only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter.

52:02

This is our elongated break. It's about 12 minutes because Grace Life Radio in Lake City, Florida, they insist upon a 12 -minute break between our two major segments because of the fact that they have their own local advertisements there in Florida and public service announcements and so on that they need to air.

52:20

So please be patient with us as we take this elongated break. And please take this time to not only write down the information that our advertisers provide so that you can properly and successfully patronize them, but also take this time to write your questions to our guests.

52:37

Again, that's ChrisArnzen at gmail .com. ChrisArnzen at gmail .com. Don't go away, God willing, we will be right back after these messages from our sponsors with more of John Miller and Simon O'Maney on what is a

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But please, whenever you contact CVBBS .com, make sure you tell

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Todd and Patty Jennings, the owners, that you heard about them from Chris Arnzen and Iron Sharpman's Iron Radio.

01:04:24

And I'll tell you an even more important reason why you should do that in a second. But their toll -free number is 800 -656 -0231, 800 -656 -0231.

01:04:35

And as I said, they man that between 10 a .m. and 4 .30 p .m., Monday through Friday. That's Eastern Time. So you can call any time,

01:04:43

Monday through Friday, during that time frame. And speak with someone. If you call outside of those parameters, you're not going to get an answering machine or a voicemail.

01:04:52

It will just keep ringing. So you can call back either the next day, if it is a weekday, or you can order online, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 52 weeks out of the year, at CVBBS .com.

01:05:04

If you order at least $50 worth of merchandise and you mention Chris Arnzen on Iron Sharpman's Iron Radio, you will not only receive free shipping on everything, but you'll also receive a free book by E .M.

01:05:18

Bounds. So please make sure you tell them that you heard about them on Iron Sharpman's Iron Radio.

01:05:24

And please also congratulate Todd and Patty Jennings for entering into their 31st year of service to Christ and His Church through their wonderful Christian book -distributing ministry.

01:05:38

And I know for certain that one of my guests today, John Miller, happens to visit that bookstore on occasion himself, right?

01:05:46

Certainly on first -name basis with them. I don't know about you, Simon. Have you been in there yet? Yeah, I've been in there once.

01:05:53

Yeah, it's a good spot. Yeah, it's an excellent resource. And of course, not only locally here, but globally.

01:06:00

And we hope you take advantage of them. Before I return to—I don't mean take advantage of them in a bad way.

01:06:07

I mean take advantage of the fact that they exist, make use of their resources by purchasing books from them, which you don't have to worry about purchasing anything heretical from them.

01:06:19

They strictly sell things that are in adherence with historic biblical

01:06:26

Christianity. You don't have to worry about anything strange, bizarre, heretical, blasphemous, or anything like that.

01:06:33

But I have just a couple of more announcements to make before we return to our discussion with John Miller and Simon O'Maney, the pastors of Grace Baptist Church in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, where I happen to be a member, much to their dismay.

01:06:48

But coming up at the end of this month, May 29th through the 31st, the Banner of Truth is having their 2018

01:06:55

U .S. Ministers Conference on the theme, Ministers of Christ. Speakers include Alistair Begg, Johnny Gibson, Mark Johnston, Al Mohler, David Strain, and Craig Troxell.

01:07:07

If you'd like to register for this event, go to banneroftruth .org, banneroftruth .org, click

01:07:12

Events, and then click on 2018 U .S. Ministers Conference. Make sure you click

01:07:17

U .S. because they also have had U .K. conferences. One of them just recently completed.

01:07:24

And if you click by accident the U .K. Ministers Conference, you're going to get totally wrong information that's already been outdated.

01:07:31

So click on U .S. Ministers Conference, and you can register that way. Please tell the folks at Banner of Truth that you heard about them from Chris Arnson on Iron Trump and Zion Radio.

01:07:39

Last but not least is the least favorite or most uncomfortable aspect of the show that I do every day because my advertisers who pay hard -earned money to keep my show on the air have urged me to do it.

01:07:56

Many of you have known since 2005 when I began this program, I went for years without making a single public appeal for donations.

01:08:06

But the times have gotten so rough financially, and the need is so great, and because of the urging of my advertisers who want this program to remain on the air, they spend hard -earned money, as I said, keeping it on the air.

01:08:19

Well, please consider donating to Iron Trump and Zion Radio. Go to irontrumpandzionradio .com, click Support, then click

01:08:26

Click to Donate Now, and you could donate instantly with a debit or credit card. Please, as I always try to remember to remind you, never siphon money out of the regular giving that you're accustomed to your local church to give to Iron Trump and Zion Radio.

01:08:44

If you're not a member of a local Bible -believing church and you're not prayerfully looking for one, you are living in disobedience to God.

01:08:51

If you need help finding a Bible -believing church, no matter where you live in the world, I have lists of biblically solid churches all over the world, and I have already helped a number of people find a church home in various parts of the world who have emailed me, including

01:09:08

Grace Baptist Church's, well, it's sort of a church plant that we've cooperated in, but I believe it's an

01:09:15

ARCA church plant, at least, in Perth, Australia. The young man,

01:09:22

Pastor Beardmore, who is the pastor there in Perth, his family is still, are still members of Grace Baptist Church in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, other than his own wife and children, of course.

01:09:35

They are in Perth, Australia, but I've had a listener asking about a church near him, and he is now very seriously, and in fact,

01:09:44

I believe he is certain he is going to become a member of that church. But anyway, so please never forego the need for finding a local church and joining it.

01:09:54

Never siphon money away from giving to that church in order to give to Iron Trip and Zion Radio. Never put your family in financial jeopardy by giving to Iron Trip and Zion Radio, because those two things are commands of God, providing for church and home.

01:10:08

Providing for my show is obviously not a command of God, but if you are financially blessed above and beyond your ability to obey those two commands, then please consider donating to Iron Trip and Zion Radio if you love the show and you don't want it to go off the air.

01:10:22

Just go to IronTripandZionRadio .com, click support, then click to donate now, or you can mail in a check the old -fashioned way through snail mail to the address that pops up when you click support at IronTripandZionRadio .com.

01:10:35

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01:10:41

If you want to advertise with us, as long as whatever it is you want to promote is compatible with what

01:10:46

I believe, then I would love to help you launch an ad campaign. If it's your business, your church, your parachurch organization, your professional practice, your doctor, a lawyer, a dentist, if it's just a special event, well, as long as it's compatible with what

01:11:01

I believe, I would love to help you launch that campaign. You don't have to believe exactly as I do, but whatever it is you're advertising at least cannot militate against what

01:11:08

I believe or be in some serious conflict with what I believe. So, please email me if you want to advertise at ChrisArnzen at gmail .com

01:11:18

and put advertising in the subject line. That's the same address, email address, where you can send in a question to our guests today,

01:11:26

John Miller and Simon O'Maney, the two new pastors at Grace Baptist Church of Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

01:11:31

That's ChrisArnzen at gmail .com, ChrisArnzen at gmail .com, C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com.

01:11:39

And please, as I said, give us your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside of the

01:11:45

USA. Only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter. Before I read any of our listener questions,

01:11:52

I just want to get the foundation laid, what is a

01:11:58

Reformed Baptist Church, and let's start with you, John Miller. This is a term that you and I both know,

01:12:09

Reformed Baptist, which I have heard, actually, I don't know if you would concur with this, maybe you know something different.

01:12:15

I have heard that the former pastor of Grace Baptist Church in Carlisle, Walt Chantry, who was there before David Campbell for 40 years,

01:12:25

I had heard he actually may have or perhaps even did coin that phrase, but I don't know that for certain.

01:12:34

I've heard that as well. I can't confirm it. I haven't actually asked him that, but the story goes, at least, what

01:12:40

I've heard from multiple sources is that while he was at a seminary at Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia, he was there from 1960 to 1963.

01:12:50

Of course, another brother, Jeff Thomas, was also a student there, and it was while they were students there that they were trying to describe their beliefs, and they coined the phrase

01:13:01

Reformed Baptist. And as I said earlier, there are brothers in Christ that we have, some of our even our close friends, who are either

01:13:13

Presbyterian or Baptist, who they have a knee -jerk reaction, they may flinch, they may chuckle, they may frown, but they say, well,

01:13:24

Reformed Baptist, that's an oxymoron, there's no such thing. In fact, there are even Baptists that believe exactly as we believe in the doctrines of Sovereign Grace and the so -called

01:13:36

Five Points of Calvinism, as they are nicknamed, who still agree with their

01:13:42

Presbyterian brothers that we should not be using, and they should not be using, Reformed as an adjective for their churches or for themselves personally.

01:13:52

But if you could explain Reformed Baptist, a combined term that seems strange to many.

01:13:58

Sure. Again, I think you make the point, why is it a difficulty for some to connect

01:14:05

Reformed and Baptist? And one of the first reasons is because they see the word

01:14:11

Reformed as entailing the issue of infant baptism, and because that's connected to their understanding of what

01:14:18

Reform means, then it sounds like a complete oxymoron. How could you be someone who's a Reformed person holding to infant baptism, and then yet a

01:14:25

Baptist is one who holds to believers only, should be baptized? So it seems utterly contradictory.

01:14:32

So that's kind of the first major problem why people have with that. But again, part of it is defining terms and understanding what we mean when we say

01:14:42

Formed or Baptist, and why we can put those things together for a couple of reasons. I think one of the main things is understand

01:14:49

Reformed, what it means is that we are those who connect with the Protestant Reformation of the 16th and 17th centuries, that we actually, historically, flow out of the

01:15:01

Reformation that came in that period, that we would stand with our

01:15:07

Presbyterian, our Dutch Reformed brethrens in saying that we are Protestant. We do not hold to the teaching of the

01:15:13

Roman Catholic Church. And you could summarize that, perhaps one of the best ways to summarize that is to think of the watchwords of the

01:15:21

Reformation. And we were actually recently just at the

01:15:26

Reformed Baptist Association, ARBCA's General Assembly, last week. And the church there, a community

01:15:33

Baptist church, I think in Fargo, North Dakota, they have a fairly new area, sanctuary area, where they meet.

01:15:40

And one of the things that you can see on the wall there is these five solas are actually inscribed in the architecture in the wall.

01:15:49

And so I think that's a helpful way of understanding what we mean by Reformed. Starts with, of course, sola scriptura, that is the

01:15:58

Bible alone, scripture alone is our final authority. Doesn't mean there are no other subordinate authorities in the church, but it is our final authority of faith and practice.

01:16:07

You can see these things in the scriptures themselves pointing to its authority from 2

01:16:13

Timothy 3 .16 to 2 Peter 1, Deuteronomy 4, our own confession of faith would say the same thing at the very beginning, the second

01:16:23

London Baptist confession of faith, the first chapter, very first sentence says, the holy scripture is the only sufficient, certain, and infallible rule of all saving knowledge, faith, and obedience.

01:16:35

And so that's kind of the foundation standing against the Roman Catholic idea that church tradition, councils, those things are on the same level of authority as the scriptures.

01:16:45

Again, it doesn't mean that we would say there is no place for other authority, subordinate standards, other kinds of things from example, the elders in a church have an authority under the word, under the scriptures in that way, but the scriptures alone are our final authority.

01:17:02

And the scriptures themselves, the God -breathed, inerrant, infallible word teaches us that in our churches we need subordinate authorities.

01:17:13

Amen, exactly. Even when you think about, as we'll come to talk more about confessions and creeds even, you see the language of Paul telling

01:17:20

Timothy in 2 Timothy, hold to the pattern of sound words. And there are even, it would seem in the

01:17:27

Old Testament and New Testament, actual creedal type statements, summaries of what the Bible teaches. So that's an important aspect of it as well.

01:17:34

So sola scriptura is not the same as what some call nuda scriptura or solo scriptura, which would say

01:17:43

Bible alone and no other authority. That's not what we mean. What we mean is that the Bible alone is the final authority under which all other subordinate standards or subordinate authorities must be founded upon, based upon, and submit to.

01:17:58

So that's kind of the first major foundation. Of course, that brought major reformation in the church. But then the next aspect would be, of course, solus

01:18:06

Christus, that Christ alone is our only sufficient Savior. We don't look to anything else.

01:18:12

He is the way, the truth, and the life, John 14, 6, 1 Timothy 2, 5.

01:18:17

He is the one mediator between God and man. And so you have the reality of Christ alone as being the focus.

01:18:24

We don't look to other things. It's not mediation through Mary. It's not mediation through other saints. Again, thinking about how the

01:18:31

Reformation was taking its stand against the errors of the Roman Catholic Church. The third thing, then, of course, was sola fide, faith alone, that faith is the alone instrument by which we are counted righteous, that we are justified in God's sight.

01:18:48

It's not faith plus our good works by which we gain that standing of being declared righteous by God.

01:18:57

It's only by his work, and our faith is that empty hand that grabs hold of him.

01:19:05

So again, contrary to the teaching of the Roman Catholic Church. You can see these things in Romans chapter 3, Romans chapter 4. And then coming from that, or flowing from that, sola gratia, the grace alone, that it is all by God's grace that we are saved.

01:19:18

Salvation from beginning to end is a work of God's grace. We really contribute nothing to our salvation except our sin.

01:19:26

And it's God himself from beginning to end. He even gives us the faith by which we grasp hold of Christ.

01:19:32

He causes us to persevere. He enables us to walk with him. It's all of grace.

01:19:38

Ephesians 2, 1 to 10 clearly reveal that to us, that we were dead in our trespasses and sins, but he has made us alive together with Christ Jesus by his grace.

01:19:48

We're saved by grace. And then the last thing, which really can be seen as the culmination of these things, is soli deo gloria.

01:19:56

It's all for the glory of God. God alone is the one who is worthy of all praise and adoration. God alone then receives the glory because it's all of grace.

01:20:04

It's the work of Christ. It's his word alone. You see how all these other solas lead to this great climax.

01:20:11

It's all to his glory. And that's really the emphasis of what it is to be reformed, I would say, at its heart, at its root, is it's all for God's glory alone.

01:20:21

And don't you think that it is just a helpful nickname because of the fact that we, especially in regard to soteriology, have more in common with the

01:20:35

Calvinistic branch of the Reformation, at least, than we do with the Anabaptists.

01:20:41

And although we have in common with our Anabaptists forefathers and even contemporary friends and brothers in Christ who call themselves

01:20:51

Anabaptists, we have in common with them a belief that only a repentant believer is a biblical candidate to be baptized.

01:21:00

And we believe in an independent, local, autonomous church polity.

01:21:06

We don't have a hierarchical structure outside of the local church other than Christ himself, who is the head of the church, because we don't see anything else in the scriptures, that this is a helpful term,

01:21:20

Reformed Baptists, just to set us apart from other Baptists who claim no connection to the heritage of the

01:21:32

Reformation, some of them even to the level of disdain, some of them, and it's unfortunate that there are many dear

01:21:40

Baptist brethren who are misinformed and who have all kinds of slanderous and fictitious understandings of who the

01:21:51

Reformers were and what they did, not that they were perfect men by any stretch of the imagination, hence the reason why we disagree with them on baptism and church polity.

01:22:01

But if you could, isn't that... That's exactly right. I mean, again, going on, the 16th century, of course, gives way to the 17th century, and in the 17th century, you really see the development of what was known then as the

01:22:14

Particular Baptists, but that's really our heritage, so it comes from the Protestant Reformation.

01:22:20

And as you mentioned, Chris, there's kind of two streams, the Anabaptists and their reasons for holding to Believers Baptist are not the same as the

01:22:29

Particular Baptists. They had a greater divide in their understanding between Old Testament, New Testament, in ways that are different from our

01:22:36

Particular Baptist forefathers in that way. So really, what you have in the 17th century is the development, the further development of Reformation understanding, what we call

01:22:49

Reformed theology, which comes into expression in the various confessions of faith. And so you have, as we've talked about, heard from Simon's testimony when he came across the

01:22:58

Westminster Confession of Faith. Those Westminster Assembly, you know, in the 1640s developed an understanding that's

01:23:05

Presbyterian understanding of those things. But our Particular Baptist forefathers would have been pastors along with these

01:23:16

Presbyterian Brethren and other Congregationalist Brethren in England at that time. And they developed their understanding of these things as well, and it would have been very much in line with our

01:23:28

Presbyterian Brethren in terms of soteriology, in terms of many aspects of the doctrine of Christ, doctrine of God, doctrine of the

01:23:36

Trinity, many of those things. I think you've mentioned the two main areas of difference between our

01:23:42

Presbyterian Brethren and even Congregationalist Brethren and Particular Baptists would be our understanding of the church, both who should be counted as members of the church, and then also the polity of hierarchy or not.

01:24:00

So part of being a Particular Baptist or a Reform Baptist, part of what that means is we don't hold to kind of an Episcopal understanding of church government, the hierarchy in that sense, or even a

01:24:09

Presbyterian understanding of church courts, or the Presbyterian understanding of a national church.

01:24:14

They would call the whole conglomerate of churches one church in that sense, where we would say every single particular local church is directly under the authority of Jesus Christ, and we can associate together, but we're not in that same kind of hierarchy.

01:24:30

And Simon, you and I were both raised, well actually you weren't raised Roman Catholic, right?

01:24:36

No, I wasn't. But your family. My mother, yes. Well, don't you think that there is a sense when our

01:24:44

Pato Baptist Brethren either mock, insult, or tolerate us barely for using the term

01:24:54

Reform Baptist, that there is a sense when we are even more Reformed than they are?

01:25:00

Because we believe that we have further Reformed from our

01:25:06

Roman Catholic heritage historically. I mean, wouldn't you agree that, for instance, wouldn't you believe that we are more consistent believing in Sola Scriptura, for instance, because we cannot find within the pages of the

01:25:19

God -breathed scriptures anything like a Presbytery, or a denominational hierarchy, or anything like that.

01:25:27

And it seems when I have conversations with my dear friends who are

01:25:33

Pato Baptists, in fact, I probably have more Pato Baptists as guests on the show than Baptists, because they seem to be writing more books.

01:25:41

But they seem to shift in their hermeneutic when they're talking about the scriptures, both with baptism and with church policy.

01:25:49

Yeah, well, certainly as a Baptist, I'd kind of have to say that. Especially if you're a pastor in a

01:25:56

Baptist church. Although I'd have to be careful the company that I mentioned that in. Well, certainly the

01:26:04

London Baptist Confession, obviously from our Baptist understanding, would be an advance and an evolution, if you will, or progress in Reformation.

01:26:18

Certainly, confessionalism as a whole is so important, both for the

01:26:25

Reformed heritage, but also the actual Baptist heritage, our particular

01:26:30

Baptist forefathers. Although they didn't call themselves Reformed Baptists, they called themselves particular

01:26:36

Baptists. And they saw themselves as being in line with Reformed theology and actually advancing in that stream.

01:26:45

When we think of the mid -1500s into the 1600s, that was a period of confessionalization in Europe.

01:26:53

We had the Reformed churches expressing themselves and identifying themselves by the use of confessions and catechisms.

01:27:02

And they used these in order to express their identity, to show, on the one hand, what they believed and how they could have unity with one another, but also to distance themselves from Roman Catholic doctrine and they engaged with Bellarmine and other

01:27:18

Roman Catholic apologists. And so our particular

01:27:23

Baptist forefathers followed in this. They used a confession to express their identity, to show the world, as it were, who they were.

01:27:32

And in fact, what's fascinating, often in our Baptist confessions of faith, we often don't have the preamble to the confession in there.

01:27:40

I'm holding one right now, and unfortunately, the preamble isn't there. But the preamble is so important. It actually sets the context for all of the doctrine contained within the confession.

01:27:48

And in that preamble, our Baptist forefathers explicitly state their purpose in putting together the confession.

01:27:56

And the reason why it's so similar to the Westminster Confession, they say it's because they don't want to clog religion with new words.

01:28:04

Rather, they want to show their continuity with their Reformed brethren to show the unity that they have.

01:28:12

Right. There was actually, I don't know if you saw it on Facebook, but somebody posted a hilarious meme.

01:28:17

It was a Presbyterian who posted it, but I still found it very funny. He obviously found, it looked like a historic painting of antiquity.

01:28:28

And I'm not sure what the actual painting was depicting, but you see these men in medieval looking robes, or perhaps even earlier than the medieval period, sitting there listening to somebody.

01:28:43

And you have a man writing something in a pad or a book. And then behind him, you have somebody who's obviously looking at what the man in front of them is writing, and he's writing something.

01:28:55

And the person who posted the meme put, as far as the man in the front,

01:29:01

Westminster Confession. And then he put London Baptist Confession for the guy copying.

01:29:06

Now, this wasn't some action of plagiarism. It was something to, because we already had a first London Baptist Confession of Faith.

01:29:16

That's right. We wanted to demonstrate more unity by merely copying, if you will, the second

01:29:23

London Baptist Confession from the Westminster. That's right, exactly. And even from the Savoy. Yes. And 39 articles, and even the

01:29:32

Westminster Confession incorporates, if you look at the language and the doctrine of God, doctrine of Christ, it incorporates the ancient creeds of the church.

01:29:39

So even then, it isn't a de novo document. It isn't just out of the blue, so to speak.

01:29:44

But it stands in the line of the creeds and confessions of the Christian church.

01:29:50

And so this would be also true of Presbyterians. But as Baptists, we're also

01:29:56

Catholic, Catholic small c, in that we stand in a line of orthodox and right doctrine.

01:30:04

Excellent. Well, we have to go to our final break. This is going to be a very brief break. And we will get to all of you who have already written questions.

01:30:11

And then we'll hopefully have time for new ones. If you want to send in a question, do so now or forever hold your peace, because we're rapidly running out of time.

01:30:20

ChrisArnson at gmail .com. ChrisArnson at gmail .com. Give us your first name, city, and state and country of residence if you live outside the

01:30:26

USA. Don't go away. God willing, we'll be right back with Pastor John Miller and Pastor Simon O'Maney on what is a

01:30:32

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That's solid -ground -books .com and see what priceless literary gems from the past or present you can unearth from Solid Ground.

01:35:10

Solid Ground Christian Books is honored to be a weekly sponsor of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. And please remember

01:35:16

Solid Ground Christian Books for all your upcoming holiday gift -giving needs. Father's Day is going to be here before you know it.

01:35:22

Please search the website of solid -ground -books .com and find things for your dad or anybody who is a dad that is in your life, whether it's perhaps even your own son who's a dad or your grandfather or anybody else that you know that you want to bless on Father's Day.

01:35:44

Go to solid -ground -books .com and I know that, as I said earlier, John Miller is a mutual friend of the founder of Solid Ground Christian Books, Mike Gadosh, and Mike always has a very enthusiastic word to say about John Miller to me when we have discussions about Grace Baptist Church in Carlisle.

01:36:05

So it's good to know that somebody in the studio with me can attest to the fact that Solid Ground Christian Books is a very vital and valuable resource, is it not?

01:36:16

It is, very much so. And this is our final 24 minutes or so of the program today with Pastor John Miller and Pastor Simon O'Maney of Grace Baptist Church in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

01:36:29

We are discussing what is a Reformed Baptist Church and our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com. chrisarnson at gmail .com.

01:36:35

If you want to send us in a question, do so now or forever hold your peace because we're running out of time. We have

01:36:41

Joe in Slovenia who says, Dear Brothers Chris, John, and Simon, this is such an important topic because many

01:36:47

Baptists are completely unaware of Reformed Baptist Churches or specifically what they are all about.

01:36:53

With that in mind, please comprehensively explain the Reformed Baptist understanding of the

01:36:58

Lord's Day, Sunday, the Sabbath, and Sunday as the Christian Sabbath. Does the

01:37:04

Bible clearly and specifically teach that Sunday is the Christian Sabbath? Is Sunday the replacement or fulfillment of the

01:37:11

Fourth Commandment commands regarding the Sabbath? If so, what texts clearly connect these two

01:37:16

Old Testament and New Testament concepts together? Which portions of the Old Testament Sabbath requirements are binding on Christians today?

01:37:24

Thank you all for your service to our King and his Church. Well, that's quite a lengthy question, so if you need me to repeat anything,

01:37:31

I could return to that. This is an interesting question because it not only divides evangelicals, it even divides

01:37:40

Baptists and even divides Calvinistic Baptists. Not all Baptists who are

01:37:46

Calvinists have the same understanding or view or practice of the

01:37:52

Sunday Christian Sabbath, and even some that would use the term Reformed in their name would be non -Sabbatarian, and of course then there would be the argument between Reformed Baptists, whether that other group is a

01:38:06

Reformed Baptist, but if you could, John, if we'll start with you, what your thoughts are on this.

01:38:12

Yeah, I think one of the things to recognize, I think, when you talk about the

01:38:18

Fourth Commandment is it is a part of the Ten Commandments, and there is an important distinction that is made even in the giving of the

01:38:27

Law and the Old Covenant between what God spoke directly from Mount Sinai in the hearing of all the people versus what he gave to Moses, what he would write later in the

01:38:39

Book of the Covenant. But even what he's giving there in the Ten Commandments, that is what was actually written in the heart of Adam.

01:38:47

It is a description, really, of God's own nature and character as well, and part of what it is to be those who are made in his image, those who are to reflect his character.

01:39:00

And so it is, in one sense, because it's part of those Ten Commandments, it's talking about what our confession, what we refer to in Scripture as the moral law of God, which is a binding law throughout all of human history in that sense.

01:39:18

Now at the same time, one of the things that's fascinating to recognize about even the revelation of the Old Covenant Sabbath day during the time of Moses is there were elements of it that were given as part of the other part of the law in the

01:39:36

Book of the Covenant. You see how the Sabbath is part of the sign of the

01:39:41

Old Covenant and the other laws related to it. And it points then to how the

01:39:46

Sabbath commandment, the Fourth Commandment, actually has two aspects to it. Our confession uses the language of positive law versus natural law.

01:39:59

And so when you talk about natural law, you're talking about those things that are rooted in the very character of God, they're true from nature.

01:40:06

And really, the Sabbath commandment goes all the way back to creation. We talk about Genesis chapter 2.

01:40:11

God blessed the seventh day and rested on it. It was a day that was meant to be a blessing to creation, a blessing to mankind, in which they were able to worship

01:40:20

God on that day and in delight in his work of creation. But you also have the second aspect, what we call this positive moral command.

01:40:30

You can read from our confession in chapter 22, paragraph 7. It says, as it is the law of nature that in a general a proportion of time by God's appointment be set apart for the worship of God, so by his word in a positive moral and perpetual commandment binding all men in all ages, he has particularly appointed one day in seven for the

01:40:50

Sabbath to be kept holy unto him. Which from the beginning of the world to the resurrection of Christ was the last day of the week, and from the resurrection of Christ was changed into the first day of the week, which is called the

01:41:03

Lord's day, and is to be continued to the end of the world as the Christian Sabbath, the observation of the last day of the week being abolished.

01:41:11

So when we say this statement talks about a positive moral law, it's something that's not necessarily rooted in nature, it's something in addition, something that God gives that's not necessarily rooted in the nature, so it could change, he could change it, and so that's exactly what he does.

01:41:28

Well, what's rooted in nature is that we are to set apart time, have time set apart to worship God, the actual day that is to be is something that he set from the period of creation, beginning of creation to Christ, to be the seventh day, but with the resurrection of Christ, the first day of the week has become that day.

01:41:48

And so it's in understanding that whole theology that you can come to see it.

01:41:54

It is something that's from the scriptures. Now it's not something where you just look at one particular proof text in that sense, but it's also important to understand what proof texts even mean.

01:42:04

Part of what proof texts are is they're pointing to the greater, shall I say it this way, exegetical tradition of what has been expounded.

01:42:12

So when you look at a confession of faith and you read a little text, proof text, it's not saying just go to that text and you'll completely understand it.

01:42:19

It's actually saying look at what we who've written this confession, look at our sermons, look at our commentaries on these texts, and you'll see how we develop that doctrine from the scriptures, that this is coming from the

01:42:30

Bible itself. And so understanding how theology itself works, how we take it from the scriptures, the various parts and put it together,

01:42:38

I think that's an important aspect of it. In fact, Joe in Slovenia, if you want me to email you the recording of,

01:42:48

I can't remember how many parts it was, it was at least two days, it might have been more, but on the old Iron Trip and Zion radio program,

01:42:55

I had a debate on the show between a mutual friend of everybody in this room,

01:43:01

Dr. Samuel Waldron, who would agree with John Miller's position as he just stated it on the

01:43:09

Sunday Sabbath, and he also wrote a commentary on the 1689 London Baptist confession of faith.

01:43:16

He had a debate on my show, the old Iron Trip and Zion radio show in New York, with a

01:43:21

Calvinistic Seventh -day Baptist on what was the true day of the

01:43:27

Sabbath for the New Testament Christian. And so if you'd like that, I can get that email to you at some point.

01:43:33

But thank you for listening to the show and joining us on the air with an excellent contribution to our discussion.

01:43:40

By the way, Simon, did you have anything to add to that? No, I thought John did a great job.

01:43:45

I mean, the only thing to say is that, you know, we even see that continued in the Book of Acts. We see the apostles celebrating the

01:43:52

Lord's Supper on the Lord's Day. Paul waits, he stays at a church for a length of time so that he can observe the

01:43:59

Supper on the Lord's Day. So Lord's Day tends to be that day that they meet. And that was the first day of the week in the

01:44:06

New Testament. Right. So just to say that, you know, even the practice of the apostles and also in the church following that up until, what, 200 years ago has been to follow the practice of that doctrine.

01:44:19

And one quick thing about that, do you think that we who are Reformed Baptists have to be very careful not to overstep boundaries of Christian liberty by defining for other people?

01:44:37

I mean, obviously there are certain things that might be clearer than others on how one might be violating the

01:44:42

Sabbath day. But to go overboard with a meticulous, detailed list of things that a

01:44:50

Christian can and cannot do, don't you think we have to be careful about that and judging others on how they should be observing that Sabbath day?

01:45:01

Absolutely, Chris. I mean, I think that's an important thing. Walt Chantry's book called The Sabbath Delight has a helpful section even just relating to that very issue.

01:45:09

I think that would be helpful for your listeners to read through. The other aspect

01:45:15

I think that's important too is to focus on the positive purpose of the day and not see it as just this is a list of do's and don'ts, or mostly the don'ts, but the positive purpose.

01:45:26

It's a blessing to be able to come into God's special presence with God's people and to experience really what is a foretaste of heaven, to be able to be in God's special presence, to worship

01:45:38

God with his people in that way. And we need to be careful not to make it into this kind of dour list of all these things that you can't do.

01:45:46

But the reality is when that's your great desire, then these other things at times,

01:45:52

I mean, that's not really what you want. And of course, we could spend a month every day on this show and talk about the

01:46:00

Sabbath and we wouldn't exhaust information and we would only scratch the tip of the iceberg even after a month of programming on it because there's a lot of things involved with that.

01:46:10

Thank you so much, Joe, in Slovenia. And we have a new listener, or I should say a first -time questioner.

01:46:17

He could have been listening to my show since its inception in 2005 for all I know, but I've never heard from Brian in Denver, Colorado before.

01:46:25

We've already addressed this before, but perhaps you could revisit it in a different way. I didn't know that he had written this question until just now.

01:46:34

He says, can you explain to me the difference between a Reformed Baptist, which I am, and a

01:46:39

Reformed Presbyterian? It's Brian in Denver, Colorado. And obviously, we don't know exactly what

01:46:45

Brian means because there's an actual denomination called the Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America that has been nicknamed the

01:46:52

Covenanters, which even has a lot of differences from other Presbyterians in the

01:46:58

OPC, PCA, and other Presbyterian denominations. So I'm not really sure 100 % what

01:47:04

Brian is referring to. And of course, you even have churches like our local congregation here in Carlisle that we would believe are our brothers and sisters in Christ.

01:47:16

And in fact, you have preached in their pulpit, if I'm not mistaken, at times, haven't you? Yeah, I've been involved in their church.

01:47:21

Carlisle Reformed Presbyterian Church. And they have that name because there was a denomination that has now been absorbed.

01:47:29

Years ago, it was absorbed into the PCA, Presbyterian Church in America, but it used to be called, I believe, the

01:47:34

Reformed Presbyterian Church Evangelical Synod. So a lot of those churches still carry that name,

01:47:40

Reformed Presbyterian, even though they're not the exclusive psalmody and Covenanter Presbyterians that are also strictly acapella.

01:47:51

But if you want to revisit this question in any way that we may have left out, difference between a Reformed Baptist and a Reformed Presbyterian, then you could as well, obviously,

01:47:58

Simon. I think, again, maybe it's a bit of a reiteration, but one of the main differences has to do with how we understand baptism and church government.

01:48:09

But to put it in another way, I think both of those issues actually are related to how we understand our covenant theology and the difference in the way that Reformed Baptists recognize the historical covenants.

01:48:25

And there's many things that we would hold in common, kind of what's often thought of as the three main covenants that we talk about.

01:48:33

We talk about the covenant of redemption that occurred between persons of the Trinity and eternity past.

01:48:39

Presbyterians and Reformed Baptists, both would hold to that. And then the covenant of grace is also a term that's used.

01:48:47

And then the covenant of works, of course, is also a term that's used about the covenant between Adam and God there in Genesis 1.

01:48:55

So we would agree on those things. It's how we understand particularly the outworking of the covenant of grace that is the main difference between Reformed Baptists and Reformed Presbyterians.

01:49:05

We are covenantal. We're not dispensationalists as Reformed Baptists. And so we do believe in a covenant theology and that there is only one way people were saved throughout all of human history, and that is through the work of Jesus Christ and faith in him, both

01:49:19

Old Testament and New Testament. So we would have that in common as well. But what really happens, what we as Reformed Baptists would say is that the

01:49:28

Reformed Presbyterians, they kind of flatten the distinctions between the historical covenants.

01:49:34

And they call all the historical covenants different administrations of the one covenant of grace, where our own confession talks about how there is this kind of by farther steps, these historical covenants reveal the promise of the new covenant.

01:49:53

So the Old Testaments covenants, they reveal the promise of the new covenant. But there is distinctions to be made between them, which is why we would hold to the new covenant being really the fulfillment of the covenant of redemption in its fullness.

01:50:10

And the covenant of grace really is the new covenant in that sense. All the other covenants pointing to it, the promise of it is there.

01:50:20

And those who believe in those promises through the types and the shadows and all the things that are there, they're saved, but they're saved by virtue actually of the new covenant.

01:50:28

And so that means membership in the new covenant is those who have faith in Jesus Christ, not just, not from the

01:50:37

Abrahamic covenant, you know, believers and their seed and their children. So that understanding is the main difference.

01:50:44

Classic work would be Nehemiah Cox's work from the 17th century. I think it's been republished as From Adam to Christ.

01:50:53

Sam Rinahan has also just recently published his dissertation, which deals with particular

01:50:59

Baptist covenant theology, which might be helpful to readers if they want to explore it more. Yeah, I got to get Sam on the program.

01:51:04

His dad, Jim, highly recommended that I do that. And I think that I will take him up on that suggestion.

01:51:11

In fact, I'm certain I will attempt to do that if Sam is willing. But do you have anything to add, Simon? Yeah, just to that other element of ecclesiology and how we understand

01:51:22

Baptist churches existing. Sometimes someone who isn't a

01:51:27

Baptist might say to me, what does the Baptist church believe? Using the language of, you know, like the

01:51:33

PCA, the Presbyterian Church of America. Our association of churches is called

01:51:39

ARBCA, the Association of Reformed Baptist Churches of America, rather than Reformed Baptist Church of America.

01:51:45

And so that's an important Baptist distinctive, being autonomous and independent.

01:51:51

So there isn't a hierarchy of courts or churches over us. We believe that Christ gives the authority to his local church and not to some hierarchy of churches, not a bishop.

01:52:03

And so as we assemble as churches, we are in association together.

01:52:08

And so there isn't a hierarchy. When we assemble at the General Assembly once a year, the decisions made there aren't binding on the churches in a way that maybe might be.

01:52:19

So in Presbyterian ecclesiology, so that's just another important distinction between Presbyterianism and,

01:52:27

I guess, Baptists. And I have, interestingly enough, much to my pleasant surprise,

01:52:34

I have interviewed some Presbyterians, Pato Baptists, who agree with us that only the regenerate and only the elect are members of the covenant, which pleasantly surprised me.

01:52:48

And so they're not a monolith when it comes to that, but it was probably the majority that would believe that the children, the baptized children of believers are automatically ushered into the covenant at their baptism.

01:53:02

Then they have the problem of how Christ is mediating for those children that prove to be reprobate.

01:53:08

Exactly. And they say, on occasion, he mediates wrath to them. That seems to be not a very comforting thing to think of Christ as our mediator, because he could be mediating wrath to you.

01:53:19

And, of course, I have friends in the Free Presbyterian Church, which is only

01:53:25

Presbyterian in terms of its polity, because many, if not most of their pastors are Baptistic.

01:53:32

And then, of course, I found this in an unpleasant way a number of years ago, that there is actually an adamantly

01:53:42

Arminian Presbyterian denomination called the Cumberland Presbyterians. And I remember some pastor in the

01:53:50

Cumberland Presbyterian denomination blasted me with a nasty email once saying,

01:53:55

I don't believe in your Calvinistic heresy. Please leave me alone or something like that. Wow. And that was a shocker to me, but obviously they are not historically connected to any of the great

01:54:08

Presbyterians of centuries past to have that kind of an attitude towards Calvinism. But thank you,

01:54:13

Brian, in Denver, Colorado. And since you are a first -time questioner, you have won a free copy of the

01:54:20

New American Standard Bible, but I'm going to need your full mailing address in Denver, Colorado, so that CVBBS .com

01:54:27

can ship you out a copy. So thank you so much. I hope to hear from you a lot more in the future here on Arm Sharpens Iron Radio with questions for our guests.

01:54:38

And now we have, let's see, Anthony in Hoshton, Georgia. And Anthony says, what church did they fellowship in in Commerce, Georgia?

01:54:51

I'm assuming he's talking about you, John. Yeah, I believe it was called

01:54:58

Grace Baptist Mission. And pastor there is Murray Brett.

01:55:04

And it's still an ongoing church? Yes, it is. Well, thank you, Anthony. And keep listening and keep spreading the word about Arm Sharpens Iron Radio.

01:55:13

Well, believe it or not, we've only got about three minutes of time left. So I want each of you to take a minute to summarize what you most want our listeners to remember.

01:55:22

Let's start with Simon O'Minney this time. What do you want our listeners to most remember today before we go off the air? Oh, that's quite a charge.

01:55:31

Well, I guess the importance of remembering that as Reformed Baptist churches, we are, first and foremost, we are a church.

01:55:41

And the purpose of the church, whether you are a Baptist or a Presbyterian or an Armenian or a Calvinist, the purpose of Christ's church is to glorify

01:55:50

God. And we do that through worship, through the edification of the saints and through evangelism.

01:55:56

Great. And Pastor John Miller? Yeah, I would certainly echo what Simon just said. The other thing

01:56:01

I think that's important to remember is, yes, we are Reformed Baptists, but that doesn't mean we think we're the only true

01:56:07

Christians. And it's important for us to have that proper preaching for the work of Christ and various...

01:56:15

I'm sorry, did you say you were a Reformed Baptist? Only kidding.

01:56:22

We're not known for thinking that way, but we do. But we want people to understand what we believe and why we believe, because we believe this is what the scriptures teach.

01:56:33

And so we would say, search the scriptures, see if these things be true, be like the Bereans in that way.

01:56:39

Amen. And our desire is to glorify Christ above all else. Yeah, we have a little bit of extra time.

01:56:45

And I think because we are talking about what is a Reformed Baptist, obviously the whole concept of the show today involved using that label.

01:56:53

And how do you respond? In fact, I even had a guest on very recently who was a

01:56:59

Calvinistic Baptist, Sovereign Grace believing Baptist, but he really did not like at all to use the label

01:57:06

Reformed or Calvinist. He agreed with us theologically probably on everything, but he does not like that.

01:57:14

He says, I just like to call myself a Baptist. And I have a number of other friends who said, I just call myself a

01:57:20

Biblicist. But when I hear them say that, I'm like, well, so do...

01:57:26

As far as being a Biblicist, you have Jehovah's Witnesses that would probably define themselves that way.

01:57:34

And you have all kinds of people who define themselves as Biblicist or say that I just stick to the

01:57:41

Bible. And they come up with all different kinds of unbiblical conclusions. So do you think it...

01:57:48

I mean, obviously, we are not eclipsing our allegiance to Christ by using a historic nickname like Calvinist, right?

01:57:58

We are not saying that he invented these things. In fact, if he did, I would have no part of this theology.

01:58:03

That's right. Again, it's getting into understanding the use of terminology, and perhaps a way to say it is that cliche truth in labeling and being clear on what we believe.

01:58:13

Just because someone says, I believe the Bible, well, what do you actually believe the Bible to teach? And that's like you just said, that's often the way many heresies and cultic groups, they say, well, it's just the

01:58:24

Bible. But then when you actually understand what they're teaching, it's against what the scriptures teach. Right.

01:58:30

Even though we believe in Sola Scriptura, the very scriptures, as I said earlier, that we believe are the only infallible, inerrant rule of faith that we have.

01:58:40

It's the only thing that we have that's God -breathed. Those very same scriptures teach us not only that we need elders, but it also gives certain qualifications for teachers.

01:58:50

And we'd be foolish to ignore those great men of God who are teachers that God rose up, who have provided us with innumerable volumes of powerful literature and theology and confessions and creeds and so on.

01:59:07

It'd be arrogance, I think, the height of arrogance to just ignore them. Well, I just want to make sure that our listeners know that the website for Grace Baptist Church of Carlisle, Pennsylvania, in the event that you either live near here or are visiting

01:59:22

Carlisle, is gracebaptistcarlisle .org. And Carlisle is spelled C -A -R -L -I -S -L -E.

01:59:30

gracebaptistcarlisle .org. And we hope that you come and visit us soon. Thank you so much, Pastor John Miller and Pastor Simon O'Maney for being my guest today.

01:59:37

I really loved every moment of it. And I look forward to your frequent return to Iron Trip and Zion Radio. I want to thank everybody who wrote in questions today.

01:59:44

I hope you all have a blessed, safe, and happy weekend and Lord's Day. And I hope you all always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater