August 23, 2018 Show with Thomas Evans on “Announcing the Return of Family Radio as Friend, Ally, & Platform for Christ’s 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, quote, 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 Arntzen. 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 Arntzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Thursday on this 23rd day of August 2018, and I do not believe that I am exaggerating when

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I say that today's interview is a historic radio event in the history of broadcasting, and I'm talking about my interview today for the very first time ever with Thomas Evans, President and General Manager of Family Radio and Family Stations Incorporated, and today we are announcing the return of Family Radio as friend, ally, and platform for Christ's Church, and it's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the very first time ever to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Tom Evans.

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Chris, pleasure. Pleasure to be with you. Thank you for the honor of inviting me onto your program.

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And I want to right away give our listeners our email address. If you have a question for Tom Evans about Family Radio, about the amazing transitions and transformations that the station is going through, the network is going through, please give us an email at ChrisArntzen at gmail .com,

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C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com. Please, as always, give us at least your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence, if you live outside the

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U .S .A., please only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter.

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Before we even go on to hear a summary of the history of Family Radio, and then, of course, more importantly, to announce these transitions that Family Radio is going through, are going through, especially because these are transformations that are answers to prayer.

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No doubt the prayers of many thousands of Christians globally that have longed for the day when

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Family Radio and Family Stations Incorporated had returned to an

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Orthodox position on theology and the Church of Jesus Christ.

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But I think it's a good idea for our listeners who are unfamiliar with you, Tom, for you to give a summary of your own salvation testimony, the kind of religious atmosphere you were raised in, if any, and what providential circumstances our

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Sovereign Lord raised up in your life that drew you to Him and saved you. Great, thanks,

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Chris. Yeah, I was raised in a large Catholic family in Southern California.

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And my parents moved the family to a town in Southern California, Newport Beach.

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It was there in and around 1980. We lived next door to a group of young men that were

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Christians who met together in the mornings, and one morning they invited me and said, Hey, Tom, why don't you come over and pray with us?

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And at first I was, I don't know if I want to do that, but over time I just observed these young men, and they seemed to be genuine.

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And so I agreed and went over, sat with them, prayed with them, and over the course of a couple of months they gave me a

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Bible. And I began to read the Bible, and God began to open my eyes.

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So it wasn't long, probably a year, year and a half, when God began to open my eyes to the truth of salvation, that it is indeed by grace, it is by His election rather than by our choice, and I began to just...

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One of the first changes that took place in my life was the belief, the conviction, that indeed the

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Bible is the Word of God. And that conviction has stayed with me throughout my life until this point.

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Praise God for that. And so how did you get involved in family radio? Great question.

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I was going to school, in fact I had read a book by a well -known

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Reformed pastor of the 19th century, and he suggested, there was a question, a young man asked him, what should

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I do to prepare for the ministry? And he said, get a degree, go get a degree in history or some kind of degree like that to help prepare you.

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That pastor's name was Charles Spurgeon. I found that path.

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I was accepted to Berkeley, here at UC Berkeley here in Northern California, and some friends of mine who were missionaries in Southern California, they're getting ready to go to Costa Rica, they said, hey

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Tom, when you're up in Northern California, look up this man by the name of Harold Camping.

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He had some of that is Reformed and someone that you can,

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I would like to, you know, we wanted to introduce you to. So I was a student working on campus, and I had a lot of time on my hand at night.

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I had a great job on campus. That allowed me to study, and I began to listen to the Open Forum program.

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So a matter of a couple of months, I finally went to that. Mr. Camping was hosting a

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Sunday school at a Christian Reformed church in Alameda, which is a neighboring town in Berkeley.

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Went there, began to, you know, sit under Mr. Camping's teaching, and one of the things that impressed me most at the time about Mr.

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Camping was his command of Scripture. He just, the man knew Scripture.

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So when I graduated, Mr. Camping approached me and said, hey

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Tom, why don't you come to work, consider coming to work for Family Radio? And that was in 1986. I did agree to that to my parents' chagrin, and I came to work for Family Radio in 1987.

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Now why was it to your parents' chagrin, just out of curiosity? Well my parents were

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Catholic, and thought that I was wasting my, wasting my education. Right. Well I think now that you have mentioned specifically

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Mr. Camping, why don't you tell us a brief history, a summarized history of Mr.

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Camping and how he founded Family Radio and how the network rose to the position of prominence in the

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Christian church as it had done, especially amongst Reformed Christians, that remained as a favorite and a bulwark of the truth until approximately 1993 or so.

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But if you could tell us about this story. Sure. I'd be glad to. Yeah, Family Radio was formed actually as a non -profit ministry in 1958, and went on the air, its first FM station, back when

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AM was, you know, FM's were not well known. The FM frequency was not well known amongst people, radio listeners,

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AM was the dominant. But Family Radio went on the air in, on February 4th, 1959, in a one

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FM station here in the San Francisco Bay Area. And so over the course of the next 30 years, 40 years,

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Family Radio continued, had a pretty broad lineup of a lot of different teachers and music, increasingly became well known.

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It was sort of a, in many circles, Family Radio was a pioneer, because we began as a listener -supported ministry entirely, and that was somewhat unusual back in that day, and even today it's still rare.

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Today Family Radio is still entirely listener -supported, but at the time it was very unusual.

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So Family Radio began to grow. When I started in 1987, there were eight stations throughout the

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U .S., eight major stations, New York, Los Angeles, San Diego.

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Then the next, in the 90s, there were a number of stations and the early 2000s, mid -2000s,

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Family Radio grew to 66 stations, and I think almost a hundred translators throughout the

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U .S. So it was a pretty, pretty large network. But things began to change, like you mentioned, in 1992.

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Mr. Camping gathered the staff here at Family Radio and told the staff that he was going, that he had written a book entitled 1994 and then had a question mark.

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And there was some dispute about that, but Mr. Camping from 1992 to 1994 began to actively talk about the end of the world possibly occurring.

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In fact, he said at one point, 99 .9 % sure that it was going to happen in September of 1994.

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Well, that came and went. And so there, so we,

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Family Radio went through a transition in the 90s. In fact, Mr. Camping had a, in 96, he had bypass surgery and, but things began to quiet and we, and listeners began to return to Family Radio.

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And then right around 2000, Mr. Camping came out with his end of the church age doctrine.

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He became convinced in his study of the book of Acts and the book of John, and he publicly began to announce on open forum and his family

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Bible study that indeed God had left the churches, or God, you know, the

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Holy Spirit. So that began and launched, you know, family, that drove a wedge obviously with the churches that created a tremendous amount of contention.

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And then you have in beginning in 2006, Mr. Camping came out with, actively came out with the 2011 prediction.

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And that started slow until Mr. Camping had an interview with a

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San Francisco news reporter who published his prediction. And that sort of launched the secular, actually

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Mr. Camping always said, you look, I'm not going to rely on the church at all. The church is not going to spread this news, but rather I'm going to rely on secular, the secular newspapers and media organizations to spread the word about the end of the world,

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May 21. You know, actually at the time it was October 21, 2011. Just to go back in time a little bit, so people have more of an idea of who

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Harold Camping was, he was a Christian Reformed Church elder, correct?

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Yes. And he was, was he an architect? Tell me something about where he was involved in the construction, construction field or the architectural field.

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Sure. He was an engineer. Engineer, right. Engineer by training. Yep. And he had started his own business after World War II.

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He had his own business, Camping Construction. He built, in fact, he specialized in building churches.

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He helped, he at the time was very much involved as a layman. In fact,

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I think he was one of very few laymen that were invited to the Synod. They had their annual

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Synod, the Christian Reformed Church. And he was very active. He was a very active member of the

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Christian Reformed denomination until his departure in 1988.

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And he departed in 88 for what reason? Because I know a lot of pastors departed the

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Christian Reformed Church over liberalism. Not that the pastors that left were liberal, but that the denomination was increasingly becoming more liberal.

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No, it wasn't for that reason. Well, I mean, I think that that was a contributing factor, but the, the, the consistory had asked

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Mr. Camping to step down briefly for a period of time as a teaching elder.

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And he, he refused to do that. So he said, no, I'm gonna, I'm a teacher, I'm gonna go, and I'm going to start, and basically start his own church.

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Oh, so that's what he did. And that was an independent church? Yeah, it was called the

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Bible Reformed Church of Alameda, and, or Reformed Bible Church of Alameda. In 1988, it probably took a couple years, because he tried to find, and I remember we tried to find a pastor who would be willing to come, because already then he was beginning to question the three forms of unity, the, you know, the, the canon of the tort, and the, some of the confessions.

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And that gave a lot of pastors pause, and they were not willing to unwind themselves already then with Mr.

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Camping, because, and this was in 87, no, excuse me, this was probably 89, 1989.

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And what were the specific reasons that the CRC gave for wanting him to step down from his position as elder back then?

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This is before the predictions of the end of the world, before the end of the

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Church Age teaching, what was, what were the specific reasons they gave that you know of anyway?

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Well, I, I don't know specifically. I wasn't in those meetings with Mr. Camping. Yeah, well, it is, well,

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Harold Camping, from my memory, has always been an anomaly amongst

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Reformed people, because he always struck me, as long as I was aware of him, and I have met him on,

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I had met him on several occasions at conferences, but he was an anomaly in that he seemed to be anti -confessional, in a very confessional, in a very confessional way, confessional circles of fellowship, if you will.

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I remember him clearly wearing the button, the Bible alone, or the

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Bible only, and of course, we who are Reformed, as I know you would agree, we are staunch adherents to the

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Reformation pillar, Sola Scriptura, but that does not mean that we only read our

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Bibles and never glean from the wisdom and brilliance of other Christians, not only from our own day, but from centuries past, and that would include the

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Confessions, which are really summaries of Biblical teaching. He always struck me as a bit out of step because of what appeared to be an anti -confessionalism.

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Was I correct in assuming that? I mean, I don't know Mr. Camping's heart.

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I do know that his personality was such that, you know, when he, he was thinking, you know, as he ran his business, he was trying to decide, well, what do

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I do with my life? And he thought about going to seminary. So he said, rather than go to seminary,

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I'm just going to teach myself, and he began to go, there was a, there was a, at Berkeley on the adjunct campus, there was a,

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I can't remember the name of it, but there was a seminary there, a school of theology that was connected to UC Berkeley.

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And he began to go to, you know, they had a pretty extensive library, and he began, you know, he got permission and went there and started studying some of the confessional, you know,

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Confessions, as well as some of the historical things. But Mr. Camping himself,

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I mean, I don't know him well enough to know what prompted him to begin to question the synodical or the

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Confessions, other than he just felt that the Bible had to be supreme. And some of the

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Confessions, I think he felt were, became more important to denominations than the actual

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Bible itself. Right. Well, of course, human beings being sinners can fall into that category, but as I remember, he would very frequently broad brush the entire church with charges.

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But first of all, let me also say in my own life that family radio has been an enormous blessing to me.

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Back in my early days of salvation, especially in the 80s, I was saved in the mid -1980s, and as Richard Homerous will testify,

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I frequently mailed in charges to my family tapes. Yes, there were things before CDs or MP3s.

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I used to mail in the old -fashioned cassette tapes for Conference Echoes, and there came a point where every single tape

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I would mail in was eventually played. They grew to trust my judgment over there, and a lot of folks were heard quite frequently.

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My own pastor at the time, Mike Gaydosh, who was pastor of Calvary Baptist Church in Amityville, and then later

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Grace Reformed Baptist Church of Long Island in Merrick, and Pastor Bill Shishko, who became a frequently heard voice on family radio, the pastor for many years at the

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Orthodox Presbyterian Church of Franklin Square, Long Island, New York, my friend Dr. James White, and many other men that I had met, fell in love with what they preached and sent the recordings.

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In fact, Richard Homerous and Bobby Hamlin, who were working for family radio,

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I understand at least Richard is still there, perhaps Bobby too, I don't know, but I remember they called me up and they wanted to interview me in New York City because I was working at the time for WMCA 570

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AM, a part of the Salem Media Network, and they interviewed me in Manhattan, it might have been

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Central Park, I can't remember exactly, but I just had a love for family radio, and then of course things started to unravel, just as you had stated in your brief history of the rise and downfall, theologically, of family radio.

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Yeah. One thing before I go to the major aspects that were the most serious departures from biblical orthodoxy embraced by Mr.

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Camping that we should highlight today, one of the things

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I was curious about, and you know, you can speak as freely as you care to on this, but when

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Mr. Camping was going through these transformations, for the worse, and what were the people working there thinking,

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I mean, was everybody following him in lockstep, thinking that he must be right because he is so wise and biblically literate or something, or was there rebellion against him, and of course this would have been rebellion in a rightful sense, people trying to stand for biblical truth, tell us about that situation, what was going on, as much as you can anyway.

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When I arrived in the late 80s, I used to talk about the two camps of family radio.

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I called them the Hatfields and McCoys. You know, it would be surprising you'd think that everybody at family radio would be aligned completely and everyone in agreement, but that wasn't true at all.

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In fact, even today, there's a mixture of people here at family radio, and yet, back in the 90s to 2000s, there definitely were two camps, and especially leading up to 2011.

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The people that remained at family radio were there for their own reasons. I can't look into anyone's heart, know what they, why, but basically people were there because they believed in the mission of family radio, getting the gospels, presenting the gospel, and they just put up with Mr.

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Camping because, one, for fear of reprisal or fear that he would, you know, who knows.

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They could lose your career. Well, it could be, I mean, and many people have been there for years and years.

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One of the things that, you know, is so sad and what had happened is that there were people at family radio for 50 years who were affected as a result of all this.

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Yeah, and as I mentioned to you before, back in the early 90s,

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Art Thompson, who was the general manager of WFRS, Family Radio, New Jersey, he requested that I come from Long Island for a job interview.

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This is while I was working for WMCA, 570 AM, Salem Media. He asked me to come in for an interview because he knew of my experience in radio, and the day that I came in, he was at the

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Japanese restaurant with me, treating me to lunch before our interview, and he apologized that he had been fired that morning because he was in open opposition to the 1994 prediction of the end of the world.

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Yeah, I don't know they, you know, you had mentioned that, and I don't know all the specifics, but I don't think that was unusual.

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I am surprised that Mr. Camping would, Mr. Camping generally wouldn't fire people.

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What he would do is basically just not, you know, just wouldn't include you.

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I mean, there was this, at Family Radio, what was called the inner circle, and people that were in that camp were very loyal, but nevertheless, that's the past.

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All of that we have learned from the past, and we realize, lookit, this is not, this is no longer the direction of Family Radio.

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The Lord took Mr. Camping, you know, back in December of 2013, and since that time, since 2014,

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Family Radio has been on a completely different mission. In fact, our mission statement in, you know,

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Family Radio is not, no longer has anything to do with the teachings, the doctrines of Mr.

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Camping, and basically, it's just a basically, listen, I want to, I do want to humbly apologize to those who are listening here who were affected by Family Radio, and you can imagine, in my position, you know, it's like the devastation that has occurred, that did occur.

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If you can imagine waking up on May 22nd, 2011, and realizing, wow, what did we just do?

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What did we just do? And yet, Family Radio can learn, and we have learned from that experience.

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God in His mercy has transformed this organization.

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We are no longer advocating any of that, and rather what we do hold on to, and I was talking about this earlier today with Scott and Pastor Joe.

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You know, a surgeon, when a surgeon goes in and performs brain surgery on a person, especially if that, if a tumor is in a very sensitive area, he goes in there very carefully and tries to excite the cancer without destroying or killing the patient, and without destroying healthy tissue.

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Family Radio has been doing that the last seven years. We've been trying to extract the false teaching, while at the same time keeping intact

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Family Radio's core beliefs in the Bible, beliefs in salvation by grace, all of these things, keeping our core music, what we stand for, why we do what we do, why is

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Family Radio here? We are here to comfort the saints and to proclaim the gospel of the

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Lord Jesus Christ. That is the only reason we're here. We're not here to defend.

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I cannot defend Mr. Camping. I will not, but rather it's time now to let it go.

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Let go, apologize, repent, turn away from what we did, acknowledging, look it, we did, we made a mess.

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We made a mess of things. We caused deep schism in the church, and I see that, and it affected my family.

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I have four small children, and it affected them. It affected my wife.

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It affected me personally. As you can imagine, waking up and realizing that I had devoted my life to something that was false.

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I never intended that. I came to work at Family Radio for this ministry because I believed in the need of the gospel and for people to hear the word of God, and now we got so far away from that, it's time now to get back, to go back to that, and let go of the past.

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Amen. And thrive forward. Amen. Well, it is such a blessing to hear you say those words, and we have to go to our very first break right now.

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If anybody would like to join us with a question of your own, and we already do have some people waiting, and I ask you to be patient with us as we will try to get to all of the questions that come in as time will allow, but if you have a question of your own, our email address is

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

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Please give us your first name, your city and state, and your 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. Don't go away,

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God willing, we'll be right back with Tom Evans, and more on the transformation of family radio.

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My name is Steve Lawson, founder and president of One Passion Ministries, as well as teaching fellow for Ligonier Ministries.

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I serve as professor of preaching and oversee the Doctor of Ministry program at the Master's Seminary in Los Angeles.

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I would like to recommend the church where one of my preaching students, Andy Woodard, serves as the pastor.

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It's called New Covenant Church, NYC. They are a Reformed Baptist church that meets in midtown

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Manhattan. You can find their service times and location on their website, which is www .ncc

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.nyc. They believe in a sovereign God who commands all men everywhere to repent and believe the gospel.

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If you're looking for a church that believes in expository preaching, which is simply biblical preaching, in New York City, I'd like to recommend that you visit

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New Covenant Church, NYC. Again, their information can be found at www .ncc

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.nyc. Have a great day. I'm delighted that my friend

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Chris Arnzen and I will be heading down to Atlanta for the G3 conference, where I'll be joining

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James White, Steve Lawson, Vodie Baucom, Mark Dever, Conrad Mbewe, Todd Friel, Josh Bice, and a host of other speakers to address the topic of biblical understanding of missions.

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Chris Arnzen and I hope to see you all at this very important conference from January 17th through the 19th.

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Make sure you stop by the Iron Sharpens Iron Exhibitor's booth to say hi to Chris. For more details, go to g3conference .com.

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That's g3conference .com. See you there. Bye now.

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FirstLoveRadio .org also live streams my Iron Sharpens Iron radio program daily.

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Please stick around on FirstLoveRadio .org after Iron Sharpens Iron radio is over to continue being blessed by the unwavering proclamation of the

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Gospel of Sovereign Grace. Spread the word about FirstLoveRadio .org. He who never quotes will never be quoted.

32:59

He who will not use the thoughts of other men's brains proves that he has no brains of his own.

33:04

You need to read. And don't forget to continue to pray for Mike Gadosz, the founder of Solid Ground Christian Books.

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He entered the hospital today for surgery prep and is scheduled to go into surgery the first thing tomorrow morning.

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This is a very serious, very delicate, very complicated and very dangerous open heart surgery.

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Not every heart surgeon is familiar or has expertise in this particular procedure that needs to be done.

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So please pray for Mike Gadosz. He means the world to me. He was my pastor for a number of years, especially during my formative years as a

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Christian. He was the one that baptized me. He was so instrumental in being my mentor and training me up in the faith.

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And he was a frequently heard voice on family radio, the old family radio prior to 1994.

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His voice was very often heard on the conference Echoes program, which was later renamed

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Echoes. And I just ask of you to pray for him. Pray that we hear wonderful praise reports very soon that he has had a very successful surgery and that he is going to be a stronger and healthier man physically than he has been in years.

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But even more so, a stronger and healthier man spiritually as a result of this trial that our loving and merciful and gracious Lord has placed him in.

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So please continue to pray for Mike Gadosz, founder of solid -ground -books .com.

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We are now back with our interview with Tom Evans, the president and general manager of Family Radio and Family Stations Incorporated.

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And if you have any questions of your own, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com. Tom, I would like to hear from you what you believe were the primary and most serious aberrant teachings that Mr.

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Camping developed. I know that he had predicted the end of the world as we already were discussing and he became a preacher of the false teaching that the church had become the enemy of Christ and that Christ had become the enemy of the church.

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The end of the church age had already begun as if there were such a thing.

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In fact, I don't know if you even realized this, Tom, but I urged

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James White, Dr. James R. White of Alpha Omega Ministries years ago, back in the early 2000s, to write a book on this, which he did.

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And I actually named the book. I gave the book its title,

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I should say, Dangerous Airwaves Harold Camping Refuted and Christ's Church Defended.

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And actually, being an art major, I did the cover artwork for that book by Dr. James R. White. And Mr.

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Camping agreed to conduct a debate with Dr. James R. White on Iron Sherpa's Iron Radio when we were broadcasting out of Long Island, New York.

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And that was a four -day event because in addition to the two days they were debating, I had them each on alone as guests so that they could articulate their views before the debate.

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And one thing that I was quite pleasantly surprised about is that Harold Camping actually told me, even though he disagreed with James White's conclusions in Dangerous Airwaves, he actually told me on the phone that he thought

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James did a great job. I still don't fully understand that, but he was not at all derogatory in his remarks against the book

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Dangerous Airwaves that James wrote. But, so let's move on to some of the other primary teachings that Mr.

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Camping began to highlight towards the end of his ministry, even teachings that he himself vociferously opposed at one time.

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I know that listening to Open Forum, the most recognizable program that identified with Harold Camping, the live show that he did where he took any questions that listeners had.

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I can even remember Seventh Day Adventists frequently calling in and challenging him on his views of eternal conscious punishment.

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And then he eventually came to deny those teachings himself and became a believer in annihilation.

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But if you could, tell us about some of these primary teachings where he went far from the biblical mark.

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Wow, that's a big topic. Where do you start in something like that? Yeah, Mr.

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Camping, when I first met him, he had a unique, already then in the 80s, he believed in the deeper spiritual meaning in the

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Bible. So basically what he...Mr. Camping believed in the three levels of meaning, the historical, grammatical, and then the deeper spiritual meaning.

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Mr. Camping began to teach early on about how numbers in the

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Bible can represent specific things, doctrinal issues, spiritual meanings, and have meaning in and of themselves.

39:23

And so he began to assemble this together, and it really was...Mr. Camping created a biblical structure, and that, you know, specifically around the end of the

39:37

Church Age, something that for those who are listening who are still avid supporters of Mr.

39:45

Camping, one of the things that I don't think a lot of people who supported Mr. Camping understand is that if they still believe in the end of the

39:53

Church Age, they must believe that we're at the end of the world, because one of the core teachings of the end of the

40:01

Church Age is that it is the beginning point of the end of the world,

40:07

God's final judgment. That's really what kind of got me. You know, after Mr.

40:12

Camping's passing, I began to look very carefully at the core of what...the

40:19

basis of what Mr. Camping believed. I don't want to get off too far on this, other than to say that in my own personal study,

40:29

I realized that there were several presuppositions that Mr. Camping made that are not supportable.

40:37

And so what he did basically is he...Mr. Camping established private interpretation.

40:45

When he had a stroke in June of 2011, all of that teaching, all of that knowledge went away.

40:54

No one else had that...possessed that. So basically, the doctrines that Mr.

41:00

Camping taught, the end of the Church Age, the timeline of history, all of that pretty much went with Mr.

41:07

Camping's memory when he lost it. So now, that helped me personally to come to grips with the fact that this is private interpretation.

41:18

Wow, you're teaching me something about his personal history that I never knew before. Yeah, he...you

41:26

know, Mr. Camping kept saying, the fact is, he would say that repeatedly.

41:34

He believed it himself. Mr. Camping, being with him the way I was, I had...I spent a lot of time with him.

41:41

He genuinely believed that the world would end and that Christ would come for his church on May 21, 2011.

41:48

So it wasn't an act. It wasn't a publicity stunt. But one of the things that I recall on June...what

41:58

was it, May 23rd, the following Monday, after the prediction came and went,

42:04

Mr. Camping had a...what do you call it? A press conference.

42:11

I was there with him, in that room, and one of the things that struck me with Mr.

42:17

Camping was, though he was shell -shocked, though he was, you could see, visibly drained, he was as stalwart and as defiant as ever.

42:32

He was a man of his word. Nothing changed in him. He thought, well, we made a mistake, yes, but then he shifted and talked about, you know,

42:43

May 21 being a silent judgment, or a silent coming of Christ. And that did it for me.

42:49

I began to think, there's something wrong here. That sounds like Jehovah's Witness teaching.

42:57

Well, I mean, I don't know Jehovah's Witnesses very well, but yes, there was a lot more, increasingly more and more,

43:03

Mr. Camping isolated himself, isolated family radio. He was not open to hearing anything, anyone, any other idea outside of his own.

43:14

He did surround himself with a cadre of people who did encourage him, in fact, found scriptures that would help to shore up what he believed, but sometime in June, I forget the date, he had a major stroke, and that was it.

43:33

All of that came crashing down, and then the

43:38

Lord took him in December of 2013, but one of the things I want to mention about Mr.

43:44

Camping, in my private conversations with him after, one of the things he did say to me privately is,

43:54

Tom, I'm grateful for God's forgiveness. So I do not know where he stood with the

44:03

Lord, but I do know that he cared deeply about God's forgiveness and God's grace.

44:12

And I think that's a lesson that we all can learn here. Yeah, praise God. Yeah. It kept me going.

44:21

All of us going is, God has been faithful. God has been faithful. We are not, but God is faithful.

44:27

And that's a powerful lesson, a needful lesson that we all need to come to grips and learn.

44:34

God's faithfulness. I want people to know about this God. I want for them to meet Him through the pages of Scripture.

44:42

That is why we've stopped being the guardian of truth or the, you know,

44:49

San Lourido became a denomination all of its own. We're no longer that. The Bible is

44:55

God's word. It is, and God is a teacher. We look to God provides.

45:00

I want to just make mention of something. I want to apologize to the pastors that may be listening now and may come to hear about Family Radio.

45:12

And I want to apologize to you personally. I'm very sorry for what, in my part,

45:20

I can't do. I apologize for Mr. Camping, but I can apologize as the president of Family Stations that we were wrong to you.

45:30

And I want you to know that I personally am very sorry for the way that we, we actually despised the body, the body of Christ.

45:40

And we had no business doing that. So to you pastors who may be listening, please forgive me and forgive

45:50

Family Radio. Amen. I just want to retrace some of the things that you said about his aberrant teachings, because I do think this is important, especially for those who are still clinging to them and also for those who are completely unfamiliar with Harold Camping.

46:08

There are people who have been raised in the church and are now young adults who none of their

46:14

Christian experience involves Family Radio because Family Radio theologically collapsed before they can even remember thinking.

46:24

But going back to the allegorical or spiritual interpretations of scripture, obviously every

46:32

Christian believes that there are many teachings in the

46:37

Bible, many words in the Bible, phrases in the Bible, that are meant either to be viewed allegorically or spiritually, or that they have both a literal and allegorical meaning.

46:53

Obviously we would all be Roman Catholic if we believed that at the Lord's Supper Jesus was actually teaching his disciples that they were eating his literal flesh and drinking his literal blood.

47:05

But it's really that Harold Camping went hyper -allegorical with these things, hyper -spiritual, and began performing eisegesis, inserting things in the

47:15

Bible that were never intended to be there by the authors who wrote words that were

47:22

God -breathed, and the numerology and all these things. These were things that he was coming up with without any historical precedent and without even basis in the original languages of the

47:38

Bible. Isn't that really more what you meant about his errors in that regard? Yeah, I mean, we know that, you know,

47:47

I certainly have come to learn and believe that in order to truly understand the

47:53

Bible, you must be born again. And that, you know, you must have the presence of the

48:00

Holy Spirit dwelling within you individually to really come to understand the

48:05

Bible. One of the things that Mr. Camping did was he created his own hermeneutic.

48:12

And by utilizing the spiritual meanings as he established them, you could, anyone could unlock the mysteries of the

48:22

Bible. And unfortunately what that did was it created, like you said, it created a lot of aberrance.

48:29

Anyone can pretty much describe any meaning they want to the Bible then.

48:35

So he departed from the traditional historical grammatical hermeneutic and went completely in the direction that the

48:48

Bible interprets itself and that we can, by utilizing, implementing, putting in place certain spiritual meanings, you can find the true, you can find the true meaning of the

49:00

Bible. But I think where he went astray is that he began to more, you can see this, you can begin to see when somebody isolates themselves when they are not surrounded by, you know, we read and there's a multitude of counselors there in safety.

49:23

Even that, Mr. Camping interpreted and said, no, that doesn't mean the counselors are not fellow believers or fellow, you know, pastors or teachers, but rather it's the scriptures themselves.

49:37

That, you know, so he isolated himself, became his own and believed himself to be the

49:43

Moses of his day. Yeah, that's a very key thing there. God, I happen to be

49:51

Reformed, a Reformed Baptist to be more specific. I believe that the 1689

49:57

London Baptist Confession of Faith is an accurate summary of the scriptures. Obviously the scriptures have no equal, the scriptures are

50:06

God -breathed, no confession or creed is God -breathed. But I believe that the confessions of the

50:12

Reformed faith accurately teach that the Bible has designed for the church a plurality of elders.

50:21

And I think it would be foolish, even though family radio is not a church or was not a church, never will be a church, it would be wise for not only family radio but every

50:32

Christian even in business to understand that God's wisdom is what produced the concept, the polity of the plurality of elders.

50:48

And I think that when one man sets himself up as the sole ruler in a church or a ruler that is far superior to all others, even if he doesn't say it in those words or doesn't have it written down that way, but basically acts that way and expects everybody to treat him that way, you are setting yourself up for catastrophe.

51:11

And I think that's exactly what happened here with family radio and Harold Camping. I agree with you

51:19

Chris, I want to make something clear here. Family radio does not endorse that at all.

51:28

I am not a theologian, I'm not trying to carry on Mr. Camping's mantle. God led me to that conviction many years ago.

51:39

I am not Harold Camping, you know, Jr. So family radio, as far as I'm concerned, family radio has no right to present itself as any kind of authority.

51:57

I'm not a theologian, I have no training in that. Family radio's purpose really today, all we really are here for, is to present the

52:08

Bible. And we do that. I mean, you look at some of our programming. We have a program recently, probably the last two years, that's called

52:15

Through the Bible in a Year. All it is, is every day there are from January 1 to December 31, we go through the

52:26

Bible. And so if someone wants to jump on and listen to family radio and hear the Bible every day, and wants to commit themselves to hearing the

52:35

Bible in a year, they can do so. So the Bible itself, family radio, all we're here for is to produce the

52:42

Bible, I mean, to declare the Bible. Alright, but that's why we have reacquainted ourselves with pastors, teachers, ministries that are faithful to Scripture.

52:54

A couple of years ago, well boy, a year and a half ago, we brought on two new syndicated programs,

53:00

Alistair Begg's and R .C. Scroll's Renewing Your Mind. We've been very blessed by these things.

53:09

I can't speak enough about these two organizations, Truth for Life and Renewing Your Mind. These individuals, or these groups, are faithfully trying to present the

53:22

Bible. I've been so impressed by both Alistair's, you know, just his heart, the way that he, his commitment, as well as R .C.

53:34

Scroll. My only regret with Ligonier is I wish I would have met R .C. Scroll personally. I wish I could have spent some time with that man.

53:42

Amen. God definitely gifted him. And the way that he was able to extract, oh man,

53:48

I mean, talk about a theologian. Amen.

53:54

I thank God that I had the providence and privilege and honor to interview

54:00

Dr. Scroll once, and he wrote a glowing endorsement for Iron Troupe and Zion Radio that has been a prized and cherished and treasured possession of mine because it absolutely blew me away when his secretary emailed me that endorsement because she had to do it for him because Dr.

54:21

Scroll did not use a computer. So he had it actually typed out on stationery and signed it with a pen, and she scanned it and emailed it to me.

54:31

But I just treasure that. And I did have the opportunity, thanks be to God, to meet him face -to -face as well on several occasions.

54:39

Yeah, I've heard stories about him, about his personality. But my wife and I listen pretty much, because it's on Family Radio in the mornings here, 8 o 'clock here on the

54:52

West Coast, as well as Central Time and then, what is it, 9 a .m.? 9 a .m. Eastern and Mountain.

55:00

So if you want to be blessed by his ministry, I would encourage you to tune in to local

55:06

Family Radio. There's a plug there for Family Radio. But I just want to, if I could,

55:12

Chris, go back to and just talk about, maybe get into Family Radio's position on the local church.

55:19

Sure, we'll do that when we come back from our break. This is our elongated break. And just to remind our listeners, we take this very long break in the middle, at least 12 to 14 minutes break, because Grace Life Radio and 90 .1

55:37

FM in Lake City, Florida, they air this program in a rerun format every day, twice a day in morning and evening drive.

55:45

And they require this long break because they air their own public service announcements and commercials to localize the program there in Lake City, Florida.

55:56

So I ask of you to please be patient while we take this break. I also ask of you to write down your questions for our guest today,

56:02

Tom Evans, president of Family Radio and Family Stations Incorporated, and also to write down the information provided by our advertisers so that you can patronize them.

56:13

Because the more frequently you patronize our advertisers, the longer they are likely to remain our advertisers, which means that the longer we are likely to remain in existence because we rely upon their advertising dollars.

56:26

So if you have a question for Tom Evans, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

56:33

That's C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com. Please give us at least your first name, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside the

56:45

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

56:52

Don't go away, God willing we'll be right back after these station breaks with more of Tom Evans and the transformation of Family Radio.

57:05

Chris Arnzen, host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio here. I want to tell you about a man I have personally known for many years.

57:12

His name is Dan Buttafuoco. Dan is a personal injury and medical malpractice lawyer, but not the type that typically comes to mind.

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Dan cares about people and is a theologian himself. Recently he wrote a book titled Consider the

57:26

Evidence for the Bible. Ravi Zacharias wrote the foreword. Dan also has a master's degree in theology.

57:34

Dan handles serious injury and medical malpractice cases in all 50 states. He represents many

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Christians in serious injury matters all over the country. Dan is an exceptional trial lawyer.

57:46

He wrote the test for the National Board of Trial Advocacy. And currently his firm has over 100 cases that have settled for $1 million or more, and in approximately 10 different states.

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In Illinois, his lawyers had the fourth largest settlement in the state's history. In New York, his case involving a paralyzed police officer made the front page of the

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Law Journal. If you have a serious personal injury or medical malpractice claim in any state,

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I recommend that you call Dan. Consultations are free. There is no fee unless you win.

58:23

Dan Buttafuoco's number is 1 -800 -669 -4878. 1 -800 -669 -4878.

58:31

Or email me for Dan's contact information at chrisarnson at gmail .com.

58:37

That's chrisarnson at gmail .com. James White here, co -founder of Alpha and Omega Ministries, and occasional guest on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

59:05

I'm so delighted. My friend Chris Arnson will be heading down to Atlanta for the next G3 conference from January 17th to the 19th, 2019, where I'll be joining a very impressive lineup of speakers on the theme,

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A Biblical Understanding of Missions. Speakers include John Piper, Steve Lawson, Bodhi Baucom, Mark Dever, Conrad Mbewe, Phil Johnson, Josh Bice, yours truly, and many more.

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I hope you all join Chris and me for this phenomenal event. For more details, go to g3conference .com.

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Chris Arnzen of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. We just have a couple of more announcements to give you before we return to Tom Evans of Family Radio, first of which is the event that I have helped to organize in Switzerland, Florida, coming up very soon.

01:10:00

This is the event at the Gordon -Conwell Theological Seminary in Jacksonville, Florida, which is right near Switzerland.

01:10:11

The Gordon -Conwell Theological Seminary has a Jacksonville campus, and they are having an event with my friend

01:10:16

Dr. James R. White of Alpha Omega Ministries and Dr. Michael L. Brown of the Line of Fire radio program.

01:10:24

That is going to be titled, or is titled, A House -Mended Christian Unity in a

01:10:30

Culture of Outrage. That's Friday night, September 7th, 630 at the

01:10:36

Gordon -Conwell Theological Seminary in Jacksonville, Florida. For more information, you can go to one of the churches sponsoring this event,

01:10:44

SwitzerlandCommunityChurch .org, SwitzerlandCommunityChurch .org. The following night,

01:10:49

Saturday, September 8th, there's going to be a debate actually held at the Switzerland Community Church.

01:10:55

This is a debate that once again involves my friend Dr. James R. White of Alpha Omega Ministries and Michael L.

01:11:02

Brown of the Line of Fire program. They are going to be debating two practicing homosexuals that believe that this is an acceptable desire and behavior amongst

01:11:14

Christians, that God is not opposed to this in the new covenant. And the theme of the debate is, is homosexuality consistent with New Testament obedience?

01:11:25

A very important debate in the 21st century, especially when this sin has run rampant in this nation.

01:11:33

If you would like more details on this debate, which is also free of charge, go to SwitzerlandCommunityChurch .org,

01:11:41

SwitzerlandCommunityChurch .org. That's Saturday, September 8th at 6 30 p .m.

01:11:46

Then coming up in November, we just mentioned earlier the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals.

01:11:53

Well, they are having their annual Quakertown Conference on Reform Theology. That's November 9th and the 10th at the

01:12:00

Grace Bible Fellowship Church in Quakertown, Pennsylvania. I intend to be there with an Iron Sharpens Iron exhibitors booth.

01:12:06

The theme is the glory of the cross and the speakers include David Garner, Ray Ortland, Richard Phillips, Timothy Gibson, and Carlton Winn.

01:12:14

If you'd like more details, go to AllianceNet .org, AllianceNet .org, click on events, and then scroll down to the

01:12:20

Quakertown Conference on Reform Theology. And then coming up in January, you've been hearing it advertised every day for quite a while here on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

01:12:29

That's the G3 Conference, which stands for Gospel, Grace, and Glory, which will be held

01:12:35

Thursday, January 17th through Saturday, January 19th at the Georgia International Convention Center in College Park, Georgia, a suburb of Atlanta.

01:12:44

They are expecting between four and five thousand people. The theme this January is the mission of God, a biblical understanding of missions.

01:12:52

And by the way, if you know Spanish -speaking and bilingual folks, they are having a special Spanish -speaking edition of the conference on Wednesday, January 16th.

01:13:01

But for the English -speaking conference, they have a long list of speakers, amazing speakers that I'm sure most of you will immediately recognize.

01:13:12

The list includes my friend Dr. James R. White of Alpha Omega Ministries, Paul Washer, John Piper, Stephen Lawson, Voti Baucom, Mark Dever, Conrad M.

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Bayway, Tim Challies, Phil Johnson of John MacArthur's Grace to You ministry. We have

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Todd Friel of Wretched TV and Wretched Radio, Stephen J. Nichols, who is the president of Reformation Bible College, the college founded by the late

01:13:37

Dr. R .C. Sproul and Ligonier Ministries, and many more are on that roster. If you'd like to register, go to g3conference .com,

01:13:45

g3conference .com, and also I would strongly urge you to register for an exhibitors booth, in addition to just attending, if you have a business or ministry that you want to publicize amongst the crowd of between four and five thousand people there.

01:14:02

Go to g3conference .com, g3conference .com. Last but not least, if you love this program, you don't want it to disappear, go to ironsharpensironradio .com,

01:14:11

click support, then click, click to donate now, and you could donate instantly with a debit or credit card to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

01:14:18

We need your donations and your advertising dollars in order to survive. If you'd like to advertise with us, send us an email and put advertising in the subject line and send that to chrisarnson at gmail .com,

01:14:31

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01:14:39

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01:14:47

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01:15:03

click support, and then click, click to donate now, and you can also send in a check via the old -fashioned way when the snail mail address appears on your screen by clicking support at ironsharpensironradio .com.

01:15:17

But now we are taking emails again for our guest today, Tom Evans, the president of Family Radio.

01:15:24

chrisarnsen at gmail .com is the email address chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

01:15:32

And just one other thing I'd like to bring up before we go on to the positive direction of Family Radio and its very high view of the church that they have reclaimed, for lack of a better term.

01:15:47

When I interviewed Mr. Camping back in the early 2000s, or perhaps even somewhere in the neighborhood of 2010 or 11,

01:16:01

Mr. Camping, when I mentioned that in the book of Revelation we see that those from out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation will be worshiping the

01:16:13

Lamb, and I said to him, since you believe the end of the world is just around the corner, how could that be true since there are still, in our modern day, tribes and tongues and peoples that have not been evangelized?

01:16:29

There are still, on this planet, people groups that have not yet heard the gospel.

01:16:35

I said how could this be a true picture of the church from every tribe and tongue and people and nation, if the church, if the world is going to end any day now?

01:16:47

And his answer to me shocked me because I did not know this before speaking to him on the air.

01:16:53

He said, you do not need to believe in Jesus to be saved. He said the old covenant saints did not believe in Jesus.

01:17:00

You just need to cry out to God, just cry out to God. That was something that stopped me in my tracks.

01:17:07

I had never heard him say that before, that you did not need to believe in Jesus as long as you cry out to God. I'm assuming this would be one of those very serious aberrations that you are departing from, or have departed from completely.

01:17:23

Yeah, I'm not going to defend that, nor am I going to get into that. I wasn't there, but no, we don't have, certainly we don't believe that.

01:17:31

We're at family stations, the Lord Jesus Christ is everything, and without him there is no salvation.

01:17:39

So contextually, I don't know why

01:17:44

Mr. Camping said it, so I don't even want to talk about that. Chris, I just think that we all know, you know, neither is there salvation in any other, and there is no other name given among men whereby we must be saved.

01:17:59

So the Lord Jesus is everything, and no family station doesn't advocate that at all. Well, praise

01:18:05

God for that, and I'm assuming he meant by that in some inclusivistic way that Jesus Christ does save you, but you don't need to know that.

01:18:15

I'm assuming that's what he meant by that. But let's, for now, before we go to some listener questions, move on to some of the very positive and history -making information that you care to share about how

01:18:30

Family Radio is being transformed and returning to some very core biblical teachings, including the very high view, the very biblical view of the

01:18:41

Church of Jesus Christ, the local Church of Jesus Christ. Sure. For me, one of the transition points was in my own study of places like 1

01:18:52

Corinthians 12 and Ephesians 4, and there God speaks about the body, the body of Christ being many members.

01:19:00

And then in Ephesians chapter 4, he talks about pastors, evangelists, teachers being in the body for the sake of God's people, and so that individual believers wouldn't be tossed to and fro by every wind of doctrine.

01:19:20

So Family Radio is a case in point that we can be tossed to and fro by every wind of doctrine when there are not pastors, teachers, evangelists who

01:19:30

God has raised up and who God has put in place. You know, if you read in Ephesians chapter 4, he does say, if I can find it here, in verse 11 of Ephesians 4, and it gave some apostles and some prophets and some evangelists and some pastors and teachers for the perfecting of the saint, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ.

01:19:58

The signal change at Family Radio is we want to edify the body of Christ, not sit here and poke and condemn the body of Christ.

01:20:06

We are no longer, I mean, the foot can't say, or the eye can't say to the foot, I have no need of you.

01:20:11

And Family Radio, I'm sorry. I regret. We were guilty of that. We were guilty of saying to the other parts of the body of Christ, we don't need you anymore.

01:20:21

We know the truth. We got it. Thank you very much. And leave us alone and let us, you know, the end of the world's coming.

01:20:30

But we no longer teach that. We no longer believe that. We understand that the

01:20:36

Church itself does need to be edified and that the

01:20:41

Church, the body of Christ, is fitly joined together and interdependent. And just as we depend on Christ Jesus, the individual members of the body depend on one another, and God has brought us together.

01:20:56

Wow, what a...the body of Christ, what an amazing thing that it is.

01:21:04

And now God fitly joins each piece together and gives the member parts different talents and abilities.

01:21:11

We should celebrate that. We should rejoice in that. We should seek to encourage one another, edify one another, build one another up, rather than the contrary.

01:21:21

So, family stations, family radio, no longer, absolutely no longer, condemns the local congregation, nor do we sit here and say that we know the truth and we alone.

01:21:35

Praise God. And I remember you mentioning before that you no longer identify yourselves as the arbiters of truth or the defenders of truth.

01:21:48

I think the key word there would be THE, because you obviously want to be a Defender of Truth, just not consider yourselves to be

01:21:57

THE, capital T -H -E, Defender of Truth. Right, Chris. Remember I said

01:22:02

I use the analogy of a surgeon going in and excising cancer, but not trying to harm the healthy tissue surrounding it?

01:22:11

That's what we're trying to do. As we go forward at Family Radio, we're trying to take the... I mean, we have an incredible opportunity here to really build upon the truth of the

01:22:23

Bible and to focus on the things that remain, the truth of the gospel that we are sought, we are saved by grace, through faith, that is the gift of God.

01:22:36

And faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God. So we trust that.

01:22:41

We want to let the Bible go, proclaim it openly, and get out of the way and stop trying to manipulate it.

01:22:50

But it doesn't mean that we lay down and say, well, we're open to any and every doctrine either.

01:22:56

Of course. We want to stay consistent, we want to align ourselves with ministries, partners, pastors who genuinely embrace the true gospel, the gospel of salvation by grace.

01:23:11

And that we are doing wholeheartedly. In fact, I want to mention that last

01:23:16

Sunday, we aired Dr. James Boyd on Family Radio, first time for...

01:23:25

I don't know when the last time he was on the air at Family Radio, but I do recall that in the late 90s,

01:23:31

Dr. Boyd was a regular on Family Radio. But now, we rejoice that last

01:23:37

Sunday, the last Lord's Day that Dr. Boyd was again heard on Family Radio.

01:23:43

Well, you should be very pleased to know that I just received an email from Robert Brady, the

01:23:50

Executive Director of the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals. And he is so excited that the

01:23:57

Bible Study Hour and Dr. Barnhouse and John MacArthur and Alistair Begg and R .C.

01:24:04

Sproul are returning to the Family Radio network. He just wanted to share his enthusiasm and excitement and his thanks to God and also his congratulations to you for this wonderful news.

01:24:21

Chris, I thank you, but I want to make one... just one thing you said. We have not...

01:24:29

great to you, it's not. But we... okay. But we are talking to them.

01:24:38

Okay. Well, that's okay. It just hasn't been finalized yet, you're saying? No. Okay. Well, that's what

01:24:43

Bob Brady said, but I guess he was jumping the gun there a bit. Um, we have a couple of listeners...

01:24:51

a number of listeners, actually, with questions. We have Daniel in Pearland, Texas, who asks,

01:25:00

Why was nothing done to stop Mr. Camping when they could have pulled the plug on him?

01:25:06

We have wonderful friends who still have not returned back to the church. That's Daniel in Pearland, Texas.

01:25:15

Wow. Basically, because there was not anyone capable of stopping him.

01:25:24

I mean, he was the... in the highest level of authority there at the station. Mr. Camping?

01:25:32

Yes. Yes. That... yes, indeed. He was the...

01:25:38

pretty much, he ran the show. And, you know, I'm not going to say anything more than...

01:25:44

other than there was not anyone within leadership capable of doing that.

01:25:51

Right. Well, thank you, Daniel. And by the way, since you are a first -time questioner, you have won a free

01:25:57

New American Standard Bible. And if you give us your full mailing address in Pearland, Texas, our sponsor is

01:26:04

Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service, cvbbs .com. We'll ship that out to you at no charge to you or to us.

01:26:10

And we thank the publishers of the New American Standard Bible for providing us with these Bibles for first -time questioners.

01:26:17

We have another first -time questioner, Lawrence in Lafayette, California, who says, if Family Radio has truly repented, why is

01:26:26

Harold Camping still on the air? They still have him in a slot, one of those...

01:26:32

They still have him in a slot, one of those old teachings. It's a little bit grammatically off, but I think we understand what he's saying.

01:26:40

If you could respond to Lawrence in Lafayette, California. I'd be glad to.

01:26:47

Look, if you... anyone who's listened to Family Radio over the course of the last five years, following May, you know, 2011,

01:26:55

Mr. Camping was on the air, boy, at least five and a half hours a day. Today, he's on a half an hour.

01:27:03

We're trying to make incremental change, trying not to, you know, we're definitely making changes in that.

01:27:13

And yes, you know, one might ask, well, why do you still have Mr. Camping? Well, the only thing

01:27:19

I can say about that is, one, we're trying to cull all of his archives.

01:27:28

We're trying to slowly make change. We, you know, under...

01:27:34

Since I became the president, I've tried to make slow but pronounced, definite change, and we're a work in progress.

01:27:45

And we are indeed editing his programs. We're culling them down.

01:27:51

We're not including any of the real aberrant doctrines that he held before, but rather trying to stick with the core of the

01:28:01

Bible, salvation by grace. Yeah, Rome was not built in a day.

01:28:10

Yeah, and so we're just trying to do this slowly, faithfully, find our way, and depending on God, looking to him to, you know, give us wisdom, how we can do this without completely destroying those listeners.

01:28:29

And I want to get back to this gentleman who asked the question from Texas. And I want to just take opportunity to talk to or to apologize to those who, listeners, those who are affected by Mr.

01:28:45

Camping and his teaching. You know, I saw, I heard about a documentary that was done, and there was a couple, and this couple, the wife was pregnant, and she was, she and her husband were, before May 21, were passing out drafts.

01:29:08

And when I think of that couple... That's okay, brother, take your time.

01:29:24

Take your time, brother. I think about my three -year -old daughter, and let me apologize to you.

01:29:44

And if you're listening or if you hear Family Radio today, this couple, I pray you'd forgive us.

01:29:52

Amen. And I pray that you would pray and look to the Scriptures, and you will find the truth.

01:30:01

Amen. Praise God for the repentance he has given you and the staff of Family Radio.

01:30:07

And we are going to a final break. It's a much briefer break, a much more brief break than the one that you just heard.

01:30:15

So if you have any questions, I would send them in now or forever hold your peace, because we are rapidly running out of time.

01:30:22

That's a little tongue -in -cheek there. Of course, there will be, God willing, other opportunities when we have Tom Evans and other folks from Family Radio return as guests.

01:30:31

But as far as today is concerned, if you want a question asked, please send it in. chrisarnson at gmail .com,

01:30:37

chrisarnson at gmail .com. And always please give us your first name, city and state and country of residence.

01:30:43

We'll be right back with Tom Evans with the conclusion of our program today on the transformation of Family Radio.

01:30:51

My name is Steve Lawson, founder and president of One Passion Ministries, as well as teaching fellow for Ligonier Ministries.

01:30:58

I serve as professor of preaching and oversee the doctor of ministry program at the Master's Seminary in Los Angeles.

01:31:03

I would like to recommend the church where one of my preaching students, Andy Woodard, serves as the pastor.

01:31:10

It's called New Covenant Church, NYC. They are a Reformed Baptist church that meets in midtown

01:31:15

Manhattan. You can find their service times and location on their website, which is www .ncc

01:31:23

.nyc. They believe in a sovereign God who commands all men everywhere to repent and believe the gospel.

01:31:30

If you're looking for a church that believes in expository preaching, which is simply biblical preaching in New York City, I'd like to recommend that you visit

01:31:40

New Covenant Church, NYC. Again, their information can be found at www .ncc

01:31:47

.nyc. Have a great day. I am

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Monday through Friday at 6 p .m. Eastern time. We are now back with our guest,

01:40:59

Tom Evans, the President and General Manager of Family Radio, Family Stations, Incorporated.

01:41:07

And if you'd like to join us on the air, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com, C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com.

01:41:14

We have B .B. in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, who asks, one of my favorite programs that was a part of my steady diet theologically for years on Family Radio was

01:41:29

Echoes. Are you planning to return Echoes to the Family Radio lineup, especially since it included great pastors from all over the world?

01:41:41

Great question, yeah, we are. We're looking at developing a program like that where well -known

01:41:49

Reformed pastors as well as lesser -known Reformed pastors can have a place from which they would have a broader pulpit to preach.

01:41:58

And so we've been talking about, yeah, I remember fondly the Echoes program.

01:42:04

And so yeah, we as a team are talking about that. So yeah, to answer your question,

01:42:09

Lord willing, we will have and be ready to interview something like that very soon.

01:42:16

We have an anonymous listener who says, Family Radio was also preaching that no one is being saved now.

01:42:25

Is that still what they are teaching? Of course, if you've abandoned his views of the end of the world and things like that,

01:42:32

I'm certain that would be one of the things you've abandoned. Of course, yeah, no, we don't teach that at all.

01:42:38

In fact, one of the passages I think that this person that's asking that question would be good is

01:42:44

Genesis chapter eight, verse 22. That was a passage that God used in my own life to kind of open my eyes to the fact that there will be the sowing of seed, which means the proclamation of the gospel while the earth remains.

01:43:01

So anyway, I don't wanna get off on that, but I just would have to encourage them that no, Family Radio does not teach that at all.

01:43:09

Well, I'd like you to take some time to as detail as you can, because I know some of this you probably don't yet know, but tell us something about what you intend for the future of Family Radio, what you are planning to roll out, as it were, things that are in preparation for the all new

01:43:32

Family Radio, if you will. Tell us about some of these things. Sure. Yeah, Family Radio, we've assembled a team here who more and more has expertise in radio and very pleased about that.

01:43:48

You know, musically, Family Radio is known for traditional faithful Christian hymns and songs and spiritual songs and Family Radio will continue.

01:43:59

If anything else, we're going to refocus on that. We're going to, rather than move away in a more contemporary direction, we're going to refocus our attention on making our music as consistent and as pleasing and as faithful to scripture as possible.

01:44:19

So musically, those who listen to Family Radio will notice over the course of the next few months, just a more, how would you say it?

01:44:31

Just a more consistent day -parting of music. You know, we talk about, you know, just we have several programs right now that just have been produced over a long time.

01:44:46

And so there's a smattering of different kinds of music, different kinds of programming at Family Radio. So we're trying to, just like we did with our new rebranding of Family Radio, we're going to,

01:45:00

Family Radio's content, the way we sound, our imaging, all that, top of the hour spot, we're going to refine that.

01:45:09

But we're also going to emphasize just smaller vignettes of scripture throughout the day, reading of scripture.

01:45:18

Here, if you come to Family Radio, here in our headquarters in Alameda, we have several scriptures on the wall, but our, one of them is

01:45:27

Romans 10, 17, so then faith cometh by hearing, hearing by the word of God. Family Radio's core is just the proclamation without comment, the word of God.

01:45:38

So that will continue. We want to make the quality of our program very consistent.

01:45:44

We want to use good radio -formatic. So we want

01:45:50

Family Radio to sound very consistent. Whether you're listening in the morning, evening, afternoon.

01:45:58

So we're getting ready also to launch some two new teaching programs on Sunday, morning and evening worship services by Reformed pastors in the mornings on Sunday, as well as the afternoons.

01:46:12

We're excited about that. We're trying to make whatever teaching we have on Family Radio uniform.

01:46:19

So we don't have a broad cross -section, where we have Reformed and then

01:46:25

Arminian, but rather all of Family Radio's preaching, teaching programs will remain

01:46:30

Reformed and salvation by grace. So we're trying to make it consistent.

01:46:38

We are grateful to many of our ministry, our new ministry partners. I just want to make mention that Family Radio recently, a couple of years ago, we became members again of NRB.

01:46:52

For those outside the Christian broadcast world, all that means is NRB is the

01:46:57

National Religious Broadcasters Association. Family Radio has become, again, has become a member of that organization and we want to become a good partner with them.

01:47:09

So we're excited about that. They've embraced us, embraced Family Radio, and we're very thankful for the reception they gave us, our team, a couple of years ago in Orlando.

01:47:20

So we also, you know, we don't sell, you know, Family Radio will remain non -commercial.

01:47:27

We operate under the principle that we freely receive, freely give.

01:47:33

So everything that Family Radio does and is will remain free of charge. So if somebody calls us and says, hey,

01:47:40

I would like to order whatever we provide, whatever we offer, we do so free of charge.

01:47:45

And that includes even our broadcast partners, we do not charge for airtime.

01:47:53

And so that's something I think that we will continue, that principle.

01:47:59

Family Radio will remain completely listener supported. We do trust that God will provide as he has provided for us.

01:48:08

We're also in the midst here at Family Radio dealing with what we call network revitalization.

01:48:16

You know, Family Radio has a pretty broad network, we have several stations that have been around for many years and has some aging infrastructure.

01:48:28

So we're neck deep in network engineering revitalization.

01:48:33

So we're excited about that too. So that Family Radio stations won't go off the air.

01:48:40

So we're also, you know, just focusing on trying to be a better partner and, you know, with local churches and pastors.

01:48:51

We want to be an encourager, we want to encourage them. We're talking about even having, you know, here at headquarters inviting pastors to come sit with us, pray with us and so that we can be mutually encouraging to them.

01:49:11

And we also, you know, Family Radio has also been for many, many years, many decades.

01:49:18

You know, I don't know if people know the fact that Family Radio broadcast, we used to have a shortwave facility in Okeechobee, Florida where we used to broadcast 50 different languages,

01:49:29

Bible, Bible reading. Though we no longer do that, we still are very missions -minded.

01:49:38

We know the gospel is needed overseas as well as it is here domestically. So Family Radio continues to broadcast in Spanish a couple hours a day from Okeechobee, Florida as well as Mexico City.

01:49:52

So we have, you know, missions are indeed part of what we are, part of Family Radio's DNA.

01:50:00

And we want to continue that. So we pray that God will open doors for us in there.

01:50:07

So we continue to look for ways that we can improve our programming.

01:50:13

But we want to embrace those who really, a lot of other radio ministries have abandoned.

01:50:20

And that is traditional, faithful, reformed, but traditional music.

01:50:27

We want to continue in that. And we're also looking at producing some new programs that are just specifically around a specific type of music, choral music or sacred music.

01:50:42

And that's yet to be developed. But we're working on that. We have a lot of work to do here.

01:50:48

And we would encourage those of you who are listening, who may have listened to Family Radio at one time but went away because of what we, you know, the direction we went.

01:51:00

But now I would encourage you to give us another chance. You know, let us, give us an opportunity to be of comfort to you.

01:51:10

To try to seek to edify you, the body of Christ. And you can go to our website.

01:51:15

We have an entirely new website, familyradio .org. And you can look and see, we have a station finder feature on our website.

01:51:26

So if someone wants to go there and find out where Family Radio is, Family Radio is in their local area. But also we have streaming.

01:51:32

So we would welcome you. Come, give us a try. See what we're about. Amen. In fact,

01:51:39

I wanted to ask you something about the fact that when people call in or write in for things, you will send them for free.

01:51:48

I was wondering if you could help me out with a late model automobile, perhaps a BMW. Burnt orange, preferably.

01:51:54

No, I'm only kidding. Got it, we'll send that to you right away. We have

01:52:01

Tony in Hayward, California, another first time questioner. And Tony asks, how many members are at the

01:52:13

Family Radio Board of Directors and how many of them support returning to the faithful doctrine?

01:52:25

I'll say this, the Board of Directors, we are in unison around the mission of proclaiming the gospel.

01:52:34

And that's all I'm going to say. That's fine. And as Tom has already said, it's a work in progress.

01:52:41

And if you do things too rapidly, they could collapse into an ash heap.

01:52:47

So just be patient and be prayerful about Family Radio. And remember, as I have told people when they may have complaints about things not being immediately the way that they want them to be,

01:53:01

I have told them that the addition once again of the voices of faithful pastors from around the

01:53:09

United States and around the world to even counteract anything that they don't like is an enormous thing.

01:53:17

It's an enormous blessing and an enormous historical event and transformation in broadcasting.

01:53:26

And I'm just asking my listeners to be patient with Family Radio. I have never either worked for or heard a radio network where I agreed with every single person on the station.

01:53:39

In fact, if you do, you probably are developing a cult mindset if you agree with everything that somebody is teaching.

01:53:48

But I just thought I'd throw my two cents in about that. Yeah, I mean, look,

01:53:55

I've been blessed by, I mentioned this earlier, R .C. Sproul, as well as Alistair.

01:54:02

I mean, in fact, I look, you know, I'm not gonna say any more of it, but I look forward to getting in my car, my truck.

01:54:10

And Chris, yeah, like you, I would love to have a new truck, but, you know, I can't wait to tune and listen to Alistair.

01:54:20

I mean, he has blessed me as well as R .C. Sproul, as well as, in fact, my wife last

01:54:27

Sunday, she said, who is this guy? He's not familiar to me.

01:54:32

It was Dr. Boyce. I said, yeah, he's on the air now. And she said, I love him.

01:54:38

I think he's great. So we're excited. We're thankful.

01:54:45

We're praying for God's blessing. Grateful to God that he has, and we're confident that he has more work for this ministry to do.

01:54:54

We're grateful for the privilege of having anything to do with his gospel. God indeed is a gracious Lord.

01:55:02

Amen. Amen. Well, I'm very happy to hear that Alistair Begg has been added to your lineup because that is also a reassurance that even though you're exclusively reformed at Family Radio, you are including

01:55:16

Reformed Baptists in the mix. Yeah, indeed.

01:55:22

We're a, what do they call that? An equal opportunity. As long as you're

01:55:28

Reformed, of course. By the way, Tony in Hayward, California, give us your full mailing address because you've also won, as a first -time questioner, a free copy of the

01:55:38

New American Standard Bible. Well, I want you now, Tom, to have uninterrupted two minutes of time to summarize what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners when it comes to Family Radio.

01:55:52

I think one of the things that has struck me throughout this situation, throughout my experience, is watching and seeing and experiencing

01:56:00

God's faithfulness. We all deserve, no, no, excuse me.

01:56:07

We do not deserve God's mercy, but yet I've seen it day in and day out.

01:56:13

I've seen God's faithfulness. He's never left me nor forsaken me personally. I've seen him how he's had his hand on Family Radio, and I want all glory to be to him.

01:56:27

And if God is going to use Family Radio in any way, to God be the glory.

01:56:34

Amen. Amen. Well, Tom, I can't even tell you in the

01:56:40

English language how deeply grateful, deeply grateful I am to you for picking, above all radio programs out there, picking

01:56:50

Iron Sharpens Iron Radio to make this wonderful announcement to the general public and the general

01:56:57

Christian listening audience. It is an honor and privilege and blessing that you have chosen

01:57:04

Iron Sharpens Iron to be the vehicle to announce this wonderful news. Chris, may

01:57:10

God bless you and give you grace, and may he continue to use you. Don't grow weary, brother.

01:57:18

Well, I really appreciate it, and I want to thank my friend, Pastor Joe Jackowitz, founder of First Love Radio, First Love Publications, and First Love Missions, and also the pastor of Christ Bible Church in Dublin, California, for helping to arrange this interview.

01:57:38

With Tom Evans, and Tom, if you could a couple of times repeat the website once again for Family Radio so our listeners can not only find out how they can listen online, but how they can find local stations that might be nearby where they live.

01:57:58

Sure. Be glad to. Family Radio's website is simplefamilyradio .org.

01:58:04

So that's Family Radio, one word, or two words connected, familyradio .org.

01:58:12

And let me just give our toll -free number as well, if you wouldn't mind. 1 -800 -543 -1495.

01:58:22

So if anyone wants to call us, 1 -800 -543 -1495.

01:58:28

And Chris, again, thank you. Pray that God will bless you and the ministry of Iron Sharpens Iron.

01:58:35

May God give you grace in this day. And I too thank

01:58:41

Pastor Joe Jackowitz. He's here with us right now, with me. And I just want to thank him for all that he's done.

01:58:50

Amen. Well, once again, I want to thank everybody who participated in this program, especially you,

01:58:58

Tom. I want to thank everybody who listened, especially those who took the time to write in. I apologize to any who could not have their questions asked and answered today because of the limited time that we have.

01:59:09

But I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater