June 13, 2022 Show with David Monreal on “One Man’s Journey into the Reformed Faith (& the Challenges of Being in a Theological Minority in a Denomination Where You Pastor”

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

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

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

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

And now, here's your host, Chris Arnzen. Good afternoon,

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.

This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Monday on this 13th day of June 2022.

And I'm really pumped up about today's program, especially having another opportunity for fellowship with my guest today over lunch several hours ago.

He is a first -time guest on the program and also a new friend of mine that I met at the

Banner of Truth conference in Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania, providentially. Didn't even know that he was a new pastor in town right here in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

And what makes it even more exciting for me is that he shares my

Reformed faith. And that's always doubly good to hear in a small town like Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

So I am thrilled to announce that we have David Monreal today on the program, senior pastor of Carlisle Alliance Church right here in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, in South Central PA in Cumberland County.

And today we're gonna be addressing the theme One Man's Journey into the Reformed Faith and the challenges of being in a theological minority in a denomination where you pastor.

And it's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the very first time ever to Iron Trip and Zion Radio, Pastor David Monreal.

Hey, Chris, it is my absolute pleasure and I have just been blessed, like you said, in God's providence of our paths crossing and being able to begin a friendship.

And so thank you very much. Well, praise God. Well, tell our listeners about Carlisle Alliance Church.

Okay, Carlisle Alliance Church, very easy to find on the corner of Northeast and East North Street.

And it is a part of the Christian Missionary Alliance and has been here for several generations.

At least from the 60s with several long -term pastors who were here.

And I was called to be the pastor here at the beginning of the pandemic in October of 2020.

I used to tell people the middle of the pandemic, but I didn't realize how long it was gonna last. And I would hope that you would extend my greetings.

He probably has no idea who I am, and probably doesn't remember who I am. But I want you to extend your greetings to one of your elders there, a dear brother who, when

I visited, probably back in 2014 or 15, I visited

Carlisle Alliance Church. And this dear brother noticed that I was a new visitor.

He had not recognized ever seeing me before. And he approached me in the lobby afterwards, and he said, if you're free,

I would love to treat you to lunch at Haase's. Haase's Steakhouse. And this dear brother's name escapes me, but I know that he is a senior saint.

Perhaps you know who he is? I think if I'm correct,

I think it might be Don Baker. Yes, it is Don Baker. Wonderful man.

He is closing in on 95 now. Wow. Still doing well, just had a chance to get together with him last week.

And he has, throughout his life, both in his military career and in other positions, and then even after retiring, becoming a visitation pastor here, just visiting people, but just has a heart for people and a heart for the lost, and shows people the love of Christ.

Amen. Well, if anybody wants more information about Carlisle Alliance Church in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, go to cacfamily .org.

cacfamily .org. And God willing, I will be repeating that information later on. Well, we have a tradition here on Iron Trip and Zion Radio, whenever we have a first -time guest, we have that guest give a summary of their salvation testimony.

And that would include the kind of theological or religious upbringing they had, if any, and what kind of providential circumstances our

Sovereign Lord raised up in their lives that drew them to himself and saved them.

And I would love to hear your story. Absolutely. I'm the youngest of eight kids.

I grew up in Wisconsin. My family was Catholic.

In fact, I went to Catholic school through eighth grade, and even looking back on it,

I don't think that I knew anyone who had genuinely had a relationship with Christ.

A lot of religious people, but nobody who was regenerate.

But again, in God's providence, my mom, when I was probably in third grade, started listening to the

Christian radio station that had a lot of the old radio preachers on there. And I remember years later asking her why she did, and she said she just liked the sounds of their voice, and she was very religious.

And so she started listening, and very out of character, but she decided, even over my dad's protest, when

I was in seventh grade, the summer after seventh grade, that she was going to send me to camp. And she was through the radio station, and I was just, of all the kids there,

I think there were three Catholic. I happened to overhear one of the main speaker talking about how he did not believe that the

Catholic church was teaching the gospel and leading people to Christ. And so this little seventh grade kid started challenging him, and he was at the same campsite as me.

And so when we got back from the field trip we were on, he had me go and get my Bible that I had brought.

I had been given a King James Bible from a wedding I had stood up in for my sister.

And he pointed out the verse, first Timothy, for there's one

God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. And I didn't come to faith in Christ then, but I knew in my heart that everything he was telling me was true, and that I wasn't learning about the way to a relationship with God through the church

I was in. And I just started crying. I remember I just got up, grabbed my

Bible, went to the tent that I was camping in, and just started weeping as this little 12 -year -old kid.

And that was really the beginning of a journey. They didn't have a camp the next year, and then the following year

I begged my mom to go back to camp. And it was at that camp in June of 1983 that I heard the gospel, and God opened my heart.

The funny thing is is that the first day I was there I actually went forward, and they tried to present the gospel to me, and it was like it was in a foreign language.

It just made no sense. And I left there, and two days later

I just came under the conviction of the Holy Spirit and knew I needed to just yield my life to the

Lord. And what two days before was completely confusing was as basic as the

ABCs. God just opened my heart and my mind to understand what

Jesus had done for me on the cross, and that was when I came to Christ.

Well, praise God. And when did you realize that you had a calling from God into the pastoral ministry?

Yeah, that's a great question. The problem was I left camp, and unfortunately there was no follow -up in the camp.

So I went home and I kind of floundered for the year because they didn't have follow -up, and so I went back the following year and really sensed even then through the speaker that God wanted me to do something.

I didn't know what, and I was too young in the faith to really know what that even meant, but just felt that, you know,

God was leading me into some type of ministry, and I kind of put it on the back burner.

And then after high school I had switched churches, and after that second year in camp, after I came to Christ, I started attending a very fundamentalist

Baptist church that had a lot of external expectations, a lot of legalism,

I guess I would put it in our, you know, kind of in the non -technical sense of the word. And after high school

I found a friend, and his mom was going to a Christian Missionary Alliance church.

I didn't realize he wasn't going. I invited myself, not realizing I was inviting him, too. And we went to church there, and that was where God was placing me to go.

And the elders there saw gifts in me that I didn't see at the time, and they said, we really think that you need to consider this, going into ministry.

And within a year I was in Bible college. Well, what was a key, or should

I say, what were the key circumstances, providential circumstances that drew you to discover and embrace the doctrines of sovereign grace, which have also been nicknamed

Reformed theology and Calvinism, and the doctrines of free grace and a number of other nicknames, the tulip doctrines and so on?

How did you hear about these truths that you and I share, and tell us about your coming to embrace them?

Okay. Yeah, when I went to college, I went to DeKalb Falls College, that is now back a part of the

Christian Missionary Alliance, but for a number of years they were actually an independent school.

And so they did have people from different theological backgrounds there, Calvinist, Arminian, different perspectives.

And I was coming in, you know, having come to faith in Christ, but most of my experience, other than that year in the

Alliance, was in the Baptist church and was very steeped in dispensationalism.

I didn't realize what it was, but that was kind of what I had been taught. And so when

I went to college, I didn't know a lot of theology. And I would say most of my professors, at least a good number of them, died in the war

Arminian. And so that was the predominant teaching in school.

And I would say when I came out of college, I was probably a five -point Arminian. But what happened,

I went to Florida. I had taken an assistant pastor church. They like to have young guys there to mentor.

And it was primarily senior citizens, Shell Point Village, a wonderful church.

But I went there as a five -point Arminian. I was a part of the

Christian Missionary Alliance. And while I was there, one of the

Sunday school teachers, who taught a lot of R .C. Sproul, the old DHS teaching series, he would teach those in Sunday school.

And he and I were talking, and he said, you know, you really need to go to a Ligonier conference. And I had never heard of R .C.

Sproul, had never heard of the Ligonier conference or their ministry. But it looked interesting, and so I signed up.

And it's funny in retrospect, because I can still remember this. I went by myself, so I was single.

You can get really good seats when you're single. So I was probably in the front row. It's true.

It is true. If you want to sit up front, that's the way to do it. And so I was right there, and I remember it was lunch, and they had had a panel discussion, and R .C.

Sproul was up there along with other speakers. And everyone just got up and turned around and walked out the doors, and I realized that R .C.

Sproul was just standing there, nobody around him talking to him. And so I went up and started talking to him, and I was this really arrogant, snot -nosed little punk.

And I actually got in a debate with him over Calvinism and Arminianism. And, you know, one thing that still impresses me today is that it wasn't just a theoretical argument.

I mean, he was passionate about it. I mean, I remember him bouncing on the balls of his feet as he's talking.

And, you know, at one point he said, I wrote a book on this. I think you need to read it. And so I ended up buying the book, and that was, yeah, the beginning of really opening my eyes.

Right around the same time, a friend of mine who I'd gone to college with had moved and was finishing up at another school, and he had started to read

Clark Pinnock, who by this point was into open theism. And he called me up and said, you need to read this.

I think it's right on. And this is when I was still kind of wrestling with Arminianism.

And as I read the book, I realized that if I'm being honest with myself, even though I knew it was heresy,

I thought, this is the logical outworking of my system if I'm truly honest. And between that and the

Ligonier Conference, it really caused me to go back to square one and begin to rebuild my biblical theology from the ground up, wherever that led me.

And it very quickly led me to become reformed in my faith.

Well, praise God. As you know, that is music to my ears. And I'm going to give our listeners our email address in the event that you would like to join us on the air, the question of your own.

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

Please give us your first name at least, your city and state, and your country of residence, if you live outside of the

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

Let's say you share my guest's theological journey in some fashion, and you may be in a church that is rabidly opposed to those things.

You might even be a pastor, and your fellow elders are rabidly opposed to the doctrines of grace,

Reformed theology, or whatever circumstances similar to that that might compel you to remain anonymous.

You may do so, but when you are sending in a question, if you are asking a general question about Reformed theology, about any pastoral question, because we will broaden the sphere of questions that we accept for our guest today, since he is a pastor.

If it's some other pastoral issue you want to ask about, and you prefer to remain anonymous because it is personal and private and intimate, well, we would grant your request, but if it's a general question, please give us your first name at least, your city and state, and your country of residence.

Now, I think it might be a good idea to compare and contrast what has become nicknamed

Arminianism and what has become nicknamed Calvinism, or Reformed theology.

Many, if not most, Arminians that I have met do not prefer to identify themselves with that label, although they would certainly fit the description of evangelical

Arminianism. Most, for some reason, view that as a pejorative term, even though they have much in common with Jacob Arminius.

But why is this such a big deal? And when I say it's a big deal, I don't believe that brothers in Christ should divide over it.

And, of course, there are circumstances where you have to divide when it comes to...

I shouldn't say have to, when it's wise to divide, but it doesn't mean that you have to break all fellowship with each other.

It doesn't mean that we should look down on each other, look down on our brethren who disagree on these issues as if they are heretics and so on.

They may be heretics for other reasons, but I wouldn't call this an issue that reaches that level of seriousness.

But tell us about what you believe the main differences are and why it became so important to you to embrace and identify yourselves with the doctrines of grace or Reformed theology.

Absolutely. One of the things I read recently, and it's kind of stuck with me, is that for a lot of evangelicals, it's either a salvation issue or it's unimportant, and we forget that there are a lot of important things that may not be completely tied to the gospel, but that doesn't mean that they're unimportant.

And I think wrestling with the questions of grace are really important and practical, too, for our

Christian life, and we can talk about that in a little bit. But what really struck me as I was wrestling through this, most people, when they think about Calvinism or Reformed theology, they get stuck on the issue of perseverance of the saints or what's commonly called eternal security or something like that, and they question if a person who's a

Christian, genuinely a Christian, can lose his faith. But honestly,

I think the biggest point for me really had to do with the nature of man because what

I wrestled with was, does the Bible teach that I'm sick and I need help, or does it teach that I'm spiritually dead and I need to be brought to life?

And for me, that was really the crux of the matter because if I was just sick,

God could aid me and we'd cooperate together in salvation. But if I was dead,

I can't do anything towards my salvation. There's nothing that is in me.

It has to be all from God, and it has to be God's work from beginning to end. And so as I was wrestling with these questions, really the heart of it for me is, are we truly lost in the sense that we are spiritually dead, we're blind, we're deaf, our minds are clouded by sin, our hearts are stoned?

And if that is the case, then I need God to first do

His work in order for me to respond to that in faith. He needs to be the one who brings life out of death, and I respond to that.

And so for me, that was really the main issue. And then once I settled that in my mind and really wrestled with the text of Scripture and saw that we are dead, the other points are commonly talked about with Calvinism just fell into place because all of those other questions,

I think, are a part of that. And so that was really how

I was wrestling with these issues. But when I was an

Arminian, I was really stuck on free will.

I mean, I thought that it was my choice and that everyone had a choice and that God wasn't fair if He didn't give us a choice.

And kind of my philosophical idea of fairness and my philosophical understanding of free will is what

I hung on to when I was Arminian. And if that is the case, then the other things again followed.

But for me, like I said, understanding that even as an unbeliever,

I'm free in the sense of I can do whatever I desire, but my desires are evil and that I needed

God to intervene because I would never seek Him by myself.

Now, it's interesting that you haven't brought up, which seems to be another primary area that those outside of the

Reformed faith reject our beliefs, and that would be limited atonement, also known as definite atonement, and particular redemption.

I'm interested to find out why that didn't come up as, immediately come up as one of the primary roadblocks, stumbling blocks, hurdles that you may have faced in coming to embrace the

Reformed faith. Even those that nickname themselves four -point

Calvinists, they're usually referring to that and reject a limited atonement or a definite atonement or a particular redemption.

Yeah, and I prefer particular redemption.

I think limited atonement kind of paints in some people's minds the wrong idea, although I do believe it is limited.

But again, if we're truly lost and God is the initiator of salvation and He is the one that brings us to life, and those whom

He calls to Himself and those whom He regenerates will and do freely embrace the gospel in response to God's quickening work and His regenerating work, and if that's the case, and God accomplishes what

He sets out to do, then all those who come to Christ, come to Christ because God was the one who chose them and He's the one who called them.

And those who God has passed over are the ones who face the rightful, just consequences for their sin, that some receive mercy, which is non -justice.

Some receive justice. They pay the penalty for their sins, but nobody receives injustice.

And so for me, like I said, if we're truly dead, then all those who come to Christ, come to Christ because God is the one who drew them and the one who saved them.

And so the question of particular atonement, did

Christ, you know, He died for the church and His atonement was effective to individuals.

To me, it wasn't just a potential atonement. It was a genuine atonement.

And if it was general, and this was the other thing that I thought, if it was, you know, just a general atonement, then it doesn't apply to anyone in particular or the other logical outworking of it is you become a universalist because if He died for everyone, then why would

God hold anybody accountable? Why would He bring judgment on them if Jesus paid the judgment for them?

He's exacting punishment twice for the same sins. And so as I thought through it scripturally, as I looked at the text, as I reasoned through it, the idea that I was holding about free will and salvation was really more philosophical and emotional than it was biblical.

So you actually, very soon on into exploring this, that was an issue that was, it seems, the least of your hurdles because of the logical conclusions, if you really think it through, the logical conclusion that you would draw, if Christ died for every single person that ever lived and ever will live, and there is a place called hell that will be inhabited by people, if you're not a universalist who believes every single person will be in heaven and there are even universalists who believe the devil will be in heaven, if you reject that, then you really have to come to the conclusion that Christ on Calvary's cross did not save anyone,

He did not redeem anyone, not a single soul, He merely made them savable and redeemable.

Am I correct in drawing that conclusion? If one were to believe

He died for every single person and yet there will be multitudes in hell? Exactly.

That it was potential but not actual for anyone. A hypothetical instead of a realized mission that was accomplished.

Yeah, exactly. And so, to your point, in one sense, it was a natural outworking biblically and logically, so in that sense it was easy.

Emotionally, it was very difficult. I mean, that was one of the things that, I mean,

I came to the text and I said, no, this is what the text teaches, this is what the Bible says.

So, on a logical sense, it really was just a natural outworking of wrestling with the text.

Emotionally, I struggled with it because I had to wrestle with all of these feelings of my perception of fairness and not understanding justice and really wrestling with the justice and the cross that it didn't seem fair to me, it didn't seem right.

I had to wrestle with what I thought free will was or volition.

And so, like I said, in one sense, it was just a natural outworking, but in another sense, emotionally, that was probably one of the harder things

I had to work through, is just to not just accept it, but to glory in it.

Well, we have to go to our first break right now. When we come back, I would like to find out more about the

Christian and Missionary Alliance denomination, where you serve as a pastor and anything that you could share with us about its origins and its typical theological makeup and doctrinal stances, although from our conversations and from conversations with others,

I do know that there is room for disagreement amongst congregations in that denomination.

In fact, the very fact that you are a pastor and a Reformed Christian in that denomination where that is a minority position, that proves that there is room for disagreement.

And we'll have a further exploration of that when we return. If anybody has questions, and we do have a number of them already waiting to be asked and answered by you, if anybody wants to get in line with a question of your own, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com

chrisarnson at gmail .com And as always, give us your first name at least, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence, if you live outside the

USA. Only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter.

Don't go away. We'll be right back with David Monreal right after these messages from our sponsors.

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Again, I'm Pastor Anthony Invinio, and thanks for listening. Welcome back. This is Chris Arnzen, if you just tuned us in.

Our guest today for the entire program is David Monreal, Senior Pastor of Carlisle Alliance Church in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

And we are addressing one man's journey into the Reformed faith and the challenges of being in a theological minority in a denomination where you pastor.

Our email address is chrisarnzen at gmail .com, C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com.

Give us your first name at least, your city and state, and your country of residence. And tell us about the

Christian and Missionary Alliance denomination. It is probably, other than those who are in the denomination, is probably a mystery to many evangelicals as to exactly where it is coming from theologically.

I know that for quite a while I knew little to nothing about it and still would never call myself an expert on it, even though I have had conversations with those who are members of the denomination.

I just know that it has a reputation for being a biblically faithful denomination that loves the

Lord, believes in the inerrancy and sufficiency of Scripture, and there are some of the areas that brothers in Christ do divide over that are represented by different sides who still remain within that denomination.

But tell us about the denomination. Let's start with the area of continuous or continuationist versus cessationism.

Yeah. The Alliance is really, it's funny, because they're not that well known, even though they're about the same size in the

U .S. as the Evangelical Free Church, and they're, I think, four times larger overseas, and so in other countries they're more well -known or people are familiar with it than here.

And, yeah, as far as the cessationist, non -cessationist, without going into all of the history of it, the

Alliance would formally be a non -cessationist denomination, but in practice would be probably indistinguishable from most cessationists that are in the mainstream of that understanding.

So, in other words, even though they would be non -cessationist, you would not walk into a typical

CMA church and think that you've walked into a charismatic or Pentecostal congregation?

I would say generally no, but as the Alliance is a broad denomination, it's a broad umbrella, it's hard to say from church to church what you might walk into and experience, and so I won't say it's not possible within the denomination to walk into a church that might be more like that, but that isn't the official position of the denomination.

They just allow for a lot of leeway in a variety of different areas.

Perhaps even not very far removed from a Calvary Chapel, then? In some ways, yes.

They're non -dispensational. I think at least my experience with Calvary Chapel is a little bit more dispensational.

Yes. But yeah, in practice, it is very broad -based, and some of that has to do with the history.

I mean, some of that has to do with the Alliance. I don't think most people realize that it's only officially been a denomination since 1968, even though it's been around since the late 1800s.

Now, a lot of Reformed folk love A .W. Tozer, who was one of the, if not the, most globally renowned figures from the history of the

CMA, even though A .W. Tozer was not theologically

Reformed or a Calvinist. What about him that you're aware of still makes him seemingly a favorite amongst

Reformed people to quote and to cite and so on? Yeah, I think that Tozer, and by far the most well -known people to come out of the

Alliance, and like you said, often quoted by not just evangelicals but people who are

Reformed. But I think one of the issues with Tozer was he was very forceful in addressing cultural issues in his day, and a lot of the things that he said turned out to be prescient in modern evangelicalism.

A lot of the criticisms that he had of what he perceived as the direction that evangelicalism was going or the church as a whole turned out to be very accurate, and he was very forceful in challenging that, even when it wasn't anywhere near as much of an issue as it is now.

And so I think Tozer, his appeal in part is that, and I think he was eloquent in some of his descriptions on the holiness of God and the person of God that I think resonate with a lot of Reformed folks.

And the areas, let's move on to the areas of egalitarian views of church polity, of ecclesiology, where men and women have equal roles, or complementarianism, where men and women are certainly viewed as equals before the eyes of God, but they have, according to the exegesis of the complementarian, the biblical evidence, the complementarian would view equal before the eyes of God, but men and women have separate and distinct roles in the church.

Where is the Christian and Missionary Alliance at this point on those issues?

And maybe perhaps even tell us historically. Yeah, and I think it's fascinating when you study the history, and it helps explain what's happening today, is the

Christian and Missionary Alliance started by a gentleman by the name of A .B. Simpson who was a Presbyterian pastor, but was heavily influenced midway through his ministry by the

Methodist camp meetings. And so I think some of those Methodist writers kind of influenced his theology.

But it started out, Simpson felt it called a mission. And so he had moved to New York City.

He was at a Presbyterian church and was reaching people out in the docks, but the state

Presbyterian church, it was hard bringing them into the church. And so rather than dividing the church, he started his own church.

He wanted to go overseas, but it didn't work for him. But his heart for missions, he decided that he would gather on Sunday afternoons like -minded, missions -minded evangelicals to pray for and support and raise money for missionaries.

And so individuals would go to their church in the morning and then they would come and they'd gather together in this

Missionary Alliance to pray and support missionaries. And it worked so well that he decided to do an evangelistic version of that in the

U .S. that he called the Christian Alliance. And after doing this for a number of years, realizing he was redoubling his efforts, he joined them together into the

Christian and Missionary Alliance. In fact, we're going to pick up right where you left off because we have to go to our midway break right now.

Okay. And just don't forget that we arrived at the point where the actual name, Christian and Missionary Alliance, came about.

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Reformed faith, and when we went to our break, you were talking about how the name

Christian Missionary Alliance Church came about. Yeah, and really understanding the history of the

Alliance helps us to understand a lot of the issues that they're going through today, because back in the late 1800s, when these two organizations joined into one, more administratively than anything, they weren't a denomination.

They were a parachurch ministry. People were going to their churches and then coming out in the afternoon to pray and to help support missions.

So as time went on, there were more and more churches that asked if they could consider themselves

Christian Missionary Alliance Churches, which they were allowed to do, and so you found in the 20th century that more and more churches were calling themselves

Christian Missionary Alliance Churches, but it wasn't until 1968 at their annual conference that they declared, as Christianity Today said at the time, they've declared what we've known for years, that they're officially a denomination.

But because they were this broad -based missions organization, they didn't have a lot of structure when it came to their doctrinal statements other than the real essentials of salvation.

They didn't take strong positions on a lot of different issues, and so they allowed a lot of variety of opinions, a variety of perspectives, because they were centered around their mission, and so these other areas, they avoided really weighing in on, and so as they became a denomination, what was their strength in one sense was also a challenge in that they are very broad -based theologically, so you could be

Calvinist or Arminian. They did have a history of a lot of women who were involved in missions, but formally, officially, they were not an egalitarian denomination.

They were complementarian. Now, they tolerated churches.

They didn't discipline them or challenge them when they would have women working on staff, and locally, they would be referred to as pastors, but they weren't formally recognized with the denomination.

When I started out in ministry, and I was an Alliance pastor in 2004, 2005, or 1994, 1995, this actually came to a head with the

National Conference, and General Council, they had commissioned a group of pastors and theologians to evaluate this issue and come back and bring recommendations to the

General Council as a whole, and at the time, they declared, and they had two statements, one that the highest servant leaders in the church are the elders, and then their second statement was elders are men, and so it seemed as if that whole issue was kind of laid to rest and that the decision was formally made or reaffirmed and announced, but they still continued to allow churches, individual churches, to have women on staff and for them locally to be called pastors, and over the years, this practice has continued to increase and has really begun to influence the entire denomination.

From my understanding and from what he has said publicly, the present president of the

Christian Missionary Alliance was one of those churches that had women on staff, and they were called pastors, and so he's finishing up his last term in office, and over the last couple of years has been pressing the denomination, and the national office has been pressing the denomination to reevaluate and reconsider this position of women's roles in ministry.

About, I would guess, 10, 15 years ago, maybe longer than that, they said, we'll ordain men, and then they came up with this equivalent type of recognition called consecration, and so then they were saying, we'll ordain men and consecrate women, but a lot of the women who have been in ministry under this consecration have been pressing the denomination as well to reconsider that and to formally ordain them, and so the denomination as a whole is in the midst of wrestling with this issue, and if what has been planned comes to fruition in 2023, it may come to a vote at their general council.

And what is your position, and what will you do if there is a vote that makes it mandatory denomination -wide for women to be ordained into leadership positions over men?

My position is that the Bible clearly teaches that within the

Church, although there's an essential equality before God, that men and women are equal in the sight of God and in God's relationship with them, that functionally there is a hierarchy that God has ordained that men lead the

Church and that elders are men. I see pastor and elder as equivalent terms along with overseer, that they're different ways and different words to talk about the same office, and so that there are differences in responsibilities and differences in roles in the

Church. As I said, this is going to come to a decision as planned next year, and there's been a lot of talk among pastors and within the district and within the denomination of what will happen, and a couple months ago,

I know there was a survey, and I received it, filled it out, and they asked how strong of an issue is this to you, and would you consider leaving the

Christian Missionary Alliance if this was passed? And to me, it is a very important issue because it really calls into question how we interpret

Scripture and what our hermeneutic is on really the whole Bible. You know, the principles that you would use to explain away those passages about male servant leadership in the

Church are also the same hermeneutics that are used today in churches for other issues, and so I think it's a lot more foundational and fundamental than I think people recognize.

Yeah, it's often been said that the same hermeneutic used by feminists and egalitarians to support female leadership over men in the

Church and in the home are the same or is the same hermeneutic used to defend homosexuality, to defend not only the practice of that abomination but also the ordaining of men and women who are involved in that abomination?

And that's my exact concern. I think if you look historically, churches and denominations that ordained women and used that hermeneutic as the basis for it didn't change initially, but a generation or two later as those ideas matured and another generation was raised up and asked those questions, those same denominations eventually did use those same principles of explaining away scripture passages in order to justify ordaining homosexuals or bringing them into the

Church in their sin as members. And so I think it isn't a small issue.

I think that it isn't an isolated issue. And I think it's fair to make that comparison.

Some people I've talked to have said, well, that's not a fair comparison and you're comparing apples and oranges. But I'm saying if you look at the hermeneutics of explaining away those passages and making them relative and situational and bound to the first century, those are the same arguments that are used in ordaining homosexuals.

And, you know, the difference is a fiction. It isn't in reality.

And so, you know, if this is passed, you know, I personally or as a

Church, you know, would gravely consider any possibility of staying in the denomination.

I know they've tried to come up with scenarios where every individual

Church would decide for themselves what they wanted and that nothing would be forced on people who hold a contrary opinion.

But I don't see how that can work out in practice. It seems to me that you're going to decide one direction or another and then eventually that's going to be the direction that you go.

To me, I kind of jokingly say that it's kind of like being, you know, partially pregnant.

You know, either you are or you aren't. And, you know, a decision has to be made and ultimately that's going to be the direction the whole denomination goes.

And for those who can't accept that or don't believe that, I don't know how they continue to function in that denomination.

And that's where I am personally with it. You know, I will wait to see how things unfold.

I won't make decisions preemptively, but I am very concerned and very cautious about the possibilities.

Now, I think it would be only fair of me to interject here.

As staunchly as I believe in exclusive male headship in the church and in the home,

I just want to be fair to some of the egalitarian churches out there that are not that way due to the advancement of leftism or liberalism in their denominations or congregations.

There are some churches that have Wesleyan roots who have practiced the ordination of women for centuries and they have remained theologically conservative in all other areas.

One such denomination that I've become more familiar with since moving to Pennsylvania is the

Church of God Findley, Ohio denomination. I think the official name of the denomination is the

Church of God General Assembly. It's not the Church of God that is

Pentecostal based in Cleveland, Tennessee. It is more resembling of a

Wesleyan Baptist movement. And from what you've described about the

Christian Missionary Alliance, they seem to have a similar view as far as they are not cessationist, but they're not charismatic.

But they have women in leadership and it is not, as I said, because of a caving in to the leftist agenda.

They have always ordained women and, as I said, they trace their practice to the

Wesleyan roots that they have that have gone back for centuries. And I'm not saying this because I'm trying to make this a matter that is not important or because I am in any way in agreement with it, but I do know very dear brethren in Christ, whom

I love very much and whose churches, some of which have exclusively male leadership that I heartily recommend, that I would even join if I did not have a solid church such as Grace Baptist Church or Carlisle.

I might even consider joining one of them because they are shepherded by such faithful men.

But I just thought I'd throw that in there. Yeah, and that's a great point.

I mean, it isn't a fait accompli that once a denomination ordains women that they'll automatically go to this extreme.

But I do think that it's more of the exception than the norm because those tendencies are there and it is kind of the logical outworking of it.

I'm reminded of a phrase I picked up from an old Lutheran theologian,

John Miller, who called it a fortunate inconsistency.

And his point was that sometimes we have inconsistencies in our theology and it kind of just stays in its own lane.

It doesn't influence other areas of our thinking, but it's just fortunate that this inconsistency is there, which allows us to maintain fidelity in spite of going off on one issue or another.

And so I'm not saying it will automatically happen, but I think historically there's a lot of precedent.

And that is kind of the way the winds will blow over decades if the alliance goes in this direction.

And so, yeah, and I agree that there are churches who haven't done that, who haven't been influenced or carried away with these other ideas.

But I do think it's a fortunate inconsistency when that happens. Yeah, one development that I was very disappointed to hear in the

Church of God in Findlay, Ohio, or General Assembly, is that they used to ordain men that were strictly complementarian in their viewpoint.

And apparently they no longer will ordain a man unless he is egalitarian, although they're not going to, from what

I understand, they're not going to force a local congregation to be egalitarian if they've already had a practice of complementarianism.

And I may be wrong on that, but I think I am correct. But as far as new men coming in for ordination, if they say during an exam,

I do not believe in the ordination of women, they will likely not be ordained. That's what I have heard, anyway, from reliable sources.

And I'm dismayed about that move in their group. But as I said,

I know some folks in that group, and I love them, and they're great men, and they're humble servants of Christ.

And I would, if I had no Reformed Baptist church in my area where I live, as I said,

I would consider joining one of the churches that I'm thinking of, one of the congregations that has male leadership.

We have an anonymous listener overseas, and this anonymous listener has a question that I've actually never really put in a lot of thought to before.

And let me find this anonymous question. Basically, the question, and I can't find it right now.

Oh, here it is. How come complementarians will not allow a woman to sing or lead in music, and yet you will use her to play the piano to lead only a few feet away from the pulpit because it suits the need?

Is that not total hypocrisy? I think, and even among complementarians, there are differences of opinion of what constitutes male leadership in the church and what's permitted for both men and women.

I don't see personally the role of somebody who's directing music to be in a teaching role or an authority over men.

And so my personal opinion on that, as I wrestle through it and trying to apply the text of 1

Timothy chapter 2, is that I don't see a woman who is humbly leading a song as teaching or exercising authority.

I mean, I've been in churches where one church in particular that it was organ -led, that they actually didn't have a song leader, but I wouldn't say that the organ was exercising authority over men.

It was really more of helping to give clarity on when the congregation should sing.

And so my personal perspective on it is I don't see that rising to the role of only men serving in that role or it being a teaching role.

And so maybe I take a little more narrow of an application when it comes to women who are leading a song in a church service.

Okay, well, thank you, Anonymous. And I hope that next time you have the courage to identify yourself.

I'm only kidding. I thought it was going to be a lot more personal than that.

Let's see. We have Thomas in West Islip, New York.

And again, I have another friend who listens to this show named

Thomas in West Islip, but this is not that person. Thomas in West Islip, New York, says, excuse me if I missed this, but is the congregation where you are pastoring going to join you in leaving the

Christian and Missionary Alliance denomination if it votes to enforce an egalitarian form of leadership?

We have not brought that to the congregation for any type of decision.

I know historically, and this is a long history before I came, that they were strongly complementarian.

I don't think there's any, has ever been any real thought or teaching to the egalitarian side of things.

I've talked with the elders about it, and the sense from the elders is that it's not something that the congregation would tolerate or accept.

But whether or not the church would follow, I don't know. Once the denomination, if they make a decision, they may not.

It seemed like they might have done that back in 1994, and that turned out not to be the case, but the exact opposite.

So if they did make that decision, at that point, it would be up to me to decide what

I was going to do personally in ministry, and for the church to decide. And if they were to decide to stay in the denomination, then

I would just need to decide for myself and my family. But we've taught on it, not directly, but the issue has come up.

We just finished our Sunday school series on the inspiration, authority, and necessity, and sufficiency of scripture, and this was one of the ongoing examples of how the different sides view that.

But again, I don't know. I really would be hard -pressed. I would hope so, and I think so, but that decision hasn't been made.

Now, as far as your decision, and forgive me for not perhaps listening more carefully,

I don't know if you've said this or not, but if the denomination decides as a whole to ordain women, but they leave it up to the individual consciences of elders of separate congregations to oppose that and continue with a complementarian leadership, would that satisfy you, or the fact that some of your sister churches are ordaining women is too much of an aberrant view for you to even be associated with by being a member of the denomination?

Yeah, I've thought about that, and I'm hard -pressed to imagine staying in the denomination if they have the ordination of women, and they've come up with some kind of rationalizations that are hard to explain, but that they would ordain women as pastors, but then they wouldn't consider pastors as elders, but I would wait to see what they decided, but if it was clear -cut that this was the denomination's position, it would be hard for me to see a circumstance in which

I would stay in the denomination. Yeah, that's a very unusual view to view the pastors as a third office in the

Church, on top of, or I shouldn't say on top of, in addition to elders and deacons to have pastors as a third office, and yet a subordinate office to the elders.

That's quite strange. Yeah, and I've thought about it, and I think it honestly has to do with the fact that most of the time in evangelical churches, because we only use

English, we don't really discuss the Greek, that in the common person's mind, oftentimes our church has pastors and elders, and even how we use the word pastor gives the idea that that is something different from an elder, unless there's clear teaching on it, and we say, okay, here are ruling elders and teaching elders, but again, most churches use the term pastor to refer to the paid, ordained, full -time elders in the

Church, and then they use elder oftentimes or either the ruling elders or lay people, laymen who are elders, and so how we use the language causes people to think that those are two different things, and so I think that this reasoning kind of plays on that, that you can have a pastor who's not an elder.

Yeah, it's interesting that Grace Baptist Church of Carlisle, where I am a member, is the first Reformed Baptist church that I have become familiar with that only uses the term, the title pastor, for the full -time preaching and teaching elders, and all of the other elders are just typically identified by their first name or they will be called an elder, whereas all of the other

Reformed Baptist churches I've been either a member of or familiar with, they will call all of the elders pastor, so it's kind of interesting.

Yeah, and I think when you look at just broader evangelicalism, you find that the offices of the church aren't as clear, and most of it is more based on local practice than really wrestling with the text of Scripture, so I think you find a lot of, in a lot of people's minds, in a lot of evangelicals, they would see pastors and elders as something distinct or maybe even completely different.

Well, we have to go to our final break. It's going to be a lot more brief than the other breaks. If you have a question, send it in immediately to chrisarnson at gmail .com.

chrisarnson at gmail .com is always give us your first name at least, your city and state, and your country of residence if you live outside of the

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We'll be right back. and Virgil Walker, co -host of the

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Welcome back. This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, and our guest is

David Monreale, pastor of the Carlisle Alliance Church, and we have

Christopher in Western Suffolk County, Long Island, New York, who has a question. Have you received any opposition either in your own congregation or denominationally regarding your views supporting

Calvinism? Among friends, there's always been a, you know, a friendly debate and discussion.

What was interesting, especially when I was out in Southern California and I would get together with other

Alliance pastors, the one thing we never talked about was theology. So it's...

That's odd. Other than one other Reformed Alliance pastor that I was friends with that was really influenced by Martin Lloyd -Jones, it was something that was just not brought up.

You know, and I think there's, because of the nature of the Alliance, I think most people that I've encountered have not had a negative attitude towards my

Reformed theology, even though that might not be what they subscribe to.

But I think, again, that might be part of just the nature of the Alliance being such a broad umbrella organization historically that that still carries out today.

And so I know I've talked to people and they say, well, there's some Reformed Alliance pastors over by Philly close to Westminster.

And so it doesn't seem to be something that has really caused division.

But I think in large parts because of just the nature of the denomination. We have...

Let's see. I was just looking at a question and it slipped my vision here. Oh, here it is.

Bobby in Hartsdale, New York said, earlier on you said as a denomination, the

Christian and Missionary Alliance is not dispensationalist. Does that mean it's covenantal or is there another form of the not only view of the church and Israel connection, but eschatology?

Yeah, I think that the Alliance would fall into the historic pre -millennial view generally that it wouldn't it wouldn't subscribe to the dispensational understanding of the complete division between Israel and the church.

And of course, you know, that plays out in really every area of theology with dispensationalism.

You know, it stands or falls together. So, you know, the

Alliance hasn't subscribed to that. I think ironically, I know when

I first started out in the Alliance, there were a number of guys who weren't dispensational but did kind of subscribe to the old kind of second generation dispensationalism out of Dallas Theological Seminary when it came to eschatology.

But like I said, they don't consider themselves dispensational, although they would very much tolerate somebody in their church who was.

But that's been their position. And we have an anonymous listener who wants to know, do you think that if you were globally well -known that your denomination would have more of a negative reaction to your

Reformed theology? Well, the Alliance actually is more globally well -known than nationally well -known.

You know, there are a lot more Alliance members in other countries around the world than in the

United States. So they've been effective in their missions. But again, like I said,

I mean, as I've been in different parts of the country, I was an Alliance pastor in the

Chicago area, in Fort Myers, Florida, in San Diego, now here in Pennsylvania, and have rubbed shoulders with a lot of Alliance pastors, that it hasn't been something that has been divisive or has caused controversy.

Not that that couldn't be found, but it hasn't been my experience. And I think, if I'm not mistaken, that the listener was meaning if you personally were more globally known, would that be sparking more negative reaction?

I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure that's what the listener was... Yeah, no, I don't think so.

Like I said, because of the Alliance's tolerance of different points of view, I think that is part of the

DNA of the denomination by and large. And so although there may be disagreement, because I know

I've had friends at the last general council that we had strong disagreements on complementarianism, but that didn't stop us from fellowship.

And so I would say generally no, but I think there would be segments of the denomination that probably would bristle or even reject my

Reformed theology. Well, congratulations on being the only denomination in the history of the

Christian church that doesn't have that hostility towards the Reformed faith outside of Calvinistic circles.

Yeah, of course, now I may find out they may come out of the woodwork, so we'll see.

Maybe we'll have a follow -up and we can talk about what's happened since. Well, I would like you to now summarize what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners, especially those men who may be out there who are facing very similar circumstances of being a theological minority in the denomination or the fellowship of churches or association of churches where they are either pastoring or entering into the pastorate.

Perhaps you can have some words of counsel and encouragement and advice. Yeah, I think, you know,

I read recently of this helpful distinction between somebody being winsome and somebody being inoffensive.

I think, you know, as Christians that we're called to be winsome, that we should exemplify both grace and truth, that we speak the truth in love, and so as, you know, as somebody who holds to the scriptural teachings, you know, my goal is to be winsome, to not be argumentative, to not be belligerent.

You know, I point back to the text of scripture. I want to be biblically reformed and not just argue my systematic theology, but there's a difference between being winsome and being inoffensive, which means that I back down because I'm worried about what other people might feel or perceive or think, and there's a danger in that because then we compromise our message or we minimize our message for fear of offending others, and so,

I mean, my encouragement would be to be bold, to be courageous, to stand on scripture, and, you know, we try to be as winsome as we can, and some, you know, may be offended, but if they are,

I want it to be from the text and not from my personality, and so, you know, that's how

I try to carry myself in conversations, and I have many, many friends who aren't in the

Reformed camp and were able to communicate in fellowship and disagree because they know my heart, and so I think that's kind of where I see kind of the biggest challenge for a lot of Reformed guys.

Well, alls I know is that winsome tastes good like a cigarette should.

Oh, I'm sorry. That's Winston. Never mind. I really dated myself because there was no one younger than 40 who even knows what

I'm talking about, but I want to thank you for being such a wonderful guest.

I eagerly look forward to your return to the program, brother, and I also eagerly look forward to more great times of fellowship with you.

I want to remind our listeners that if they want to find out more about the Calvary Alliance Church, they can go to cacfamily .org,

cacfamily .org. I want to thank everybody who listened today. Oh, and I want to let you know, folks, since my guest brought up R .C.

Sproul, tomorrow, for the first hour, we have Nate Pikowitz returning to Iron Trip and Zion Radio to discuss his new biography of R .C.

Sproul, R .C. Sproul, Defender of the Reformed Faith.

So I am looking forward to that with bated breath tomorrow, and that's for the first hour.

I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater Savior than you are a sinner.