Christian, There Will Be Sin (w/ Ken Jones) | Theocast

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Hi, this is John, and today on Theocast, Justin and I interview Ken Jones about a topic that we're passionate about,

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Christian, there will be sin. And yeah, it's a little punchy, but the point of it is, sometimes we forget that the experience of the

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Christian life is one that battles with sin, and often it's a very passionate war that sometimes we lose to, and how long can we struggle, and what kinds of sin can we struggle with?

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We're going to look at this from a theological and biblical perspective. We hope you enjoy, stay tuned. And you want to listen to the very end, because in this particular episode, we went ahead and left the

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Simple Reformation podcast in, so you could hear what it's like to be a part of the SR podcast.

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It's a great conversation. I know you're going to enjoy it, because we talk about church discipline, and at one point, at what point should a

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Christian question their salvation? We hope you enjoy. We're excited to announce we have a brand new podcast available called the

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Kingsmen Podcast. It's where we are reclaiming biblical manhood by training and equipping men for the work of the kingdom.

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You can find it anywhere you download a podcast. You can also watch it on YouTube. We have new episodes that come out every

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Monday. Welcome to Theocast, encouraging weary pilgrims to rest in Christ, conversations about the provision of life from a reformed pastoral and confessional perspective.

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If that was a jumbled mess for you, here it is, we're going to break it down. We want to clarify the gospel and reclaim the purpose of the kingdom.

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And today we're going to do that with three of us, three passionate pastors who love Jesus. Your hosts, first of all, we'll start with Justin Perdue, pastor of Covenant Baptist Church in Asheville, North Carolina.

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I am Jon Moffitt. I'm the pastor of Grace Reformed Church in Spring Hill, Tennessee. And yes, once again, we bribed them with enough money to come back on the podcast with us.

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We sent a little seed gift down there to Miami. We sent them a $25 Starbucks gift card. Yes, Pastor Ken Jones from Miami is joining us today from Glendale Baptist Church and from Saint and Sinner Unplugged Podcast and many, many, many other things.

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Speaker at Ligonier, writer at The Gospel Coalition, Whitehorse. OG on the Whitehorse.

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Yes, OG on the Whitehorse. And if you've not heard our previous podcast, you are missing out. Christ -centered preaching, revivalism, and today might be the subject

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I'm most excited about. And yes, we picked it about 30 seconds ago. We are going to be talking about Christian, there will be sin.

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Justin, please, my friend, bring us in. I don't want to waste any more time. Go for it. If anybody's ever read

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Romans chapter 7 or Galatians 5, 17, and you've thought to yourself, yeah,

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I don't know if truer words have ever been written, then today's podcast is for you. The fact that we, by a work of God, by sheer grace, have been caused to be born again.

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We have been made alive with the Lord Jesus Christ. We've been united to Him, and we've been set free from bondage to sin and death and hell.

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We no longer live under the tyranny of sin. We have become obedient from the heart.

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And at the same time, there is also another law that wages war in us, that when we want to do good, evil lies close at hand.

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We delight in the law of God and our inner man, yet the corruption of the flesh is always near, and the spirit and the flesh are opposed to one another, as Paul says in Galatians 5, which keeps us from doing what we want to do.

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If that resonates with you at all, and in your experience, I trust that the next half hour or so will not only resonate with you, but will also be encouraging to your soul.

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As we think about what it's like to live as sinner saints in this fallen world, trusting the

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Lord Jesus Christ for our righteousness, united to Him, knowing that everything that's His is now ours, and at the same time battling against the corruption of our flesh.

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So we're going to talk about this theologically today. We're going to talk about it a little bit in terms of our own experience. We may talk personally,

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I'm not sure. And then we're going to talk about it pastorally, too, because we are three men who are justified and sinners at the same time, pastoring other people who are exactly the same way.

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And so with all that, just by way of teeing it up for us, there's a lot that can be said here. Ken, we like to be gracious hosts, man, whenever possible.

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So we want to throw it over to you and let you talk theologically, brother, help people maybe that have not thought deeply about these matters or are even asking the question, sinner saint reality.

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You guys are using Latin terms, simul justus et peccator. What in the world are you talking about? Can't be reformed if it isn't

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Latin, brother. Yeah, there you go. But especially if you look at the doctrine of justification, in the doctrine of justification, the righteousness of Christ is imputed to us and our unrighteousness is imputed to him.

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Double imputation. Those categories are very helpful so that we realize that what gives us a right standing before God is not infused righteousness in the same way that Christ is treated as if he is guilty, but he is not guilty.

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He does not consume our corruption. He stands in our place as our federal head, as our representative, and he offers up his righteousness so that we are treated as if we were as righteous as him because God has treated him as if he were as impure as we are.

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So the whole concept of imputation and the reason that's so important is so that we know that those to whom the righteousness of Christ is imputed, they are being conformed to that.

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But there is an already not yet continuation with us.

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We are already treated as if we are pure, but at our inner level, at the level of the soul, we still carry around the corpse of our fallen nature, which is why we still need to die.

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We still need to die. And so therefore, the reality is we are never intrinsically in and of ourselves what we are supposed to be.

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But because we cling to Christ by faith, what is true of him is true of us, and that's what gives us the power against the flesh.

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The way Paul expresses it in Colossians 3, if you have been raised with Christ, if you have been crucified with him, then you are also hidden in him.

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And then he says in verse 4, now, therefore, put to death the deeds of the flesh. Set your mind on things that are above, set your heart, your affections on things that are above where Christ is, and you're hidden in him.

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If I can just briefly interject, and then we'll just keep trucking along. What you just said is very important for us.

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Whenever the apostles write, the ways that they encourage the saints in obedience and toward godliness is always by pointing out to them their identity in Christ and their union with him.

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They always encourage the saints, effectively, live like who you are. The whole put off the old man, put on the new man stuff is entirely about this.

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This is who you are now in the Lord Jesus Christ. You've been united to him. You've been, like we said earlier, set free from bondage.

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You used to be that, but you're not that anymore, and now live this way.

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That's the apostolic pattern, really important for us as we think about obedience in the pursuit of godliness.

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The put off and the put on is always because of, and not so that.

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You're not chasing after anything you don't have. Underline that and repeat that on replay. Because of, not so that.

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Excellent. Now, having said that, I put it this way.

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I used to say that there's a single statement that you can say to a

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Christian that can be very helpful and healing to them.

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But when you say it about a Christian, it can be condemning.

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And that is, you can't always tell a Christian by their behavior. That's right. So when

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I tell you that, I'm telling you as a brother in the Lord, as I've had to hear it myself, it relieves me because I'm consumed by my guilt.

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If I believe these things, then how could I have done that? And so when you tell me or when

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I tell you, you are not a Christian because of your behavior, that helps me.

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Because now you're guiding me to remind me what makes me a Christian is my faith in the person and work of Christ.

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But when I have to say that about a Christian, that's a condemning thing. Because now what

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I'm saying is your behavior is inconsistent with your confession. So we begin there, that what makes us

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Christian is not what we do, it's what we believe. And it's because of what we believe that it challenges our behavior.

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So sometimes, and I hope we're not misunderstood on this, therefore outside of blaspheming against the

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Holy Spirit, we can't say that there is a sin that a

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Christian will not commit. I'm going to say there is no sin that a

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Christian should commit. That's right. Come on, brother. Amen, dude. There is no sin that it is not possible for a

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Christian to commit. We've said it before, how long and how badly might a

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Christian sin? It's like they might sin really badly for a really long time. Yes. It's exactly what you're saying.

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And this is never, like you said, may people not hear what we're not saying. This is not a justification for foolishness.

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This is not a condoning of stupidity and sinful behavior. It's an acknowledgement of the reality of living life in a fallen world with a fallen nature still and being united to Christ at the same time.

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That's right. Well, not only that, sometimes there are believers who are not shepherded well, and they find themselves, because they haven't been given the pure milk of the word and they haven't been guided by elders and developed, they're trapped.

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You listen to the things that Paul's telling the Corinthian church, and you just kind of cringe. You're like, whoa, you guys are just sleeping with prostitutes?

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That's wild, man. Whoa, guys. And he doesn't call them unbelievers.

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He's like, you guys got to stop that. You can't do that. You know, that's not acceptable. And this whole thing, like you're sleeping with your mother -in -law thing, man, you guys got it.

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And, you know, we forget that Paul is dealing with people who, not that they might fall into sin, it's that they're in sin.

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And he's like, all right, look, can't do that. That's not, this is not how we live. And then he says, by the way, once you stop doing this sin, look, it's a battle.

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It's a war. And you're going to be in the war until you die or Christ comes back.

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And so here's how you fight the flesh, right? If you walk by the spirit, you will not give into the flesh.

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And so there's this war that's going to go on. And I have found in my own experience, and I know with you, man, because I've talked with you and in pastoring, that when you do not hold this battle, this tension that's going on back and forth, you, first of all, make yourself vulnerable because you can become very confident in your own flesh.

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Like, oh, I, you know, I have the spirit within me. I'm not going to fall to that. That's foolish. I mean, why else would

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Peter say, be sober minded, be alert? Cause you're under attack. He's coming after to trip you up, man.

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Make you, what does he say in second Peter one, make you ineffective and unfruitful, absolutely.

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Right. And then the second thing is, is that, that pride can set in. What does

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Paul say? Right. When you go to a brother's trapped in sin, you're like, take heed, lest you too fall, be cautious, be humble, lest you too fall.

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So we walk around in a weak flesh, knowing that I would say it this way, that a strong flesh, right?

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Our flesh can overpower our spirit. If we're not careful with that. And so Paul talks about this. And I think all the

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New Testament talks about this constantly, where if you do not realize that the spirit lives within a body that is not redeemed.

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And if you're not careful, that body will absolutely go against the design of Christ, which is to reflect holiness.

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Um, for me, it has really helped, you know, I tell guys all the time. You know, cause they'll come in and they're struggling, whatever it is with, they're struggling with anger, lust, whatever, and they think like,

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Oh, there will come a moment where like, that won't be a problem because I've been sanctified. I'm like, no.

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There'll come a moment where you trust the spirit more than you trust your flesh, but you will never stop fighting the flesh ever.

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It never stops. And that's the lie of what's, you know, Satan basically is.

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He either gets you to deny that there's a problem or he gets, he gets you to the point where you give up.

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It's like, well, I can't do this anyway. So I might as well just give in and you live a secret life of sin because you're just like, well,

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I guess I just can't overcome this. So the language of sanctification is very severe.

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Yeah. Put to death. I mean, that's not like fix a habit.

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It's no, it's put to death. That's, that's pretty severe and it's very zombie -esque because when you put it to death, it doesn't happen.

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Yeah. It's you're going to have to put it to death again. Wow. Yeah. And again, but I think that this again is where gospel distinctives are so important gospel categories.

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And so we began with understanding that the righteousness that gives us a right standing with God is credited to us, but also conforming our affections to the degree that we love the righteousness for its own sake.

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But we struggle. And so therefore, like I said, there is no sin that is possible.

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It's not possible for a Christian to commit. Um, and so therefore this is where church life, the life of the church, the pastoral ministry, fellowship, all of these things are important.

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But we began by recognizing that ours is an imputed righteousness on this side of heaven.

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Yeah. You know, it's going to be fleet. It's going to be fleeting. It's going to be flawed.

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Even the righteousness that we do is going to be flawed standing on its own, but it's through Christ, therefore it's accepted to God.

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Um, so as Christians deal with conflicting thoughts and recognize actions that are inconsistent with their confession and conviction, this is why you need continual reminders of who you are in Christ, the affirmation of confession, absolution, however you want to put it, to be reminded that this is what we are in constant need of.

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And so when we look at some of the issues of the day, uh, we can be consumed by these things.

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We can be overtaken. We can be overthrown in any given thing that is contrary to the law of God.

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But we are still indwelt by the spirit. We are sealed by the Holy spirit, reminding us that we belong to him, the spirit of redemption.

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We belong to him and he who has begun a good work in us will be faithful to complete it until the day of the

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Lord. So we stand with brothers. We deal, we take sin seriously and we should take it seriously individually and corporately within the body.

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Yeah, man. Well, we need to be perpetually reminded. It can't be said enough that Jesus is our whole and only righteousness.

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And we receive that by faith. It's what he did in fulfilling the requirements of the law and also enduring its curse in our place.

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And the righteousness of Christ is all the righteousness that we'll ever need. And it's the only righteousness, like you said, that we will ever have this side of the resurrection that would ever reconcile us to God.

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And, and so that can't be said enough. And this, this is part of the reason why we gather week over week in the church is to have

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Christ heralded to us like that, and to be, to confess our sins together, to be absolved of our guilt, assured of our forgiveness, and then to come to the table.

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To be reminded that as surely as we hold the bread and the cup in our hands and eat and drink them,

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Christ died for us and that we have been grafted into him, we've been united to him. Our sins have been remitted.

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His blood is the, is what the new covenant is founded upon. And it's about the forgiveness of sins.

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And so we, we come to receive that week over week, like you said, because the reality of our experience is something very different.

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It's a war, it's conflict, it's struggle, it's difficult. Right. And that's the day over day experience of the believer that the non -believer does not experience.

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And that needs to be stated as well. Yeah. I remember back in the early nineties, there were a lot of evangelical or scandals with televangelists and so forth.

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And we were down in San Diego at a Ligonier conference, I think it was. And, um, Bob Godfrey made an interesting point.

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He said, um, the difference between these, this group of televangelists and their scandals and so forth, the form, it's not that we aren't capable of these things, but we have a category for it.

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We have, we have a category for at the highest levels of those who are practitioners of ministry or participants in ministry, uh, who fall into egregious sin, we have categories for that.

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So it's not, it doesn't have to be all or nothing. And it doesn't mean that we glorify, but I never will forget that.

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That's a good observation. That's helpful. It is. Go ahead, John. Well, I was going to say to your point is that I think that's why we as pastors probably take extra precautions because we know the frailties of our flesh, that Satan's good at what he does.

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And if he can take us off of our capacity to preach the gospel, uh, like we have been, then he, then he will, this is why there's so many warnings for pastors to be like,

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Hey, be aware, be alert, be accountable. Yeah, no, that's good. And that's what we, that's what we, how we minister to the sheep, because like you said, yes, under shepherds have these struggles, but our sheep, and especially at a very young age, if we ground them in the message that we embrace, that we believe and we ground them in law gospel, and we articulate and open up what the law actually means, not just what it says, but what it means, our young people are challenged with a lot of things.

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And so they have to know a, that even that sin is forgiven. And then B also how, how to live in a world where sin is all over the place without compromise, compromise of your convictions and without corruption.

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So how do we, how do we deal with these things? Because do we tell them to be jerks to others who don't hold to those same things?

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Yeah, that's so good. I, in my experience, people who understand their frailty, this

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St. Sinner reality are quicker to repent and bolder to confess.

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You know, when James says, confess your sins to one another, we're not afraid to hide it because we all expect there to be sin.

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So what the, one of the deals, issues I deal with when I get people that come in from fundamentalism or they come from charismatic movements is that they hide their sin for so long that it's this infestation and it's overtaken their life, where I'm like, brother, if you would have repented of that years ago, you could have got help to fight that.

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Listen, I say this and I know it makes people feel uncomfortable, but it's the fact, God expects you to sin.

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What does Hebrews say, right? Your great high priest is a sympathetic high priest because he understands your weakness.

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He didn't sin, but he experienced what you, and then what does he say? With boldness, I mean, you don't have to be afraid that you sinned.

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He says with boldness, run into the presence, throne room of God. If we say we have no sin, the truth isn't in us and we make

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God a liar. That's right. So it's pretty plain. I love this. When he says, you ask for grace and mercy in a time of need.

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And in my moment, I'm going, I can't think of a day when I don't need his mercy. And he says, dear child, don't be timid.

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The grace and mercy is something you could come in and get. Come on, come on in here and get this because in order for you to make it every day, you're going to need my grace and my mercy.

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So come on, come in here and get it. What is mercy? Holding back judgment. That is what grace giving merits that are undeserved.

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Exactly. Right. Yeah. You're going to need recently. Uh, and I shared it in preaching, uh, uh, it was a tick tock.

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Uh, a father had his 12, I think son must've been about 12 or so. And he's talking to his son.

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He says, look, I'm not trying to be a jerk, but did not tell you to clean your room. And, uh, the son says, yeah, he says, man, that room is a disaster.

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And he doesn't just, he doesn't beat him up. He says, but we already talked about this and I know it's your birthday. And, but I told you, and your room is just, it's in horrible shape.

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He says, now, now go in your room. And the son opens the door and the room has been cleaned for him.

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And so he looks around and the father walks in behind him and the kid drops to his knees.

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And then he stands up and he embraces his dad, you know?

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And, and I think that's what we have to do. We are bringing people. We're telling, reminding them with the law of what the law says and how disastrous our lives are without it.

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And then the father tells us, come here, come and sit down at the table.

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And what was that? That's scandalous right there, bro. But this is where, so this is not a law and gospel episode directly, but I wanted to say something earlier when you mentioned it and you just said it again.

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This is why the right division of law and gospel and the right preaching of law and gospel is so important.

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And I'm not even going to talk about the third use of the law right now. We, we need to rightly preach the first use of the law every

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Sunday, not just for the believer, but we need to preach the law in all of its holiness. We preach the thunder of the law for all of us to be reminded of what the law requires and how we fall so far short.

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And then what do we do? Like, lest we get it twisted, we can't do this. We still can't, you know, spirit empowered obedience does not fulfill the requirements of the law.

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Only Christ fulfilled the law. And so then we herald him. And this is so helpful for us to be reminded and have our minds and hearts recalibrated this way consistently, because we're so prone to think in other ways.

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And we think we, we think we, we lower the level of the law because we're like the rich young ruler.

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We think we've done it. John, you're from Southern California, you know, on a clear day, you're driving down the freeway and what do you see ahead of you?

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The mountains on a clear day, those mountains seem so right next to you.

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It's like you can go out and touch it, but then the more you drive, the more you realize how far away you are.

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The largeness of the mountain, nor its clarity make you think you are there because you're a long ways away.

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You're that's big bear up there. Two hours away. It's like you just run to it, but no, it's further away.

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And when we open up the law, it's not like, okay, then I'll get out of the car and run the rest of the way.

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No, when we open up the law, people realize how far away they are.

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When you get to the base of that mountain, you realize how big it is too. I mean, so, all right, let's, let's talk a little bit about how this kind of law and gospel preaching and this understanding of the center

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Saint reality, how it really is fruitful in the church and how it's helpful to the saints in this life.

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You know, as we're making our way as pilgrims and sojourners and exiles to the heavenly country. If you're new to Theocast, we have a free ebook available for you called faith versus faithfulness, a primer on rest.

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And if you've struggled with legalism, a lack of assurance, or simply want to know what it means to live by faith alone, we wrote this little book to provide a simple answer from a reformed confessional perspective.

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You can get your free copy at theocast .org slash primer. Yeah, it's the exact opposite of what we're kind of experiencing today, where the individuals encouraged to be strong in their own strength.

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And what's, what's powerful about Christ in the gospel is he says, first of all, you weren't, you weren't alive in order to save yourself.

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I made you alive. And now that you're alive, you're not able to keep yourself sustained. I have to do that.

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And you're not even able to grow. I have to do that. So every area of your life is the objective realities of outside of yourself, right?

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So we are dependent upon the spirit for our salvation. We're dependent upon it for our sanctification and our glorification.

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So what this looks like is that there's a constant battle between, am I going to trust that the spirit is sufficient in his word, or am

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I going to trust in my flesh, right? I love how Colossians at the end of chapter two, he says, these areas of discipline in the flesh appear to be wise, but they're of no value of stopping the indulgence of the flesh, right?

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Where does he then point you? He points you to Christ, look unto Jesus. But what's interesting about the book of Colossians is that that's not a look individually unto

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Jesus, right? He says, I love this. Let the word of God dwell in you richly.

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And then he tells you how that happens, right? By admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual psalms, right?

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So the experience of the Christian life is one that is those who are empowered by the spirit, who are gifted by the spirit, use the means of the spirit to sustain themselves until Christ returns.

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So our salvation and our obedience to Christ, I love this too, right? Consider daily how to build one another up that you weren't hardened by the deceitfulness of sin, right?

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So the experience is always do not trust self, do not trust flesh, trust

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Christ, his means and his spirit, and all of that is outside of yourself. And I'm telling you for me that in the last 10, 15 years has been a sweet experience in a horrendous world.

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The longer I'm alive and the longer I pastor, oh, gentlemen, I'm sure you've wake up days going,

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I can't help these people. This is too hard. You know, I need help. And then I'm realizing, oh,

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I don't have to do this. The spirit will do this and I will trust his work and I will trust his means. That would be my first initial response.

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No, I'm with you. And I think the difference that that message makes is going to be seen not just in your individual quote unquote

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Christian walk, but the totality of your Christian life, which means you are being a part of the covenant community.

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And so therefore you have a different expectation from fruitful fellowship.

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I think, you know, part of our growth is vital Christian fellowship. Hearing God's word, not just through the ordinary means of preaching and teaching, but through the ordinary connection that we're connected one to another with each point to find strength to the other as each one does its part.

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And so what God speaks in his word is, is, is confirmed and it's, it's made more, uh, more visual sometimes, uh, in the context of the body.

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So it's a reminder of how sinful we are. So we get a true assessment of self because here's the thing.

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God is not the only one talking to us and affirming us. Uh, so is the flesh, the flesh, the world of the devil is all speaking to us.

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And they speak a different word, man. They are affirming our corruption. God is affirming our purity in Christ and his love for us.

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So there's a counter message that's being affirmed in the, with the world, the flesh and the devil.

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And by flesh, what we mean is corrupt human nature by world.

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It is corrupt. Human nature is collectivized and by Satan or the devil, of course we mean

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Satan himself. So Satan works through our fallen nature, individualized and collectivized to tell us that we're okay.

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And God speaks to us individually and collectively telling us you're okay.

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And me gives us a different vision of self. And that's why we need that message.

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So we can see the law with all of its grandeur and it's, even though it's away from us, but here's what we are told you're seated with him.

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That's where you're. So keep driving, keep walking because that's where you're seated. Exactly.

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And the, the promises, I mean, a number of things are just popcorn around in my head right now, but the, the certainty of our future hope is what enables us to continue on.

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That's, that's very clear in, in the writings of like, I I'm in, I'm in Romans right now and Romans five, one to 11, there's a ton there.

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But one of the things that's very plain, it just pops off the page is that present justification is the guarantee of final salvation.

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And, and that having been united to Christ and justified by faith in Christ, apart from works, we can now rejoice in hope of the glory of God that's coming.

31:53

And if we've been reconciled to God through the death of his son, how much more will we be saved by his life?

31:58

The fact that he ever lives to plead for us and intercede for us and advocate for us, all of those things.

32:04

You know, if we've been justified by faith in Christ, when we were God's enemies, how much more so will we be saved by Jesus from the wrath of God?

32:11

I mean, this is what enables us to continue. And even in a, in a Hebrews 12 kind of way, what is it that helps us to bear up under discipline?

32:18

Because discipline at the moment is never pleasant. God is working in us to produce holiness, to help us to share in his holiness.

32:26

It's hard though, but we bear up under it. Why? Because we know that our father loves us and because we are looking unto

32:32

Christ. That's in my mind right now. That's important for us. And it kind of undergirds this whole conversation.

32:38

But then in the church, this understanding of law and gospel and center saint and all this produces a lot of good things in us individually that then is very fruitful collectively.

32:50

Like, because we were humbled because we don't misunderstand this. Like we never could earn anything.

32:57

And it's not like now having been justified, the project is to turn myself into the kind of person that God would have been happy to save originally in the first place.

33:05

That's not what we do. We realize we're always debtors to mercy. We're always debtors to grace.

33:11

It's all of Christ. He's it. He's our only hope. That's humbling. But then in addition, it produces this kind of understanding, produces vigilance because we understand like, man,

33:21

I am far more wicked than I ever care to admit, and there are so many things that go on in my mind and heart on a daily basis that I would literally be horrified to think that my brothers and sisters would know what's going on in here.

33:35

We know that's true. And so when we can talk like this to one another and acknowledge that this is what we are in terms of the old man, then that helps us be vigilant together and we can live honestly and openly.

33:47

Lastly, it produces compassion because compassion, right?

33:53

Where you don't, you're not looking down on others. You're not thinking, well, man, they just need to get it together. If they were just as disciplined as me, then this church would be just, it would be banging in here, man, because we would all be crushing the

34:04

Christian life if we were all like me. None of that nonsense goes on because we realize that just like we struggle and battle things that we didn't ask for and that we didn't sign up for, that is true of our brothers and sisters in the faith.

34:16

And this collective sense of our need of Christ, it knits hearts together guys, in a way that nothing else can.

34:24

No, I totally agree that that compassion part. That's why, again, we've got counter messages that are attempting to help us, counter sources of help.

34:35

We have the world, the flesh and the devil that's helping us be the best that we can be in our corrupt fallen selves and be happy about it.

34:43

And then we have Christ and the church that's helping us to understand who we are in him.

34:51

But that is what helps us help each other. Hopefully a better grasp of law and gospel will teach me more patience in dealing with the sins of my brothers, my sisters within the body individually, and even as an overseer, even as an under shepherd, that we are careful and cautious in how we deal with the people because we know what we're dealing with.

35:19

I have one last comment, Justin, and I'll let you take us out. God in his wisdom knew by putting it in the word of God, how weak your flesh is.

35:29

You see, if we didn't need the body of Christ and the constant hearing of the word, he would have saved us and then said, okay, go out and do your thing.

35:39

And there is no gathered church. There is no gathering of the saints. It's like, you've got my word. You've got the spirit.

35:45

Now go do your thing. No, he says, do not forsake the sinning of yourself. Submit to your elders for they watch over your soul.

35:52

Your flesh is so weak and influenced by the world, you're going to need the constant preaching of the gospel week after week until you die, and that's how much

36:04

God doesn't trust your flesh, just to be frank. Now, John, you're the one that's going to take us out, but since you got it back over to me,

36:11

I'm going to take advantage of this opportunity to make one final comment myself. That's the flesh for you.

36:17

That's exactly right. There's something sinner saying in there. I think what an understanding of these things does for me as a pastor too, guys, and I'm sure you've experienced this, and this is born good fruit in our congregation, when people come to talk to their elders and they're kind of sitting there, they won't even make eye contact and they're squirming in the seat, they're ashamed, and they're going to say something to you that is grieving to them, but maybe in past experiences, they're just expecting you to recoil in horror.

36:52

When they confess it, though we're grieved and our heart breaks for them, we lean in.

37:01

That'll bear some fruit over years and decades when we can pastor people like that and because we understand their frames and because we too battle the same things and are capable of the same things.

37:16

Yeah. So this leads us to an additional podcast we did last week.

37:22

If you go back and listen to that one, we give you a free SR. I know I made that decision without you knowing, JP. We give them a free

37:28

SR so you can learn. We haven't done that in a while, so that's what SR sounds like. Hey, listen, this is how it works at Theocast.

37:35

I don't make these decisions, John. It's fine. You know, when you're the director, you get to do fun things like that. Anyways, we're about to do a second podcast.

37:41

Justin and I love this. This is family time and Ken joined us last time where he's going to join us again. And we're going to talk about something that's a little bit more spicy.

37:50

What about people who struggle with sin like homosexuality? Can someone struggle with that sin and still claim to be a

37:57

Christian? Or how long can a

38:03

Christian sin before we would begin to question their salvation? Things like that. Or maybe even when should a

38:10

Christian question their salvation? That's right. When should a Christian question their salvation? All of this is in what's called Semper Firmanda.

38:16

It's Latin for always reforming. We're trying to take these conversations and reform our hearts and minds around the truth of scripture from a reform perspective.

38:24

And there's an app that's involved where there's almost 700 people in there and we're having conversations and I know

38:30

Justin's in there posting all the time. We would love to have you a part of that. This is all for our monthly donors.

38:36

If you want to go to our website, theocast .org, it's right there on the homepage. You can learn more about it. Thank you for listening.

38:41

Ken, before we jump over to that podcast, I just want to say thanks again for giving up a couple of hours of your time so that we could love on the saints here.

38:50

If you have not heard his podcast, Saints Center Unplugged, please go subscribe to that. I know you'll be encouraged.

38:56

And sir, thank you so much for being with us again. Thank you. Thank you guys for having me on.

39:03

All right. We'll see you guys next week. All right.

39:21

For the sake of time, we're not even going to take a pause. We're going to get into it. So welcome to Semper Firmanda.

39:26

It's so good to have you guys here. And I threw out two hot topics right away. And so I'm going to throw it over to Ken, because this is a conversation that we were having before we hit record.

39:36

And I'll let you kind of tell the story or however you want to tee this up. But the struggle that sometimes

39:41

Christians get confused in, in that we can be trapped in serious sin, like same sex attraction, and yet still be a

39:48

Christian. So brother, walk us through your thinking on that. You've had the opportunity from a reformed perspective to pastor and think through this when it maybe wasn't as big.

39:58

And now that it's a huge issue within our culture, talk us through from a pastoral standpoint, you know, how we should think about these things.

40:08

Well, we begin with what we know to be definitively exhaustively true. And that is any sexual relations outside of marriage between man and woman, according to the scripture, is sin.

40:23

That is a defilement of the marriage bed, as the writing of Hebrews says.

40:30

And so all, all sexual sins outside of marriage is a defiling of marriage.

40:36

So we begin there. Now, we also know that none of us are as sexually pure as we may think we are.

40:47

So therefore, we are not saying because we have maintained that standard.

40:54

So the issue then is what about homosexuality?

40:59

And a lot of Christians are quick to point out, but it's the only one that God calls an abomination.

41:06

Well, it's not. It's not the only thing he says is an abomination, but also lying and gossip or abomination to those things are abominations of the

41:14

Lord. So we can't put it in a category above what

41:20

God has already put it in. So the question then becomes, is it possible for a

41:25

Christian to be engaged in either homosexual activity or same sex attraction and still be a

41:35

Christian? So if we transfer homosexuality to sexual immorality in general, then we ask the question, is it possible for a

41:47

Christian to be engaged in sexual immorality? And if you don't put homosexuality on it, most would agree.

41:54

That's right. Yes. We're not affirming the behavior. We're affirming the statement that we said earlier that there is no sin that a

42:02

Christian may not be guilty of. So the way we handle it is the way we deal with sexual immorality as it surfaces within the body.

42:13

We confront it with the law of God. We call people to repent of it, give them opportunity to do so.

42:21

And I do think that each situation is different, you know, but in terms of the time span or whatever, but we confront it and then we call people to repent.

42:32

So to answer the question, is it possible? Of course, it's possible for a Christian to be a genuine believer and either overtaken in that particular sin or are leaning in that direction.

42:47

For sure. Yeah. I mean, no controversy here as far as John and I are concerned. A struggle with same sex attraction does not mean for one second that you're not

42:56

Christ, in short, and it's not that you are uniquely wicked either.

43:03

I mean, because the corruption that we all carry around with us in the form of our fallen nature is wicked beyond measure when compared to the holy standard of God's law.

43:16

And so, yeah, I think that everything you've said, Ken, I would fully agree and endorse.

43:22

And I think that this is the way we need to speak. I mean, even to issues of our day, when it comes to issues of sexuality, issues of gender, all of these kinds of things and the confusion that exists out there on the gender front, all of that, we speak with this kind of clarity and compassion, right?

43:42

And I think when we don't, we open the door for two extremes. We open the door on the one hand for those to reject the church outright, walk away because they haven't received compassion or whatever.

43:56

And even if it's only temporary or we open the door, if we accept without the nuances and understanding the law, we accept the individual in their sin and affirm the sin, then what we are doing is opening the door for corrupting the doctrines that define us.

44:15

Sure. So in other words, that's where you come up with churches that we are gender affirming. We are this and the other.

44:21

I think we can be compassionate and we can be consistent with our convictions, with our compassion.

44:28

But we don't have to say that it's OK. We can't say what God says is sin.

44:33

We can't say it's OK. No. Yeah. I mean, sin is normal and it's not

44:39

OK. That's right. Well, why does he have to tell us to put these things to death?

44:44

That means that they're capable. I mean, I love this one, right? Let no temptation overtake you, which is common to man.

44:52

He wouldn't say, don't let it overtake you if it could. You know, those are the kind of things you have to stop and do the reverse on these things, right?

45:00

Just reverse what he says. He says, OK, this can overtake you and it's common that it overtakes you, but don't let it overtake you.

45:08

And those are the things that I think is helpful. I love the Lenten Baptist Confession here because, you know, 5 .5

45:13

talks about how times. Right. I mean, it's like in that paragraph, it could not be more clear that not only does

45:20

God, this is a reality, but God at times will allow a believer to stay in long periods of slavery to cause them to have a greater dependence upon him when he relieves them from it.

45:32

Like you want to see how powerful your flesh is? Watch this. I will I will release my restraint of it and you will see how powerful this is.

45:42

And he does this as a loving father to teach us, as it says, I love how it puts us in this so that we have a greater dependence upon it.

45:50

We've all done this with our children where they're like trying to pull off and they're trying. And I find let me show you what happens when you do that and they get terrified and then you grab them and say,

45:58

OK, that wasn't great. What? Hold my hand. This is why you hold my hand. And this is

46:03

I think it's so important that the amount of self -righteousness that just absolutely broods out of this stuff that, well,

46:11

I would never. Well, Paul says, but by the grace of God, there go I. Well, that whole

46:17

I would never statement is absurd on the face of it because it's like, oh, I would never

46:23

I could never do A, B or C. And it's like, OK, well, you have thought and done far worse, countless things that you swore you would never do.

46:31

That's right. I mean, what in the world are you even talking about? And that goes back to that, that honesty, the humility, the compassion part of the whole thing.

46:40

All right. Let me ask this. We don't have a lot of time left. Yeah. And I have one more thing after that. OK, I'm going to throw this out there and I'm going to give my take.

46:47

So I don't want to like do the bait and switch thing. When should a Christian question his or her salvation? I'm not saying that this is the definitive only thing that could be said, but my general answer is this.

46:58

A Christian should question his or her salvation when they are facing the the censure, the discipline of the church.

47:06

Yeah. That's my answer. Like, I don't think in a general sense we need to be preaching, teaching, living in such a way, discipling in such a way where people are constantly doubting their standard.

47:18

But if we are in a situation where because of stubborn, obstinate, ongoing, unrepentant sin, we are facing the censure of the church, the discipline of the body of Christ, we should seriously and soberly assess our confession and our life and question and in that sense, examine ourselves.

47:40

Am I in the faith? That's the time, though. And I think if we if this is this, I'm just gonna make this observation,

47:46

I would throw it over to you guys. That obviously makes very clear that we need healthy churches where the law and the gospel are rightly preached and where discipline is practiced.

47:57

And so but not in this heavy handed, crazy way, but with an understanding of law and gospel and center state reality, we're going to practice discipline.

48:05

Yeah. Thoughts? No, it's interesting, I'm thinking of three scenarios, two times that we've had to remove the right hand of fellowship from people within the congregation.

48:18

And each situation was different. But I think to your point,

48:24

Justin, what ended up happening in both cases over a period of time, the individuals came back.

48:30

Praise God, brother. They needed it. They needed the church. And so I think of those those two things.

48:37

But then I also think of a brother who came to me once. He wasn't a member of our church, but he was a member of another church and we were serving at the

48:45

Lord's table and we qualified the table. I'm sorry, sorry. You're good, bro. Like John said, we family, bro.

48:52

It's OK. Qualifying the table. So he came into my office afterwards. And one of the people that we withhold, one group that we withhold the privileges of the table from are those who are under the present discipline.

49:06

Yes, same. That if you have been censored, wherever it is, even if it's a different denomination, you say, well, you guys wouldn't agree with them.

49:15

It's where you have exactly the care of your soul. So therefore, we ask that you would not participate.

49:21

So we had qualified the table and came into my office afterwards and he had not received the table.

49:28

And he said, you know, he told me the situation where he had been censored. And so at that point, he couldn't even look me in the eye.

49:35

And I said, so and here's what he said. He says, here's what I'm afraid of, that I'm actually loving this sin more than I do

49:47

Christ at this point. Yeah, which is probably true.

49:53

Well, brother, what you have just said, then you need to go back. Yeah. Well, what you just articulated,

49:59

Ken, beautifully, and we have a wonderful story in our own context, too, of a of a woman who was who was excommunicated, who was removed from our fellowship years ago, and then after six years came back and wrote beautifully to the elders of how the discipline of the church had weighed heavily on her soul.

50:20

So we have just articulated that even church discipline is a tool of our loving father to keep his people.

50:28

It is restorative in its aim. Right. I think a lot of times people talk about church discipline in ways that's unhelpful, and that maybe is another pod for another day.

50:37

But when used rightly and practiced rightly, it does sober people. It causes people to reflect and examine themselves like this man did.

50:46

I'm afraid I'm loving my sin more than I'm effectively loving God and his law and trusting in Christ.

50:52

And that's useful. But in a general sense, we don't go around telling people with the posture of, you're probably a faker and I'm going to smoke you out.

51:04

Like that's not how we operate generally. No, but it is useful. And I would say this about church discipline, because church discipline begins not with the public censure.

51:16

No. It begins with the personal confrontation of your sin apart from the ordinary preaching of the word is speaking a little bit louder.

51:27

So when he brings someone to you and speaks a little bit louder, that's first step in discipline.

51:34

That's right. And therefore the end of discipline, the purpose of discipline is repentance.

51:40

Amen. That's right. Repentance and restoration. That's right. It's repentance. So therefore, when it reaches a point of excommunication, we think in terms of restoration, but what is it that would bring restoration?

51:53

It's repentance. So at each step along the way, he's giving us another opportunity to repent, just as we have the ordinary way of repentance or call to repentance when we hear the gospel or when we hear law and gospel.

52:08

Amen. One last comment on discipline, because I think this needs to be stated. When we even reach that final, most severe step of church censure, which is excommunication, we are not saying that we know this person isn't a

52:19

Christian. All we are saying is that you are in unrepentant sin that is hard -hearted and ongoing in such a way that it is very dangerous for your soul.

52:29

And so that you might repent, and so that you might then be restored, we are going to put you out.

52:36

That's the whole goal behind it. And I think there are a lot of well -meaning Calvinistic Baptists who talk about church discipline in a way that's unhelpful because they use the language of excommunication.

52:48

The church gave you the jersey that says Christian on it, and now in excommunication, we're taking the jersey back.

52:55

That's really unhelpful and sounds pretty Roman. And so I just wanted to make that statement of clarification.

53:02

I realized that wasn't the point of everything we're saying. I like what Paul says in 1 Corinthians, turn him over to the devil.

53:09

Turn him over to excommunicate him so that the devil can have his flesh so that his soul can be saved in the day of the

53:15

Lord. Yeah, like that whole thing of treat him like an unbeliever. The point of that is that, hey, listen, they're not going to enjoy the benefits and fellowship of the believer, but we love the lost.

53:26

We evangelize the lost. We don't hate them and reject them. And the point of it was treat him like an unbeliever, meaning let him feel that coldness and the distance of turning away from the fellowship of the believer.

53:40

So he goes, I want that back. Great. We want you to have that back too. Come back to us. And what

53:45

I'll have to say, we'll save it for another podcast for another time. Justin, you might want to make this SR free too.

53:52

This is pretty great. I'll make them all for you. But no, I mean, this one maybe brother, I mean, because of the conversation about church, this one

53:58

I think is useful for people to hear. Anyway. They're all really good. Why don't you, why don't you take us out? We've been on here for a while.

54:03

Well, I'm so thankful for you, Ken, and that you've come on. And he has, he has become a dear friend to us.

54:09

He loves on us and cares for us. And we young pastors are appreciative of that. And at least

54:15

I consider myself to be young. I guess I'm getting gray hair now. I'm an old guy now. Amazing how time flies.

54:23

Joining the Alliance and RC used to call me and Mike. Oh, you guys are the young guys, young bucks.

54:30

Now we're the old guys. Hey, you know, Timothy, right. Passing down from faithful men to faithful men.

54:36

We're so thankful that you've done that. And, uh, Hey, those of you that are supporting TheoCast monthly, you allow us to have great conversations like this with Ken, and we're so thankful for your ongoing support and your kindness and friendship, and we'll see you guys hopefully in glory and next to our savior.