Phil Howard Interview (Part 2)

Welcome to No Compromise Radio Ministry, also known as Duplex Gratia Radio.

Christ for pardon, Christ for power. Double benefit, not only for justification, but also for sanctification.

Don't forget the new book, Cancer is Not Your Shepherd, a 31 -day guide to suffering, is out on Amazon.

And also an updated version of Sexual Fidelity, a 31 -day guide to purity.

That's the book I wrote thinking about what I talked to my son about, Luke, when he was growing up about the topic.

But it's good for older folks and younger folks. I'm just thankful when I hear people say, well,

I got the book, and my son and I don't really read the book that much. We mainly talk about the subject.

And I say, victory that you would sit down with your son and talk about sex and purity.

That's something I wish my father would have done. So anyway, both of those are on Amazon .com.

Today is part two with my dear friend, Pastor Phil Howard, retired, but was at Valley Bible Church for many, many years, about 50.

Phil, welcome back to No Compromise Radio Ministry. Good to be with you again. Well, we have had a

Q &A during the marriage conference, a Q &A during Sunday school, a Q &A during the first radio show last

Wednesday. What in the world are we going to do now? What are we going to talk about?

I know. All right. I'll flip things around. Do you have any questions for me? Would you like me to answer any questions?

Fire away. What fed your thirst for Reformed theology? Oh, that is a good question.

Well, you do radio, so see, it just is easy for you to do that as well. What's the name of your radio show again?

Truth for Today. Truth for Today. Out of San Francisco. KFAR, if I remember right. KFAX.

KFAX. 1100 AM. KFAX. All right. Well, you know, it's interesting to me,

Phil, if you don't live in San Francisco in the old days, you couldn't get the radio stations. And then now, because of the

Internet, lots of these radio stations are on your Internet. Exactly. And we've just gone to podcasts after 25 years of doing radio.

And that station was San Francisco and then moved to Fremont, California.

That's the present location. But we've been on 20. And we did it because everybody that wanted to get a

Bible lesson had to hear Swindoll or John MacArthur. And we thought we're in the

Bay Area and we teach the same Bible. We love the text.

We think equally, maybe not as equally competent, but we love the text.

And why don't you come and give us a chance to talk to you in your neighborhood?

Absolutely, because if you listen to Chuck Swindoll and you don't live in, in the old days, close to Fullerton, California or now close to Dallas, what do you do?

But if there's a local guy, yeah, I'll answer your question. But the trash pickup guy just drove by and everybody could hear that probably in the radio station.

And that's because we don't have a soundproof booth here. No compromise radio ministry. Before I answer your question,

Phil, you said something very convicting about receiving counsel from someone about emptying the trash.

Tell us that story, because I thought, oh, when I think of trash now, I think of what you said.

I was going through domestic trouble with my oldest daughter.

And she became pregnant while at a

Bible college and put our family in crisis. And in it, so many believers do not know how to comfort you.

They seem to everybody have an opinion of you. And many of those were negative.

Do we know how to raise children? It was a time of Job's comforter setting while you're in Ashes and sackcloth, they're setting critiquing you.

So I was in the process of becoming a bitter pastor. And I took my, our elders encouraged me to go for family counseling.

My wife and I and my three children, we go to a counselor, happened to be a pastor's wife.

That was very good. And she's interviewing everyone. And she comes to me and what?

Tell me your perspective, Pastor. And I start sharing. And she said, you know what?

You sound like a man that needs to empty the trash. And I was quite frankly,

I was caught off guard. I thought, what does emptying the trash have to do with this?

And she said, I mean, the trash can of your heart. You've got one collected hurt, disappointment, grievous remark that someone's made.

And instead of a comforting word, they've been arrows. And it's like garbage that is turning your spirit into sour, you know, maggot infested garbage.

And she said, unless you empty the heart of that, it's over for you. You can't go on that way.

And I'm telling you, it nailed me. I had to get along with God.

And it took me a long time on my face in the basement of my house, pouring out all the garbage and letting it go, letting it go, forgiving people and not becoming a bitter pastor that it was over.

And God, in his grace and mercy, rescued that girl, rescued my family from the depression she was in.

And he had mercy on us and restored us. When I read Ephesians chapter four, verse 31 now,

I'll hopefully always think of the trash, that all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put in the trash can along with all malice.

I think that's excellent. Excellent. On the flip side, be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another as God in Christ has graced or forgiven you.

Absolutely. So, to answer your question, Phil, how did I get a taste for Reformed theology?

Well, when I grew up, I grew up in the Lutheran Church, and I don't think

I learned hardly anything about Martin Luther. Maybe I learned more about Martin Luther King Jr. than I did

Martin Luther. But I did learn the catechism, and Phil, a while ago, I found some old confirmation preparation quizzes.

Before we were confirmed in the Lutheran Church at age 13, I believe, we had to study things, and I knew which kings were good and which kings were bad.

If I didn't know the answer to the good or bad king, I'd just say bad, because most of them did evil in the eyes of the

Lord. And then I got saved, Calvary Chapel. Thankfully, they're just teaching the

Bible chapter by chapter, verse by verse, super encouraged. Oh, side note, Phil, because I know you love music.

I grew up with hymns at the Lutheran Church, for which I'm thankful. I go to Calvary Chapel, I've never heard anything like it in my life, and they have no screens with lyrics.

They have no hymnals, no songbooks. Everybody seemed to know the songs. And so, because I was prideful,

I secretly brought in a small little micro cassette recorder and would record the songs so I could learn the songs in the car by myself to sing with the saints.

I just thought, oh, I didn't know it was Maranatha. I had no idea what it was. But I did learn Calvinism, of course, at Calvary Chapel, and then

I started attending Grace Church with John MacArthur. And I don't think he regularly said something about Calvinism or five points or doctrines of grace, but the people he quoted, he would say,

Ralph Venning, in The Sinfulness of Sin, said this.

And he'd say, I read that book every year. And I thought he said Fenning instead of Venning. And so I go down to the library and I look at the

Fs and there's no Ralph Fennings. I finally found it, Ralph Venning. And so that's how

I started reading The Reformers, is just someone that I trusted would say, you should read that book.

Just like today, if somebody trusts me and I'll say, you ought to read The Gospel for Daily Life by Jerry Bridges.

You know, there's millions of books. Which ones do I pick? So I think it was from the preacher dropping extracts from Thomas Watson and the

Body of Divinity or John Calvin and the Institutes. And then I thought, well,

I should probably read those myself. So that's kind of how it started. It is just a pastor quoting some

Puritans that I thought were pretty wonderful. Wow. What a wonderful way.

And now just being with you, you're saturated with them.

This man's library is amazing. And I've been a book collector for years, but he loves and thrives.

And even in the sauna, you can't be quiet about it. You're reading me S. Louis Johnson's Little Treatment of Romans 5.

And then you're reading me the Nicene Creed. I thought I was just going to sweat off some fat and I'm learning theology in the middle of the fiery furnace.

Well, I wanted to read something to keep our minds off of the short distance between the two of us.

Mike Havendroth with Phil Howard today on No Compromise Radio Ministry.

You have since retired from full time ministry, but still do some speaking. How often do you go to places and speak?

Well, as often as they ask. Quite frankly, when I first retired in 2019,

I'd been at the church for, well, I started it and been there for 48 years.

From 19 people to we grew to nearly a thousand. And then COVID hit us, closed down the church in California.

Many churches closed down and we did for about 10 months. Then I had a year of throat surgeries.

One thing after another. Now I'm back. I've been teaching the book of Romans in Concord, California, in Rodeo, California.

And then you and this church have graciously had us. I thought it was amazing that I would be asked to speak on marriage here at nearly 80 years of age.

I thought, wow, you need some kind of slick Pat Boone guy to come in here.

Pat Boone. Just how old are you? No one listening knows who Pat Boone is.

You know, Tom Cruise, maybe. And I don't know if I'm current or not.

I better shut up. And you know what? Because I wore out as a pastor.

Fatigue had taken me, having diabetes, some health issues. And I was just exhausted after 40.

I just had no more to give. But the gifting and the desire to preach, teach, exhort never left me.

And I want to speak as much as I'm able to, even now. And God keeps opening doors.

And I can't say I'm on the circuit. I'm just available. Amen. Well, hey, if you want to have

Phil Howard come and preach, I get a finder's fee. Mike at NoCompromiseRadio .com.

Phil, I ask you, what would you say to a person who'd just like to start reading their

Bible? They don't really know where to start. We talked about 1 John. What about a person who says to you, pastor, you've probably seen it and done it all and encouraged lots of people when it comes to prayer.

I, Pastor Phil, don't pray like I should, don't really know what to do. How can

I just start a prayer life? I think the best thing is to decide if you want one.

I think we've left prayer as a non -discipline. Pray without ceasing.

Read a verse like that. We are in constant communication with God as believers.

But I think I would set a time, set a place, and begin.

I think it's a very good help. Learn to pray

Scripture. Ken Boa has a great little book called

Face to Face. It's three months of Scriptures organized around adoration, confession, intercession, thanksgiving.

You can pray. It prays through the Psalms, through New Testament. Ken Boa, Face to Face.

He used to have one for spiritual worship and another one for the spiritual life.

That would be a great help because sometimes we don't know what to say. I think the acronym

ACTS, adoration, confession, thanksgiving, supplication, which means particular petition.

Start somewhere. If you're a morning person, beginning the day, it's ideal to read

God's Word beginning the day. If you're George Mueller, Mueller learned to pray

Scripture on his knees and not just pray. Because a lot of praying—and

I made a covenant to pray several hours a day when I was in junior high and high school.

But a lot of times it's repetitious and it's hard to come up. What do you say?

But when you have Scripture in front of you and you know you're praying His will, you're praying

His heart, learn to pray Scripture. So if I ask you, don't just tell me you pray all the time.

Tell me when, tell me where, and tell me what Scripture you're praying through.

My wife and I just finished Ephesians. We pray the Psalms in the morning and we go to the

Psalms for worship, Proverbs for wisdom, and the New Testament for application to our life.

Amen. Phil, I know you'll be right in lockstep with me when

I say this. It seems to me that for the unbeliever, there's plenty of grace.

God dies, God the Son dies for the ungodly. You know, the Son dies. And then once you get to become a

Christian, then you better get to work. Now there's something to be said for work and obedience and obeying

God's law. But why do you think, and Jerry Bridges talks about this a lot, why do you think it seems to be that, you know, you get grace if you're an unbeliever.

But once you're a believer, then here's a list of things to do and there's not much talk about grace.

Why do you think that is? Well, probably because we're Pharisees at heart.

Is that profound? You know,

I just think it is so easy to keep a log in your eye while you're straightening out other believers.

I love the Romans 14. Don't be judging your brother, for he shall stand for his master.

His master, not the other children, not the other believers.

His master shall make him stand. And I do say this, if it's possible, get at least one

Barnabas in your life. I know Howie Hendricks used to say, you need a mentor in your life, and you need an exhorter in your life, and you need someone you can pour your life into, a

Timothy. And one guy, I forget who it was, he said, you don't need

VD people in your life. And at first you're shocked. And he said, I mean very draining people.

And in church, one day God impressed me in leadership training.

And he said, you will always have the sick among you, but you will not always have physicians.

You must make it a priority as a pastor to train some physicians, because the sickly, the whining, the desperate, the just perpetual problematic people, they'll always be there.

But who will train somebody that can help them? You said something the other day about, as a pastor, you didn't want to hear problems before Sunday morning worship while you were at the church building.

Absolutely. It's no place to share how much money you made on the stock market, who won the game, and the latest problem, and the

Sister Jones just got corns on her feet. You know, it's not, someone said a lot of prayer meetings are like an organ recital.

You know, you hear the liver's bad, the kidney's bad. He said, you know, I didn't come for a medical show.

If you took away the health requests, they wouldn't know what to pray about. He said, could we not magnify the

Lord, glorify Him? We've got six weeks to work on our problems, but how about a day to worship the problem solver?

You also helped me with Mondays. What do you do on Mondays? And, of course, there are always problems, because we have problems ourselves, and then we know people that we're shepherding that have problems.

It's good to just kind of take a day off of dealing with church stuff. Well, to quote

God, He said you needed it off. To quote

God. I used to have a prof who said, I go along with Jesus on this.

And so, you know. To quote God. That just strikes me as funny.

You know, you can go pray a position or have your nervous breakdown.

In my early days, I had times that I nearly broke, because I was doing a master's program, commuting to San Francisco, teaching 10 units, preaching every weekend at other churches, and helping to manage a co -ed school, and staying in the dorm with boys with spiritual problems.

And guess what? I don't need rest. Jesus is coming. I've got to work. The night's coming.

You've got to work. And guess what? All of a sudden, I'm so bad, I can't even sign the degrees for diplomas.

And I'm the dean. I'm supposed to sign. I have to get my wife to sign. Why? And I'm 20 -something years of age.

I'm burnt out. I cannot go any further. And God said rest.

I think sometimes we think the things won't get better unless our hands are on it.

And sometimes it's a miracle. They do just great when we have had nothing to do with it.

Probably the Holy Spirit's real and omnipresent, and he does his work in Christians even if we're not in the room.

Absolutely. Phil Howard today on No Compromise Radio Ministry.

We met, I don't know, 15 years ago or something in Mount Hermon Conference Center in Felton, California, right outside of Santa Cruz, and we've been friends since.

Phil, do you know that I think you're the only person in the world that still calls me

Michael? No. You know, of course, my mom used to say that or dad if they were bugged at me or whatever.

But you say it regularly, and you say it with affection, and so I just want to thank you for having someone in my life to call me

Michael. That is amazing. I figured if your mom and dad thought that was good enough, it's good enough for me.

See, that's right. What's your middle name? Allen, Phillip Allen. Okay, all right. Well, I'm Michael Lee, named after my dad

Lee. Okay. Yeah, there you go. Luke, my son, was looking at some Puritan names.

And, you know, sometimes someone might be named Barnabas. Earlier you said everybody needs a

Barnabas in their life. I thought you almost said everybody needs a Barabbas in their life. Anyway, Luke found a guy's name back in the 1600s,

I believe, and his first name was Fly Fornication. I said, Luke, you mean

Flea Fornication? He said, no, Fly Fornication. How would you like to be named that? Your first name,

Fly -Fornication. They were desperate. That's like that one woman named her boy

Pislum 15. And they said, Pislum, it was Psalm, but she didn't know how to say it.

Oh, no. Is that true? Yes. Phil, I like the way you explain things simply, and we've all started someplace as a

Christian. You know, there's nothing wrong with being an immature Christian if you're immature, right? If you should be mature, immaturity is bad.

I mean, we don't expect an infant to be riding a bicycle. What would you say to people who listen and they love the

Word, they love to come worship on Sundays, but they don't really serve? If I looked out on Sunday, reading

Isaiah 53, there's a bunch of people there that are servants, sacrificial, have ministries, probably do things that I don't even know they do behind the scenes, being poured out in the lives of other people.

And there's maybe, let's just say, for instance, 40 % of the people at the church are doing that, 60 % of those in the congregation.

But the other 40, they show up just at the last second. They leave right away.

They know they should be in church. They're hearing the Word of God. It's transforming them. But they don't serve in any way, shape, or form.

What do you tell them? Well, there's just a living contradiction of our message.

They need, in their first beginning days, to be taught from the get -go.

I became an usher by the time I was 15. I'm helping break down the church afterwards.

You're never non -engaged, non -engaged. Sometimes I see people, they're so old in God that you have to part their whiskers to give them a bottle.

And, you know, I've heard all the best teachers. I did this and that.

And you finally say, and what has God chosen to do through you besides critique preachers, besides critique this church?

And it's totally inconsistent. And in our own church, 20 % give the money and 20 % do the work, no matter what our size.

And so that the rest have got a can of beer, are sitting in the stands and expecting a good game.

Everything better click. It is atrocious. It is not Christianity.

It's a spectator sport with critics galore. And I say, what do you do?

I had a man tell me one time, he said, well, I notice you don't do this, that I was not good at something.

And I didn't argue with him. And I said, and I noticed you don't preach. Have you ever prepared a sermon?

Oh, no, I could do that. But you know how to critique the men that do.

Right. I just thought of First Peter, chapter four. The end of all things is at hand. Therefore. Okay, so the world's coming to an end.

We're in the last days. And what should we do? Well, let's don't pray. Let's don't love people.

And let's don't serve. Right. Because he says right after that, as each has received a gift, use it to serve one another.

Luther said, God doesn't need your good works. But the church does. The church does.

Beautiful. And then it says, as good stewards of God's varied grace. So if you're not serving, you're a bad steward.

Bad steward. And it's never too late to repent and start. No, that's right. And the fun is in the game.

It is. It's in the game. Pastor Phil, I'm glad to have you here.

It's been a great weekend. I'm sorry to see you go. I have to get some work done, so that will be the upside.

Great host, folks. Great. You made it feel unwelcome every minute. You can write me,

Mike, at NoCompromiseRadio .com if you'd like to get in touch with Phil. I'd be happy to forward that information to him.

Don't forget, cancer is not your shepherd. And also, sexual fidelity, they're both out.

By the way, Phil, you're such an encourager. I know you'd encourage me regarding this. My friend

John Moffitt, who's a pastor in Tennessee, he hosts a show called Theocast with his friend Justin.

And he gave the cancer book to somebody who just was starting chemotherapy. And the lady said, the book is talking just the way

I feel. And that's what happens, because I don't know what it's like to feel certain things when you have cancer if I've never had it.

But if I have it, then I can help. And so I was super—I thought to myself, if only she's helped,

I'm thankful. And you took the position of Hebrews 5, 5, 1, and 2, that the priest that ministers is beset with a like weakness.

And you dared—you told me on the phone, you said, I'm going to write this book as we were talking.

And you dared identify with the suffering, not the smartest, not those that need postgraduate knowledge, but those with subzero and substandard health and crises, that they may be in the valley of death sooner than they want.

You said, oh my, Tozer said, there's a broken heart on every row, and the smart

Alex, and the smart that won't serve. But oh, I need another sermon.

No, you don't. I wish you'd put your hand on somebody that's suffering and help get them out of the ditch.

Amen. That's why shepherding is very messy. See, now you know why

I call Phil my pastor. So thank you for pastoring me, Phil. Where were you 50 years ago? In a mess.