SRR 111 Emails, Events, Books, Controversies

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00:02

I do a podcast. I'm not interested in your podcast. The anathema of God was for those who denied justification by faith alone.

00:13

When that is at stake, we need to be on the battlefield, exposing the error and combating the error.

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We are unabashedly, unashamedly Clarkian. And so, the next few statements that I'm going to make,

00:30

I'm probably going to step on all of the Vantillian toes at the same time. And this is what we do at Simple Riff around the radio, you know.

00:37

We are polemical and polarizing Jesus style. I would first say that to characterize what we do as bashing is itself bashing.

00:57

It's not hate. It's history. It's not bashing. It's the Bible. Jesus said,

01:07

Woe to you when men speak well of you, for their fathers used to treat the false prophets in the same way.

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As opposed to, Blessed are you when you have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness. It is on.

01:23

We're taking the gloves off. It's time to battle. Alright, ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the podcast.

01:33

My name is Tim and you are listening to Simple Riff around the radio. So, today I'm here with my good friend and co -host,

01:40

Carlos Montijo. So, Carlos, welcome to the show. It's good to have you here with me tonight.

01:46

It's good to be back on. It's been a while. So, I'm excited to catch up. It has been a while.

01:52

I've pretty much gone AWOL. I've been dealing with some controversy. I've had to leave the church that I'm at, or that I was attending, which was

02:01

Horizon Christian Fellowship in El Paso, Texas. And I don't think that you should just up and leave and not explain why you're leaving.

02:11

And I don't think that you should leave a church for any reason. I think a lot of people,

02:17

I'm going to hear it, there's no perfect church, there's no perfect pastor. And so,

02:23

I think that when you leave, you need to leave for an appropriate reason. And when you leave, you need to explain why.

02:31

So, the other thing is, Carlos really enjoyed those episodes with Hiram Diaz.

02:38

And I want to just give a big thanks to Hiram for coming on the podcast. And man, he really killed it with the

02:47

Critical Race Theory stuff. One of the things that I really appreciated was the connection that he made between Satanism and some of the views that are being accepted now.

02:59

And it really just goes to show that there really is nothing new under the sun. So, big thanks to you guys for that.

03:07

Yeah, those were episodes 108. And the first one that we did was 105.

03:17

So, check out those episodes 105 and 108. It was when I interviewed Hiram talking about Critical Race Theory.

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And it was an excellent episode. We had a really good in -depth discussion about those topics. Yeah. And the other thing that I want to highlight is

03:34

Timothy Kaufman's Eschatology. I think it is one of the most outstanding series in eschatology that I've ever heard.

03:46

Have you been listening to that? Yeah, I need to catch up. But I listened to the latest episode and I've gone through about half of it so far.

03:56

And it is very good stuff. It is hard to listen to when you are not focused.

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Because I have to really focus when I am listening to that. Because he just throws so much information at you.

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Very good information. But it is a very serious in -depth study of the Bible. Regarding all of the prophetic events in the

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Bible. And making sense out of them. And comparing them to the other traditional views.

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And pointing out the problems with the traditional views. So he is extremely thorough.

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And he has got some really good articles that he has published as well. This is like world class scholarship that he has done.

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And I hope he publishes a book or something about this. Because it needs to be out there.

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I am really glad that we have the opportunity to publish it on our platform.

04:49

And I hope people get a chance to take a look at that stuff. Because it is excellent. Yeah. You know,

04:56

I have also been listening to the Trinity Foundation Radio. And they are on episode 8.

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And Steve Matthews is just killing it. And he is also putting out some really good stuff on his own blog.

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And his own website. Lux Luquette. And he is also putting out some really good stuff on Thorn Crown Ministries.

05:15

So big thanks to Steve. And then of course a big thanks to Pastor Patrick Hines. Who is really behind the scenes.

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He has really been helping me to deal with the personal conflict or controversy that I have been walking through.

05:30

At my church. Giving me some really good sound advice. And so big thanks to him.

05:37

He has had some really, really good episodes come out recently. One of the ones that I wanted to highlight was his episode where he talks about what an elder must do.

05:49

So if you get a chance, be sure to check out that episode. Let me see if I can pull it up real fast.

05:58

Oh, also episode number 84 where he had on a guest. And they talked about J.

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Gretchen Mason's book. That was very, very good. Be sure to check out that episode.

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That is actually one of the men that he is training for leadership in his church. It is a very good episode. Yes. Yes.

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And that guy was really, he brought his A game. He was really on top of it.

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I forgot his name. So I will have to go back and listen to it again. But I really appreciated the format that they had there.

06:31

So seven characteristics of false teachers from Thomas Brooke. That is episode number 83 on the

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Protestant Witness. And then the other one that I wanted to highlight. Oh, man, this is really good stuff.

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He has really put out a lot of good stuff. Why ruling and teaching elders must call out false teachers.

06:58

Episode number 76. Be sure to check that out. Radio Luxe Lucette.

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Is it Lucette or Lucette? I say Lucette. But Radio Luxe Lucette.

07:10

Episode number 29. Anchor Babies. Very good stuff. So just check it out.

07:17

It is all there. Subscribe to us. And Carlos, you wanted to read an email that we got?

07:24

Yes. So we have a backlog of emails that I wanted to catch up on. We have been getting some really good feedback from John Bradshaw.

07:37

He has left us several comments. And emails throughout our time as Thorn Crown Ministries.

07:46

And I'm really grateful for his comments and encouraged by his feedback. So thanks, John, for your comments and your feedback to us.

07:56

He brought up a question that I wanted to highlight to our listeners because it's a common question.

08:03

He was asking about being able to access older content on our website.

08:11

Older episodes, older articles, and things like that. So I wanted to explain that a little bit. Because we're still working out the kinks in the website.

08:20

And so when people see the pages in the website,

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Squarespace typically limits the amount of posts to 20.

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In a page. And so we're trying to work around that to see if there's a workaround to that.

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But there are a few things that you can do now. You can actually search. The search function works really well on the website.

08:45

So if you're looking for a specific episode or article, you can search for it and it should come up.

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The other thing is that we have two main sections on our website.

09:00

Which is the blog and the podcast. So we have the

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Megafeed podcast, which is the Thorn Crown Network. And so if you're on the website and if you go to podcasts and if you click on Thorn Crown Network, that will take you to the

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Megafeed. That will show you all of the episodes. And you can scroll down and click on older, for older posts or older episodes there.

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And if you're looking for articles, the main blog is called the

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Scripturalist. The Scripturalist is our main blog and that's where all of our articles are.

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So you can scroll down there. That's like the Megafeed for our articles. So that's where everything is.

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And everything else is basically a page that filters out specific content. Like if it's pertaining to polemics or to the

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Protestant Witness podcast or Timothy Kaufman's podcast. So we're trying to figure out a way to keep the full list of things that pertain to those podcasts.

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But right now we're still kind of limited at 20 episodes. So I just wanted to bring that up. And also an important thing is you can subscribe to our podcast.

10:29

So whatever podcast app you use, you can subscribe.

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We're on iTunes or Apple Podcasts or whatever they change their name to. And so you can search for us there and we should come up.

10:43

You just search for Thorn Crown Network. And also another thing to point.

10:48

I mentioned this before that I use. I don't know what podcast app you use Tim. But I've been using

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CastBox and I like CastBox because it's compatible with Android and iPhone.

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And I use both. But the problem I've been having is that they've been. So they've been putting out a lot of trashy advertising.

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Like trashy podcasts that has nothing to do with me. Because all of the stuff that I subscribe to is basically like Christian stuff, business stuff, technical stuff.

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Like it has nothing to do with what I like. And they keep like throwing a bunch of trashy ads.

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And now it's getting worse. When you play an episode, they're actually starting to flash like even trashier ads.

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So I wouldn't recommend CastBox to people. I'd recommend that you try looking elsewhere first.

11:36

But yeah, I just wanted to point that out for people. Because we've had some questions about accessing some of the older stuff on our website.

11:43

That's helpful. Yeah. Yeah, so we've got some emails. Some other emails that I wanted to get us caught up on here.

11:54

Yeah, somebody actually subscribed because they heard from us from God's Hammer.

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From Sean Garrity's blog and God's Hammer. So a big shout out to Sean Garrity and his blog.

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I highly recommend that you check it out. He has some excellent articles there. Very good stuff covering a whole bunch of things.

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And he's an author from the Trinity Foundation. He's published books with them. And he has excellent material.

12:21

So thank you for that. Yeah, I think that we've decided that we just need to create

12:27

Sean an account and tell him to put his stuff on Thorn Crown.

12:34

That's right. We kind of joked about that we're being outnumbered now quite significantly by a bunch of Presbyterians.

12:43

Dude, who does that? We're Reformed Baptists and we started a network with a bunch of Presbyterians. Yeah, it's our ties to the

12:50

Trinity Foundation, I guess. But that's more of a good thing because not all Presbyterians are created equal. Well, it's funny, man.

12:59

Yeah, we're pretty outnumbered. But, you know, I think it's awesome.

13:05

I think every single one of them, they're just outstanding theologians. So, yeah, we need to do that.

13:12

And we're going to do that as soon as we just get the time. So, all right.

13:19

Go for it, man. Yeah, we also got a… I subscribed to Doug Dalma's newsletter for Solar Appalachian.

13:30

And he's got some exciting updates that he was publishing. So, I wanted to direct you to his ministry as well.

13:37

It looks like they're getting up and running. And they're also asking for support, you know, for prayers and for financial support.

13:45

And to do that, you can go to discoversola .com.

13:52

Actually, we need to get Doug back on the show.

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We talked about getting him back on. And we really need to do that because we have a lot of unfinished business to cover with him.

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So, he's a big shout -out to Doug and his ministry. I hope things are going well with him.

14:13

You're going to say something? Yeah, I just wanted to point out the Trinity Foundation is also doing their annual book sale.

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Where quite a number of books are marked at 50 % off. The 2019 resource sale.

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So, the 50 % off list price, you can get such books as Against the

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Churches. So, Against the Churches, let me see. There's For the King and then there's

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Against the World. These books are really, really good. They're basically the published articles.

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I mean, you're going to get so much out of those. Can the

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Presbyterian Church Be Saved? Oh, and that's by Sean Garrity. Maybe we should have him on to talk about that.

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But A Christian View of Men and Things, an outstanding book by Gordon Clark. The Clark -Ventile

15:23

Controversy, definitely a must read if you're going to get into discussions about Gordon Clark and Cornelius Ventile.

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I mean, so many people just spout off bad information. They'll say stuff like, you know,

15:38

Gordon Clark was denied ordination. And it's like, no, he wasn't. He wasn't denied ordination.

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You don't know what you're talking about. So, there's a lot of misinformation about Gordon Clark that's out there.

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So, definitely that's a must read. You know, For the King, that's another book that has a compilation of Trinity Foundation articles.

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So, all of these books, I mean, these are really, really good quality books. They're all listed at 50 % off.

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Sale is effective. Started May 1st, 2019 through January 6th.

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I don't know if you have a birthday coming up or Christmas is coming up.

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Just get yourself some quality Christian books. I highly, yeah, highly recommend them.

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I recently ordered nine books from them as well. I got some really good stuff.

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I got God and Evil, The Problem Solved. That's a chapter from Clark's Religion, Reason, and Revelation. That's actually also in Volume 4, which is

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Christian Philosophy. So, I highly suggest that you get that as well. My family, we're doing a

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Bible study. We're doing a study on that book, on God and Evil, and it's been a really good study. Very helpful.

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I've read that, like, I think at least six times, and I keep learning something new every single time I read it.

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So, that's an excellent book that people should definitely get.

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And then another one I got was The Emperor Has No Clothes. That's Dr. Richard B. Gaffin, Jr.'s Doctrine of Justification by Stephen M.

17:17

Cunha. I just finished reading this, and it was really informative. Pretty startling stuff that Richard Gaffin teaches.

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And unfortunately, when he presented this stuff to the elders at the church, I think they basically just dismissed it.

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So, that was very, it sounds very similar to other accounts of other issues, like the justification controversy with Norman Shepard and things like that.

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But this was a very, very good book. Very helpful, exposing some of the serious errors that Gaffin has.

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And some, not surprisingly, some overlap with John Piper. There are some similar statements that both men make.

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So, that's another good one to check out. Then I also ordered Can the

18:07

Presbyterian Church in America Be Saved by Sean Garrity. I've been wanting to read this one for a long time, so I finally got a hold of it.

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Haven't started it yet, but look forward to it. And I also read, I mean, I also bought The Changing of the

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Guard by Mark Carlberg. And I think that one is an article up on the Trinity Foundation, but I wanted to get the booklet as well.

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And that was an excellent read, too. He's just kind of showing some of the transitions that were being made in the seminary,

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Westminster Seminary, and the negative consequences that resulted from that. And I got a couple of e -books, too.

18:43

The Holy Spirit, Clark's book on the Holy Spirit. Clark's book on the biblical doctrine of man. That one looks really good, too, because he talks about covenant theology there.

18:52

So, there's some really good stuff in that one. The Covenant of Works and things like that.

18:58

And I got Logical Criticisms of Textual Criticism, which is a very good... I think that's also up on the

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Trinity Foundation as an article. It's a very good critique of some of the textual critical decisions that modern scholars make that aren't necessarily warranted.

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They may not always be valid decisions because they tend to make assumptions that may not always be correct.

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So, it's a really good study of that. It's a very good introduction to textual criticism for people who aren't familiar with the matter, the subject matter.

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It's a very complicated subject, but Clark has some really good things to say about that. And then another really good book that I ordered is

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Sacramental Sorcery by a Presbyterian named James Henley Thornwell.

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And that book is outstanding. It's a really good book. I haven't finished it yet, but he talks about just how corrupt

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Roman Catholic baptism is. And it's amazing.

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Being a Catholic myself, I didn't realize how bad it was until he was kind of exposing it and how just the way that they corrupt the water with oil.

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They mix it in with oil and just all of this perversions that they do to the baptism.

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And this is a huge controversy with Presbyterians because some Presbyterians, I think

20:26

Calvin himself said that Roman Catholic baptism is considered valid.

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So you were telling me about this and Hodge thought that the Roman Catholic baptism was legitimate because Roman Catholicism retained some of the gospel.

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Is that right? Or what was it that you were telling me about that? Yeah, so that it's a very interesting book.

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There's a big controversy. There was a big controversy at the time with Thornwell and Hodge.

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And Hodge, unfortunately, made a very poor assessment of Roman Catholic baptism.

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And there was a big debate about that. And Thornwell was squarely on the right side of the camp. And yeah, let me see if I can find the quote real quick.

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Yeah, here it is. So on page nine of the book, Thornwell, actually, yeah, it's a foreword.

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I think it's Robbins. John Robbins wrote the foreword. He quotes Hodge saying this.

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That was from Charles Hodge.

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I don't understand the disconnect. That sounds like a lot of the people that we talk to today that think that Roman Catholicism is a legitimate form of Christianity.

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And it's not. And I don't understand the disconnect, but that is wrong.

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And, you know, you got to be able to say it's wrong even when it's, you know, people from your own camp.

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I mean, you know, we both respect and highly revere Charles Hodge's work.

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But he was human and he, you know, he's not the standard. So when he's wrong, he's wrong.

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I mean, that's all there is to it. Yeah. Yeah. I'm pretty.

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I was pretty surprised by all that. And unfortunately, because of Hodge's clout and the influence that he had in Presbyterianism in general, this led a very this did a lot of damage downstream.

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And there's still a very it can get a it's a pretty sharp debate still going on in Presbyterian circles.

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And it's pretty sad because Thornwell destroys all of the opposition like that.

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There's no way you can you can you can validate that claim from the Catholic Church. Like all of the doctrines that he quoted as being preserved by the

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Catholic Church are completely perverted. And this is somebody coming from the Catholic Church. There was no there was no understanding of the gospel at all.

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I had none of it until I got out of the Catholic Church. It's it's a it's all a farce.

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It's like it's like it's it's it's so demonic because it's antichrist.

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And they don't none of the stuff that he mentioned is actually taught or or from a biblical perspective.

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Yeah. Well, they they did not preserve the gospel. They anathematized the gospel at the

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Council of Trent. Yeah. And and therefore condemned themselves and Roman Catholicism preaches a damnable gospel and is a false church.

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So it is pretty baffling. And this also reminds me because I was listening to our church library has a copy of a debate between James White and Doug Wilson about baptism.

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And it was very interesting that they brought up this issue with Calvin. Wilson was bringing up this issue with Calvin and citing

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Calvin in his favor and Hodge as well. And so it's it's just interesting to see how people use men like these because they know that they're well respected theologians.

24:53

Rightly so. And that's why you got to be able to say, yeah, Calvin was wrong. Hodge was wrong.

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Yeah. You know, like, good argument, but, you know, it's not going to hold any water.

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You know, it's it's very similar to people quoting including these these other people in favor of Piper.

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And it's like, OK, well, great. That's not your standard. And just because somebody said something similar to Piper doesn't exonerate, you know,

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Piper at all. Yeah, right. You know. Yeah. Even yeah, even Gaffin. Gaffin does the same thing.

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He quotes Machen in his favor. Unfortunately, and people of the federal vision variety, they tend to quote some quotes by Machen where he unfortunately kind of took an unbiblical view of works in certain passages.

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And they take they take that and run with it because they know that these men are highly revered. Well, Richard Gaffin quoted him.

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I think I think that if I remember correctly, that was in The Emperor Has No Clothes.

26:01

Yeah. The author points out that Gaffin quoted Machen to sort of substantiate his view.

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Yeah. So, I mean, we only agree with men as far as they agree with the word of God.

26:16

Yeah. Yeah. Put that on a t -shirt. Right. And that's the because one of the issues that and it's partly the issues that we've been talking about with Piper is that how you define works.

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And Machen basically kind of restricted the view of works and certain passages to only relate to works that you try to earn use to earn your salvation.

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But that's not what the works that works in that context means.

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Works just means works required by the law. Hodge actually has a really good definition of that. It's works required by the law.

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And so that led to some serious problems downstream once again. And these federal vision guys try to run with that and in order to sneak in works back into the picture on the final judgment and things like that.

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So it's a very subtle error that some of these men make. So let's let's move on.

27:16

What else do we got? I don't even know what we're going to call this episode like a conversation between Tim and Carlos.

27:22

Catching up. Yeah. We got some catching up to do. So that was it. This is an excellent. Yeah. This is an excellent book by and even

27:30

David J. Engelsma, a very well known and respected Protestant Reformed Church theologian.

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Highly respect him. I mean, he has some excellent material. And yet he believes that Roman Catholic baptism is valid.

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And he was, you know, you know, it's interesting is he just did an episode with Sonny Hernandez.

27:52

That's right. On reforming American ministries. Maybe we should reach out to Sonny and and ask him about that.

27:58

Because, I mean, he has, I mean, he has an ear with Engelsma.

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And yeah, the episode that they did was really, really good. I learned a lot about the federal vision stuff.

28:10

I think the way that Engelsma articulated the problems with the federal vision.

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And then he talked about Piper as well. I thought it was a really good episode. So, yeah, maybe we should reach out to him and just ask him what his views are on that.

28:28

Yeah. I mean, he's still alive. So I think he's like 80 now, but maybe we could dialogue with him about that.

28:35

Yeah, it is. I listened to his interview with Chris Arnzen on Iron Sharpens Iron. Another really good

28:41

Reformed Baptist podcast that our listeners should check out if they don't know about it already. But he interviewed David Engelsma on there.

28:48

And Engelsma basically said that he believes it's valid because he's being baptized by a minister of the church.

28:55

And it's like, how are you calling the Catholic Church a valid church?

29:00

That's not a church of Christ. I don't know. It's baffling. I don't know how you can say.

29:07

I mean, so there seems to be a disconnect because I believe Engelsma would call somebody like Piper a heretic.

29:14

And he does. But it's like, how would you not call a Roman Catholic priest a heretic? That doesn't make any sense.

29:20

Yeah. There's a big disconnect there. And that's a trail that you can see a lot of it in the

29:27

Sacramental Sorcery by Thornwell. Highly recommend this book. It's an excellent book. It really sheds light on the controversy between Presbyterians today.

29:37

And Thornwell himself was a brilliant theologian in his own right. He fortunately was kind of overshadowed by these larger figures like Hodge.

29:46

And he died young, I think, too. But he is an excellent theologian. I have a lot of respect for him after starting to read this book.

29:54

It's excellent material. So you should check out Thornwell when you get the chance. And yeah, so I'm really excited about those books that I got a hold of from the

30:05

Trinity Foundation. I also got What is the Christian Life by Gordon Clark. That's his book on sanctification. So there's really good material there that I'm eager to dive into.

30:17

But yeah, so going back to our emails, I actually wanted to recommend a podcast called

30:30

Undaunted Life by Kyle. And I apologize, Kyle. I forget the last name.

30:36

But I got in contact with Kyle not too long ago and told him that I appreciated his podcast.

30:43

And he's got some good stuff that you should definitely check out. It's sort of a podcast for men.

30:49

And it's very good. It's got some good material. He seems to endorse some of the people that we call out, that we sharply criticize, like Tim Keller and things like that.

31:01

But he has some really – he's very thoughtful. So he listens to podcasts that don't agree with him and even teachers that don't agree with him.

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So he's actually – it's part of what being a man is. You should listen to people that you disagree with.

31:18

I even think they said that in his Bible studies, they read books by atheists and stuff like that.

31:25

So that's useful to keep you sharp and to sharpen each other. So good podcast there.

31:32

I wanted to check – wanted to recommend that for our listeners. Specifically, he actually gave an interesting commentary on the recent interview between Andy Stanley and Jeff Durbin.

31:47

I don't know if you got a chance to listen to that dialogue, but it was a very good dialogue. Jeff Durbin basically destroyed

31:53

Andy Stanley. He did an excellent job. I listened to about 75 percent of it, and I thought if Jeff had just asked

32:01

Andy, how do you know who Jesus is? I mean what else can he point to other than the word of God?

32:10

Yeah, yeah. And so I thought the arguments that Jeff used were really good.

32:15

He had some really good points, and maybe I need to go back and listen to it.

32:21

But I think there's just a much simpler way to approach it.

32:27

Anytime Andy Stanley starts talking about Jesus Christ or about the resurrection, just ask him, well, how do you know about that?

32:35

Yeah. What else can you point to other than the word of God? Yeah, right.

32:42

And I think this partly ties into this issue between metaphysics and epistemology and which is primary because he tends to favor the historical event as opposed to the written revelation that's recorded.

32:55

And it's like when you're talking about primacy here, we're talking about epistemology and how you know.

33:01

And this was one of the fundamental differences between Clark and VanTale as well. Well, and so let me say this.

33:09

Jeff dropped a bomb on him when he – I forgot how it was said, but I mean it was a meme everywhere.

33:16

And Jeff said, you know, by the word of the living God. Yeah, he asked him –

33:21

Andy asked Jeff, like, what is your standard or how do you – and he just basically said the word of the living

33:27

God. All I'm saying is like Jeff should have capitalized on that a little bit more. And this is just –

33:34

I mean this is just friendly commentary on this. I think Jeff did a really good job.

33:41

Don't send me any hate mail. I like Jeff. I think he's an all right guy.

33:46

I just think he could have capitalized on that a little bit more, impressed Andy for his epistemology.

33:56

Because Andy is going to stand on the event of the resurrection.

34:04

But how do you know about that? And how can you be sure about that? Well, is he going to point to some other source outside of the

34:13

Bible? Or is he going to point to the Bible? And so I think there's a really good point that Jeff made.

34:20

But he should have thrown it back on Andy and made him answer the question, you know, how do you know?

34:27

I don't remember him doing that. Hey, sweetheart. I'm just talking.

34:34

Are you going to go play? Okay. I don't remember him doing that.

34:42

And if he did, then great. I'm not criticizing him.

34:47

I think he did a good job. Yeah, I think he made several good points. I think he did an outstanding job. And I don't personally like Apologia Radio.

34:55

I really don't like their style. I think sometimes they go too far with some of the sanctification issues and things like that.

35:03

I don't really – I'm not a big fan of them. But I thought he did an excellent job. It was very informative, a very revealing discussion there.

35:15

And I think it really showed the strengths of a presuppositional approach that's far more biblical than any evidential kind of take that Andy Stanley was representing.

35:30

But, yeah, that was some good stuff there. You can check out that podcast,

35:36

Undaunted Life, by Kyle. And there were some other emails I wanted to catch up on as well.

35:44

Here, let's – yeah, so we actually – we got a really long email from Michael, a gentleman named –

35:54

Is that a hate mail? No, no. He was very – he starts by saying, I was delighted to find your programs addressing

36:01

Thomas Hopko. As an Orthodox Christian serving in several local churches in the UK, I am unspeakably grieved in my spirit at the distorted way that many

36:10

Orthodox teachers present the gospel in the same regrettable way as so sadly displayed by Thomas Hopko in the many examples you set forth.

36:18

I think he was talking about Pastor Hines' episodes on Eastern Orthodoxy. He has a good number of episodes talking about that and Hank Hanegraaff as well.

36:28

And I was a little surprised by this email because he says he's an Orthodox Christian and I was under the impression that there wasn't really a sound strain or branch of Orthodox Christianity that was actually biblical.

36:45

So that kind of surprised me. I might try to get back to him about that because he seemed – it seemed like he really agreed with what

36:54

Pastor Hines was saying. So that was a pleasant surprise. But yeah, so you can check out

37:00

Pastor Hines' episodes on that and the Protestant Witness pertaining to Eastern Orthodoxy.

37:10

And yeah, I think – I think that was most of them.

37:16

Yeah, I think we got caught up on the emails now. So actually – so there was a few other comments that some people left us that I wanted to get to.

37:27

I wanted to give a shout out to a good friend of ours,

37:33

Ernie. Ernie Van Boven. So Ernie, he left us a really good comment, a really good feedback pertaining to some of the stuff with Piper and – let me find it.

38:00

So he left us a really good comment. He says this.

38:23

And he's talking about believers in that context. We talked about this in Fatal Flaw number two.

38:31

And Kauffman had pointed that out. So he twists that verse in Matthew 7, 23.

38:41

And he says that people will go into internal punishment because they've really failed to love their fellow believers. So we talked about that in Fatal Flaw number two.

38:49

And that's a quote from John Piper in his book What Jesus Demands from the World, page 160.

38:56

But what we didn't point out – I don't think we pointed this out. At least I didn't – was that the

39:02

Canons of Dort has a very relevant passage pertaining to this.

39:07

In section six, I don't know the one pertaining to –

39:13

I'm not sure if it's a section on election here. But it says here that it's a rejection of those who teach that not every election to salvation is unchangeable.

39:23

But that some of the chosen can perish and do in fact perish eternally with no decision of God to prevent it.

39:28

By this gross error they make God changeable, destroy the comfort of the godly concerning the steadfastness of their election, and contradict the holy scriptures which teach that the elect cannot be laid astray,

39:42

Matthew 24, 24. That quote, Christ does not lose those given to him by the Father, John 6, 39.

39:48

And that quote, those whom God predestined, called, and justified, he also glorified. That's Romans 8, 30.

39:55

So that's a stark contradiction to Piper's teaching that fellow believers will go away into eternal punishment.

40:05

I'm sorry, because believers will go away into eternal punishment if they really fail to love their fellow believers.

40:12

So there you have it, another glaring example of how Piper perpetuates and promotes himself as a historic

40:20

Protestant theologian, when in reality he is completely at odds with it. Well, we also need to point out that this was one of the points that Piper himself rejected or refuted in his clarification.

40:36

Which is interesting because it just really goes to show how double -minded he is.

40:45

Let me go ahead and pull this up. In his clarification, he says that people hear this, that works are necessary, and they come to two inferences that are false.

41:00

Let me go ahead and pull up this one. Okay, so it's actually the second false inference.

41:12

He says, they say, therefore, it's uncertain.

41:20

I could fail. I could lose my salvation. I could be justified and then not be justified.

41:26

A child of God might lose his justification. And so he actually rejects the view.

41:35

And what's interesting is, when you listen to Piper, this is a legitimate concern for his view.

41:42

Because if our salvation is contingent upon what we do, which he actually uses the word contingent, and Robbins actually called him out for that.

41:56

If it's contingent upon what we do, then the question is, okay, well, there are going to be some who fail.

42:05

But what Piper points out in his clarification is, he says, we work. So again, he acknowledges that we work.

42:12

He says, but God is the decisive worker. And so it's still a false gospel because we don't work for our salvation.

42:19

It's still a false gospel, but he backtracks and he tries to clarify this.

42:27

Basically, he's double -minded because he's preaching a false gospel. But it is interesting that he says, people hear this, that works are necessary, and they make two false inferences.

42:41

And it's like, well, you made the false inference yourself, because you walked it out to its logical conclusion.

42:48

And now you're just being double -minded. Yeah. I really appreciate

42:55

Ernie. I've been on the phone with him lately, talking to him about the stuff that's going on at my church.

43:03

Man, he's a really solid dude. I'm grateful for social media where we can get connected to other people around the world.

43:14

I think he's from Canada. Yeah. He says a boot when he talks.

43:22

Yeah. Yeah. Again, a lot of people who criticize us for calling out

43:29

Piper are not recognizing that even though Piper says the right thing on occasion, they ignore or overlook completely the stuff that he says that's completely false.

43:41

And so, like we've pointed out before, time and time again, Piper is a both and kind of guy.

43:48

He is the quintessential both and kind of guy. He'll say the wrong thing, and then he'll say the right thing on another occasion.

43:57

And then it will be like, okay, well, he's saying the right thing here. The problem is that, like you said, he's double -minded.

44:04

He's contradicting himself, and he hasn't addressed what he said and what Jesus demands of the world.

44:09

And that's still, you can download it for free from his website, like we pointed out in the episode. Yeah. I think one of the dumbest things that people have said to me, and we have been attacked.

44:20

I've, man, you've been attacked. I've been attacked. I was blocked from a Facebook group before I even had the opportunity to answer their questions about, you know, they ask you questions like, do you go to church or whatever?

44:36

I was blocked from the group before I even had the opportunity to, I mean, we've been attacked.

44:44

But one of the dumbest things that people say to me is that we're misrepresenting Piper. Let me just tell people how dumb that is.

44:53

What you have to do in order to represent somebody accurately and fairly is you credit them with the sanity and the decency to tell you what they believe.

45:07

So you take what they say at face value. I'm not going to call you a liar. I'm not going to call you insane.

45:15

I think that you're intelligent enough to tell me what you believe. So you accept what they say at face value, and then you allow them to define their terms.

45:25

You don't define their terms for them. You have to let them define their terms. And then you make a valid inference or deduction if necessary.

45:36

And if the conclusion, so here's the thing.

45:41

Let me give people an example. If I were to say, if someone, someone were to say all

45:47

Mexicans are lazy, and then someone else were to say, Hey man, that's really, that's really messed up.

45:53

Why would you call Carlos lazy? You're Mexican, right? Carlos. Yeah. So someone else comes and says, why would you call

46:00

Carlos lazy? And then the first person gets upset and says, I didn't say anything about Carlos.

46:06

You're putting words in my mouth. You're misrepresenting me. You're taking me out of context, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

46:12

This is the, the, just the absurd irrationality. It's like you said all

46:18

Mexicans are lazy. Carlos is a Mexican. You're calling Carlos lazy. That is the valid conclusion.

46:26

The conclusion is false. You're not lazy because the premise is false, but we've ensured that we're representing that person accurately and fairly.

46:38

It just, because you don't accept the conclusion, the logically necessary conclusion of your own position does not mean that we're misrepresenting you.

46:48

It means that you should probably revise your position. It's wrong. So it is, it is completely fair to say,

46:54

Hey man, you're calling Carlos lazy. I mean, imagine the irrationality when someone says,

47:00

I didn't say anything about Carlos. I said, all Mexicans are lazy. It's like, yeah, dude, Carlos is

47:05

Mexican. You're saying he's lazy. This is, this is basically what we have to deal with.

47:11

All we have to do is we just have to accept what a person says, allow them to define their terms and make a valid deduction or a valid inference.

47:18

And sometimes the inferences are immediate inferences. Sometimes it's a, it's a deduction.

47:24

But when we do that, we ensure that we are representing them accurately and fairly.

47:31

Now, if they don't want to accept the conclusion or the label of, of, you know, if they don't want to accept the, the, the outcome, the conclusion of their position, then it's not on us.

47:44

And the other thing, it's like, people are going to deny, you know, that, that they're teaching false doctrine.

47:52

They're going to, they're going to be double minded. And so we're not misrepresenting

47:59

Piper. We've, I'm just so, I'm so sick and tired of people saying that we're misrepresenting him or we're taking him out of context.

48:08

It's, it's like, no dude, we, we allow him to define his terms. And then the other question that comes to, you know, that I want to ask is, so are you saying that he's crazy?

48:20

Are you saying that he's, he's stupid? Like he can't, he can't, because what people will do is they'll try to rephrase what

48:28

Piper, what they, what they want Piper to be saying. And they'll try to rewrite it and say, well, I think that he's, he's trying to say this.

48:35

And the question becomes, well, that's not what he said. Are you saying he's stupid? Are you saying he's, he's a liar?

48:43

I mean, let the man speak for himself. Yeah. Yeah. And we're not just, we're not just calling out something he said back in 2006.

48:50

I think that's when he wrote, where Jesus demands of the world. We're calling out what he said within the past year.

48:56

And because there's things that he said that he's doubling down on that he is saying that's completely false about the

49:03

Bible and about your salvation. So it's not like this is some obscure, obscure quote back in 20 years ago.

49:11

This is still happening. He's still making a bunch of false statements about salvation.

49:17

And that's why we're calling him out. So, yeah, people, people who say that tend to not read

49:25

Piper, tend to not even be familiar with his material that well. Definitely not as much as we are, because we've actually read his stuff thoroughly.

49:35

And have scrutinized it and have been, and have quoted it in abundance in our, in our, in our criticisms to show, to show his, his context.

49:47

And he, that he means what he says, like, like you said, and what he says is completely false about final salvation and things like that.

49:55

So, yeah, yeah. I told him, I don't know if you want to talk about Brandon. I forgot that guy's name.

50:04

Brandon Craig, right? Facebook.

50:12

Facebook. Well, maybe here's maybe. Yeah. I mean, hey, Brandon, it would have been nice if I had the opportunity to actually discuss things with you.

50:22

But he, he, I think he's the one who blocked us and he mentioned me by name and then didn't like anybody who disagreed with him.

50:34

He removed their comments or blocked them and wouldn't even dialogue.

50:40

And I mean, yeah, it's like, what a coward.

50:45

So, I mean, don't, don't have a blog and a social media platform and then, you know, mention somebody by name and not, you know, not have a civil conversation with them.

50:58

You know, I don't even know the guy, but it's like, I would have loved to have just, you know,

51:04

Hey man, how's it? And the thing is, what's so interesting about this is I didn't even have time to really say anything about the issue.

51:15

So it's not like I was going to like suck up all his time. But I think he got upset with you because you told you accused him of lying.

51:23

Yeah. Well, let's set up the context a little bit. For those of you who don't know, there's this guy called

51:28

Brandon Craig. He has a blog called the Reform Layman and it's also a Facebook page for the blog.

51:37

And I think you had jumped in one of his posts about Piper and you were, you were disagreeing with him.

51:42

And then I saw, I was just, I was disagreeing with several people. I don't even remember what I said because he deleted my comments.

51:49

But the reason I got involved was because he mentioned me, me by name. And there were, there were some people on there that were like,

51:56

Oh, he's talking about glorification. And so I posted a quote from the article that I wrote with Tim because Tim actually wrote a section about, you know, as Piper speaking about glorification.

52:09

And I copied and pasted that. And then I might've like said something, you know, if I, if I hurt anybody's feelings,

52:18

I apologize. That's not my goal. But apparently, you know,

52:25

Brandon, Brandon put his foot down and he showed me what's up.

52:30

Cause he blocked me or he, I think he blocked me. I don't even know. I don't even care.

52:37

It's just, I'm sure he did, you know, block both of us. Okay. Yeah. And he probably doesn't even listen to this episode, but this just really goes to show like the level of maturity that we deal with.

52:50

Cause we're willing to talk. Well, yeah. Speaking about that. And we're, I don't really want to waste time with this guy, but we're just,

53:00

I want to bring it up to our listeners just so that they're aware. And to be careful with this guy, because he's really, what he did was very immature and cowardly.

53:10

And so I jumped in there shortly, I guess, sometime after you did. And I said, no, you're actually, that's not true.

53:20

I told him, I expressed my disagreement about regarding Piper, whatever. And then he blocked me from his page.

53:27

And so then, so what I decided to do was invite him to the show because we've been trying to get somebody from the opposing, who defends

53:38

Piper on our show. And to talk about it. And so I sent him an email through his website and I sent him a formal invitation.

53:50

I told him this. So, dear reformed layman, dismissing us as slanderous without substantiating your claims is in fact liable on your part.

53:58

Just because you disagree with our exhaustive arguments doesn't make us guilty of slander. There are even prominent Christians, Scott Clark, James White, the

54:05

Trinity Foundation, who recognize Piper's errors. Are they slandering him too? We're not the only ones pointing out his errors.

54:13

So in a spirit of mutual upbuilding, I cordially invite you to come on Semper Ephraim on the radio and tell us why we're wrong.

54:20

We won't corner you or attack you. We'll even let you drive the discussion to make your case. And we'll simply respond the best we can to your objections.

54:28

I genuinely think this will help both sides understand each other better, rather than just grenade tossing each other from opposite ends.

54:35

What say you? So I sent him that email and he hadn't gotten back to me a day or so had passed.

54:44

And then I joined a meme, some new Facebook group, meme groups, the

54:49

Reform Meme Group or something like that. And so I ran into him there because something funny, it's kind of a funny story, but without getting too much into it.

55:06

I was trying, I guess you were trying, we were trying to figure out who the Reform layman was because we didn't even know. And so I started looking around in that group.

55:15

And I noticed that somebody had said something that sounded like a post that the

55:22

Reform layman had posted on Facebook. And so I was like, okay, so that sounds like it was basically the exact same post.

55:29

And so the guy who posted it was Brandon Craig. And he posted it in this Reform, it's called

55:36

Rate My Reform Meme or Else. And there's some funny stuff on there. It's a meme group or whatever, but there's a lot of people there who defend

55:47

Piper. And there are some who agree that Piper is wrong.

55:53

But there seems to be a lot of people who defend Piper and Brandon Craig is one of them.

56:00

And so I can't even see his stuff anymore. But he posted something and then

56:06

I thought, okay, maybe it's this guy. But then I saw at the bottom, he was talking to another guy called Ashton. And Ashton said,

56:12

I'm going to take this from you. Can I quote it and use it for somebody else? And he's like, okay, so I said fine.

56:18

And then I thought, okay, well, maybe it's Ashton because he's the one asking him for this to quote it.

56:24

So I thought it was Ashton who was the Reform layman. But then I confronted him in sort of a funny way in one of the memes.

56:33

And I told him, hey, so what do you think about coming on the show, Ashton? Or I mean,

56:39

Reform layman. And so we went back and forth. And he said, no, I'm actually not the guy. So I was like, okay, well, it's either you or Brandon.

56:46

And so then we kind of figured out that it was Brandon. And so Brandon responded to me to my email in that group.

56:57

And I'm trying to see if I saved it. I hope I saved it. Well, his justification for kicking you out and blocking me was that we accused him of slander.

57:13

He accused us? No. We accused him of libel.

57:18

Oh, yeah. I want to pull that up too. Which I didn't even accuse him of libel.

57:26

That was you. And I got blocked. I mean, I would have. I didn't even see.

57:31

Where did he accuse us of slander? Oh, yeah, he did that. He did that several times. Wait, a

57:37

Piper fan accused us of slander? That's weird. Like that's never happened before.

57:44

Brandon, basically, he accused me of slander because I claimed that Piper denies

57:56

Sola Fide when he explicitly affirms it. And so this is what's funny about that because this was my response to Brandon regarding that.

58:09

He said a bunch of other stuff. He said he doesn't have time to come on or whatever, and he didn't want to come on.

58:15

So he denied the invitation. But then this is what I told him.

58:21

So I told him, Brandon Craig, suit yourself, but you're wrong. If you actually read what I wrote or listen to our podcast, you'd know that I clearly state

58:28

Piper is a both and kind of guy. Like we just said, once again, he affirms

58:33

Protestant orthodoxy, but teaches contrary doctrines. And I don't just claim that Piper's teaching is teaching error.

58:40

I document it with extensive quotes and arguments. Our whole team does. The Aryans, quote, confessed the very creed they rejected by isageating their heresies into it.

58:51

I learned that from Piper. Claiming one thing and teaching something contrary is the false teacher's favorite sleight of hand.

58:58

And by that comment, I don't mean that Piper's doing this intentionally, but it's nevertheless false teaching.

59:04

And so it doesn't matter that he's sincere. That doesn't let him off the hook. If what you're teaching is false, it's false, and you need to be called out for it.

59:13

So and then I continue. Your bald accusation of slander is in fact liable on your part, as I said before.

59:20

Given that there's still sharp disagreement on both sides means that there should be more productive discussion rather than empty dismissals of slander.

59:27

And I demand that you be put on trial for selling under a false flag of SPC while exercising admin status here.

59:34

I was trying to end it off on a light note, on a positive note, like a joke, because I thought he was an admin in that group.

59:43

And only Presbyterians are allowed to be admins. And his profile said that he was a

59:49

Reformed Baptist. So I guess he was Baptist, and now he's a Presbyterian or something like that. I thought he wasn't an admin.

59:56

No, I guess not. Somebody clarified that he wasn't. But that's what I see.

01:00:01

You were wrong. He's exonerated. And that's what I told him.

01:00:07

And after that, he blocked me. And so that was pretty much it.

01:00:15

How old is he? Is he a millennial? Does he need a safe space? No, I think he's like, it seems like he's in his late 30s, early 40s.

01:00:23

Oh, so that's... He doesn't seem like he's that young. Is he a Democrat?

01:00:29

Does he need a safe space? I mean... It's that kind of behavior.

01:00:36

What are we dealing with here? It's pretty shocking and cowardly.

01:00:43

So then this guy, Matt, shout out to Matt. He was trying to help us because I told him that we've been trying to find somebody to come on the show.

01:00:54

To discuss Piper with from an opposing viewpoint. I think that would really benefit both sides.

01:01:00

I genuinely think that. Which, by the way, we may extend an invitation to Ashton, who

01:01:06

I talked to earlier. He was very gracious about the whole thing. And he said he was willing to come on. So hopefully, we'll see if we can set something up with him.

01:01:13

If he's still willing to do that. So we got in touch with Matt. And he showed us some of the exchanges that happened between Brandon and some other guy.

01:01:24

I think he's an admin. Nathan. So, Brandon told

01:01:32

Nathan. And I think he's referring to you. To you,

01:01:38

Tim. He says, he means, I personally blocked the guy. Well, I don't know if he's talking about...

01:01:44

He might be talking about Matt. Because Matt was trying to find somebody to come on the show.

01:01:49

He was like, you know, trying to ask somebody. So he says,

01:01:54

Brandon says this. He means, I personally blocked the guys who accused me of libel.

01:02:00

And one other accusing me of bullying when he was the one on my page. So Nathan says, ah, well, no loss to intelligent discourse then.

01:02:09

Well played, Brandon. So the guy just assumes that, you know, we're a bunch of morons and that was it.

01:02:14

When in fact, he was the one who accused us of slander first. Falsely so. Because what his accusation was baseless and false to begin with.

01:02:23

Did he just call us stupid? No loss of intellectual discourse? Yeah. So the guy doesn't even know us and he doesn't even know the story.

01:02:32

The one who answers the story, he doesn't matter. But anyway. And it's his page, his rules.

01:02:38

I mean, if he wants to block us, I mean, if he wants to run his page like that. Like, okay, fine. Yeah, I could care less.

01:02:45

He acted like a child. It's kind of like, don't accuse us of slander and then not talk to us about it.

01:02:54

I mean, it's just, it's immature, dude. Yeah. He acted like a child and we just wanted to warn people from that guy, from Brandon Craig and his website,

01:03:05

The Reform Layman. I had other people messaging me privately telling me like, anybody who disagrees with him, he's going to delete.

01:03:15

And a lot of people were disagreeing with him. And it's like, nope, can't delete.

01:03:22

And here's the thing. I have put stuff on my Facebook page and then somebody will take me to task and I delete the whole thing.

01:03:33

Because I realized like, okay, I don't actually have time to sit down on Facebook and type out responses all day.

01:03:42

I've got other stuff to do. And so I take down the whole post, you know, because I don't have time for this.

01:03:51

I'm not running from you. I mean, if I have time, I'd like to engage. So it's like,

01:03:57

I understand when people do that. But to delete everybody who disagrees with you and leave it up and leave your comments up where you're mentioning me by name and not give me the opportunity to respond.

01:04:13

You're a coward. Yeah, childish and cowardly. And he needs to repent of that stupid behavior.

01:04:20

It's a shame when Christians act like that, especially with other believers, fellow believers. Brandon, say you're sorry.

01:04:27

All right, let's move on. Yeah, so there's so much to cover.

01:04:36

But I'm glad we've kind of tried to tie up some of these loose ends that we've been wanting to deal with.

01:04:44

I did also, I don't know if we should. I don't know if we should read the reviews of our podcast now or if we should say that for another episode.

01:04:57

Well, rate us on iTunes. We've got 10 ratings.

01:05:04

All of them are five out of five stars. All right. We have one from Pastor Hines.

01:05:10

He says, this is Pastor Hines, host of the Protestant Witness podcast. I'm very privileged to be with very godly, serious minded men who love the true gospel and desire to proclaim it to the world just as I do.

01:05:23

So big thanks to Pastor Hines. Yeah, the privilege is absolutely ours. We're very grateful to have

01:05:29

Pastor Hines on. Thank you for that. You know what's funny, man? Somebody recently told me, we were talking about John Piper, of course, and they mischaracterized me as like, you just get mad anytime anybody disagrees with you.

01:05:42

That's what they said about me. And I was like, oh man, that's so wrong. Go listen to Pastor Hines' episode where he just takes us to task over baptism.

01:05:54

I think we took that pretty well. Yeah, we know how to play along with people who disagree with us.

01:06:04

We're pretty well seasoned in the area of people taking us to task.

01:06:14

We're not going to get upset if you disagree with us. Shout out to the porch.

01:06:21

Yeah, shout out to the porch. All right. So this next one is from Abby Youth 89, who says the sermons have been great.

01:06:32

I'm guessing Pastor Hines because he's the only one who really posts sermons on here.

01:06:39

Abby says, I hardly ever read who's the one preaching, but he does a good job.

01:06:46

So, yeah, it's Pastor Hines. It's always nice to listen to a podcast that holds to the biblical doctrine of faith and grace.

01:06:55

Although I love Apologia and The Dividing Line, I know they don't hold to the same belief as Clark, meaning

01:07:03

Gordon Clark, which is disappointing given that it's a biblical view. So, yeah,

01:07:08

I agree. I do like Apologia. I like their podcast. I don't like their

01:07:14

TV show. And I don't want any hate mail.

01:07:21

There's nothing wrong with saying you don't like it. I mean, I don't like it. I don't like it either. Yeah, I'm not trying to bash them.

01:07:28

I'd rather do something else than watch a night show.

01:07:37

So anyways, let me see. There's another one. Oh, from Kolodog, who says,

01:07:45

I appreciate the serious and sober approach that these brothers take when dealing with their subject at hand.

01:07:52

Great content. Another one from Sal Adam, who says, don't always agree with them, but love the fact that they do some serious homework and handle topics firmly, yet fairly, from their perspective.

01:08:05

This is a show to check out for sure. So that's from Shine His Lights, Adam Staub.

01:08:13

Big thanks to him. And of course, he's New Covenant Theology, and that's what we disagree with.

01:08:21

But I think he's a pretty solid brother in the Lord, and we don't agree with New Covenant Theology.

01:08:29

We think that it's a gateway drug. I'm just kidding. The gateway drug to fundamentalism.

01:08:37

Yeah, the gateway drug to fundamentalism. But speaking of Adam, and I want to thank you very much,

01:08:43

Abby and Kolodog, for your positive feedback. We're very grateful for that. And I want to give a shout out to Adam Staub as well of Shine His Lights podcast.

01:08:51

He was one of the podcasts that was with us when we joined the

01:08:58

Bible Thumping Network, and I think he's still on there. So I highly recommend his podcast, despite the fact that he has

01:09:05

NCT leanings with some of the episodes that I've listened to. Leanings? He's NCT.

01:09:11

What are you talking about leanings? He's full -blown NCT. Yeah, I guess so. But he has really good stuff.

01:09:21

I want to highlight one of the episodes that he did. Not too long ago,

01:09:27

I listened to episode 99 of Shine His Lights podcast called Endgame, Population Control, and a

01:09:34

Christian Response. That is an outstanding episode. And I highly encourage everybody to listen to it.

01:09:41

It was an outstanding episode. These guys have their pulse on the culture. They know what's going on, and they really give a solid biblical response to it.

01:09:50

Yeah, and that brings up another thing that I really appreciate about Adam is his perspective on schooling.

01:09:57

He did some really good episodes on homeschooling.

01:10:03

Man, I love to see this because he was doing a podcast for kids.

01:10:13

I love the fact that he's really taking it seriously to train up his own kids.

01:10:19

He's a pastor, so you would expect that he would have this mindset, but to training and equipping his kids in the faith.

01:10:28

I really, really commend him for that. When you're a parent and you take that role seriously,

01:10:39

I believe that the Lord will bless that. That doesn't mean that every child is going to...

01:10:47

I've seen some kids grow up and they fall away from the faith.

01:10:53

As parents, we're called to just be faithful and to trust

01:10:59

God in that process. I really commend him for that. I love that he's taking on that job seriously.

01:11:08

His episodes on homeschooling were outstanding. I've only been able to do one episode on homeschooling.

01:11:15

Man, I think if you're going to not do homeschooling,

01:11:28

I think maybe there's some good private schools out there. I think

01:11:34

Christians are going to be faced with an ever -increasing challenge to ward off the influence of the world.

01:11:46

That's primarily going to come through public education. I think that Christians need to take a second look at their schooling options.

01:11:58

I'm with you on that. Big shout out to Adam again.

01:12:04

We might have to invite him on the show and catch up with him. It's been a while since we've talked, but I'm very grateful for that brother and his podcast.

01:12:11

It's very good content. Just ignore the NCT stuff. Oh man, throwing shots.

01:12:20

I'm glad we're all men and we can just take it. I know we're kind of all over the place, but this is just stuff that we've really been needing to get to.

01:12:32

What else do we have? I guess maybe we can end it on this note. Hold on.

01:12:39

Why don't we end it on... You went on vacation recently.

01:12:45

You did some sightseeing. You read one of Piper's books. I wanted you to give me some of the feedback on the show.

01:12:55

You were giving me some feedback on the phone. I want you to cover that.

01:13:00

We can just end it on that note. This is partly the excuse that we have for not being...

01:13:09

It's been a while since we've released an episode recently. I guess I wanted to apologize to our audience for that.

01:13:16

We've had a lot of stuff going on. Personally, I went on vacation for two weeks to Dallas and Houston to visit family.

01:13:27

You've had a lot going on with your church and recently leaving that, transitioning out of there. We've had a lot going on.

01:13:37

It's nice to be able to talk about this now. It's been a couple of months now. More than a month.

01:13:46

I recently, not too long ago, went on vacation. Went to Dallas first.

01:13:55

Had a blast there. If you're in Dallas, you suffer from an embarrassment of riches there.

01:14:00

There's just so much cool stuff to do there. We went to a ton of Bible museums.

01:14:06

We went to a Holocaust museum actually. It was also adjacent to a museum of biblical history.

01:14:14

I'll try to put up the links to those really cool places that I went to. They have some fantastic stuff there.

01:14:20

It was fascinating. We also went to the Dallas Museum. They've got some interesting stuff there too.

01:14:28

Actually, there was some really interesting stuff there too. There was really interesting historical artifacts.

01:14:34

Even from the founding fathers. They have all kinds of epochs there.

01:14:40

Ancient stuff. More recent stuff. We had a blast.

01:14:51

I got the chance to visit Pastor G. Craig Lewis' church.

01:14:57

It's Adamant Believers Council in North Richland Hills. That was one of the things

01:15:03

I've been wanting to do for a while. He was actually the pastor that introduced me to Christ.

01:15:09

God used to save me. Through his videos, The Truth Behind Hip Hop. I highly encourage people to check that out.

01:15:17

There is a funny thing about this pastor. He has not reformed at all.

01:15:23

He's a pretty strong Arminian in fact. He's done such outstanding work with respect to the family.

01:15:33

I've learned a ton of stuff from him regarding family life. Regarding being a man. Manhood.

01:15:40

Womanhood. Church discipline. Dealing with church matters.

01:15:47

Music. The influence and power of music. Just so many things. He's one of my favorite preachers still to this day.

01:15:53

Despite the fact that he's not even reformed. If I get the chance, I think I might actually be able to win him over.

01:16:01

He does say some things that actually keep him in check. Relatively so. He doesn't go as far as other

01:16:08

Arminians do. With respect to certain things. He actually checks himself even though it's not necessarily consistent.

01:16:14

I'm really grateful for that pastor. I got to go to his church. He has a pretty big church there. He's been doing ministry for several years now.

01:16:23

I got the chance to say hi to him. I bought several of his DVDs. One of the ones that I recently watched was about race.

01:16:34

It's the truth behind hip -hop, I think part 11. Yeah, I think it's part 11.

01:16:40

He talks a lot about race there. There's a lot of overlap with what he was saying. With what

01:16:46

I was talking about with Hiram Diaz. Regarding critical race theory and things like that.

01:16:52

He's got some excellent stuff. He's been putting some really good content out there. Really engaging what's going on with the culture and society.

01:17:00

Providing a solid biblical stance against it. Giving you really practical biblical suggestions for standing firm against the tide of liberalism and wickedness.

01:17:18

That's so rampant in our culture today. That was a really neat experience to check that out.

01:17:28

Another interesting thing that happened. I wanted to bring this up with you to see what you thought about this. I went to my nephew's school activity.

01:17:41

They had a project. It was a wax museum exhibit. They had to pick a historical figure.

01:17:49

Basically dress up as him. What's that movie called? The Night at the

01:17:55

Museum. Kind of like those wax museums where they have people, historical figures up.

01:18:00

They don't do anything. They just stand there or whatever. Pose. That's what they were supposed to do.

01:18:06

They were supposed to pick a figure. Whenever you pressed a button they would give a speech.

01:18:13

About their life. There was a bunch of students there obviously. My nephew picked

01:18:20

Hershey. The chocolate company. He did a good job. But one thing really struck me.

01:18:29

That I noticed that I had never really thought about before. This was that some of the girls.

01:18:37

Chose male historical figures. They dressed up as a man. Basically as a male.

01:18:44

I think one girl was Abraham Lincoln. Or something like that. I thought about that.

01:18:50

I don't know if I'm okay with that. Given what the

01:18:56

Bible says about cross dressing and things like that. It just kind of didn't sit right with me. I thought about it and I was like wow.

01:19:03

This is so normal. Especially in our society. People hearing me saying this.

01:19:10

They would probably dismiss me as some legalist. Pharisaical legalist. What's your problem?

01:19:16

But it really kind of didn't sit well with me. With the idea that it's okay for little girls to dress up as men.

01:19:22

Or as a male. As if it's harmless.

01:19:29

What I didn't see was boys dressing up as girls. I don't think

01:19:34

I saw any boys do that. That probably would have been. That really. That's the thing.

01:19:42

It seems instinctively more wrong for a boy to do that. But if it's wrong for a boy to do that.

01:19:49

Why wouldn't it be wrong for a girl to dress up as a boy? Because there's this tomboy culture.

01:19:55

With girls sometimes. But it's like. That just didn't sit right with me.

01:20:02

And it kind of. I thought about this. I know the Puritans for a fact. They would not tolerate that stuff for a minute.

01:20:09

And that's where our Reformation heritage comes from. So I don't know. What are your thoughts about that? I don't agree with it.

01:20:19

I do think. It's funny because I've even seen homeschoolers do that.

01:20:26

The girl will dress up as some famous person in history.

01:20:32

But one of the things that I think is inconsistent. Is the feminist movement.

01:20:41

It's really interesting. Because feminists would criticize us.

01:20:47

Because they want to give these little girls the freedom to be whoever they want to be.

01:20:57

So they would criticize us for this view. But then at the same time.

01:21:02

It's like. Wouldn't you want a little girl to.

01:21:08

That's exactly what I was going to say. Bring to light a female figure in history.

01:21:15

Who did something meaningful. That's exactly what I was going to say. I don't agree with it.

01:21:23

But that's because I'm approaching this from a biblical worldview. I think that as parents we need to make gender roles and distinctions very clear to our kids.

01:21:41

And I think that the world really has done a great job of bringing in gender confusion.

01:21:48

To our kids. And I just think that we need to keep those distinctions very clear with our kids.

01:22:02

Yeah. This really was interesting. And I don't think

01:22:08

I mentioned this. But this was an elementary school. So there were like 8, 9, 10 year olds. And it's like you said.

01:22:17

There's the issue of. You should allow girls to dress up as boys or men if they want to.

01:22:25

But then there's plenty of women to choose from. So why don't you just go with the women. If that's like the whole feminist thing.

01:22:31

You would think that they would say that as well. But that's just one of the ways in which that LGBT agenda just kind of collides against itself.

01:22:41

It can't sustain itself because it's such a massive contradiction. Yeah. It's like feminists fighting for Islam.

01:22:51

Yeah. Oh man. You don't know what you're talking about. Yeah. There's professors at UTEP.

01:22:58

The university I went to that do that very thing. And they are seriously misleading people.

01:23:05

It is really disturbing. But yeah. So that was really interesting.

01:23:13

Because yeah. The Bible clearly condemns it. It's an abomination for a man to dress as a woman and vice versa.

01:23:20

And so. But Christians. You have even Christians now on events like Halloween.

01:23:26

Where not only do the boys and girls dress up as opposite genders.

01:23:32

But they dress up as monsters and demons and a bunch of other stuff that's ungodly. So it's like.

01:23:37

What's wrong with that? People don't even. Christians nowadays don't even think that's wrong anymore. And there's.

01:23:44

But there's another issue as well. Because. You have popular.

01:23:50

Quote unquote Christian culture. You know where the church is so inundated with this garbage.

01:23:56

Like. One of the most prominent. Actors in Christian films.

01:24:03

Quote unquote right. Tyler Perry. This guy has made a living. Dressing up as an old woman.

01:24:10

And mocking the church. Mocking all this stuff. About the church and church life.

01:24:16

And people. There's Christians who eat this stuff up. It's disturbing.

01:24:23

It's actually really perverted too. He has like half naked men in a bunch of his movies and stuff. And it's like the guy has issues.

01:24:30

And he's he's admitted to that. He has issues. Doesn't he?

01:24:35

Doesn't he profess to be a Christian? Yes. Dude. This is what

01:24:40

I've learned a lot from G. Craig. Pastor G. Craig. He's done a lot of work. Calling him out because.

01:24:48

And T .D. Jakes. And they had a big huge event with Tyler Perry. And he

01:24:53

Tyler Perry laid hands on T .D. Jakes. There was just a whole mess of stuff going on in that. And that whole part of the.

01:25:01

You know. The whole church quote unquote. But he's extremely popular. Especially in the black church.

01:25:08

And you know quote unquote black church. To get politically incorrect or whatever. But. It's stuff is so disturbing.

01:25:17

And there's it's perversion. It's really what it is. We have to call it for what it is. It's perversion. And it's important to teach our children.

01:25:24

The distinction. A clear distinction like you said between men and women. And you know what's funny is.

01:25:29

Is a lot of people when they talk about this. They act like they're the mature ones.

01:25:35

And we're we're not. Yeah. And it's like oh well you know. Yeah we're we're mature adults about this.

01:25:41

And it's like no dude. You're just wicked. Like I.

01:25:47

You're not mature. I'm you know. I'm just as mature as you.

01:25:53

I'm an adult. But but they they they act like they're more sophisticated.

01:25:58

They act like they're more mature. And yeah. No. You're you're just you're you can't discern the profane from the holy.

01:26:07

And you're just yeah. You're compromising. Some people are just downright wicked.

01:26:13

Other people it's like like you said there's other Christians that have been duped because you know they don't they don't consider that the

01:26:22

Bible actually has something to say on this. You know. And and it's funny because they say like oh you know they would they would profess to have the

01:26:34

Bible as a final authority. But that's just on faith. That's not on. That's not on anything else in their life.

01:26:41

As if the Bible doesn't instruct us. On everything else. Well yeah.

01:26:47

And what they fail to recognize is that the Bible gives us a complete and comprehensive worldview.

01:26:52

There's nothing in our worldview that's you know there's no there's no gaps.

01:27:01

You know if you want to know how to handle your finances go to the Bible. If you want to know how to run a government go to the

01:27:08

Bible. I mean all these people that are advocating for socialism. It's the most anti -Christian thing in the world.

01:27:16

And they say that Jesus was a socialist. And it's like no you. And it's funny because they they quote you know or they'll appeal to the good

01:27:28

Samaritan and it's like oh yeah like we should be like the good Samaritan therefore socialism. The good

01:27:34

Samaritan used his own resources his own money. He was not an agent. He didn't.

01:27:40

Yeah he didn't lobby the government to take that money and take those resources from other people to give it to the poor on your behalf.

01:27:49

I mean the disconnect is just it's astonishing.

01:27:55

And what we have is we have a society that is not Christian. And when you look at you know when the

01:28:03

Israelites were taken into captivity there were some that would hold the line and maintained their faith.

01:28:10

And there's others who would you know fall away into the culture. And so you see you see like different degrees of this you see because we're not a

01:28:22

Christian culture anymore and arguably we weren't. We just had the facade of it.

01:28:28

But you know we don't we live in an anti -Christian culture. And so if people don't have a biblical worldview they're going to be persuaded by the culture.

01:28:42

That's just that's all there is to it. There's just by something. There's no way around it. Yep. Yeah.

01:28:49

Yeah. It's really bad. Yeah. Yeah. So so that was some really interesting stuff that that was going on.

01:29:00

And yeah yeah we have to be very careful with what's going on and be aware of it. Kirk Franklin himself you know

01:29:06

Kirk that's another big figure and quote unquote gospel music. This guy has a song called

01:29:13

Smile where he has lipstick on and there was people actually defending the guy and he had lipstick on.

01:29:23

I mean it's just it's unbelievable like how blatant these people are how blatantly anti -Christian they are.

01:29:31

And well yeah in one of his videos I mean they they make him look feminine.

01:29:37

Yeah. In one of his videos. Yeah. Yeah. Sadly when you have a when you get into the music industry and things like that you have to pretty much sell yourself out to Satan because that he controls those platforms without a doubt.

01:29:51

And so yeah there's lots of really bad stuff going on there.

01:29:57

We'll have to probably revisit these topics later on when we get the chance. But so I wanted to close it on this note because I got a chance to go to half price books.

01:30:08

It's a really it's a popular bookstore in certain areas certain states. Fortunately this where you found

01:30:14

Piper's book. No. On even better. I found something better.

01:30:21

So half price books. It's a really hard. That's not hard to do.

01:30:26

But did you want to do you want to read the quote from Piper or talk about. That's what I'm getting to. So I went to half price books and that's a good store.

01:30:36

Yeah it's a really good bookstore. Sometimes they're a little pricey but I wouldn't you wouldn't believe what

01:30:42

I found there. Let me get the book. Yeah.

01:31:05

So I was looking around in the Christian section and much to my surprise

01:31:10

I found two books published by the Trinity Foundation.

01:31:16

And I got a hold of Against the Churches which is a collection of the

01:31:22

Trinity Review archives of 1989 through 1998. I was so excited to I couldn't believe

01:31:29

I found this like in a small little half price books in Forney.

01:31:35

It's like it's a little town. And sure enough there two books were there from the

01:31:40

Trinity Foundation. So that was pretty cool. And I got a hold of that one. It's a really neat find there that I that I got a hold of.

01:31:48

But all that to say I also read another book while on you know during our trip.

01:31:56

I managed to read another book and this one was by John Piper. I had ordered this book a while back and I finally got the chance to read it when

01:32:05

I went on the trip. It's called Counted Righteous in Christ Should We Abandon the Imputation of Christ's Righteousness.

01:32:12

And so this book by John Piper it's a short little book. It's only like you know one hundred and twenty seven pages.

01:32:22

And it's a it's a little book. So I got through it pretty quick. But honestly this was one of the best books probably the best book

01:32:31

I've read by John Piper. The book was pretty much outstanding for the most part like it was excellent.

01:32:40

A lot of the stuff that he said was very good. He's like the book is saying the title says he's he's essentially defending the imputed righteousness of Christ.

01:32:52

And so there was a bunch of good stuff in here. It was very well written very well argued.

01:33:01

Very little that I disagreed with. And there. So there's a lot of interesting ties to this because.

01:33:09

So we're wrong on everything and we need to retract what he said. Right. Right. So he says a lot of good things here and he says them very well.

01:33:19

In fact like he states Orthodox doctrine very well articulated it very well.

01:33:28

And an interesting side note to this. He makes very sound defenses even of the in Romans 5 where it's talking about the headship federal headship and things like that.

01:33:43

He doesn't take it as far as defending an actual covenant of works because he obviously rejects the covenant of works which is funny because he's just inconsistent there.

01:33:52

He defends he affirms the fact that we are legally guilty of Adam's sin.

01:33:58

He says that when the Bible says that because all sin that that really means all sin in Adam.

01:34:06

That's what the passage means. And so he does an excellent job of explaining that and of defending like sound reformed

01:34:16

Protestant doctrine. Very. It was a very good read. Actually it was a very good book.

01:34:22

I very much I was like a meaning you know a large portion of pretty much the whole book practically.

01:34:34

And there was another interesting note about this because when we engaged NCT folks the new covenant theology people about this they often quote

01:34:42

Piper to defend their view to support their view of a new covenant theology. But if you read this book it's actually not very it's not it actually contradicts a lot of what many if not most new covenant theology people believe about you know that's tying to federal headship and things like that.

01:35:02

The stuff that Piper was talking about here was very very close to reformed covenant theology again just without going as he just didn't take it as far as affirming a covenant of works but there was some very good stuff in here defending that.

01:35:18

However there is nevertheless a however but it wasn't completely unspotted unfortunately.

01:35:30

And so there was in fact one little footnote towards the end of the book.

01:35:38

It's towards the very end of the book on page 108. So he got he got he got all the way across the field and then he fumbled the ball at the one yard line.

01:35:52

You might say that. Let me let me let me read what he says footnote 52 says this the future.

01:36:00

So he's talking about he's starting to talk about final judgment. He doesn't he he doesn't really talk about final judgment in the book apart from this section here.

01:36:08

The footnote says the future tense. Okay wait let me let me read the context here first.

01:36:15

So he says let me read the sentence. Verse 19 of Romans 5 supports this by saying it another way to make sure we get the main point for though as through the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners even so through the obedience of the one many will be made righteous the two different two differences from verse 18 should light in the meaning.

01:36:41

So he has a footnote on the future tense of will be made righteous. So in that footnote he says the future tense here does not necessarily suggest that Paul has in view the age to come or the last judgment.

01:36:54

It is probably simply owing to the fact that as history moves forward more and more people will believe and be counted righteous when they believe the effect of Adam's sin was automatic and affected all people in the moment he sin.

01:37:08

Hence the past tense many were made sinners. The effect of Christ will be so so far so good.

01:37:15

So far what he's saying is correct. It's right. It's true. So like we always say if he just stopped if he had only stopped there and not gone any further.

01:37:26

So here's he continues the effect of Christ obedience was not automatic and affects only those who will believe.

01:37:34

This is not to deny of course that there is an eschatological dimension to justification in which

01:37:41

God confirms our right standing with him on the basis of Christ obedience alone with the fruit bearing work of the spirit as the necessary evidence and public proof that we have indeed been justified.

01:37:57

Period. That one little Frick clause that phrase at the end of the footnote.

01:38:06

Just like that's enough to raise an eyebrow, you know, and if I had read if I hadn't read anything else by Piper and I came across that footnote it would

01:38:14

I would raise an eyebrow right that would raise an eyebrow and be like I don't know about that. Like I don't know what it's not necessarily enough to condemn him because he's not explaining what he means fully.

01:38:25

But he's he's clearly hinting at final salvation without a doubt.

01:38:32

And when was this published? Good question. So this book was published in 2002.

01:38:40

So that was way back in the day. Yeah, you know. Well, and so you do see that those views are developed.

01:38:50

Well, and it's not just that it's not just that though.

01:38:55

Because what he's saying here he already expounded back in 1993 in his sermon series on the last judgment.

01:39:05

He already explained what he means. He said that at final judgment our works will serve as public proof that we truly are saved.

01:39:14

And so he already affirmed back way back when that our works forensically contribute as evidence to our justification.

01:39:27

And so and this is where this is where Christians really need to be discerning because people hear him say that our works are evidence and they say amen.

01:39:38

Yeah, like that's the that's the Christian view. But what they need to keep in mind is that, you know, false teachers redefine what that means.

01:39:48

And so what he means by evidence is legal evidence in Christ's courtroom.

01:39:54

He's talking about the final judgment. Yeah, in order to render a verdict. Yeah. So that you might enter heaven by or through those good works and be saved by or through those good works.

01:40:05

And so that is a complete redefinition of the nature of evidence and of justification.

01:40:14

Yeah. Yeah. And so, you know, and I hope that people see when

01:40:22

I mean, we've got to be balanced and fair in our criticism.

01:40:27

And I think that a lot of times when you see immature Christians call somebody out and they then the person that they're calling out as wrong.

01:40:40

They can't admit that that person ever says or does anything right. You know, and it's like, oh, they're wrong in this and they're wrong in that.

01:40:50

And they're constantly just like beating that guy up.

01:40:55

Well, I think that's that's it's really immature. But I think that it also misses something very important.

01:41:05

We do acknowledge that a lot of what Piper says is right. And I think that it's extremely important to acknowledge that because that makes that makes it, you know, when we ask, why aren't people seeing this?

01:41:27

Well, what is the wolf in sheep's clothing? I mean, a lot of what these false teachers say is right.

01:41:35

But when they're wrong about the gospel, when they're wrong about justification or salvation, it really

01:41:43

I mean, that is you're looking at the wolf in sheep's clothing. And, you know,

01:41:49

I think that's that's why it's so difficult for people to to see the errors in Piper's work because of stuff like this.

01:41:58

It's like, yeah, I mean, he said he said it right. But then, you know, in the footnote, he's alluding to his false teaching of final salvation, where he just completely butchers it.

01:42:12

Yeah. You know, sadly. And I think that it's I think that it's really important for people to acknowledge, like, yeah, a lot of what

01:42:19

Piper says is right. But the fact that he's he's wrong in the gospel makes makes his views lethal.

01:42:29

And just because just because. So if you get the gospel wrong, you get Christianity wrong.

01:42:35

And there's a reason why, you know, there's there's a reason why we don't recommend him because.

01:42:45

He. I'm trying to figure out how to explain this when when he's right.

01:42:54

It lures people in. And gives them the false notion that he's there for solid.

01:43:03

And I think that that's I think that's the deception. I think, you know, that is the wolf in sheep's clothing.

01:43:09

He looks like he looks like a sheep. And that's why it's so difficult to spot them.

01:43:15

And that's why that's why I consider him to be I actually consider Piper to be the most dangerous false teacher in American Christianity today.

01:43:26

Yeah, the we if you want a fuller explanation of this, go back to our episode where we talked about fatal flaw number one.

01:43:34

This is the first flaw that we covered. Necessary evidence and public proof.

01:43:40

He is so and I learned this was helpful from reading Cunha's book on Richard Gaffin, The Emperor Has No Clothes.

01:43:48

So Cunha explains in that book that works from a reformed perspective historically were demonstrative and or declarative strictly demonstrative or declarative meaning that they would they were a public evidence and outward evidence to other people that you were a

01:44:10

Christian. They did not in any way contribute to your to your salvation or your justification at the final judgment.

01:44:18

And this also illustrates an extremely important lesson that people need to keep in mind that hopefully they've already gotten away from this from listening to our stuff and before and I'm reading our work when you talk about justification

01:44:35

Piper talks about justification imputed righteousness and he is dead on practically dead on and all of these points.

01:44:43

But when he starts talking even hinting about the final judgment is where the lethal injection is made.

01:44:52

And if you fail to acknowledge that aspect of justification with respect to the final judgment that your justification is already final there is no reckoning or forensic analysis on the final judgment of a believer.

01:45:10

Your judgment is satisfied in Christ and you are reckoned righteous the moment you believe and so that was an extremely vivid lesson for me that I that I got away from this because everything else was almost dead on point and that one little phrase at the end of that footnote undermines everything else that he established before everything else because it's not enough you have to be you are going to still face

01:45:44

God as a judge in the last judgment and he is going to forensically evaluate you to see if you have the works to get into heaven and you know this is why it again it was very helpful

01:45:56

Kunya's book to show the way he explained it it's declarative they're declarative and they're and they're evidential evidential in that sense not in the sense of the final judgment to prove that you're actually a believer before God and so unfortunately a lot of people like like Piper appeal to like James chapter 2 to support their view of a final judgment and what's so astonishing is the most basic fund the most basic reading of James chapter 2

01:46:29

James is giving a hypothetical scenario and the context is a conversation between two people here and now it has nothing to do with the final judgment because he says what good is it my if what good is it my brothers if someone says

01:46:44

I have faith you know but does not have works that says to who says to you and then he says some will say you have faith

01:46:55

I'll just I'll just actually read it look at the context of the hypothetical scenario that James gives you know they they butcher this to support their view of a final you know

01:47:14

James is talking about a final judgment and and before God it says what good is it my brothers if someone says he has faith will says to who says to you this is a conversation between two people verse 18 but some will say you have faith

01:47:30

I have works show me your faith apart from your works and I will show you my faith by my works this is a conversation between two people here and now that's the hypothetical scenario that James gives yeah it's and so Piper will rip this and use it to support his his doctrine of final salvation at the last judgment and James you know and it's like James doesn't even mention a final judgment you know the context is not us showing our good works to God it's

01:48:07

God God knows the faith that he's given us he's even given us the works that we might walk them out or walk in them so he's given us everything he we don't have to show

01:48:18

God anything he knows but I can't see the faith that you have because it's invisible

01:48:26

I can't see that faith and so in order for me to see your faith as you know person to person it has to be made manifest in good works and that's the that's the context of the the hypothetical scenario that James is giving and and these guys just constantly butcher this and the

01:48:47

Christian needs to slow down a little bit look at what the passage is actually saying ask you know is is their conclusion supported by this passage no it's not and and then ask you know okay what is what is he saying by this like because you said like he says you know we're justified by faith alone but how far does that get you you know in his view it doesn't get you through the final judgment and into heaven so yeah that this was very interesting learning experience and again

01:49:30

I just want people to take that away we are not misrepresenting Piper we are completely acknowledging when he is correct and or when he says something correct when he's right when he says things correctly but again

01:49:49

I wanted to just take away with this because we and we've already covered this in our previous episodes the

01:49:57

Christ himself said most assuredly I say to you he who hears my word and believes in him who sent me has everlasting has everlasting life and shall not come into judgment but has passed from death into life that's

01:50:10

John 5 24 we've already mentioned this it couldn't be any clearer that believers are not going to face a judgment at the end we are our judgment was satisfied on the cross that's the whole point of why

01:50:22

Christ came and so for Piper to say that and you know we're going to cover this we're also going to cover this in a future episode but unfortunately in the reformed tradition and I think especially with the

01:50:35

Puritans there has been there there is also a stream of thought that has developed that where works play a little bit more of a prominent role at the at the final judgment then then perhaps they should and so that's we're going to have to get into all of that stuff especially with like Mark Jones and that and and that those group of guys that are defending

01:50:58

Piper from that perspective because we have to be very careful with how we are explaining ourselves and our good works and how they relate to the final judgment and so because it's not a joke we're not being judged we are not being judged to see if we are worthy of heaven what

01:51:15

Piper says is a false gospel yeah I think you bring up some really good points and we're going to have to like get into that obviously in another episode otherwise we're going to go yeah hours definitely but um all right well that's all we have today just catching up conversation between Tim and Carlos just a little bit about everything we are going to come out with a few more episodes

01:51:43

I'm going to do an episode by myself I might bring

01:51:48

Carlos in at the end of that episode but I'm going to address the situation that I just walked out at my old church and and actually now

01:51:58

I'm going to your church Carlos yeah the old pastor's in church I asked

01:52:04

I asked Pastor Joe Rosales to just reinstate my reinstate my membership membership membership status and he said okay because really as I go through this controversy with Horizon Christian Fellowship I have to be under authority that's just all there is to it and I need to be under church authority in case anybody needs to bring a charge against me and so I'm basically submitting myself to Pastor Joe and I didn't leave your church well now our church but we didn't we didn't leave that church years ago so I was a member at your church we left to go to Horizon Christian Fellowship we left really out of practical reasons it was just closer to home and and I thought it was a good church so I and I didn't think anything of it and as time went on you know we there were just some irreconcilable differences and you know that's that's just that's where we're at but I never left your church out of disagreement with anything that Pastor Joe had said so yeah and I know

01:53:21

I know in the past some people have come into El Paso and they've asked you know hey where do you go to church you can find us at Old Paths Christian Fellowship is that right?

01:53:32

Oh the Old Paths Christian Church and the website is the OldPathsChurch .org and and I wanted to commend you as well for walking us out and bringing light to the to this issue with your old church

01:53:44

I really do commend you for that not a lot of people would just not bother taking a stand and really trying to defend the gospel so I appreciate you doing that work and look forward to bringing that out in the in the in the near future and I also

01:54:02

I just wanted to thank our listeners for being patient with us for you know it's hard for us sometimes to be consistent with publishing episodes and things like that so I thank you for your patience

01:54:14

I hope you enjoy this episode and also thank you for your positive feedback please continue to leave us some good your feedback whether good or bad email us review us on iTunes whatever you you want to do and and also you can remember that you can call us and leave us a voicemail at 915 -302 -0915 yeah or you can email us at thorncrownministries at gmail .com

01:54:40

so yeah I wanted to thank our listeners for that and hope you enjoy the show yeah all right we'll catch you guys next time