Lots of Short Topics, Andrew Fuller and the Reality of Death, then Back to Carl Trueman

Alpha & Omega Ministries

Subscribe

Download

Share

00

00:33

Well, greetings and welcome to the Divine Line, folks. We are continuing a study we started in the last program.

00:39

We'll get to that in listening to Carl Truman's presentation on classical theology.

00:45

But just so many things sort of piling up here, let me just begin.

00:53

Brief comments on a couple of topics. You know, when there were theological controversies in the past, up until, you know, the late last century, they would always take place over a fairly lengthy period of time.

01:17

And without telegraphs and electronic communication, the vast majority of theological controversies had to be hashed out in print.

01:34

And it would take time to print things, take time to write things, take time to distribute the printed material.

01:42

And, you know, there's positives and negatives. Mormonism got a good start before almost anybody could put together a whole lot of decent documentation.

01:55

I mean, E .D. Howe did something early on. But again, distribution of that type of material, it can allow cults and isms to get going.

02:08

But cults and isms can get going a whole lot faster today, thanks to the internet and things like that.

02:17

And so things like the Alistair Begg issue, in the past, no one, you know, in this situation, if you've been following it, he gave advice and he said he knew it was controversial.

02:36

He said in his response, people are going to be upset about this answer. So he knew.

02:43

But he gave advice to a grandmother that a grandchild entering into a transgender wedding, whatever, who even knows that means,

02:54

I mean, it is sinful rebellion to the max, that he specifically asked her, does your grandchild know that you do not countenance this marriage?

03:13

You do not approve of what's going on here? Because he has preached sermons on the sinfulness of homosexuality and same -sex mirage and things like that.

03:25

I don't think he'd ever use that terminology. Someone told me, and I haven't, my trip's coming up.

03:32

I don't have time to dig on all these things, that he is friendly toward women ministers or nation women ministers.

03:44

That would be relevant to this. It really would be, as far as how that works.

03:53

But as long as this couple, whatever it is, two males,

04:00

I don't know, as long as they are aware of where you stand, that you should go to the wedding and you should buy them a gift.

04:16

And most everybody's like, but going to the wedding and buying a gift is contradictory to saying that this isn't a wedding, and that this isn't actually something blessed of God.

04:35

And my gut feeling is, if he does address this,

04:42

I can't see how he can't. If he does address this, what he's going to say is,

04:51

I think we should leave avenues of communication open. Because he made the comment, and if you don't, then you're just proving what they're saying is true, that Christians are judgmental and they're not open to new things.

05:10

Well, of course, we can't be open to this new thing. It's a fundamental denial of God's right to order his own creation.

05:16

But that's my gut feeling, is if he is going to hold fast and say,

05:25

I believe I gave the right advice and here's why, that's going to be the idea. And obviously,

05:34

I cannot imagine how he could not address this issue, come straight out and address not...

05:46

There's been a bunch of people saying, oh, nope, just cancel right now, that's it, over with.

05:52

And a bunch of people saying, there's a bunch of these younger firebrands that are out there going, yep, these older guys are all saying, give them time, nope, nope, out right now.

06:02

And it's like, wow. A lot of you young guys, you're going to wake up 20 years from now going, what was

06:13

I thinking? I wouldn't listen to anybody that was older than me, and now

06:19

I'm looking back going, wow, yikes, what I didn't know. Anyway, I can't see how he can't.

06:30

He has to come out. He has to make a formal statement. He needs to deal with the serious, considered objections of at least men his own age, at least men who have a similar amount of time in ministry, who are saying to him,

06:51

I understand keeping lines of communication open, but at what cost? Upon what foundation?

07:00

Now, I realize in our society today, attending weddings is just considered to be something you do between grocery shopping and going to the movies or something like that.

07:18

And weddings are not considered to be some type of really important covenant celebration.

07:33

You look back, and weddings were so important to society.

07:38

They were important outside of just the family that was experiencing it, because the whole society knew that this is what held us together.

07:46

It was these commitments that held everything together. And so I understand why today there would be people who are like, well, it's just a wedding.

08:03

What's the big deal? The reality is your attendance at that wedding is saying something about what you believe about marriage, and what you believe is actually taking place.

08:18

And from the Christian perspective, if this is two males, and one of them is pretending to be a female, which that's what it sounds like, what else would a transgender wedding be?

08:33

Unless it's actually a male and a female, but one of the females is pretending to be a male, so it's a fake gay marriage?

08:47

I've got a picture of my grandfather in my office, a simple

08:53

Baptist preacher out in the flat, flat, flat lands of Kansas, just where you can just see forever, and had nothing.

09:05

I mean, they grew up eating dirt. And once in a while I just stop and think,

09:14

I never met him. He died when my dad was 14. But I don't think

09:22

I could explain to them, to my grandparents, what we have to deal with today.

09:31

They wouldn't have the vocabulary back, they'd just be looking at me going, what happened?

09:37

Did aliens land? There'd just be no way, things have changed so radically.

09:43

So the important point that Alistair Begg needs to deal with is what his advice means in regards to what marriage is, and what attendance at a marriage means.

10:00

That's what he needs to deal with. This isn't a wedding. It is an act of rebellion against God.

10:13

It is destructive to the people involved with it. It's destructive to the people attending it. It's destructive to society as a whole.

10:22

That's why Christians don't attend these things. So we need to know why a man who knows

10:30

Scripture as well as Alistair Begg knows Scripture, would not put those things together. That is a fair request.

10:41

It truly is. I cannot see how anyone could object to that. But that's what needs to take place.

10:47

It really does. And if you want to see what happens down the road if you don't deal with these issues, look at what happened recently in regards to the

10:57

United Methodists. I don't know why things that your parents say all of a sudden just pop into your mind decades and decades later.

11:15

But I don't remember what the context was. I just remember my dad saying once,

11:20

I guess because it surprised me, because I had imbibed a lot of the

11:28

IFB influence of my youth, I remember my dad saying to me,

11:38

I have heard a lot of Methodist preachers that could just preach the

11:45

Bible like nobody else. And, you know, okay, for some reason it stuck.

11:57

I remember him saying that. And yet by the time

12:03

I was in seminary, there was a United Methodist woman in my class. She was a really nice lady, but if she was a plain, she would have had two left wings.

12:18

You know, I mean, that's just all there was to it. The United Methodists were not as bad in the 1980s as they are now.

12:31

But still, the destruction of the

12:36

United Methodist denomination. You may have seen the video of this abusive mother who brings her 11 -year -old son out as a transgender

12:54

Rachel now at the ELCA convention. I didn't know there were enough

13:00

ELCA Lutherans left to have a convention, to afford it, to be honest with you.

13:06

I mean, it's a dying, dying denomination, and appropriately so. But this gives you an idea of what it's all about.

13:14

They are promoting this abused child. And someone pointed out on Twitter, you know, you never see the parents, the dad.

13:25

Once in a while you do. Dwayne Wade, you know. But very often it is clearly an overbearing woman who is involved in the abuse of a son.

13:42

I mean, talk about some real disgusting realities that we're seeing.

13:49

But it's the same. That's where it's going. That's where the United Methodist, ELCA, and I don't want to see churches in the

14:00

Alistair Begg circle there in 30 years.

14:07

Because there has been a fundamental capitulation on vitally important foundational issues.

14:12

But look, at the same time, I've seen a lot of responses from people that have not shown a whole lot of in -depth thought as to why they're saying what they're saying.

14:23

And you might say, well, but they're saying the right thing! Okay, but they need to know why it's the right thing.

14:31

Or their next generation won't be saying the right thing. That's the problem. So, there you go.

14:42

Completely different subject. Babylon B posted a picture of Ted Cruz in mutton chops.

14:54

Saying that he was preparing for the Civil War. You know, it's scary what you can do with stuff like Photoshop and things like that.

15:05

It really is. Because that looked really real. I mean, I know, in five years we're going to be flooded with fake

15:18

AI voiceovers, fake video. And it's just going to get worse and worse and worse until no one will have any idea what's going on anywhere.

15:30

You will not be able to trust anything that you see. At all. Already, I don't trust most of what

15:39

I see. There's so many cool things that I see, and I just go,

15:46

Okay, is that some AI generated thing that looks really real, but it isn't?

15:55

That's where we're headed. A lot of people have been saying, once they lock you in your 15 minute city, then they're going to provide government sponsored, the

16:08

Apple virtual reality thing. I've never put one on.

16:16

It's a great temptation. Because what I'd love to do is use one of those things, put one on Rich, and play

16:27

Descent with Rich. And within seven minutes, he'd be looking for the waste paper can, because he'd lose it.

16:38

He'd be blowing cookies everywhere. It's true! He's agreeing, through the window.

16:45

He is agreeing, because we did play Descent once. And if you've never played

16:53

Descent, it's a 3D thing, so you're going up and down, doing stuff like this, and fighting these robots and stuff.

17:01

It was a lot of fun, back in the day. That was like 20 years ago. We did it over the network once, and he didn't last long.

17:12

He was about as green as the cue light on that camera. It was pretty easy to beat him, because once you're too sick to function, that's all there is to it.

17:26

But anyways, they're going to stick you in your 15 minute cities, and they're going to put the virtual reality thing on you, and then you're just going to live in this fantasy world anyways.

17:35

I mean, that's what Facebook was doing with it's, what do they call it? It's virtual reality stuff?

17:43

Meta or whatever? Yeah, I don't know. I've just never put one on. I'm not saying there's something wrong with it.

17:49

I'm just like, yeah, you know, I don't have time to play video games, but if I'm sick, or I'm waiting for something on a project, and so I'm sort of stuck for a while, if I play a video game, you know what it is?

18:06

Descent is fun, but I don't have it set up on a Mac anymore. But what

18:13

I play is called Dune 2000. Remember Dune?

18:19

From the movie Dune. It's command and conquer with worms and spice and stuff like that.

18:28

Some of you know what it is. It's the computer equivalent of a board game.

18:33

You know, it's like the old Tobruk. Most of you don't have any idea what that is, but there used to be board games that would take just as many hours to play as video games, but you'd use a dice to, you know, will that tank hit my tank?

18:52

We'll find out, you throw the dice, and you know. So yeah, if I do anything like that, it would be

18:58

Dune 2000. Because I can, I've ported that into my

19:04

Mac, and I can play it, but yeah, I don't have time to. So it's been, I think

19:10

I did one like six months ago, you know, played a round of it or something like that.

19:16

So I'm not really overly tempted to these virtual reality things, but that's where they're going.

19:23

And it's sort of scary when you see how many people are really amenable to living their life that way.

19:33

It's the Matrix, yeah. They just plug you into the Matrix and turn you into a battery. You know, you go to work, you work for the elites, and then go home and put your virtual reality on and escape into another world.

19:42

It's, yeah. Ready Player One, was that what the movie was called? Something like that?

19:48

Something along those lines. So anyways, warning about that. I really wish,

19:55

I was mentioned about Ted Cruz, and went off on that tangent. What we were talking about, of course, was what's happening in Texas.

20:08

And the, it's so hard to get real news.

20:16

The Supreme Court, what the Supreme Court did was not actually turn on Texas or something like that.

20:25

When you actually dig down to what it was all about, it was about being able to cut razor wire on the part of the

20:34

Border Patrol, and it was all about people drowning in the river. And they wouldn't be drowning in the river if the idiots in Washington, I'm sorry, the

20:44

Chinese purchase traders in Washington, weren't sponsoring the invasion of the

20:50

United States, which they are. I mean, we have had millions, millions of people cross that border during the

21:01

Biden regime, purposefully. And we don't know where almost any of them are or what they're going to be doing, until the terrorism starts.

21:10

And then there'll be all sorts of finger pointing, but nobody, it won't matter at that point.

21:16

It'll be all done with anyway. But yeah, Texas is saying, cut it all you want, we'll put it back up.

21:26

And there does need to be, if the nation is going to survive for any length of period whatsoever, the brakes can't just be slightly tapped.

21:41

And everything that I'm seeing, to be honest with you, is light tapping the brakes.

21:49

It seems like the best the Republicans can come up with is, could we not destroy ourselves quite so fast?

21:59

Instead of, no, stop, we're not doing this anymore. There are slight little bright lights.

22:10

Ohio, you all put abortion up to the time of birth.

22:15

You know, they're trying to do it in Arizona. They're trying to do it in every state. But there are people out collecting signatures right now to do in Arizona what they did in Ohio.

22:23

Abortion in the Constitution up to the point of birth. They won't tell you that. In fact, they will lie to you and tell you, oh, it's only 15 weeks.

22:31

No, yeah, but it's not. It's all the way up to birth.

22:42

It's so weird that Ohio would vote that in, but then they also overrode the veto and said, yeah, no more of this men competing with women, and no more sex assignment surgeries for people under 18, and this kind of stuff.

23:05

And so there are some positive things. Even Utah, which has been going, even

23:15

Utah passed legislation in the same vein, same general area, and all the

23:21

Democrats showed up to protest it wearing black. It's like, okay.

23:29

The party of death. That's what they are. It's horrible.

23:34

But anyways, I certainly hope that Texas has a large supply of razor wire.

23:40

I wish I lived in a state that had a governor. We don't have a governor right now.

23:48

We have a weak -minded woman who would never even debate, who presided as Attorney General over her own contested election.

24:01

Secretary of State, sorry. Secretary of State. She presided over her own contested election.

24:09

Maricopa County, Chicago. Kissing cousins. It's just the same level of corruption.

24:15

And of course, you all heard the audio that just came out, which I guess you were just telling me was recorded like 11 months ago.

24:25

I don't keep up with a lot of local news, to be honest with you. I just don't have time to. But of Carrie Lake and the head of the

24:32

Republican Party in Arizona, trying to buy her off. She's running for Senate.

24:39

She's running for Senate. She hadn't announced then.

24:46

They're trying to keep her from running for Senate. And so offering her lots and lots and lots of money.

24:53

And now the big question is, who's money? Who is going to do that?

24:59

Is the question. So yeah, we got a lot of bad stuff. Bad, bad, bad stuff going on.

25:06

So moving back into the theological realm here,

25:15

I was part of Dr.

25:20

Truman's presentation. We started talking about at the inauguration of the Center for Classical Theology, whatever it's called.

25:31

I'm not worried about getting any invitations in the future, so I'm not all that excited about it. But part of, toward the end,

25:44

Dr. Truman made reference to a book by a man who was reflecting on his terminal cancer.

25:57

And one of the arguments that he made was that, you know, what he was saying, he talked about Moltmann and the suffering god, and this was stuff that was real big back when

26:09

I was in seminary. A lot of it goes back to, you know, how do you believe in the god of classical theism in light of Auschwitz?

26:20

And those are not unimportant questions. Western Christianity has had to struggle a great deal after World War II.

26:35

After those two world wars, back to back, I mean, there was only a generation between them, who thought the first war was the war to end all wars, and it actually just set up the situation for the next.

26:50

And there are important issues to be addressed in that area.

26:57

How do you explain Auschwitz? And the answers for many

27:08

European theologians basically had to do with abandoning biblically necessary elements of the doctrine of God.

27:27

So, in essence, God's immutability,

27:34

God's decree, God accomplishing a purpose in this world, that had to be sacrificed for a suffering god.

27:46

And of course, there is language that's appropriate of talking about a suffering god in regards to Jesus, the god man suffered.

27:52

So there is a realm in which you can make that assertion, but this was more of an evacuation of any element of transcendence.

28:05

So as to bring God into the suffering and try to eliminate asking the question, but couldn't

28:14

God have done something about this? Let alone the question, is

28:20

God glorifying himself in this? These are important issues. And Dr.

28:29

Truman's assertion, and I didn't even mark any of this stuff, you'll see why in just a second.

28:36

Dr. Truman's assertion was, from his perspective, the man, who

28:44

I assume has since died, the man found solace and consolation and strength not in a suffering god who suffers like he does from cancer, but in the transcendent, unchanging

29:04

God who is accomplishing his purposes. And hence, that gives meaning to his cancer, to his suffering in this life.

29:16

And gives meaning to the entirety of his life, not just the end of it or how it ended. And that's very important.

29:29

I've mentioned before, meeting with one of the elders at PRBC the day before he died, and the encouragement in hearing his very weak, because he was very weak, but firm affirmation that the entirety of his confidence was to be found in the imputed righteousness of Christ, and that he was looking forward to being in the presence of his savior.

30:08

And so, I really get that. And so that was in the back of my mind, and then

30:16

I'm doing preparation for a class, this trip

30:22

I've got coming up, it would be more than the biggest challenge

30:29

I've ever faced, if all I had was the five debates, but that's not all I have. I'm teaching an entire intensive class.

30:37

If you're not a professor, if you're not taught, you don't know.

30:47

Intensive classes are tough for students. They're brutal for the professor.

30:54

You're talking about eight hours of teaching a day. And I'm not the kind of teacher that can just sit up there and drone through notes or read from the book.

31:04

I've had professors like that, and they got paid, and oh well. But that's not how

31:11

I am, and so I'm doing reading in Baptist church history, because that's what it's about.

31:20

And one of the things that has struck me, No, we're using... There we go.

31:28

We're using the three volume, this is volume two. Oh, this is volume three. The Baptist by Tom Nettles.

31:35

That's what they used before I came on staff. In fact, I think Tom Nettles actually taught it.

31:41

And so I'm like, well, I'm not going to change that. I'm going to try to keep it as consistent as possible. One of the things that has struck me, and this has struck me, of course, in teaching about the

31:56

Reformers, I think one of the reasons that we are different today,

32:09

I forget which modern writer it was, who said that the doctrine of justification no longer rings the bells of the hearts of modern man.

32:24

And it's true, when you read Luther, when you read contemporaries in the

32:30

Reformation, you see what they were willing to risk, willing to put their lives on the line.

32:38

When you realize that Calvin's Geneva produced a long line of martyr missionaries who graduated from the school in Geneva and immediately went directly south into Italy.

32:53

And almost every single one of them died under the

32:58

Roman Catholic Church in Italy, because they felt they needed to give their lives to bring this message of justification to Roman Catholics.

33:16

And I've often thought, and you can't avoid but think about, why have things changed?

33:24

Oh, we still have conferences where we talk about the solas and stuff like that.

33:30

But then you go home and you turn the TV on, you watch an NFL football game, and it's the farthest thing from Rome.

33:40

So, what's changed? And I think one of the main things that's changed is we don't see death on a regular basis.

33:55

Even on television, things like that, I've used the illustration, since I'm a

34:03

Trekkie, one of the first times I talked about this, I had just seen the Next Generation episode where the

34:10

Enterprise encounters her sister ship, I think it was Yamato, if I recall. And it's been infected with this computer virus, and it eventually infects the

34:22

Enterprise too, but of course they survive. But the point is, the Yamato explodes right in front of them.

34:27

And there's, what, 1 ,100 people on that ship. And they're all killed.

34:34

In an instant. And 48 minutes later, everybody's right as rain.

34:42

You know? Hey, the episode's over, you gotta go on to the next episode. You can't...

34:48

The crew may even be joking with one another by that point in time. 1 ,100 people just died right in front of them.

34:55

So we see death out there, but even in most of our churches, funerals sparsely attended, and we're uncomfortable around people who've lost someone recently.

35:16

We don't really know what to say, and we don't know how to interact with them, and stuff like that.

35:25

But I was... Well, my grandmother died when

35:31

I was a teenager. I guess that was the first death really close to me.

35:37

Well, my Uncle John. But they weren't people that I knew really, really well.

35:48

And so, I didn't really see death until I started working as a hospital chaplain.

35:57

To see it happening right in front of you. When you say the Reformers, they all lost children in infancy.

36:06

They all lost children in infancy. Luther, Calvin. And that was the norm.

36:17

There were times in history where a woman would have to have ten live births to get one through to maturity.

36:26

That's how bad things were. And so, everybody experienced this.

36:36

You couldn't put it out of your mind. You couldn't entertain yourself out of a regular, daily recognition of your own mortality.

36:48

Because, if you're walking through the village, and there's a corpse along the side of the road, and you knew that person, and you know that they've died of this plague, you don't understand, you don't know how to protect yourself from it.

37:04

There are no masks, there are no inoculations. You cannot help but think about the brevity of life, and about what's really important.

37:18

And we can't get people to see what's really important anymore. One of the hardest things you deal with in talking to modern people.

37:30

I don't know if this is true, but I saw a thing

37:38

I don't know if it'll pop up here, but I saw a thing that said according to some major study, 30 % of Gen Z identifies as LGBTQ+.

38:00

But only 28 % identify as Christian. Now, just in passing, may

38:08

I just note, if you look at each of the generations and see that going up, that tells you this has nothing to do with I was born that way.

38:19

It has nothing to do with that at all. None. But, anyway, we we don't see death around us.

38:34

You can't get people to really recognize what's foundational.

38:42

What's important. What will allow a culture or a nation or a people to continue and not die out.

38:54

Simple, uneducated peasants knew all about this stuff hundreds of years ago.

39:01

Educated, iPad carrying digital Gen Z people are clueless about how to keep a nation going and what's necessary for a people to continue on.

39:17

Because they don't know what's important. And one of the reasons for that is they never have to deal with death.

39:28

They don't recognize the brevity of life. They're just focused upon their own primarily sexual fulfillment.

39:39

Because that's all they've got. That's all secularism gives you. You are an animal.

39:45

We can't even say you're highly evolved because that implies directionality and true

39:50

Darwinism doesn't have directionality. But you are an evolved hominid and all we can really give you is enjoy it now.

40:02

Get as many Os as you can. And then who cares if there's anybody left after you?

40:11

Don't worry about kids. Don't worry about family. Don't worry about carrying on your name.

40:18

None of that stuff matters. It's all about you. And when those people vote and control what happens that culture is dead.

40:33

DOA cannot survive. And will not survive. It'll just destroy itself which is exactly what we're watching happening all around us right now.

40:45

So losing children, losing wives in childbirth as I've been reading about the

40:55

Baptists and great Baptist leaders of the past so many of them were married to more than one woman not because of divorce but because either natural death of diseases, smallpox and everything else or very often childbirth is dangerous.

41:16

Very dangerous. Not just to the child but to the mother. They would be on their second or third wife and they would have many, many dead children that they had to do the funerals for.

41:36

And that changes how you view everything. Are you going to interrupt me here?

41:44

You're describing virtually both sides of my family. Whether it's my grandmother who had 13 children first one in 1915 she lost four before the age of 10.

42:01

Or my great grandfather three different wives all died my great grandmother died in childbirth as a result of childbirth a week after my grandfather was born.

42:18

This was the way life was. It was. The thing is their children then lived through the depression.

42:28

My great grandfather died at 58 in 1929.

42:38

And suddenly my grandfather is running his restaurant at the age of 19. And the business and all that that he built.

42:45

Yeah. And that means the generations for centuries and centuries and centuries before us have seriously thought about the

42:56

Odyssey. The Odyssey is the justification of God's existence in light of the existence of evil.

43:04

And when I look at the childish I was going to mention this

43:10

I forgot the childishness of some of the open theists on the internet

43:21

I saw someone sent me a link that a certain individual

43:27

I'm not even giving him credit by naming him he does not deserve any of it was going to be posting an apology to me and the person who sent it to me

43:38

I texted back I said that'll be a punch in the face I didn't believe it from the start and from what

43:45

I've been told I was right but Rich tells me that he looked at the comments on this video and that there was someone

43:56

I could probably pull it up from the thing but I it's looking at the clock

44:03

I'm not getting very far anyways someone made comment on the video about allegedly something that I had said to someone and it was just such a twisting of what

44:20

I have said in the past and so before I read this I'll go ahead and comment on this someone said well you need to debate infant damnation um

44:36

I cannot think of a topic that would be more worthless to debate with someone who doesn't believe what the bible teaches about God's sovereignty and God's decree than that that would be similar to the weird guy in St.

44:53

Louis years and years ago I think 1998 -99 somewhere around there they arranged a debate with this guy oh yeah he was the guy who wrote um

45:08

I thought I had his book I may be using it to hold other books because that's the only worth of it anyways there was this guy what no uh uh anyway this guy wanted to do a debate um on perseverance of the saints but he wanted to put in a contract that I have to sign that I would not make reference to or mention the other four points of Calvinism to debate the fifth point of Calvinism and I said you're nuts um that is the result of these things that lead up to it and the same way if you don't believe in the

45:56

God of the Bible and these people don't um if you're offended by the

46:02

God of the Bible and they are then the pastoral subject of infants who die in infancy which obviously has to be handled with tremendous respect toward God toward scripture toward the church see one of the problems is this this topic is almost always allowed to be individualistic and you'll never accomplish anything there if you want biblical answers on these subjects then you have to see that we don't live on an island we live in a community our families are part of a community and your loss the last the last funeral

47:00

I was at was for a child who died at birth that I spoke at less than a month ago okay almost none of these people on the internet are actually pastors are actually involved in ministry so forgive me for not having a scintilla of concern for their opinions they have not done anything that I can see that would for a second make me go hmm

47:30

I ought to think about what this person is saying look at what they've accomplished in life no reason to none but this topic if it's going to be addressed has to be addressed pastorally and in the context of the church and unlike again my critics um

47:55

I have worked as a hospital chaplain I've published in the field most people don't know that if you don't watch the program or hear the few programs where I've mentioned it but I've been there and you don't make that a subject of debate if a if a family in apology of church wants to sit down with me and some of the other pastors and talk about biblically what the bible teaches about God's sovereignty and salvation and the death of infants then we'll do it we'll be happy to do it and we'll be happy to open up scriptures and we'll be happy to consider the broad spectrum of things and we'll look at the various sides you can find long lists of and it is the majority view even amongst reformed people that every child that dies in infancy is of the elect in fact that's what the

49:07

Westminster Confession says it uses the phrase elect infants okay how do you defend that biblically what are elect infants well obviously we're dealing here with speculative theology we're going well in light of this and this and this

49:25

I put it together this way we are not given anything in scripture about this we're given we're given

49:33

David and the child that dies being in the realm of dead the dead sheol that doesn't really tell you much and so the very idea of debating it is just disgusting advice anybody who comes up with that should just crawl under a rock and never come back out you would actually want to use that as a debating subject you're disgusting you're shameful you need to grow up or get born again or something because you've got a problem you've got a problem now if people want to sit down and talk about historically what have been the various views well you've got limbo and Roman Catholicism it wasn't a dogma but what's that all about that deals with sacramentalism and you've got all kinds of stuff at the same time you've got other people say well hey if you just simply say that every single infant that dies in infancy goes straight to heaven then abortions become the greatest heaven filling device that's ever come along how are you going to respond to that?

50:54

I've heard people use it I've heard people use it and sadly that's almost always on the street corner outside the abortion clinic or whatever else it is it may not be the most amenable place for a meaningful conversation

51:12

I've always said God has just as much freedom to be gracious in the matter of those who die in infancy as those who are adults let the judge of all the earth do right but I'm not going to sit here and pretend that there's a bible passage that answers all these questions so you can just be dogmatic about it because there isn't there just isn't so the very idea of debating it wow

51:42

I don't even do these people sit around at night and think of these things I feel for them

51:49

I truly do feel for them that's how cults get started and I think some of these guys will be starting their own cults before long so with that in mind

52:00

I wanted to get to this I don't know that I'm going to get I mentioned Carl Truman I did sort of say

52:07

Carl Truman Andrew Fuller I just want to read you a section here because I think it really struck me this morning as I was reading it earlier theological ideas created doubts about encouraging the lost to call on the name of the

52:26

Lord the doctrine of election as his instructors in the faith applied it had been a hindrance to him the plain examples of scripture taught him a different lesson he concluded the doctrine of election is the greatest encouragement instead of discouragement to prayer the

52:42

God who has decreed what we shall possess of the things of this life has decreed that it will be in the way of industry we do not shirk our work because of God's decree neither should we be slothful in the business of our soul because our final state is decreed the trying days of lingering sickness and eventual death of a six year old daughter demonstrate the chastened intensity of Fuller's witness of the eleven children that Fuller had by his first wife only two survived their parents nine died before they did nine after falling ill in December 1785 she died on May 30, 1786 that's a long that's a long decline that's six months

53:33

John Ryland Jr. describes her as a very intelligent and amiable child and gave much hopeful evidence of early piety did you hear that?

53:43

gave much hopeful evidence of early piety they don't hold to this idea of age of discretion or accountability and so on and so forth they're looking for hopeful evidence of early piety during these days she took great delight in reading accounts of the conversion of little children and seemed to love those children for their godliness in March during an extended visit to the

54:12

Rylands in Northampton Fuller talked lovingly to her about prayer she asked him to pray for her

54:18

Fuller responded why do you wish me to pray for you, my dear? that god would bless me and keep me and save my soul do you think then that you are a sinner?

54:29

yes, father what is sin, my dear? telling a story that would be lying in our language what then,

54:38

I said you remember, do you, my having corrected you once for having told a story? yes, father and are you greed for having so offended god?

54:47

yes, father I asked her if she did not try to pray for herself she answered, I sometimes try but I do not know how to pray

54:55

I wish you would pray for me till I can pray for myself he continued to speak with her and she eventually said

55:02

I'm afraid I should go to hell my dear, said I, who told you so? nobody, but I know if I do not pray to the lord,

55:09

I must go to hell Fuller records I then went to pray with her with many tears Fuller often carried her in his arms into the fields and talked with her about the joy of dying and being with Christ where holy men and women and holy children would be singing

55:23

Hosanna to the son of David Ryland composed a hymn for the young girl one verse of which says a helpless creature

55:31

I was born and from the womb I strayed I must be wretched and forlorn without thy mercy's aid but Christ can all my sins forgive and wash away their stain and fit my soul with him to live and in his kingdom reign one day as Fuller was reading scripture to her he found her to be quite solemn and unhappy she remained silent for a while and then asked if she was afraid that she would not go to the blessed world of which he had been reading, she answered yes he responded, what makes you afraid my dear?

56:03

because, said she with a tone of grief that pierced me to the heart, I have sinned against the

56:09

Lord, true my dear said I, you have sinned against the Lord, but the Lord is more ready to forgive you if you are grieved for offending him than I can be to forgive you when you are grieved for offending me, and you know how ready

56:23

I am to do that he then told her of the great grace of God and the love of Christ to sinners,

56:30

I just stopped to say, is this how people would respond today? or would not the temptation, and I use the term temptation, would not the temptation be oh honey, you're just fine you're just fine, don't worry about these things, that's what we'd say today, it wouldn't be pray it wouldn't be talking about forgiveness, it wouldn't be giving illustrations of God's forgiveness, no, you're just fine the fellow became so affected by her approaching death that as he says that the agony of my spirit produced a most violent bilious complaint which quite laid me aside for several days

57:11

I then reflected that I had sinned in being so inordinately anxious we don't read a lot from this period so you need to hear what he just said because I don't think a lot of people have the background to understand what he was concerned about he says the agony of my spirit produced a most violent bilious complaint a complaint against God, which quite laid me aside for several days,

57:49

I then reflected that I had sinned in being so inordinately anxious, how many

57:55

Christians have such a high view of God's honor and glory to even begin to understand what that sentence means see, when

58:11

I read that I immediately remember again, a book I read in seminary that right after seminary,

58:19

I think it might have been during seminary, that just really hit me and it was the biography of Jonathan Edwards, and in it was the words of Sarah his wife when she received word of his death from a botched botched vaccine and her first thought was to pray to God and say,

58:55

God do not allow me to respond to the loss of my husband in any way that would detract from your glory that was her first thought that's

59:14

Fuller's first thought here his dear precious six year old daughter is dying and he knows she's going to die and there's nothing he can do about it and instead of what you get from so many people today um, about you know, go ahead and scream at God, and you know all the rest is kind of self centered,

59:41

I'm not really his creature his glory really doesn't mean anything to me type stuff here

59:49

Fuller recognizes that he has sinned in his anxiety in his complaint against God that is the response of someone who is facing these tragedies of life and they've already built the solid foundation upon which to do so you don't get that kind of maturity by all of a sudden reading a few books on the subject once you're in the midst of the trial you've got to have those foundations laid long before long before it hits says his own sickness caused him to be absent from his daughter when she finally died upon her death

01:00:46

Fuller wrote an 11 stanza hymn one of the stanzas says nor mourn to excess her loss but say tis well what matter when she died if but to God if reared for him though young or old she fell his bosom is her last her blessed abode his daughter

01:01:17

Mary while in school in Northampton felt that God had granted her a true faith in the gospel Fuller wrote a series of letters to her these were designed for both encouragement and caution given her personal perception of the state of things

01:01:31

Fuller wrote if there be any doubt in the matter it is whether those feelings which you enjoy be excited by the

01:01:37

Lord's presence and whether the sense you have of the greatness of your sin does lead you to bewail and hate it boy when

01:01:45

I think of when I think of well I don't think he'd mind

01:01:51

Kevin Johnson was taking some classes at Golden Gate years ago when

01:01:57

I was teaching was it Greek or Hebrew it was one of the biblical languages anyways he had just had a church growth class and he came in and sat down and he just going like this he said yeah we just had a list of words given to us that we should never use in church lest we hinder the growth of the church and one of them was repentance ugh because what what he's saying to her cannot be understood by anyone who does not recognize the centrality of repentance to conversion he did not mean to suggest otherwise but encouraged her to suspect your own heart which is deceitful if she felt herself a great sinner

01:02:43

Fuller only wanted to add you are a much greater sinner my dear than you are aware of an interest in the dying love of Christ is of far greater importance than you have ever yet conceived you see when you diminish the power and depth of sin you diminish the power of the savior in fact self examination be advised for you are at present my dear but little acquainted with the snares and temptations of the world and the fickleness and sinfulness of your own heart this should not discourage her however for Christ is a greater savior if he is precious to your soul and you are willing to give up your sins and be his servant forever though your sins be as scarlet yet the blood of Christ is sufficient to make you pure as snow if God has begun the work it will be carried on the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sins believe his gospel commit your soul to him as a perishing sinner and you will be everlastingly saved these are the words of a father to his daughter relatives children friends and parishioners received letters of this sort from Fuller they reveal a pastor's heart of love for sinners and love for a sinner's gospel and remember he lost nine of eleven from his first wife and then his wife

01:04:03

I can imagine a lot of people that would use that as a excuse to become rather hard over time death was the constant companion of Fuller only two of his eleven children by his first wife survived him three of the six by his second wife died in infancy so if I'm doing my math that's up to twelve during his first wife's final months she fell victim to severe emotional and mental distress weeping pacing worrying to the point of wild despair most of the time she did not know

01:04:40

Fuller or that she was living at home I think we know what that was sadly she recovered for one full day and then collapsed into her deranged condition she gave birth to a child before she died the child died some weeks after her mother

01:04:59

Fuller commented to Mr. Gardner his father -in -law concerning this trial poor soul what she often said is now true she was not at home

01:05:07

I am not her husband these are not her children but she has found her home a home a husband and a family better than these a wayward son gave unimaginable grief to Fuller after living a profligate life the son

01:05:23

Robert wrote to his father asking for his forgiveness his father answered you may be assured that I cherish no animosity against you on the contrary

01:05:31

I do from my heart freely forgive you but that which I long to see in you is repentance toward God and faith to our

01:05:38

Lord Jesus Christ without which there is no forgiveness from above later in the same letter

01:05:43

Fuller said you have had a large portion of God's preserving goodness or you had e 'er now perished in your sins think of this and give thanks to the father of mercies who has hitherto preserved you think too how you have requited him and be ashamed for all you have done nevertheless do not despair for as far as you have gone and as low as you have sunken sin yet if from thence you return to God by Jesus Christ you will find mercy

01:06:11

Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners even the chiefs of sinners if you had been ever so sober and steady in your behavior towards men yet without repentance toward God and faith in Christ you could not have been saved and if you return to God by him though your sins be great and aggravated yet you will find mercy in March 1809 after a lingering illness

01:06:34

Robert died and was buried at sea his deportment through his last months had been exemplary and Fuller entertained some hope that he might have been an object of mercy so are far from home this is

01:06:47

Fuller some are far from home and have no friend in their dying moments to speak a word of comfort but this is near when

01:06:54

Jonah was compassed about by floods when the billows and waves passed over him he prayed to the

01:06:59

Lord and the Lord heard him here he paused and wept and many in the congregation wept also he could close only by solemnly charging the sinner to apply for mercy for if it were rejected after having been so near and of such easy access it would be a swift witness against him writing to Dr.

01:07:19

Ryland within two weeks of his own death Fuller said I have preached and written much against the abuse of the doctrine of grace but that doctrine is all my salvation and all my desire

01:07:31

I have no other hope than from salvation by mere sovereign efficacious grace through the atonement of my

01:07:39

Lord and Savior with this hope I can go into eternity with composure one day when his deacons were speaking to him and commending him on the enviable position he had of soon being a state of blessed immortality

01:07:55

Fuller assented lifted up his hands and exclaimed if I am saved it will be by great and sovereign grace on May 7th the

01:08:06

Lord's day heard his congregation singing in the chapel and called to his daughter Sarah he said I wish I had strength enough to do what father?

01:08:13

to worship child my eyes are dim his family helped raise him in the bed he continued in an attitude of worship for nearly an hour clasped his hands fixed his eyes upward fell back and died what why why read all this and not get back to what we were supposed to be doing being relevant and stuff

01:08:40

I really think that when you take the theology of scripture and you live it and you live it in the face of death it makes an imprint and it changes you in a way that all the seminary education world can't you can know all the statements but when you've lost 12 of your children and you still trust

01:09:27

God and in fact you repent of having questioned God's goodness while your little 6 year old daughter is dying where does that come from?

01:09:39

that comes from a changed soul a changed heart that's where it comes from and so much of our conversations and discussions are surface level and won't mean anything in eternity because we don't make that application we haven't experienced that in our own lives and one of the main reasons is we are constantly praying to not experience that in our own lives

01:10:16

I'm not saying could you please kill most of my children he wasn't praying that cough but the fact that most of his children died in infancy did not turn him into a bitter hater of God and yet how many people all these deconstructors running around today well

01:10:42

I discovered that I'm a transgender child of God but the church hated me wouldn't even

01:10:52

I don't even know what to say so I was going to go from that back into into you gotta leave and yeah let's try to get a few more things done on it get a little bit farther through it, it's not like there's a lot it was fairly short but at least we have a solid foundation for discussing it now a little heavy not your normal lighthearted stuff

01:11:33

I realize but important stuff alright let's dig into it here picking up where we left off one of the things

01:11:42

I'm going to say about classical theology is a lot of it is contemplative the purpose of classical theology is not to enable the city to flourish it is not to help people give up alcoholism it is not to save somebody's marriage all of those things may be very very good things but one of the things that you find when you read the early church theologians or the medieval theologians or even many of the

01:12:07

Puritans is that the contemplation of God is seen as an end in itself it is not instrumental to something else ok elements of truth with some things that are concerning every religion has some kind of beatific vision concept whether it's eastern religions where it's really an emptying of oneself and a communion with the universe to where my individuality is wiped out to medieval mystics who will write pages and pages and pages on the beatific vision and the contemplation of God in and of himself and issues like that and it does seem that Dr.

01:13:12

Truman and he will repeat this later on he said in another context about a year and a half two years ago that he's been having his classes he's been reading some of Thomas's prayers to his classes and they're like we've never heard anything like this we don't hear anything like this in our church hey that's that's dangerous that's how you get people to go to a different church where they will hear the prayers of Thomas Aquinas and there's only one where that's going to happen but there is there is truth in the fact that scripture gives us ground and warrant for meditating upon the glories of our

01:14:06

God if heavenly worship is focused upon that then obviously earthly worship should likewise be relevant should be should partake of that but there's something

01:14:26

I want to suggest merely the contemplation of the glory of God is not what

01:14:35

I see people doing in scripture they confess his glory, his power, his worth and everything but they always they always connect that to what he has done that reveals his glory and that is the redemption of his people his covenant faithfulness and here's the issue what good is it if you can cross every

01:15:10

T and dot every I in knowing to the nth degree the depth of Thomas Aquinas' demonstration of doctrines about God that have almost nothing to do with your life if at the same time you then hold

01:15:36

Thomas' view of how you know God and as a result don't know God now

01:15:42

I'm pretty convinced that what you're going to see over time that means not immediately but time can be 20, 30 years what you're going to see over time is people going you know what when

01:16:01

I first started doing this I was into this we disagree with Thomas' soteriology and ecclesiology and sacramentology and all that stuff but his theology proper is just mind blowing

01:16:17

I think what you see over time is that then goes to and then the people who follow

01:16:25

Thomas and the great Thomas scholars oh they're mind blowing too and they're just awesome maybe this soteriology stuff isn't all that important maybe maybe there's a much wider expression that we can embrace here because I mean if Thomas could have these level of insights if R .C.

01:16:51

Spock would call him the greatest theologian in the Christian church then his wild dedication to the mass as a perpetuatory sacrifice can't really be all that bad right you can see the line of thought and someone doesn't necessarily have to walk that line of thought but there's not much that's going to keep them from doing it and what he says is the contemplation of God it doesn't save a marriage but the

01:17:31

God who desires to be contemplated and has revealed himself has revealed himself as the

01:17:40

God who enters into covenant relationship with his people as savior and the how of that cannot simply be put on some low level down here we'll get to that later so are you truly contemplating

01:18:00

God if you do not have a relationship with him are you truly contemplating

01:18:08

God is the contemplation of God actually the this intellectual mountain that you climb

01:18:18

I didn't bring it up but do I have to pull out the book on divine simplicity and re -read that section about modalities and everything else that leaves almost everybody going huh mass -adjoined

01:18:31

Christians have no way of understanding what's being said so is it getting over that mountaintop that now

01:18:38

I can see God and getting your mind to go okay

01:18:45

God has revealed his attributes to us and we're to glorify him for his omniscience and his omnipresence and his immutability and but they're all the same thing and I've just got to get to the point where in my mind

01:18:58

I want to think like God and God doesn't distinguish and so is this what contemplation is or do we gladly accept in toto what anyone can read here seminary degree or not

01:19:20

Greek or Hebrew or not Greek or Hebrew or not I love teaching Greek or Hebrew but Greek or Hebrew or not you can still understand what this says

01:19:28

I take this God reveals himself and I am certainly in awe of who he is but the

01:19:44

Christian message is and then I am in awe of the fact that in light of who he is he is condescended to call me into relationship with him if you don't have that if you stick the

01:19:59

Roman Catholic sacramental system in there does that have some impact maybe possibly yeah

01:20:09

I think it does I think it has to I think it has to and it's not you know some of these guys go oh there it is again they just try to dismiss it and not think about what's actually being said here does can you actually in a

01:20:33

Christian fashion contemplate God while holding to a false gospel and I think a lot of these guys are just coming to the conclusion he didn't

01:20:42

Thomas didn't he was good he was good and that means you can't be concerned about the mass and sacramentology

01:20:54

I mean I suppose what you could do is say well yeah the stuff that's come afterwards indulgences you could argue purgatory though just not as specifically dogmatically as it would eventually be finally codified in the 15th century but that's probably the direction they would go

01:21:16

I don't know but all I'm simply asking if you want to talk about contemplating God is that done through classical theology or through the revelation of scripture as far as classical theology expresses what's in scripture great, fine, wonderful when it becomes its own evolved developed great tradition that's where the problem is and see what you guys don't understand is you can poo poo me you can cancel me you can tell your students that I'm a horrible heretic fact of the matter is there are a lot of pastors deacons, leaders in churches that are listening to what

01:22:03

I'm saying and they have the common commitment that I have to scripture and they're going, yeah yeah this is what we've always said we don't want to be changing that anytime soon the contemplation of God as God is not a significant part of modern protestant reformed or evangelical piety

01:22:33

I don't I'm not sure how he's defining reformed piety when

01:22:42

I read the first chapters of the institute I am forced to contemplate

01:22:49

God from a biblical perspective but if what he means is a lot of churches do not emphasize a deep understanding of how

01:23:05

God has revealed himself okay there's always room for rebalancing and emphasizing what's really important but my concern is it seems like the new classical theology movement substitutes its peculiar understanding and application of a

01:23:34

Thomistic definition of simplicity or inseparable operations or whatever these side issues as if that is definitional of actual contemplation of God and so nobody else is doing it but them and if you really want to contemplate

01:23:56

God then you've got to do it the way that they're doing so I wonder in the rest of this lecture offer some thoughts on why

01:24:03

I return to classical theology and by classical theology I'm really meaning the theology hammered out in the early church, preserved in the middle ages and then codified in the sections dealing with things like the doctrine of God in the great confessions of the 16th and 17th centuries now that's a broad, broad area and anybody knows that there are outlines of consistency through there but there's also all sorts of differences and notice his terminology my return to classical theology which again in a webcast

01:24:40

I heard a few years ago 18 months ago 2 years ago, whatever it was he identifies being in 2016 when he was working on that book on Owen but I find it odd, my return to classical theology

01:24:55

I didn't know that he had ever repudiated it but he sort of makes a statement along that line

01:25:02

I'm coming at this as a historian, as an intellectual historian, not as a theologian or as a philosopher

01:25:09

I could put it facetiously and say there was only one original theologian in Geneva in the 16th century and they burned him because of his originality the last thing you wanted to be in the 16th century was an original theologian sadly that's in reference to Servetus and Servetus wasn't in Geneva he obviously was elsewhere remember

01:25:33

Calvin sought to Calvin risked his life to seek to be a benefit to Servetus he snuck back into Paris when he was a wanted man to meet with Servetus and Servetus didn't meet with him

01:25:46

Calvin knew where he was for years before letting that information get out and get to the

01:25:53

Inquisition and it was the night before Servetus was to be burned by the

01:26:00

Inquisition he escaped in his nightgown over he wanted to use the restroom and snuck over the wall and got away and made a beeline for Geneva so there's a little bit of the historical aspect he knows all that his point was they weren't trying to be unique, new in their theology

01:26:23

I agree and the reason for that was you wanted your theology grounded in the tradition of the church because you assumed that the tradition of the church was basically correct unless it was proved to be inadequate by the teaching of scripture how do you demonstrate that a tradition is inadequate by the teaching of scripture without being a

01:26:54

Biblicist? If you say that the

01:27:00

Bible cannot be interpreted outside of say, the Nicene faith then how do you examine tradition by scripture if tradition is necessary for your understanding of scripture?

01:27:18

This is not some new thing this is an important issue that must be understood and it is not a chicken and egg type thing but it can start getting close to that so that's a good place to call it quits for now we'll if I hadn't run into all that stuff from Fuller this morning in my studies we would have probably gotten through all of it today but I hope it was worthwhile for those of you who listened to think on those vitally important things and from a church history perspective to recognize that this does help us to understand why we struggle at times to understand why people did what they did in church history and my final statement on that will be we struggle because we're not quite as grounded in reality as they were our modern world protects us from the daily reminder that we are mortal and that this life passes us by and you know

01:28:44

I'm about to go out and get in a vehicle drive down the road and that's a pretty safe vehicle but there are still even bigger vehicles than mine on the road and the number of times that I've gone through an intersection

01:29:00

I mentioned this on Twitter I started driving on September 17th 1977 that was when

01:29:08

I got my learner's permit how many intersections have I driven through in that time period and I've never been in an accident

01:29:18

I was in the passenger side in an accident my son was driving but I've never been in an accident that's grace that's grace because I imagine that if not this day this week someone here in Phoenix will die in a traffic accident and that doesn't make me better than them but if God's got a purpose and he's trying to accomplish anything he better be in control of all those traffic accidents too and those open theists they can't have that that's why they can't even touch the

01:29:55

Bible as far as a source of authority anyways thanks for listening to the dividing line we will be back with you

01:30:03

Lord willing next week and then I think it's the week after that so when I head out please be praying preparation is still undergoing still ongoing pray that I get it all done