SRR #62 | Interview Tom Juodaitis of The Trinity Foundation

I do a podcast.

I'm not interested in your podcast.

Justification by Faith Alone and the Battle Against Error

The anathema of God was for those who denied justification by faith alone. When that is at stake, we need to be on the battlefield, exposing the error and combating the error.

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

We are polemical and polarizing Jesus style.

I would first say that to characterize what we do as bashing is itself bashing. It's not hate, it's history. It's not bashing, it's the Bible. Jesus said, woe to you when men speak well of you. For their fathers used to treat the false prophets in the same way.

As opposed to, blessed are you when you have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness.

It is on. We're taking the gloves off. It's time to battle.

Introducing Tom Giuditis and the Trinity Foundation

Okay, I want to welcome you back to Simple Riff from on the radio. This is Tim Shaughnessy. And today, we finally have Carlos Montijo, who is back with us. He's been out for quite a while actually. Carlos, when was the last episode that you did?

Oh man, was it the interview with Doug Thelma?

You know what? I think that might have been it. Secretly, I've been thinking about taking you off the intro music.

You know, it's funny because it's very fitting. Because this episode is going to be another one of those definitional, super awesome, mega important episodes. So, very excited about this one.

Yes, it is. And I think because of the guests that we have on. We have with us today, Tom Giudaitis. Or is it Giudaitis?

It's pronounced Giudaitis.

Giudaitis from the Trinity Foundation. And he is the president of the Trinity Foundation. And I believe you're the son-in-law of the late Dr. John Robbins. Is that correct as well?

Yes, I am. I married his daughter, Laura.

Okay. So, I think it's a tremendous honor to have you on today, Tom. I want to welcome you to the show. We have been promoting the Trinity Foundation for really the entirety of the time that we've been doing podcasts.

And, you know, as a matter of fact, one of the reasons that we even joined the Bible Thumping Wingnut Network. Was because at the time, and I believe it's still this case. We were the only ones who are Clarkians.

And we wanted to bring attention to the Trinity Foundation. We wanted to, we hear a lot of stuff about it that's negative. And we wanted to really come out and speak favorably of it. Because it is one of our favorite ministries.

And it's really helped Carlos and I tremendously. Just in our own personal walk with the Lord. And we also wanted to really give a platform to Gordon Clark. And promote the writings and teachings of Gordon Clark.

And so, having you on, I think, is really going to be a bolster to that. And I'm excited to have you on. And I wanted to, before we start, I just wanted to let our listeners know. That the Trinity Foundation, they have a book sale where a lot of their books are 50 off.

Now this sale has been going on from May 1st. And it ends October 31st. Which I guess is fitting because that's the Reformation Day. But I wanted to just let our listeners know about that. So that they could take advantage of that.

Tom, is it all of the books or is it just certain books on a list?

The sale is books on a list. But the rest of the books that are not on the list are 25 off. And that also includes the DVDs that we sell. From Adullam Films by Chris Pinto. So the e-books are not on sale.

And the lectures that are on compact disc are not on sale. Because they are already marked down significantly anyway.

Well, and the e-books are pretty cheap anyway. If people want to get the e-books. I actually had somebody ask me which books they should start with. And I recommended God's Hammer and A Christian View of Men and Things.

I don't know if you guys have a different pick. But that's what I recommended. And he actually bought the e-books. So there's that option as well. And then the Trinity Foundation, they also have a bunch of articles that they publish.

And they also have a bunch of lectures. So they have a lot of stuff to offer. A lot of stuff that is extremely relevant to the church today. So we definitely recommend this to our listeners. And I want to give Carlos an opportunity to chime in here.

If he wants to say hello. I know that he's had a long history with the Trinity Foundation. He's actually the one who introduced me to the Trinity Foundation. Back when I was a Bantilian. So that's funny to me because now I'm a Clarkian.

So anyways, Carlos.

The Trinity Foundation’s Mission and Its Defense of Gordon Clark

Yeah, definitely. It is an absolute honor and privilege to have with us Mr. Tom Giuditis from the Trinity Foundation. As Tim said, this is one of our favorite ministries. We already had Brother Tim Kaufman on.

And he's been doing some great stuff on eschatology, the Book of Revelation, church history, Roman Catholicism. But now we are very excited about having Tom and Tim on. I think I might have told this story before when I first found out about the Trinity Foundation.

It was in 2009. Back in 2009 when I was still in college and I was looking for some scholarship money. And lo and behold, I basically stumbled on the Christian scholarship. What is it called? The Christian essay contest.

Christian worldview essay contest. And it was practically by accident because I was just looking for money. And the prizes looked very appealing. I think the first place was $3 ,000 and a ton of books from the Trinity Foundation and so on and so forth.

So that was what drew me in initially. And then the contest that the book was based on was actually Gordon Clark's God's Primer. Which is a compilation of his essays on the inspiration, the authority, and basically a study of bibliology or the Bible.

And one of my favorite books. I've read that book like five or six times. And it's just an outstanding read. It's helped me so much. All of the books that I've read from the Trinity Foundation have been some of my favorite books.

And take advantage of the book sale. These are some of the best books that we've ever read. You will learn an incredible amount. You really go deep. You're going to go very deep with the kind of material that the Trinity Foundation offers.

Because they talk about everything. This is a foundation that focuses on everything. From discernment to sound doctrine to Christian philosophy. They leave no stone unturned. So they really provide you with a comprehensive theology and worldview that's thoroughly biblical.

On just about every subject you can imagine. So welcome again to the show, Tom. So I think we should probably get started here. What do you say, Tim?

Yeah, that sounds great, Carlos. Let's go ahead and get started. I want to give Tom an opportunity to just introduce himself. We know very little about him. And I'm sure that our listeners really don't know a whole lot about him.

But Tom, can you tell us a few things about yourself? Who you are? And we'll start from that.

Okay. Well, thank you, first of all, for having me on your show. It's really a pleasure and delight to be on the show with you all. I am Tom Giuditis. I am the president of the Trinity Foundation. I married John's middle daughter, Laura.

And he became my father-in-law. My background, I became a Christian in high school my senior year. And God gave me a hunger and a desire to read his word. And I became a Christian about the winter of my senior year in high school.

And by the time I left college, I had actually read through the whole scripture. And I went to a Baptist church. I had some friends that were Baptists. And so that's where I went. But I met a fellow at college who ended up becoming my best friend who started talking to me about predestination, election, the atonement.

And these things made sense because I had read through the Bible. And that is how I got into the Reformed faith. And there was a small Orthodox Presbyterian church there. I grew up in California. And I was at the University of California at Santa Cruz.

And there was a small OP church there. That's where we went. And I had about three years at the University of California I'm sorry, two years at the University of California at Santa Cruz. And becoming a Christian, obviously that was not a place where I could grow educationally.

And so I transferred to Covenant College. And finished up my degree there in English and secondary education. After graduation, I worked for a year doing odd jobs. I think delivering pizzas mainly. And then I got a teaching position at a Christian school up in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Where I taught English to junior high kids for about ten years. And then during that time I also taught church history and apologetics to high school students. And I moved down I met Laura while I was up in Pittsburgh.

And we moved down after the birth of our first child to be closer to her family, to John and Linda. And I got a teaching position at the school down here in Johnson City, Tennessee. Teaching English again and also some logic.

So my background is English. And becoming an English teacher, editing was right up my alley. And, you know, those grammar mistakes kind of jump off the page at me. I'm weird that way, I guess. And so I was teaching church history up in Pittsburgh.

And after I met Dr. Robbins, he let me take some books out of his library on church history. To help me in my teaching of my classes. And he was very generous toward me. I was in an OP church up in Pittsburgh.

Very strong, Vantillian and other things of that sort. I had heard the stories, you know, of John Robbins and these things. And the stories and the man don't compare. He was generous. Yes, he is very polemical in his writings.

But bad doctrine, false doctrine needs to be fought. It needs to be exposed. It needs to be counteracted. And that's why he was polemical. Because doctrine matters. And so he let me read some of the books he was thinking about publishing.

And I, you know, spotted some errors and things like that. So I think he saw some of the gifts that I could bring to the table. And so that's how I got involved with the Trinity Foundation. And then I was made vice president under him.

And when he passed, it was his desire that I become the president. To continue the ministry of the Trinity Foundation. So that's a little bit about me.

The Purpose of the Trinity Foundation and Its View of Christian Teaching

Well, yeah, I appreciate everything that you said. And, you know, some of the things that you touched on are some of the things that we want to, I guess, try to cover in this podcast. Because it seems that a lot of the negative stuff that we've heard about the Trinity Foundation just seems to be from an echo chamber.

We've heard the same phrases over and over and over. And most of the people, I think, that do have something critical to say. They usually say, well, I read this article and I didn't appreciate it or something like that.

But before we get into that, I really want for you to just give our listeners an overall view of what is the purpose and goal of the Trinity Foundation overall. I mean, it was started by John Robbins, is that correct?

That is correct. He started in 1978 and began publishing articles even then. The purpose, and I'm taking this really kind of summarizing some of the things said in the Crisis of Our Time that we publish in the back of all of our books.

And the purpose is really teaching the faithful all that scriptures contain. Presenting the system of doctrine taught in the Bible as clearly and as unambiguously as possible. That also means counteracting the irrationalism of the age and exposing the errors of the teachers of the church.

In doing so, we're emphasizing the Bible as the sole source of truth. It has a systematic monopoly on truth, John would say often. Also, the primacy of the intellect, the supreme importance of correct doctrine, and the necessity of systematic and logical thinking.

God is a God of order, not of chaos, and so our thinking must be logical. So that's the purpose, presenting the system of Christian teaching, the philosophy and doctrine, theology of the Bible, as well as counteracting the errors of the age in which we live.

And I was actually going to ask you about that later because I've noticed that article, the Crisis of Our Time, is in the back of pretty much every book that I've bought from the Trinity Foundation. But let me ask you this.

So the Trinity Foundation was started by Dr. Robbins, and one of the things that it aims to do is to preserve the legacy and the teachings of Dr. Gordon Clark. So I wanted to ask you, what was the relationship between Dr. Clark and Dr. Robbins?

I believe he was a student of his, but it seems like they became much closer as friends. So much so that I know that in one of his books, Dr. Clark asked Robbins to finish the book for him. So if you could fill us in on that.

Gordon Clark, John Robbins, and the Preservation of Scripturalism

Well, Dr. Robbins was not a student in the classroom setting of Dr. Clark's. But during his Ph .D. at Johns Hopkins in political philosophy, Dr. Robbins was searching for an epistemology that would be a sure foundation to his thesis.

And he tried Bantill and it led to confusion. He looked there and he looked elsewhere. It wasn't until he came across Dr. Clark's works, especially I think the one that really hooked him, was Religion, Reason, and Revelation.

And just as an aside, that would be one that I would recommend to people first reading Clark. That's I think his magnum opus on apologetics, is Religion, Reason, and Revelation. And so he struck up a correspondence with Dr. Clark.

And also, personally, he did have Dr. Clark baptize one of his children while Dr. Clark was still alive. And they did become, I guess, maybe mentor in terms of ideas, mentor and mentee. But they were also equals.

They were both Ph .D .s. And one of the primary reasons also for starting the Trinity Foundation was to preserve and publish, keep in print, the works of Gordon Clark. You know, PNR had published some.

Eerdmans and other publishing companies had published some things. But I think by the time Dr. Robbins was around, they weren't so much interested in publishing Clark very much anymore. So Robbins saw the value of Clark's scripturalism and wanted to keep that in print.

It is an antidote to so much of the irrationalism of the age, of which much in the Christian Church is not an antidote, but continues some of the same errors in thinking. And so Robbins wanted to keep Clark's works in print.

And Clark was appreciative of that and even donated himself to the cause. And not only his writings, but even financially. And then the book you were referring to is The Incarnation, where it was the last book that Clark was working on before he passed.

And before he passed, he wanted Robbins to complete it. And Robbins, I think, added a paragraph or two just in summary at the end in the book on The Incarnation. So that's really the relationship there.

Robbins was never a student, say, in the classroom of Clark. But he saw in Clark one whose Christian philosophy, Christian theology, gave a proper biblical intellectual defense of Christianity.

Why John Robbins Criticized False Teachers by Name

Let me ask you this. So I wanted to talk a little bit more about who Robbins was. And like I said before, we have heard a lot of criticism of Robbins. And as you already mentioned, he was very polemical.

So what should our listeners know about him? And then talk a little bit about just the fact that he was polemical. Because we received some criticism about Dr. Robbins and about the Trinity Foundation.

And it came about because there was a person who sent an email to Tim Hurd thanking us for the episodes that we did with Tim Kaufman about Tim Keller. And the first comment was basically saying that John Robbins was doing hit pieces on well-known Christians.

And what I find really interesting about that is to describe what John Robbins was doing as a hit piece really, I think, is an uncharitable characteristic itself of what John Robbins was trying to do.

First of all, we have to recognize the intellect that was behind the articles that were being written. It's not as if he was some obscure person in his mom's basement trying to make a name for himself.

Looking around the landscape of Christianity, trying to figure out who he could do a hit piece on. And just to characterize what the Trinity Foundation does, to characterize what John Robbins was doing as doing a hit piece on somebody, as if he was out to get somebody, I think is itself very uncharitable.

And we hear these things all the time. But what came to light was the fact that John Robbins had criticized John Piper. And the individual thought that he was very uncharitable, that he referred to him as Pied Piper, and he didn't appreciate that or he had an issue with that.

But I wanted to give you an opportunity to tell us what should our listeners know about John Robbins in light of these criticisms and in light of the fact that he criticized people like John Piper, who I personally think has a lot of problems.

I haven't done a full assessment on Piper, so I'm not really sure where to place Piper. But I know that you and Carlos would probably have a little bit more to say about that. But if you could just shed some light on that, that would be helpful.

Thank you. John was a very personable person. He gets this rap that he's some sort of angry man, and he's not. He had a great sense of humor. But when truth is assailed and truth is attacked, he was valiant for the truth.

And just as the Bible, in the Bible, Paul named names of those who were teaching false doctrine, so John was not afraid to name names. And this is important. We need to be aware. And someone of Piper's stature has a big platform.

So if he's teaching air, he's spreading it far and wide. And so he needs to be taken to task, and it needs to be pointed out. And so John Robbins saw that he was teaching Samaria, and he dealt with not Piper as a person.

Now, there's no personal attacks in the article. It's dealing with his teachings, his doctrine. And he is dealing with those doctrines, and they were false. They were false doctrine. And they're not just false doctrines on something that's not that important.

But he was dealing with the doctrine of justification, the doctrine on which the church stands or falls. And he was teaching air on the doctrine of justification. And he has since done so. He's given N .T. Wright a pass.

He's written a book on N .T. Wright's theology, and he kind of gave him a pass, it seemed to me. And he's also had he's given a platform to Doug Wilson of the Federal Vision by having him speak at his national conference.

His Desiring God conference. He's also given a platform to Rick Warren of the Purpose-Driven Life and Purpose-Driven Church movement. Warren is also someone who went to the same seminary he did, Fuller Seminary.

And so, you know, Piper's got some problems on his doctrine of scripture. He agrees with Daniel Fuller, who didn't hold to full inspiration. So, you know, there's some issues there. And so when someone has a big platform and they're teaching air, many can be led astray.

And so it's the biblical thing, it's the right thing to do, is to expose the errors and those teaching the errors. We're hopeful that, you know, the person that's teaching those would recant and repent.

But for the sake of the people that are out there that are reading and learning from this person, they need to be exposed so that people take heed. You know, all of us ideally ought to be Bereans in comparing what someone is teaching with the scripture.

They need to do that with the Trinity Foundation. John Robbins and Gordon Clark are not infallible. I'm not infallible. Only the Word of God is. Only God is. And so everybody needs to be a Berean when it comes to that.

Unfortunately, we live in a time of great man-pleasing, great hero worship. You know, people follow after men, just as they did in the Corinthian church. I'm of Paul. I'm of Apollos. I'm of Bantu. I'm of Clark.

You know, I'm of Piper. I'm of MacArthur. You know, we need to follow them as they follow Christ. But we're the error. We need to say, no, we need to follow Christ, not the error.

Berean Discernment and the Need to Test Teaching by Scripture

I absolutely agree. Carlos, did you have anything to add to that?

Oh, yeah. So, you know, it's really interesting because one of the things that you mentioned earlier about the Trinity Foundation heavily promoting an emphasis on a systematic grasp of the Bible. And this is one of those things that literally rescued me from so many perilous movements that I literally would fall into just about every time I came across something on the Internet because that's what happened to me when I first became a Christian.

I didn't have a church or a mentor to guide me. I was basically just raised on the Internet. And the first thing I came across that really drew my attention was a fundamentalist King James only website.

But when I started reading Clark and the Trinity Foundation, it literally, it's very true what you were saying. You know, the truth literally sets you free. Now, because I've benefited so much and learned so much from the Trinity Foundation, I'm no longer tossed to and fro like the Bible says, you know, being tossed around by every wind of false teaching.

It grounds you so solidly that now I just, I know you can smell it now. You can smell it from a mile away when somebody's straying from the biblical teaching or from, you know, it equips you so thoroughly and so well that you can see it coming from a mile away.

And it's so empowering. And it is so, it just gives you a piece to know that the truth, you have the truth because it's in the Bible and you understand it because it's, because you have a consistent understanding of the Bible and it enables you to, it literally sets you free.

You know, I believe Jesus was talking about that very thing. That's exactly what it sets you free from, the lies and deception, even from people who claim to be Christian or who, you know, who claim to be teachers of the church, you know, Christian teachers or whatever.

So one thing I did also want to say is that I highly recommend for people to read the material from the Trinity Foundation. Their books, you do have to buy, of course, they're very affordable, but a lot of the material is actually free on the website.

You know, they have MP3 lectures that you can download and listen to online, which we've also been putting up on our podcast when we, you know, we put out some of the lectures every now and then. Extremely, extremely edifying material.

They cover everything again from political politics to science, to theology, to logic, everything. And also there's an article from the Trinity Review, which I guess is like the, it's like a journal. Is it, what would you, it's like a periodical, right, Tom?

Yeah, I call it a monthly newsletter. Yeah.

So, right. And you, I guess you publish an article with every edition or newsletter. And so there's a 2002 article called the Pied Piper. And that's the article that Robbins wrote regarding John Piper, criticizing several points of his theology that were extremely problematic, to say the least.

I mean, they were, I mean, they were pretty, like you said, he wasn't focusing on secondary issues and on personal attacks. And so one of the things that I've noticed that when people make those criticisms against Robbins, it tends to stem from, I think, two things, primarily.

One of them being ignorance, that is ignorance of the Bible and ignorance of these men and what these men actually teach, whom they think are sound, or they assume that they're OK because so many people like them or whatever the case may be.

So, like you said, again, like the Bible says very clearly, we all need to be Bereans and we all need to examine each other, examine each other's teaching. That includes Gordon Clark, that includes Robbins, that includes anybody and everybody.

And that includes John Piper as well. And so when people say those statements that, oh, well, he's bashing Piper, it's like, well, first of all, you probably haven't read what he said. And the other thing is that almost to me, because I was raised a Roman Catholic, I was brought up Roman Catholic.

And to me, that sounds just like something the Pope would say. It's like you're just going to offhandedly dismiss Robbins in that arbitrary, it's just a very arbitrary and offhanded way of dismissing this man and the entire ministry and work that he's contributed to the church in such an offhanded way.

It's just it's incredibly immature and shallow when people do that. And I find that it's very frustrating because you see a lot of that on Facebook. Everybody thinks they have an opinion and that it matters and that it's valid on Facebook.

It's just it's very it can get very annoying. And that tends to be a popular opinion where people think that you're not supposed to call people out in the way that Robbins did. When, in fact, Robbins was actually extremely tame compared to Paul when he says that the Judaizers should castrate themselves.

You know, it's like what you don't are you even reading the same Bible that that that you claim to be reading? You know, it's like the Bible is telling you things that are so strong. It's like it would make anybody wince, especially people with those sentiments like you.

It doesn't seem like they have an accurate understanding of the Bible. I mean, you can't even read Paul's letters without without him calling names. I mean, he does it repeatedly in almost all of his letters, you know, and for wishing.

I mean, he even tells them at one point that he wishes their blood be on there, that their blood is on their own heads now. And I mean, just things it goes on and on. Right. So, I mean, Robbins was a tremendous blessing and gift to the church.

And, you know, there's a lot of problems that I've read some of Piper's stuff. And, you know, one of the issues, like you said, Tom, you mentioned that he's been giving people platforms who are very who are basically false teachers and people who aren't or extremely dangerous in their in their teaching like Rick Warren.

You know, and and who was the other one? Rick Warren and Doug Wilson. Right. Doug Wilson, who supposedly recanted his views. But it sounds like it's just basically playing word games from what I've seen.

And I know Sean Garrity, who is another fellow published. He's published some of his articles and books on the Trinity Foundation. He's he's kind of called him out on that as well. And it's not just them.

He also heavily promotes Tim Keller and invites him to his conferences, who we've called out on the show and criticized extensively, documented all of the false teachings that he's promoted. And so he promotes C .S. Lewis as well, who is, I mean, and people make these assumptions about these people thinking that they're sound or because they're so popular.

And it's like, no, I mean, a lot of people don't even know that C .S. Lewis denied the inspiration of books of the Bible, like the Psalms, certain Psalms and stuff. I mean, it's just and he confesses sins to a priest.

And I believe he also believed in purgatory.

Yeah, he was he was an Anglo Catholic.

Right. Exactly. So, you know, and that's why I'm so grateful for for the Trinity Foundation and the work that you all do, because you're one of the very few ministries that sound the trumpet when nobody else does and when nobody else wants to.

And you don't have a problem with it because the truth is what's at stake.

And so, you know, let me jump in there, Carlos, because that what Carlos is saying is exactly right, because we've shared our testimony before on the podcast. But when we were going through the the challenge of trying to sift through all of Tim Keller's teachings and trying to figure out, OK, is he Orthodox?

Is he is are we the only ones seeing this problem for a while? That's exactly how it felt. We felt as if like we're the only ones seeing this problem. And what we discovered was that the Trinity Foundation was on top of it.

You know, Tim Kaufman had already published several articles outlining some of the problems with Tim Keller. And so we've seen this over and over because it's you know, it's very difficult to go through everything that's out there and try to figure out what sound what's Orthodox, what's OK.

And and so it's a tremendous blessing to have a ministry like the Trinity Foundation where you have scholarly work and they can go through and look at. OK, so there are some issues with Piper. There are some issues with Tim Keller.

I just wanted to bring out here pointing out doctrinal errors is not a hit piece. And that's what that's what we try to do. And that's what John did is is we quote these folks with their own words and we don't take them out of context.

We quote their own words and and compare them to scripture and where they're in error. We point that out. And also there are other ministries out there doing this. I have a book that I just got from E .S. Williams, Christian Hedonism, a biblical examination of John Piper's teaching.

E .S. Williams is a fellow over in the UK who is I think he's a member, maybe a deacon of the Metropolitan Tabernacle Spurgeon's Church where Dr. Peter Masters is the pastor. He's written a couple of books exposing Tim Keller as well.

So there are other voices out there, but they're not the the majority voices. They're not the loud voices, but there are other voices out there and they're seeing these things as well. I think I think it was Kent Silva of Uprising Ministries.

I think he's passed, but he was bringing some attention to the problems with John Piper's teaching as well. So there's others out there. But I think what John did in his Pied Piper was he got to the heart of the false doctrine on justification.

You know, other people point out some other things that are errors that are that are wrong. You know, with Piper, you know, maybe, you know, his his charismaticism, his, you know, contemporary worship are the things that, you know, are maybe wrong, certainly.

And but I don't think they're the gospel. And this was the gospel issue on justification. How can a man become right before God? How can he be declared righteous? And I think John was John Piper was sounding an uncertain sound there, an error with his doctrine of future justification.

And it's very similar to Gaff, Richard Gaffin, Norman Shepard, John Connard and their teachings on, you know, on the Day of Judgment, we're going to be justified by our works. And it's a very dangerous teaching.

And that's why John was animated. That's why he called him out, called John Piper out, called anybody else who teaches these things. We called out Connard and Shepard and and Gaffin on on these teachings that are false teachings.

And it's a false teaching. I think I think it's the confession calls it a damnable heresy because it concerns the salvation. You know, Paul, the apostle, had strong words in in in First Corinthians 15 for those who denied the resurrection.

But his anathema or the anathema of God was for those who denied justification by faith alone. That's where the anathema comes in. That is the doctrine on what's the church stands are false. And so when that is at stake, we need to be on the battlefield exposing the air and combating the air.

And there's a great quote by Luther, you know, if we're faithful in everything except where the actual battle is, then then we're not faithful. You know, if we're faithful on all the all field except where the enemy is, then we're not faithful because we've not we've not engaged the enemy.

That's a paraphrase of a paraphrase, maybe. But the idea is there. But so there are thankfully there are other people that are waking up. They're comparing their Bibles to what these men are teaching and they're coming up wanting.

But as I said, we live in an age of anti intellectualism, of irrationalism, of for lack of a better word, lazy Christianity or churchy even. And people just swallow what they're being taught without comparing it to the scripture.

John Piper, Future Justification, and Final Salvation

Yeah. You know, Tom, so I'm actually aware of Williams and that is a book that I want to get. I quoted Williams in my criticism of Tim Keller, the article that I wrote. But I wanted to ask you, did you by any chance see this article written by John Piper published on September 25th, 2017, titled Does God Really Save Us by Faith Alone?

No, I have not seen that yet.

I'm going to send that to you because, you know, I think I think we should probably just do an episode on John Piper and what his errors are. I mean, you can you can.

When did he publish that?

On September 25th. It's the one that it was this year. Yeah. Yeah. This year.

You know, yeah, I read that, too. And I'm glad you brought it up because I wanted to point out a couple of things that that brother Tom had mentioned about, you know, I'm really glad that you pointed out that Robbins.

From what I remember, Robbins didn't even focus on Piper's other secondary scruples about, you know, his his his views about the gifts of the spirit and of his view of church, of certain things about certain ways of doing church.

He didn't even focus on that. Like you said, he focused on the primary gospel core gospel issues and exposed his teachings for for what they were. They were false. They're false. They were they're contrary to the biblical teaching.