My Interview With John MacArthur

Justin Peters

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Hello ladies and gentlemen, my name is Justin Peters. I hope that you and your family are doing well today.

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I want to thank you so much for joining me for this podcast. A few weeks ago I had the special privilege of interviewing

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John McArthur. John is the pastor of Grace Community Church in Sun Valley, California, just outside of the

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Los Angeles area there, and I want to share this interview with you. But before I do,

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I have a few thoughts of my own, a few reflections of my own dealing with John McArthur and I'd like to share those with you as well.

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Now, if you would like to skip this part and go straight to the good stuff, straight to the interview, you certainly may.

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That's fine. Won't hurt my feelings at all. In fact, I will put a time stamp or time marker rather down there in the description there for you.

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So you can do that if you so wish, but if you would be so gracious as to allow me, give me a few minutes of your time.

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Let me share a few thoughts. So John has been the pastor of Grace Community Church now for 53 years, and there are very few men who can say that they've pastored the same church for 53 years, but John can, and over the course of those 53 years, he's had to fight a number of different theological battles.

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There's been the inerrancy battle, the lordship salvation battle, the seeker sensitive battle, the charismatic battle, the social justice battle, and most recently the battles with the local state and federal government related to the restrictions that they have attempted to place upon churches and how they can gather for corporate worship in light of COVID -19 and all of that.

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And so each of these battles, I guess maybe with the exception of the COVID -19 stuff, but each of these battles are ongoing.

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They continue to be fought to one degree or another, and they're all interrelated, by the way.

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They're not standalone. They're all very much interrelated. And as John has had to fight these different battles over the decades, the number of men who have been willing to stand with him in these battles, that number has shrunk.

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That number has become fewer and fewer and fewer to the point now where I think, now listen carefully to how

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I say this, given the size of John MacArthur's church, Grace Community Church, he pretty much stands alone.

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He stands alone. Now, there are thousands of other pastors out there all around the world, and I know this because by God's grace,

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I've been able to preach all around the world in many of these churches. There are thousands of pastors who are just as faithful as is

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John MacArthur, and he and I both have a tremendous amount of love and respect and appreciation for these faithful shepherds that are out there.

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But they don't have the size of the platform that he does. And given the size of his platform, given the size of Grace Community Church, I'm not aware of another pastor who has a church that size, who has been willing to take the stands that John MacArthur has taken and continues to take.

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Generally speaking, the larger an evangelical church becomes, the less willing it is to take the hard stands on biblical truth.

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Generally speaking, that is true. Now, to be sure, there are plenty of small churches out there that are wackadoodle.

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It doesn't mean that just because a church is small means it's faithful. Not at all. But the larger a church becomes, the less willing it is to take those hard stands because the greater the pressure, the bigger platform you have, the bigger target you become.

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And so to stand fast in the face of withering criticism, that takes a man who is completely devoted to God.

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That takes a man who actually believes that one day he will stand before Christ and give an account.

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John MacArthur knows that one day when he dies, he's not going to stand before a committee.

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He's not going to have to give an account to a committee. He's not going to have to give an account to a denomination.

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He's not going to have to give an account to a blog writer or whatever. He's going to stand before Christ and give an account, and he knows that.

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And you can tell he knows that. You can tell he believes it just by the way that he has conducted his ministry, has taught the word of God faithfully, and lived his life.

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And so I'm very, very grateful, as are so, so many people. John MacArthur's ministry has had an impact on both me and my wife,

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Kathy, in ways that neither one of us could adequately put into words. And so many of you watching this right now, you're saying, yep, me too, me too.

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And so I'm very, very grateful. And I think the argument can be made,

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I've said this before and some people don't like it, but I'll say it again because I believe it. I think the argument can be made that given the sheer size, the sheer scope of John MacArthur's ministry and all that goes along with it, that God has used him in a greater way than any other single individual since the apostolic era.

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And lest you think I'm overstating that, stop and think about the scope of his ministry, because in God's providence,

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John MacArthur lives in this day and age in which we have the ability to disseminate teaching so quickly at the click of a button.

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You know, teaching can go out all around the world. When you consider just the sky, you know, John MacArthur is not living in the 16th, 17th, 18th, or even 1900s.

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He's living in the 21st century. But when you think of all that, you think that every sermon that he has ever preached is available for a free download.

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A couple of clicks of a mouse and you're there. He's preached through the entire New Testament verse by verse.

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He's preached, I don't know how many sermons, in the Old Testament. I don't think it's even possible to preach through the entire

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Old Testament verse by verse. You'd have to live to be about 500 years old. But many, many, many sermons in the

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Old Testament. They're all available to listen to, to watch, to read the transcripts, and it's all available for free.

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I mean, unless you live in a country like North Korea where it's just prohibited, anybody on the planet can have access to that for free.

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You look at the commentary, he's written an entire commentary set on the

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New Testament, Systematic Theology, Bible Doctrine. When you look at the

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Ministry of Grace to you, gty .org, when you look at the Master's Seminary and all of the who knows how many men, thousands of men that they have trained to be expositors of scripture, to be pastors, how to shepherd a church, and these men have gone out all over the world.

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The Master's Academy International. I think God has used John MacArthur in a greater way to champion all of these things, to champion expository preaching, to champion biblical churches, sound theology, sound doctrine, to recover the doctrine and the practice of church discipline.

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And I'll ask him about that in the interview. That was unheard of until John MacArthur came along.

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So just the sheer scope of this, I think God has used in his providence, has chosen to use

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John MacArthur in a greater way than any other single individual in the apostolic era. So I'm very, very grateful for him.

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And as you can imagine, with such a sizable platform and the scope of his ministry, he's a big target.

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The bigger ministry you have, the bigger target you become. And he's got a lot of critics.

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But here's an interesting observation, a couple of them, that I've noticed because I see it in my own ministry as well, even though on a smaller scale because my ministry is not near the size of his, but I still see the same thing.

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The angriest, loudest critics are either people who come from theological circles that are opposed to what you believe.

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So for example, John MacArthur's critics, some of his loudest critics come from Armenians, come from egalitarians, in other words, people who believe that a woman can preach and teach and pastor just like a man can do, come from charismatics, come from theological circles that are opposed to the things he believes.

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So it's quite natural to expect that your critics would come from those circles. I'm not surprised when

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I get criticism from Word of Faith folks, for example. So that's part of them.

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But there's another part, and I would say the angriest people, the loudest people, the nastiest people, the people who, quite honestly, the least truthful people, the people who will take half truths and twist them, the people who have a clear agenda and just have a hatred for John MacArthur or whoever, in my cases as well, those kind of folks, the angriest folks, they come from no church accountability.

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They have no church that they are a part of. They have no church accountability.

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And it's very ironic that people who would criticize you for how you do church or how you teach or the things you believe would come from folks who have no church background themselves, who have no, or not maybe a background, but have no church accountability themselves.

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So I think that's very ironic and it's true with John MacArthur, and it's true with my ministry as well.

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And let me say this real quickly. I've decided to turn the comments on this particular video off, and I know some of you may be disappointed in that because many of you watching right now, you would like to express your love and appreciation for John MacArthur, but I also know that this video will be a magnet to some of those same critics, and they will want to jump on and start twisting things and saying half -truths and lying, quite frankly, and just offering slanderous accusations against John MacArthur.

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And quite honestly, I just right now, I don't really want that test of my sanctification at this point.

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So I'm going to turn the comments off and I'm just going to let this video stand on its own.

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Let me say another couple things. I do not know John MacArthur as well as do many.

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I've been around him some. I do consider him a friend. He, by God's grace, considers me one of his friends, but I don't know him all that well personally.

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There are many, many others who know John MacArthur far better than do I, but I do know a lot of people very, very well who know

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John very, very well, if that makes sense. And something that I've noticed about everybody that I know who knows him very well, they all say the same thing about him.

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They all say he is one of the kindest, most generous and humble people they've ever met.

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I hear those same three things from everybody that knows him well. He is kind, he is humble, and he is generous.

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And they just, those three things keep coming up over and over and over with people who know John well, and that speaks very, very well of him.

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He helps an awful lot of people that, you know, he doesn't tell anyone about.

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He just does it. But you know how word kind of gets around, and people have have taken note of that, how generous he is with people, how kind, how humble he is.

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I've seen that myself on a couple of occasions. I've had an opportunity to see that myself.

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Long story short, I'll tell you this, but it was just kind of a really neat, very unscripted kind of an insight that I had into John MacArthur's character.

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A few years ago, I was teaching Sunday school for Phil Johnson at the Grace Life pulpit there at Grace Community Church, and I guess

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John heard that I was in town at the church on that Sunday, and so he invited me and my wife

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Kathy to come down and sit on the front pew there for the morning worship service, of course, after Sunday school.

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And so we did that, but Kathy and I weren't alone. We had a friend with us, a friend of ours named

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Frankie, a lady named Frankie, and she was there. She had invited her niece to come, and her niece,

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I'll change her name just to protect her privacy, but anyway, let's call her Susan.

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So Susan was there. Susan, Frankie's niece, was just 19 years old back in,

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I think this was 2018, so she was 19 years old. Frankie is a Christian. Susan was not, and so Susan had no idea where she was.

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She just came to church because her Aunt Frankie invited her to, so Susan had...

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Grace Community Church meant nothing to her. The name John MacArthur meant nothing to her. She had no idea.

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It was just another church, you know, as far as she was concerned, but an unconverted young lady. And so, but anyway, she came and sat down on the front pew with us, and as we were placed in the pew, so I'm sitting here.

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Kathy is to my left, then Frankie to her left, and then Susan to her left, and Susan was the last person there on the pew, or the first person, depending on how you come in.

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So anyway, we got there before John did, and after we had been sitting there for a few minutes, John walks in, into the sanctuary, and he comes to the pew where we are.

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The first person to whom he comes is Susan, and John extends his hand to her, to welcome her, and he says, he says, good morning.

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What's your name? And she said, Susan, what's your name? Hi Susan, I'm John. We're so glad to have you here with us this morning.

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Not a hint of surprise, not a hint of, did you seriously just ask me my name?

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I'm John MacArthur. You know, think about this, the front pew, Grace Community Church, Sunday morning worship,

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John MacArthur comes in. I dare say that might be, I think it'd probably be a safe bet, that that's probably the only time that John MacArthur has ever been asked or said to, what's your name?

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You know, by someone sitting on the front pew in a Sunday morning, Grace Community Church. Not a hint of surprise.

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He was just as kind and gracious to her and welcomed her so warmly, and you know,

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I saw that and I thought, that's pretty cool. That's pretty cool. That was a neat little window, a little insight into his character.

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Just last weekend, I was preaching at Redeemer Bible Church in La Quinta, California, right outside of Palm Springs.

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Good church, by the way, if you live in that neck of the woods looking for a good church, Redeemer Bible Church. But it's pastored by a man named

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Sam Matthews. And Sam is a great, great guy. We just had a wonderful few days together.

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Good, good brother in the Lord, good faithful expositor of scripture. But Sam is a graduate of the

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Master's Seminary, and Sam was a student at the Master's Seminary from 2002 to 2012.

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He earned three degrees there, Master of Divinity, Master of Theology, and then a

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Doctorate of Ministry. So he was there for quite a while, and Sam was just telling me a little bit about being a seminary student.

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The first thing that Sam told me about being a student at TMS, again, remember he started in 2002, 20 years ago, he said the first thing that he was taught by John MacArthur and the other professors there was not theology, was not exegesis, was not hermeneutics, was not church history or any of those things.

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He was taught those things, to be sure. The first thing he was taught was to love his wife, to love his wife.

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He said, that is the first thing that I was taught by John MacArthur and the other professors there, and me and the other students that were there with him.

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Men, love your wives. That was the first thing they were taught. And when

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I heard that, I thought, that's pretty cool. That's good stuff. That speaks to his character and integrity.

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And, you know, as a minister, as a preacher, our first ministries, if you're watching this and you're a preacher, your first ministry is not to the church.

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It's to your wife. As a preacher, my first ministry is not to the people to whom

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I preach and teach. My first ministry is to Kathy. And I thought that was really cool that they were taught that there at TMS.

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So, dear ones, I'm very grateful for John MacArthur. And I know a lot of people have said of me, oh,

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Justin idolizes John MacArthur. He, you know, he worships John MacArthur and all that kind of stuff.

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And that's just, that's nonsense. I don't idolize any man.

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I don't worship any man. John MacArthur would be the first person to tell you not to do that. But there is a place for being grateful, for being appreciative to a man who has proven himself to be faithful for so, so many years, untouched by the kind of moral scandals that bring so many other men in the pulpit down.

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Untouched by anything like that. He's proven himself to be faithful. He has withstood oftentimes withering criticism, lies, falsehoods that others have told about him.

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And he just stands strong. And I have heard Phil Johnson say of John MacArthur.

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I haven't heard John MacArthur say this personally, but Phil Johnson has heard him say it. In regard to his critics,

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John MacArthur says, I wouldn't defend myself to Satan. And we all know who the accuser of the brethren is.

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And so John MacArthur doesn't answer them because, well, for one thing, he knows that no matter what he says, they wouldn't be satisfied.

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They would just keep on, keep on. So there's no satisfying them. He knows that he has got one person to whom he must give an account one day, or actually, to be theologically precise, three persons, one

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God and three persons to whom he will one day give an account and whom he must please.

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He has an audience of one. So very grateful for John MacArthur. And thank you for indulging me for these few minutes here without any further delay.

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Here's the interview with John MacArthur. John, thank you so much for this opportunity.

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And I just, I know you've heard this a million times, but your ministry has meant so much to me and my wife,

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Kathy, and it's a special privilege to be able to interview you today. Thank you. Well, the privilege is mine.

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We, we are really grateful for your ministry, Justin. Wonderful. Well, I appreciate that,

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John. Thank you so much. You're welcome. So, John, there's been a number of battles that you have fought in your 53 -year ministry.

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You've had the Lordship Salvation Battle, the Inerrancy Battle, the Seeker Sensitive, Charismatic Issue, Social Justice, which is still ongoing, and then most recently the

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COVID -19 government mandates and shutdowns and all of those. And it seems like with each battle that you've fought over the years, the circle of men that are willing to stand with you has grown smaller and smaller.

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And now some of the men that have been longtime friends of yours and you've ministered with are no longer willing to stand with you.

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In fact, some even kind of obliquely have criticized you for the stands that you've taken.

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Has that been a discouragement to you? How have you handled that? And has it ever made you second -guess yourself?

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Well, no, I don't second -guess myself, maybe because I try to live and respond biblically.

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So if I'm second -guessing the Bible, that's probably not a good thing. And to make it simple, we fight every battle.

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We fight every battle. Every battle that comes up against the

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Word of God, against the truth of God, we earnestly contend for the faith once for all delivered to the saints.

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So we've been battling since the beginning. It's not a matter of selecting certain battles.

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We fight them all. We fight them all because that's our calling to earnestly contend.

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So it's a whole life of contention. Even as a pastor, early on in my ministry, what struck me about Paul in Acts 20 was that for a period of three years, he did nothing, he said, but warned people of what was coming.

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And he said, it's coming from the inside and it's coming from the outside. And for three years, I warned you about that.

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Well, that's kind of unique. If you're going to plant a church somewhere to spend the whole time essentially warning people about the dangers that are lurking everywhere, and you of all people in the ministry get that because you have fought on the front line for the years of your ministry.

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I also understand that not everybody is willing to fight all those battles. There are people who would stand with us on this battle and maybe that battle, but not this one or not the other one.

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Because it may be because they have friendships. It may be because they have faculty in their institutions who are on the other side of that issue and they don't feel like they can take that issue on because it would divide their institution.

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It may be that they're seeking a more cordial relationship with certain people.

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But yeah, I guess I mean you would hope as you live your life that you would gain friends instead of lose them.

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But it was said of Martin Lloyd -Jones that he spent his whole ministry life gaining and losing friends at the same time.

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I think it just goes with the fact that not everybody is going to fight those battles. But from my standpoint,

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I mean here we are at the Shepherds Conference and there's 4 ,000 guys out there fighting the battle with us, right?

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Amen. So we may be losing some of the big names, some of the elites.

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But I think we're collecting the good guys. Yeah. I agree.

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I agree. And that's been one of the great encouragements to me in my ministry traveling is there's lots of faithful shepherds out there.

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They're just not in the limelight. Yeah, you don't want to get an Elijah complex. Yes, right. I only I am left.

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Yeah, this helps to put that to bed. It does. I've heard that comment from many of the pastors here.

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So John, we're in the year 2022. We're now almost a decade, nine years past the

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Strange Fire Conference. And I heard a sermon that you did. I think it was a follow -up to Strange Fire.

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And you made a statement. You said that the charismatic movement is doubt looking for proof.

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And I thought that was a fascinating insight. Can you flesh that out a little bit more for us?

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Well, it features itself as the movement of faith. This is real faith.

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And if you have faith, you can do miracles. And if you have faith, you can hear from God. And if you have faith, you get what you want.

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You can believe things into existence. And if you believe enough to speak them into existence, you have the power in your tongue.

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This is all supposed to be faith, but it is anything but faith. It is relentlessly trying to find a sign, an external sign to validate it, which means essentially it's doubt.

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It's doubt. And look, the people who are in it, if they ever reach a point of honesty, they know people aren't getting healed.

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I mean, people are dying. It has a short shelf life. The stamp on the charismatic can is not too far into the future.

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Because when people start dying, and you don't get the miracles, and you don't get the money, and you don't get the big house, you don't get the job promotion, you got to turn over the audience.

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You got to get a new batch of people that you can try to convince this is going to happen to. Unfortunately, it does happen to some people, and that's the people who purvey the lie.

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Yes. About healing and prosperity. They get wealthy, but I've noticed lately they don't get healed.

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Right. And that's why the charismatic movement flourishes so much in Africa, in a continent that's known for its poverty, and yet you've got prosperity preachers that are fabulously wealthy.

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That's one of the ugly things about it. You're preying on the most deprived people. You're preying on people who are ill.

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You're preying on people who are struggling. You're preying on people who are poor. It is the worst of the worst because it's exploitation.

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Right. It is. Thank you for that. Something that I've noticed a lot in my evangelism,

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Pastor John, is that I find a lot of pastors, young pastors usually, who come into a church, often their first church, and they have a biblical ecclesiology and polity.

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They understand that the Bible mandates a plurality of elders, but they're called to a church that is congregational -led, and the church doesn't know what elders are.

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They think an elder is an older man. And so the pastor comes in, and he knows he needs to move, transition the church from congregational model to a plurality of elders, but that is often a very difficult transition for many of these men.

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Any words of wisdom to these brothers? How they go about doing that?

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How long should they expect such a transition to take? I think it's a pretty simple question to answer.

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Wait till the leaders of the church tell you they want to do that, and that will come when you've instructed them.

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In reality, you're fighting a battle you can't win because they are where they are because somebody they loved and trusted taught them this, right?

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And not only were they taught this, and not only did they operate this way, and not only did God bless their church while they were operating without elders, but this is their identity.

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This is how they see their role in the church. If you come in and start taking away those things that are familiar and those things they love and those things that give them a sense of worth and usefulness, you're going to create trouble.

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I mean, you're liable to have a very short career. So my advice to young pastors is you know what's right.

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Teach it until there's a groundswell of people who are coming to you and saying, you know, we need to get in line with the

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Word of God. And that may take a few years. You know, I taught a men's

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Bible study when I came here every Saturday for maybe eight years, and that was really important to do that because I had to get the men of the church ahead of the congregation.

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In other words, if I'm just preaching Sunday morning and Sunday night to everybody, they're all moving forward at the same speed.

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So how do I get elders out of that? I've got to accelerate something to get elders ahead of the rest of the people.

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And so I suggest to young guys, get the men in your church who are in a position of leadership and take a few hours

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Saturday morning or whenever works for your schedule and train them in the details of biblical ecclesiology and then patiently wait until they get it.

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Okay. Okay. So find the men in the church that are leaders and disciples and teach them, oftentimes, not necessarily outside the church, but in addition to the

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Sunday morning. Well, yeah, because if all they hear is what you preach on Sunday, then everybody's moving at the same speed and it's going to take too long.

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So you want to accelerate the training of the men. And the way to do that is to pick the men that are leaders and throw it open to any men because you may not know who might develop.

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Yeah. Okay. Good. Helpful. So let me ask you a little bit about sufficiency.

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I've already mentioned the inerrancy battle that you were involved in. And every evangelical church would at least give lip service to believing that the

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Bible is inerrant. Whether they believe that or not is another matter, but they would give lip service to it. But it seems to me that the real battle today is over sufficiency.

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Can you talk to us a little bit about the importance, not only of inerrancy, but the sufficiency of Scripture?

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Well, inerrancy says the Bible is true. Sufficiency says the

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Bible is all you need. All you need for life and godliness.

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Everything that pertains to life and godliness that the Lord didn't leave anything out. In fact, the truth of the matter is there are only so many spiritual truths in the panoply of necessary truths to live a godly life.

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And they're just repeated all over the place in the Bible. I mean, they're everywhere. So it isn't that you have to have all 66 books to get them all, as if there were thousands and thousands and thousands of principles.

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There aren't. So the Word of God just continually, continually, continually reveals and teaches all the foundational realities.

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And that's enough to make the man of God complete, thoroughly furnished for all good work.

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So I think sufficiency says psychology offers you nothing. Sociology offers you nothing.

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Philosophy offers you nothing. Politics offers you nothing. Bible offers you everything.

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Amen. Indeed. And certainly, sitting around waiting for a revelation from God, I don't think you'd go for that.

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No, I would not. No. The charismatic prophets don't have a very good track record, as we've seen.

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Whatever God seems to be telling the charismatic prophets is contrary to Scripture. Absolutely.

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And I've asked this question for years. If God did give miraculous gifts, why would

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He give them to people with such bad theology? Amen. Would God validate such bad theology and then underlying bad living?

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Right. Indeed. No, and that's what marks the life of false teachers.

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And we know that from Scripture as one of the things, not only greed, but sexual immorality. We see that all over the place.

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Well, Jesus basically said that in the Sermon on the Mount. Yes. Look at their life.

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Right. See the fruit. Yep. Indeed. Indeed. Well, speaking of that, that's a pretty good segue into the next thing

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I want to ask you about. And I've noticed something I know you have as well within our soteriologically reformed circles, is that there is a wing of that, if you will, that seem to flaunt their

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Christian liberties or what they perceive to be their Christian liberties. Pastors that think it's cool to sit down and have a

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Bible study over alcohol and they use foul language, some of them even intentionally using foul language from the pulpit at times.

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And so it seems to me that they're really lacking in personal holiness.

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How important is it for a pastor in his personal holiness and to model that to his flock?

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I think that's one of the problems with the young, restless, reformed movement was there was a lot appealing about the sovereignty of God.

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Because within that movement, there was a lot of macho. There was a lot of being a man's man.

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And I think the macho thing kind of appealed to them. Yeah, God is in charge.

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He's absolutely sovereign. And they bought into that because in a sense, you could be like God and you could be in charge.

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So it fit the young, restless reforms to say, well, God is in charge.

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God is sovereign. And I want to be like God. So I'm in charge, everybody roll over because I'm calling the shots.

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Yeah, right. And then there was this notion that salvation was by grace through faith, which is absolutely true.

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But the movement ran out of gas at that point. It just ran out of gas.

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It never went to the very next essential critical reality and that was sanctification.

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And they were unsanctified. They weren't even interested in sanctification. They had no interest in sanctification at all.

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I wrote a whole series of articles years ago at Grace to You on all the alcohol and the profanity.

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And it basically was coming out of Mark Driscoll and it was setting a tone and other young guys were following in that kind of pattern.

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And as it's turned out, he has at this point completely trashed all reform theology, all the five solas and everything.

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And the reason is because, and I'm just saying this from an observational perspective, the reason is that they like the sovereignty of God and they were happy about grace because grace didn't require anything, but they really didn't like sanctification.

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Right. And so that was the point at which they turned and went the other way.

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So I think that was missing in the movement and it showed up in many ways. I mean, how many churches, Driscoll blew up his church and other churches have been blown up.

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So many of those people who were young, restless and reformed are not even in the ministry anymore these days.

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So look, reform theology doesn't come in two points.

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It comes in five solas regarding salvation. But beyond that, it has the most robust view of sanctification because it has the most robust view of God.

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And they liked some things about God, but they weren't interested in everything that reflected him.

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The thrice holy part seemed to escape there. It definitely did. Yeah. I'll tell you a funny story.

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I was talking to a Russian pastor and he looked at my ring and he said, your wedding ring is on your left hand in America.

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This is a guy who had not been to America. And he says, in Russia, your wedding ring is on your right hand, unless you've been divorced and you're available.

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And if you're divorced and available, it goes on your left hand. Oh. So he said, when I first got here,

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I was shocked because I met all these pastors who were divorced and available and then they were drinking root beer.

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That's funny. And his response was, how can I follow men who are divorced and available and drink beer?

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Right. So I was a little bit lost in the translation, I think. A little bit lost.

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That's funny. But they made their point. Yeah, they did. You can't follow that kind of man.

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Yeah, yeah. Well, good for them. At least they recognize that. That's funny. I like that. I like that. Well, so John, in our soteriological circles, reformed circles, most of us understand church discipline, but very few evangelical churches outside of these circles do.

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Southern Baptist Church, church discipline is almost unheard of. They think where two or three are gathered together is referring to Wednesday night prayer meeting.

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When you first began in your ministry, church discipline was almost nonexistent.

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I didn't know any church that did it. None. None. I didn't know one church. And people, when I said, we need to do this because this is biblical, it was not difficult to understand.

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They said, you'll empty the church. You'll empty it. You can't do that. You can't. You mean you're actually going to stand up and say, well, if somebody doesn't repent, tell the church.

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So we're going to do that on Communion Sunday, and we're going to say so -and -so won't repent. And this is a category of sin without telling all the details.

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And the very opposite happened. It grew the church. Yes. Because the

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Lord grows this church. You don't grow it by some methodology. He grows the church when the church is faithful.

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Right. And people started rushing into this church because they desired holiness.

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They desired to live godly lives. They weren't threatened by that. They wanted that kind of accountability.

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Right. So it had the opposite effect of what I was told. And I honestly think it's part of shepherding the flock, because the first thing

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Jesus ever said and used the word church was in Matthew.

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And it had to do with that whole discipline thing of tell the church. That's the first time church is mentioned in the

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New Testament. Right. And it's in a situation where you confront sin, take two or three witnesses, tell the church, and then if they don't listen, you treat them like a tax collector and a

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Gentile. Treat them like a nonbeliever. Right. The greatest threat to the church is comfortable nonbelievers in the church.

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Because now the children of God and the children of the devil are standing side by side singing the same hymn. Right. This is threat to the purity of the church.

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Right. So discipline restores the penitent and reveals the impenitent.

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And that's very important since the Lord wants to present a chaste virgin. I mean, since Paul says he wants to present a chaste virgin, the church to the

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Lord. But yeah, it is threatening to the children of the devil who are comfortable in the church.

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Obviously, if it's a Baptist church, they're probably going to vote against it.

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Yeah. Right? Because they've got to vote. Right. Exactly. Yeah. I often tell people that when you're looking for a church, if you want to know how seriously they really take

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God's word, ask the leadership, what do you do with Matthew 18? Yeah, of course. Of course.

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Because it's hard. It's hard, but it's right. And I mean, you've been around here enough to know these people aren't beleaguered.

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They're not browbeaten. They don't feel like somebody's spying on them. No. You know, the goal of our instruction is love from a pure heart.

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And when the word of God does its work in those who belong to him, the result is love.

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And that's what we see. Right. And the desire is for the sinning brother or sister to come to repentance.

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That's what... Exactly it. Yeah. Yeah. It's all about restoration and recovery because a little leaven...

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Leaven's a whole lump. Leaven's a whole lump. Indeed. Indeed. John, what do you...

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I mentioned earlier as we started that all of these different battles that you have fought and continue to fight.

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I know you're not a prophet, but as best you can tell, what do you see may be on the horizon for the church as far as the next battle, the next threat, even though Christ's church is safe?

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But what do you see on the horizon? Well, if you're talking about the true church...

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The true church. You're right. The true church will survive. There'll be some battles. They have to be fought. I'm extremely grateful for the vast number of pastors who are faithful and will fight those battles.

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I think this sort of church in general, not discriminating whether they're true or false believers, is going to continue to struggle from an abysmal lack of discernment.

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You remember the AIDS epidemic, and AIDS was an acquired immune deficiency syndrome that literally your immune system didn't work, so you could die of a hundred diseases.

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Well, the church has the same deficiency. Its lack of discernment means it can die of a hundred heresies.

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It is shocking to me. I mean, just the fact that people in leadership in the evangelical movement, seminaries, institutions, denominations are woke.

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Don't they get it? Don't they get that this is a satanic effort to destroy the church, and they're trying to incorporate it into the church?

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And the more people from the church that go out the back door because they're not going to stand for it in a good church, the more they yell at them.

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Where is the discernment that you don't... By the fruit of this, you would know whether it was genuine, right?

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Because the Holy Spirit would bless it when everybody's at everybody's throat, and people are pouring out the door, and hundreds and thousands of people are leaving your church.

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Maybe you missed it. So, I mean, this is a symptom of the inability of people to discern, which is all...

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I mean, this is what Paul said. He said, don't despise prophesying or preaching, but you better discern.

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You better hold fast to what is good, and you better let loose of what is evil. So, I think that's always the challenge in the church.

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And, I mean, you confront this all the time, the deficiency of their ability to discern.

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And, you know, by the time you get to them and they wake up, they're five years down some ridiculous pathway that's muddled up their life and confused their

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Christianity and left them disappointed. Indeed. Indeed. I tell people often,

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I wish the aspect of my ministry for which I'm most well -known, you know, the discernment and engaging false teachers,

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I wish it wasn't necessary. I wish it wasn't necessary to do in the first place. And if people had more discernment, they were more biblically grounded, it wouldn't be.

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Well, I go back to 1 John 2 where John writes and says, you have overcome the wicked one because you're strong in the word.

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The wicked one is a deceiver. The only way you're going to overcome that deceiver is to be strong in the word. And when you have the kind of evangelical

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Christianity we have today where people are children tossed to and fro and cared about by every wind of doctrine, they're not strong enough to overcome the wicked one's deceptions.

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Yeah. Indeed. Amen. Well, John, as we wrap up, I travel around and one of the things,

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I've mentioned this early, one of the things that greatly encourages me, it can be discouraging as you look at the broad visible spectrum of Christianity, all of the compromise, all of the dilution of the gospel, all of the moral failings and all that.

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But there are thousands of faithful pastors out there, faithful shepherds, many of them are here right now, who are doing the work of a shepherd.

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They're laboring in the word. They're shepherding their flock, protecting them from the wolves, but they're unknown.

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And many of them are isolated in that they don't have like -minded pastors, fellow pastors in their area with whom they can fellowship.

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So they kind of feel like an island. And nobody knows about them.

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They're not being asked to speak at the conference. They don't have a platform. They're known only to their little flocks.

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What word of encouragement would you have for those faithful brothers out there?

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Well, what comes to mind is join the Master's Fellowship. Okay. You need an ally.

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You need a friend. You weren't intended to be on your own. Look, you asked at the very beginning about how it was for me to lose friends in one sense.

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But I have to tell you, I am so enriched in the environment that I'm in by so many men who come around me.

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And I know that's rare. I mean, that is a very rare thing. And there are so many pastors out there all across the country, all around the world, even missionary pastors who desperately need fellowship.

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And you need to find the guys of like precious faith and like -mindedness who are nearby.

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And honestly, that's why we started the Master's Fellowship. You can look up the Master's Fellowship. It's just an association of men who are willing to be friends to each other because they hold a common faith.

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And I think you need to take the opportunity to be a part of something like this or some pastor's conference where you can make friends beyond your own area, beyond your own walls.

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And I know the guys that come here year after year. I talked to a pastor yesterday whose pastor's in Moscow, Moscow, Russia.

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This is his 21st year in a row at a shepherd's conference. It took him 37 hours to get here.

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He flew from Moscow to Istanbul because no flights go to the States or Europe during the war.

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37 hours to get here for his 21st time. And I'm thinking to myself, what are we going to say to him? We haven't said 20 times already.

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How important is this to him? And he sees me and he gives me this huge hug.

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And Russians always hug on the left side because they hug the hearts. And he's just over the moon being here because where he is is really tough, really difficult and challenging.

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So maybe on a macro level, don't forsake the assembling of yourselves together with other leaders of like precious faith because that'll stimulate you to love and good works.

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Yeah, indeed. Well, John, one of the things about your ministry is your love for the pastors, your love for shepherds and all that you have done in Grace Community Church, the grace to you has done to equip pastors.

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And I appreciate that so very much because... They give me far more than I ever give them.

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I'm just a talking head. I'd say a little bit more than that. And you're very much appreciated,

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John. And thank you. Thank you so much for your time. Well, thank you for being my friend. Appreciate it.

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Thank you. God bless you, John. Thank you. Thank you very much for joining me, dear ones.

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Until our next time together, may the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God and the fellowship of His Holy Spirit be with you all.