November 15, 2016 Show with Josh Buice on “Guardrails Against Hyper-Calvinism” PLUS David Campbell on “The Lord’s Day: Why Go to Church Twice on Sundays?”

Iron Sharpens Iron

Subscribe

Download

Share

00

00:01

Live from the historic parsonage of 19th century gospel minister George Norcross in downtown

00:08

Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron, a radio platform on which pastors,

00:16

Christian scholars and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

00:23

Proverbs 27 verse 17 tells us, Iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

00:32

Matthew Henry said that in this passage, we are cautioned to take heed whom we converse with and directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better.

00:46

It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next hour and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions.

00:57

Now here's our host Chris Arntzen. Good afternoon

01:05

Cumberland County, Pennsylvania and the rest of humanity living on the planet earth who are listening via live streaming.

01:12

This is Chris Arntzen your host of Iron Sharpens Iron wishing you all a happy Tuesday on this 15th day of November 2016.

01:22

I'm so delighted, doubly delighted today to have two men of God who are very dear to my heart on the program today.

01:32

For the first hour we are going to have Josh Bice on the program. He is the senior pastor of Praise Mill Baptist Church of Douglasville, Georgia.

01:41

He is the blogger at deliveredbygrace .com and director of the annual

01:47

G3 conference. We're going to be discussing guardrails against hyper -Calvinism during that first hour 4 to 5 p .m.

01:55

Eastern and then following that hour we are going to have my pastor

02:01

David Campbell who is the senior pastor of Grace Baptist Church of Carlisle, Pennsylvania and this may be actually the last opportunity that I have to interview

02:12

Pastor David in the studio because he has accepted a call to Northern England at North Preston Evangelical Church and he is going to be departing the

02:23

United States in just a matter of days so it's going to be a rich pleasure to have him in the studio.

02:31

I know I, God willing, will be interviewing him by phone in the future but this may be my last in -studio opportunity.

02:38

We're going to be discussing the Lord's Day why go to church twice on Sundays which is a book he wrote for one day of publication or day one publications so please stay tuned for that during the second hour but it's my honor and privilege to welcome you back to Iron Sharpens Iron, Pastor Josh Bice of Praise Mill Baptist Church, Douglasville, Georgia.

03:01

Glad to be with you Chris. It's a great pleasure to have you back and I'm very excited about the conference coming up.

03:09

It's going to be here before you know it January 19th through the 21st but before we get to that as we always do since we have new listeners in our audience it seems joining us every week if you could let our listeners know about Praise Mill Baptist Church of Douglasville, Georgia and the event that they've never heard of that church before.

03:30

Happy to do so Chris. So I serve a 175 -year -old

03:36

Baptist church here just west of Atlanta, Georgia in Douglasville and it happens to be the church where I grew up as a boy.

03:44

My wife grew up here in the context of this church as well. So after pastoring and attending seminary out of state for a number of years in God's providence six years ago

03:57

I was extended a call to come and to serve the church, the people that had served us as children and young adults and so that's the context in which

04:09

I serve and I'm just privileged to be not only a child of the king but also a pastor serving people under the banner of the gospel.

04:18

And tell us something about your blog Delivered by Grace. Delivered by Grace is a blog that I write weekly.

04:31

It did start within the context of my time at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary just myself and a few other friends.

04:39

We just used it as a springboard tool for conversation through the week. Eventually it morphed into what it is today just a site where I write a couple of main articles a week and spotlight some other articles and ministries and resources throughout the week and a sermon review typically on Monday.

04:59

So just a good outlet for writing and and just helping people think clearly about the gospel.

05:07

Great and for those of you who would like to visit that blog it's deliveredbygrace .com.

05:13

Very easy to remember deliveredbygrace .com. And last but not least let us know about the highly anticipated

05:21

G3 conference for January 19th through the 21st 2017. Absolutely.

05:28

So the G3 conference was started really in through prayer about six years ago.

05:36

We started praying about this entire need really in the

05:41

Atlanta area to have a good Bible conference a good theology conference. So through prayer and much work here within the life of this church where I serve we formed a conference that was basically designed to take a theme that we would unpack for three days so Thursday through Saturday and so we decided to name the conference the

06:05

G3 conference taking on really three pillars gospel grace and glory.

06:10

So we wanted to set you know a clear precedent you might say from the beginning that this is a theology conference it's not it's not some type of pep rally for Christians or some type of entertainment outlet for you know for the

06:26

Christian community but it's a say you know unashamed theology conference.

06:32

And so that was a little over five years ago and here coming up now in January will be the fifth annual conference and this particular year we're looking at the subject of the protestant reformation being it's the the 500th anniversary of the protestant reformation in 2017.

06:50

Well I am eagerly looking forward to being there myself this will be my first G3 conference and I don't think

06:58

I've ever in fact I know I have never been at a conference that had 19 speakers and all of them really impressive speakers and you'll be hearing more about that not only during this interview but in the days and weeks to come until the

07:16

G3 conference is completely sold out. How many how many do you expect to actually attend the conference? Chris we have right at 2 ,000 people already registered so we're looking probably at 2 ,500 maybe at that you know by January the end of January.

07:33

Wow that is very impressive and in fact I've never been at a conference where there's been 2 ,000 people so this is going to be a joy for me and I hope that those of you who are in my audience who are attending that and I know that there are a number of you who have registered as a direct result of hearing about the conference on this program.

07:57

I hope that you look for me at the Iron Sharpens Iron exhibitors booth I'll be right next to the

08:04

Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals exhibitors booth and I would love to greet you face to face because there are many of you that I have never met and I would love to meet as many of you as possible at this conference and so that's g3conference .com

08:20

g3conference .com Today we are discussing something we have addressed this before on my program but I don't think that reformed

08:30

Christians can hear this topic too often because it is important for us not to fall into heresy just as we are well known for preaching against heresy the heresy of others we have to protect ourselves from that same error that comes in a different flavor it is known as hyper -Calvinism and obviously

08:56

I think it would be wise to make it clear Pastor Josh that you are a theologically reformed

09:04

Baptist Christian a Calvinist as it has been nicknamed and perhaps if you could summarize what that means because one of the reasons we should clarify that is that as you know many of the enemies of the doctrines of sovereign grace or reformed theology will call everyone who adheres to those teachings a hyper -Calvinist they even will call

09:27

Calvin a hyper -Calvinist but if you can if you could please summarize obviously since we have less than an hour for our interview just a brief summary of what makes

09:40

Calvinistic theology stand out and I'm talking about obviously the biblical historic genuine form of this theological system yeah

09:50

I think that for me Chris I was certainly not always a Calvinist I you know grew up in the context of a

09:59

Southern Baptist church interestingly enough I did have two pastors for about 10 years each that were

10:09

Calvinistic in their soteriology not necessarily in their ecclesiology but in their soteriology so as they would preach expositionally they would unpack what the bible teaches about the doctrine of salvation from a reformed view which

10:26

I believe happens to be the biblical view but for me I think that you know after going to seminary and then being on somewhat of a journey trying to understand what it was that I actually believe where I stood on this issue

10:41

I did waver back and forth quite a bit and then serving a church in Tennessee for a number of years at the time

10:50

I looked at a situation that I was facing to be quite discouraging there was a particular man in the church that had come into that church context before I arrived as pastor and he had a

11:03

Methodist background and he really just you know everything that I said if it pertained to the bigness or the sovereignty of God he would come to the office and he would want to duel with me you know in the text of scripture and complain that you know that I was preaching from a

11:21

Calvinistic position at that time I certainly rejected any type of notion that I was a

11:28

Calvinist I didn't like the term and still to this very day I think Chris you would probably agree that when we sit and talk about the fact or say that you know

11:38

I'm a Calvinist I want to make sure that people are using the same dictionary as me because for some in which pertains to this very subject of hyper -Calvinism that we're talking about today for some just Calvinism in and of itself is synonymous with hyper -Calvinism so they will just throw that term around you know very loosely so I want to make sure that you know according to some people's definition

12:07

I'm probably a zero point Calvinist because their definitions are just so corrupt or or you know just not exhaustive not accurate but according to historic

12:19

Calvinism yes I would definitely embrace five points but so through that time period in Tennessee this particular gentleman would really just you know discourage me he would accuse me of being a

12:34

Calvinist or a hyper -Calvinist I didn't like that language so he was pressing me to study the scriptures in ways that I had not before and so through time

12:44

I was trying to prove that I wasn't a Calvinist but every time I would turn a corner in the

12:50

Bible and flip a page I was seeing the sovereignty of God and salvation in ways that I had not studied before so long story short after God called me back to serve my home church here after the dust settled

13:07

I picked up this study once again started studying more and eventually ended up embracing all five points of Calvinism so you know for a time

13:19

I would probably have considered myself to be a 3 .5 or a four point Calvinist but I don't think that that you know if you if you want to be technical

13:29

I don't think that that really exists because if you truly understand what total depravity is then

13:36

I think that all of the other points are connected to that one foundation yes and most of the time with few exceptions

13:45

I do know a couple of of individuals that are four -point

13:51

Calvinists and they really do claim even though I believe I agree with you I believe that they're being inconsistent

13:57

I don't think that they can logically hold only four but they do actually believe in the four even if it's inconsistently uh out of the five usually it is a limited atonement or definite atonement or uh some of the other particular redemption is another phrase uh but that's usually the one that's excluded but most of the time when people call themselves four -point

14:23

Calvinists they're really redefining what those four points are and when it boils down to it there really are who believe that you can't lose your salvation yeah that's true so for me

14:37

Calvinism is very attractive because as I often say when

14:42

I preach here within the context of of our church I want people to see a very big

14:48

God in other words I think that I don't think that it's possible for me to err to the degree of making

14:56

God too big so I think it's possible to make God too small but I don't think that in in my human understanding in my human vocabulary in preaching a sermon on the

15:08

Lord's day I don't think that I'm going to be guilty of making God too big and so when

15:13

I'm reading the Bible I want to lift up before the people each week a robust sovereign majestic God who saved sinners and he doesn't need anyone you know he doesn't need anyone's help or cooperation or anything else involved in that process but that's not just my philosophy that's something that I'm seeing straight from chapter and verse all through the

15:38

Word of God and uh those of you who want to have a more of an exhaustive in -depth description of what

15:46

Calvinism is we don't have the time to do that today but it has been spoken of so often on this program you can listen to many different interviews that I've conducted on Iron Sharpens Iron and discover the more in -depth definition but today because we are really predominantly addressing our

16:05

Calvinistic brothers those who would actually claim to be theologically reformed believers in the doctrines of sovereign grace or actually use the title

16:16

Calvinist our like -minded brethren and we are addressing guardrails against hyper -Calvinism which is a heresy and before we even contrast hyper -Calvinism with the authentic article would you say in summary for those of our listeners who are not in our camp that in summary that Calvinists believe or theologically reformed

16:44

Christians believe that God deserves 100 percent of the praise honor and glory and credit for the salvation of sinners whereas all other theological systems whether they be

16:59

Roman Catholicism whether they be Evangelical Arminianism or Historic Arminianism or Semi -Pelagianism or Pelagianism they all have men contributing to their own salvation that were men even if they wouldn't dare verbally give credit to man for his salvation the only thing that you can logically conclude from what they say is that men are partially responsible for their salvation correct yes so when you have the

17:32

Roman Catholics for instance who insist that we cooperate with God or you know you have you know loose phrases like you know that that are you know handed around or or spread abroad throughout

17:47

Evangelicalism that state that God does his part and then we do our part in salvation is just it's just a horrific view of salvation that obviously does not come from the scripture now when we uh contrast

18:04

Calvinism historic Biblical Calvinism uh faithful to the reformation and so on uh the the the hyper -Calvinist one of the hallmarks would you agree is that hyper -Calvinists tend to reject the idea that God uses means to accomplish his purposes they go so far that in excluding men's involvement in any way in the their salvation that they even exclude the fact that God uses means such as evangelism and so on the preaching of the gospel etc to to actually save uh his elect right so hyper -Calvinism is actually a technical term that must be properly defined so you can't just say that someone that's a hyper -Calvinist is someone that's really overly excited about Calvinism yeah um hyper -Calvinism is actually a technical term that must be defined properly and so what it means is what you're driving to and in your further description and former description it means that that someone believes that God saves sinners but he does not use people and efforts and means uh through missions and evangelistic efforts and church planting and the preaching of the gospel to the non -elect and so they they simply you know reject any desire to preach indiscriminately to everyone the gospel of Jesus Christ right and uh i'm going to be very careful not to broad brush but uh some who would uh be in that camp would be a segment i think a pretty a fairly considerable segment of the primitive baptists would be in that camp where they they actually have a term for people like us they or they have a term for our doctrine they call it the means doctrine and they would typically label us as arminians just because we believe that God uses the preaching of the gospel and evangelism as his means to actually save his his elect yeah i mean it's well known you know from from church history that you know that God has first of all from the great commission and then all through church history we see men carrying out the great commission so you have someone like William Carey who wanted to take the gospel to India and you had this older gentleman years ago named

20:48

John Ryland who stood up and told him basically to sit down and shut up because if God wants to save the heathen he'll do so without our aid so that type of language that type of belief is hyper calvinism in the history of our church here that i serve if you go back and read the history there was a group of people years ago that split off from this church this was you know back some 65 70 years ago that split off from this church on that very issue because this church was very evangelistic and they wanted to you know plant churches and send missionaries and support the mission endeavors and and they simply did not agree so they went and formed a primitive baptist church uh which was in essence very heretical it's um hyper calvinism so they were rejecting any desire to preach the gospel to the non -elect and uh there are also hyper calvinists are not a monolith they uh manifest themselves in different ways it's interesting that you have some hyper calvinists who make the gates to heaven a lot broader than the bible would describe that would i think include the primitive baptists because they don't even and i'm and of course i have to constantly say that i'm not broad brushing they don't all uh harmoniously believe these things in fact i even know a church that invited years ago dr james r white to preach at a conference for them and they adhered to the 1689 london baptist confession and seemed to be very biblically orthodox but those within the hyper calvinistic camp within the primitive baptist they don't even believe that all of god's elect will come to saving faith in christ on this planet they so far remove the preaching of the gospel and evangelism from the whole uh act of salvation that god sovereignly determines that they even have the elect going to heaven and discovering christ for the first time when they open up their eyes in eternity right you know i think it's really important for us to um just lay the foundation that it's extremely unhelpful and unbiblical for people to to just classify someone as a hyper calvinist simply because they believe the five points of calvinism because if if indeed hyper calvinism is heresy then what we have at that point is people who are using a term that's heretical and and by that definition we we must understand that you know heretics they die and they go to hell so if say charles spurgeon was a hyper calvinist um then that means that he died and went to hell but we you know so in my context i don't know about in your context but in my context within the southern baptist convention within the bible belt south there are so many people that just simply don't understand what historic calvinism is so they just loosely categorized miscategorized calvinist as hyper calvinist often and so i think it's very unhelpful uh you know for people to just use terms loosely not define terms properly and so if you go that route you must consign an awful lot of people from church history such as spurgeon and others to the flames of hell something that i don't think that they really want to do so interestingly enough in the in the south here we'll have a lot of baptists who will rail against calvinism but then in the very next breath they will quote charles spurgeon which is completely inconsistent yeah they deny that he was a calvinist what's that again the armenian baptists among us and of course most of them don't call themselves armenian but the non -calvinist or non -reformed baptists among us very often adamantly reject the fact that spurgeon was a calvinist yeah well that's simply not true it's not accurate right well documented that you know spurgeon called the you know calvinism basically the gospel um when he moved into the metropolitan tabernacle and you know in 1861 they had to build that church because they had outgrown every other facility you know that they were in previously and when that particular church doors were opened the first week basically was dedicated to uh you know a uh a series of messages on the doctrines of grace and basically he just he just wanted to lay the foundation from the very beginning that that that entire house was built on the doctrines of grace and he even said i am never ashamed to avow myself a calvinist so you know that's just a misuse of spurgeon a misunderstanding of the historic figure of charles spurgeon and his preaching ministry he was unashamedly a man who stood uh on the the doctrines of grace and preached them passionately amen and as i was saying before uh not all hyper calvinists are monolithic the other side of the coin of what i mentioned before uh that would have an opposite manifestation of this than the primitive baptists would would be some of the groups like the netherlands reform church uh dr joel beakey left the netherlands reform church and he and other brethren in christ in that denomination who also left started a new denomination that was more faithful to the scriptures in regard to election because of the netherlands reform church unlike the primitive baptists who have a much broader understanding of the gates to heaven they have a much more narrow understanding of the gates to heaven than the scriptures would describe and it was very typical i have heard in that denomination where you could have a church of a couple of thousand members where only a tiny handful of people would accept the lord's supper because they are filled with an unscriptural uh doubt and a morbid introspection of their own souls like the doubts of their salvation are planted in their minds because of unbiblical reasons and so on so uh so therefore either way that hyper calvinism manifests itself it's a very dangerous thing it is and i think one of them i think one of the newsworthy uh people or groups that you see presently that embrace this view of hyper calvinism are the west borough baptist group yes they are hyper calvinist yes they are and uh they they uh they have no concern if you notice when they do their their marches and their their uh boycotting and all that kind of thing the signs that they carry and the things that they say they have no interest in seeing homosexuals for instance one to christ they they leave them uh in their damnation and rejoice in it they uh rejoice in the fact that unrepentant homosexuals will be damned but they have no interest in seeing them repent no they don't in fact i was at southern baptist convention years ago in indianapolis and i was headed out for a lunch break and as i went out onto the sidewalk to go to lunch there was a group of west borough baptist protesters standing there with their signs preaching uh at the red light in the inner city there and so it really disturbed me to watch that little boy stand next to his father as he's screaming hate -filled messages into the windows so after eating lunch i came back and as i was walking back by i just popped and started preaching the gospel to them so when when people would roll up to the red light and he would preach his false gospel into their windows into their into their cars um i would then echo the true gospel by pointing them to jesus christ and so i took a few minutes to just evangelize his son he he wouldn't listen to me um he called me a reprobate and other choice words uh but his son was captivated so i just took an opportunity to preach the gospel to his son and then uh but but but that group that they are just a prime example of what it means to be uh hyper calvinistic to preach judgment but no grace and we have to go to our first break right now if you'd like to join us on the air with a question of your own our email address is chris arnzen at gmail .com

30:12

c -h -r -i -s -a -r -n -z -e -n at gmail .com please include your first name at least your city and state of residence in your country of residence if you live outside the usa you may remain anonymous if it's about a personal and private matter that compels you not to identify yourself especially when you're asking things of a pastor that may be personal in fact if you're going to be saying anything negative about your own congregation we would insist that you remain anonymous or i will keep you anonymous but uh we look forward to hearing from you after these messages so don't go away we'll be right back with pastor josh bice of praise mill baptist church i'm chris arnzen host of iron sharpens iron radio and here's one of my favorite guests todd friel to tell you about a conference he and i are going to hello this is todd friel host of wretched radio and wretched tv and occasional guest on chris's show criticizing i think i think that's what it's called hoping that you can join chris and me at the g3 conference in atlanta my new hometown it is going to be a bang up conference called the g3 conference celebrating the 500th anniversary of the protestant reformation with paul washer steve lawson d .a

31:38

carson voddie bockham conrad and bayway phil johnson james white and a bunch of other people we hope to see you there learn more at g3 conference .com

31:46

g3 conference .com thanks todd i think see you at the iron sharpens iron exhibitors booth charles heddon's virgin once said give yourself unto reading the man who never reads will never be read he who never quotes will never be quoted he will not use the thoughts of other men's brains proves he has no brains of his own you need to read solid ground christian books is a publisher and book distributor who takes these words of the prince of preachers to heart the mission of solid ground christian books is to bring back treasures of the past to minister to christians in the present and future and to publish new titles that address burning issues in the church and the world since it's beginning in 2001 solid ground has been committed to publish god -centered christ exalting books for all ages we invite you to go treasure hunting at solid -ground -books .com

32:46

that's solid -ground -books .com and see what priceless literary gems from the past or present you can unearth from solid ground solid ground christian books is honored to be a weekly sponsor of iron sharpens iron radio i am chris arnson host of iron sharpens iron radio here to tell you about an exciting offer from world magazine my trusted source for news from a christian perspective try world at no charge for 90 days and get a free copy of r .c

33:19

sproles book relationship between church and state i rely on world because i trust the reporting i gain insight from the and world provides clarity to the news stories that really matter i believe you also find world to be an invaluable resource to better understand critical topics with a depth that's simply not found in other media outlets armed with this coverage world can help you to be a voice of wisdom in your family and your community this trial includes bi -weekly issues of world magazine on -scene reporting from world radio and the fully shareable content of world digital simply visit wmg .org

33:59

forward slash iron sharpens to get your world trial and dr sproles book all free no obligation with no credit card required visit world news group at wmg .org

34:13

forward slash iron sharpens today paul wrote to the church at galatia for am i now seeking the approval of man or of god or am i trying to please man if i were still trying to please man i would not be a servant of christ hi i'm mark lukens pastor of providence baptist church we are reformed baptist church and we hold to the london baptist confession of faith of 1689 we are in nofolk massachusetts we strive to reflect paul's mindset to be much more concerned with how god views what we say and what we do than how men view these things that's not the best recipe for popularity but since that wasn't the apostles priority it must not be ours either we believe by god's grace that we are called to demonstrate love and compassion to our fellow man and to be vessels of christ's mercy to a lost and hurting community around us and to build up the body of christ in truth and love if you live near norfolk massachusetts or plan to visit our area please come and join us for worship and fellowship you can call us at 508 -528 -5750 that's 508 -528 -5750 or go to our website to email us listen to past sermons worship songs or watch our tv program entitled resting in grace you can find us at providence baptist church ma .org

35:33

that's providence baptist church ma .org or even on sermonaudio .com providence baptist church is delighted to sponsor iron sharpens iron radio welcome back this is chris arnzen if you just tuned us in our first guest today for the last half hour and the next half hour to come is pastor josh bice senior pastor of praise mill baptist church of douglasville georgia we are discussing guardrails against hyper calvinism and if you'd like to join us on the air our email address is chrisarnzen at gmail .com

36:06

chrisarnzen at gmail .com we do have a listener in slovenia joe who asks please ask brother josh to address this thought since reformed theology aka calvinism is arrived at through a consistent hermeneutic and exegesis how do seminaries and those who graduate from them who affirm sola scriptura come to any other conclusion other than reformed understanding thank you for being a means of god's self sanctification in his church yeah i think that the answer to the question would be just be centered on the fact that when we study the bible although you know many well -meaning seminary professors do teach good hermeneutics and uh you know a good methodology of studying and expounding the scriptures unfortunately you still have a lot of baggage that's brought into play so we bring our preconceived notions or our beliefs and we sometimes are guilty of importing them into the text instead of expounding the truth from the text so that's how we end up believing you know what we believe oftentimes because we have been taught this that's why so many people are born armenians and they remain armenians because they've always just been taught this superficial view of of god's saving grace so i think that an awful lot of people although having been taught and given the tools of faithful exposition they still don't do a lot of faithful exposition if that makes sense so what you end up with is you end up with people who are just doing you know a superficial flyover or a shallow skimming of the text and they're not digging in and preaching expositionally through the word of god and so you know they might do an overview of john but they never deal with chapter 1 verses 12 and 13 they never deal with you know uh john chapter number 3 where the wind blows where it wishes and you can't control it they never deal with john chapter 6 they never deal with john chapter 17 and a host of others such as john chapter 10 so you know it's about rightly handling the word of god and unfortunately whether it's seminary professors or preachers pastors just an awful lot of times people aren't really doing solid exposition therefore they're missing a lot of depth in their doctrinal studies and of course obviously hyper calvinists are doing the same thing when they so want to jam calvinists calvinism i should say in every verse of scripture and eliminate anything that involves the responsibility of men uh they they wind up just doing the the same thing but coming up with an opposite conclusion than the armenians and um well we do have some other questions but i really wanted before i get to them i really wanted you to go through because we're going to obviously have to have you back to go through some more guardrails against hyper calvinism this is what we want to discuss today uh what would what would be some practical pastoral advice uh to other pastors perhaps and also just your average christians to prevent hyper calvinism not only from seeping into the church around you but even in your own mind and heart uh obviously there are uh i don't know if the situation is the same with you pastor josh but i have found that a lot of those who newly discover calvinism a lot of people have nicknamed that cage stage calvinism where there is a lot of aggressiveness and enthusiasm and excitement and zeal but no wisdom or tact behind it you have a lot of people in that group being hyper calvinistic in their approach but what what practical advice do you have uh to prevent this from becoming a bigger problem not only within the church but in your own mind a couple of very private trips would be simply this we heard the former um question from our brother who talked about sola scriptura but we need to also remember that the reformers were defenders of another view called tota scriptura that's right so uh the the totality of the bible is extremely important so when we're reading the bible you can't just camp out you know on you know romans chapter 9 or you know some passage that deals with the the very depth and width and height of god's sovereignty and salvation you must deal with the great commission that's actually in the bible and and jesus actually said for us to go out and to preach the gospel and to do so that the early disciples were sent out from you know from the area of jerusalem and then went throughout you know judea samaria and then to the uttermost part of the world and so if jesus sent us out to do that very thing to preach the gospel indiscriminately to everyone and then leave the results to god i think that that's exactly what we should be doing so the same bible that teaches that god is sovereign in saving people and he does so upon his own initiative and he does so in christ before the foundation of the world he also has ordained the mean by which these people come to faith so he could have being god he could have chosen to save people elected them in christ before the foundation of the world and then commissioned angels a host of heavenly angels to come down and preach the gospel and bring people to faith but that's not what he did he has commissioned his children to go out and to preach the gospel so just very simply from the beginning i would just encourage people as a guardrail to the errors of hyper calvinism is just to read and believe the totality of scripture second of all i would encourage people to read and understand church history so go and study the passionate missionary movement go and find out who william carey is or was and find out what william carey believed go and study and find out who adoniram judson was what he believed what he preached go find out who jim elliott was uh what he believed and what he preached i would encourage people to find out who george mueller was and what god did through that man of faith what he believed and what he preached about the doctrines of grace so all of these men that i've just named and notwithstanding as far as the former conversation goes charles spurgeon and others these men were robust calvinists but they were passionate evangelists and so i think that we need to have a good grasp of of the totality of scripture and a good understanding of the long line of men that we stand with in the shoulders that we stand upon and understand that we are called commissioned by christ himself to go out and preach the gospel amen and i let me think another thing is that those who have a hyper calvinistic tendency really have to understand that the fact that god uses means and human beings and preaching and evangelism and writing the fact that he uses means to save his people from their sins uh that does not nullify or contradict the fact that he is sovereign over their salvation one of the best texts i think that demonstrates uh god using means and and also clearly revealing that he is sovereign over someone's salvation is in acts 16 14 with lydia a woman named lydia from the city of thyatira uh a seller of purple fabrics a worshiper of god was listening and the lord opened her heart to respond to the things spoken by paul that's right and uh the other uh one of the verses that the i've never heard an adequate arminian response to uh ever uh is in acts 13 48 uh when you know paul is preaching uh to the uh the gentiles and when the gentiles heard the preaching of the gospel they began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the lord and as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed that's right but how did they believe right they gospel someone was commissioned to go and to preach amen so i mean over and over again you have these examples uh in the bible where god is clearly using means he's not using just the fact that uh people are born to godly parents or right he's not zapping people you know and uh eliminating all forms of evangelism to them uh right you know he is uh clearly even even the fact that he has ordained his word to be written uh i mean these people chris who are camped out in romans 9 they need to actually read a little further down into romans 10 where it actually says in verse 14 how will how then will they call on him and whom they have not believed question mark and how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard question mark and how are they to hear without someone preaching question mark and how are they to preach unless they are sent and so then it goes on and says as it is written how beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news so we are called to go and preach the good news because it's impossible for people to believe unless they hear the gospel amen let me take a couple of other of our listener questions we have seth in randleman north carolina what would pastor bice recommend for a pastor who has fellow elders who are sound theologically and preach the gospel but consider themselves synergistic in salvation how would he handle a situation like that would he say or do anything well i can't imagine you ever keeping your mouth shut in the midst of somebody having biblical error but or theological error but if you could answer to the best of your ability seth's question well i think that you know again as far as if it were me just say in my context i don't understand how someone becomes an elder who's preaching and teaching and has oversight and authority within the church that has such errors but i'm not going to get into the details of that i mean i'm sure that perhaps this individual inherited this problem or whatever else but you know when it comes to the idea of someone i guess cooperating between you know with god in the process of salvation that type of thing again i think that biblical orthodoxy is is key here um roman catholicism teaches a form of cooperation um with you know with god but as far as the scriptures are concerned and as far as the historic um orthodox christianity is concerned it's faith alone in christ alone for the remission of sins and even the faith romans or ephesians chapter 2 verses 8 and 9 for by grace have you been saved through faith and this is not of your own doing it is the gift of god when it talks about even faith there it is a part of the gift of god so it's grace the whole idea of god saving us we are undeserving in salvation this is god's god's grace his mercy his kindness toward us but even the faith that we believe god is the one who gifts us with repentance he is the one who gifts us with faith so um i just would take you know if it were me i would take these brothers through a a clear you know study of uh biblical soteriology what the bible actually teaches about salvation and just point out verse by verse by verse that it's faith alone in christ alone for the remission of sin it's in christ alone but yet even the faith that we that we exercise is given to us by god and so i would just go to the verses of scripture i would just spend time trying to disciple these men and to correct them in their errors uh and pastor george in enola pennsylvania sent me just now a very large article uh of an by an armenian pastor seeking to refute the calvinistic interpretation of acts 1348 obviously we don't have the time in eight minutes to go through an exhaustive article that i haven't even read yet pastor george but what i would like to do is i'm going to email this article to pastor josh and perhaps in a future interview we can go through this article because this this armenian uh author of this article goes through a number of points where he thinks that the calvinistic x attempts at exegeting acts 1348 are faulty perhaps if you uh after you read this article you might consider it worthy of another interview pastor josh sure i'll be happy great well so pastor george uh be patient and we'll let you know uh because i haven't even had a time to read this article obviously it's i'm on the air live right now and i just received it so perhaps at some point we will address uh that uh that article for you i would love to see what this armenian pastor has to say because it it's interesting that i have a friend from a church of christ background dr efflegard smith who wrote a book called troubling questions for calvinists and it was subtitled and the rest of us and uh he was honest he was honest enough to say that he had no answer to x 1348 and he believed that every effort from a non -calvinist that he had bred trying to interpret it in a different way than reformed exegetes have done he believed that they were uh pouring their own eisegesis into the text so even even even he as a non -calvinist could not come up with uh a response but but anyway um we do uh let's see we have tyler in mastic beach long island new york is it true that a hyper calvinist theology kills evangelism because they say that the elect are predestined to salvation in which they ignore matthew 28 um as far as like the great commission is that what speaking of chris i'm assuming that's what he means because obviously we do believe that the elect are predestined to salvation and we're not hyper calvinists but i guess he's i guess he's just talking about that being isolated alone as a truth and eliminating the great commission perhaps yeah yeah i think he's i think he's just hitting on the you know the whole foundational principle of hyper calvinism that divine sovereignty is emphasized to the exclusion of human responsibility and that you know if god if god before the foundation of the world has elected someone and chosen them in christ then they will be saved because god's will will come to pass so therefore the great commission is really not even necessary but again that's inconsistent that's cherry picking the bible that in other words that's saying i'm choosing to believe divine sovereignty and salvation i'm choosing to reject the the scriptures that teach the great commission so you know that they're guilty of just bypassing they're using the bible as a buffet to just get what they want instead of taking the totality of scripture and the uh the thing that we have to keep repeating is that those who are historically faithful biblically faithful calvinistic christians reformed christians believers in the doctrines of sovereign grace believe that we must passionately and fervently evangelize all that we meet and become acquainted with and all that we know and love with the gospel because we do not know who the elect are until god gives them a repentance and they become you know outward in their faith and we realize that they have been redeemed by christ but while in a lost condition we don't know who the elect are and and going back to what we've been saying but god uses means to draw his people unto himself such as the preaching of the word that's something that a drum that we have to keep beating isn't it it is you know the the idea that that you preach the gospel to everyone is essential in in biblical orthodoxy and and and it's what christ has commissioned us to do so hyper calvinism insisting that we don't preach the gospel to the you know the non -elect my question would just simply be how do we determine who the non -elect are and how do we preach the gospel only to the elect so again it's just it's just complete inconsistency and unfortunately it's it's it's a heresy and it must be rejected as a heresy and in some ways it's very selfish uh to believe that you have eternal life only because of the blood of christ and you're keeping that to yourself or keeping it confined to your own little club of people that is the height of selfishness it's like having the cure for a terminal disease that everyone around you is inflicted with and just watching them die and not sharing this this secret cure that you have yeah and one of the arms of this heresy which we don't have time to unpack is is in many times these people not only are selfish but they're also um almost joyful in the idea of god damning the reprobate because in many cases these hyper calvinists believe that god does not love in any you know in any way whatsoever he does not love the non -elect and so um again just complete inconsistency with the totality of scripture scary picking certain verses without uh understanding the full meaning of the text in relation to uh the full counsel and the whole counsel of god's word by the way pastor george in enola pennsylvania since you are a first -time questioner you are going to receive a free new american standard bible an absolutely beautiful edition of this translation with an embossed cross on the cover if you give us your full mailing address we will have that bible shipped out to you by cumberland valley bible book service cvbbs .com

57:22

so please email us your full mailing address pastor george and we'll have cvbbs .com

57:28

ship that out to you within a week or so thank you very much for joining us i'd like you to conclude now pastor josh with a final summation of what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners i think if i could just really encourage people you talk about guardrails albinism chris i would just simply state uh just very quickly that we must read the full counsel of god's word and we must believe every jot and every tittle of what scripture actually teaches so if we're reading the great commission and jesus gives us a commission to go out and preach the gospel to everyone indiscriminately calling everyone to repent then we must do that and we must do that with with a broken heart and tear -filled eyes and a passion and a compassion to see men women boys and girls come to faith alone and in christ alone for the remission of their sins but also when it comes to the idea of the difficulties of the robust understanding of god's sovereignty and salvation then we must believe that too and so many times the hyper calvinist will look at the armenian you know and and just critique them and say that the armenian is unwilling to believe the robustness of god's sovereignty and salvation but i think that we should all look at the the hyper calvinist and say that they're unwilling to believe the great commission and so read and understand the totality of the bible and study church history and know the the large figures of the missionary movement and see these men what they believed and how they obeyed the great commission even within the context and framework of a robust sovereign grace position we do have a listener david i'm not sure where he is from right now but he is very disappointed in our interview because of all the things he believes we left out well well perhaps david we can continue this discussion again on iron sharpens iron and as i've said at the outset of the broadcast we have talked about this before on the program and i don't intend to stop today but we only had an hour to discuss a very broad and deep and complicated issue that does not it's not monolithic as i've said so hopefully we will be able to continue this subject with pastor bice at some point in the future and we will address some of the points that you've brought up in your email so sorry david if we didn't get to all the issues that you wanted us to address but uh pastor josh bice it has been such a joy to interview you again and i want to give our listeners your uh your email addresses so first of all the g3 conference if anybody would like to register for that um i believe they have a room for about 500 more uh folks to register they have over 2 000 registered now and uh that is g3conference .com

01:00:37

g3conference .com and also praise mill baptist church's website is praisemill .com

01:00:45

praisemill .com and pastor josh's blog is delivered by grace .com

01:00:52

delivered by grace .com thank you so much pastor josh god willing i look forward to seeing you in january in atlanta georgia at the g3 conference god bless you chris thanks it's always a pleasure to be with you all right well god bless you brother and uh we are going to be joined any moment now by my pastor of grace baptist church in carlisle pennsylvania uh pastor david campbell uh who is the second guest today we are going to be talking about the lord's day why go to church twice on sundays and if you would like to join us with a question about that our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com

01:01:37

chrisarnson at gmail .com and please give us your first name your city and state and your country of residence if you live outside of the usa and uh please only remain anonymous if it's something about an issue that is personal and private and intimate and you really really would rather not identify yourself other than that please give us at least your first name city and state and country of residence we will be right back after these messages so don't go away linbrook baptist church on 225 earl avenue in linbrook long island is teaching god's timeless truths in the 21st century our church is far more than a sunday worship service it's a place of learning where the scriptures are studied and the preaching of the gospel is clear and relevant it's like a gym where one can exercise their faith through community involvement it's like a hospital for wounded souls where one can find compassionate people in healing we're a diverse family of all ages enthusiastically serving our lord jesus christ in fellowship play and together hi i'm pastor bob waldeman and i invite you to come and join us here at linbrook baptist church and see all that a church can be call in brook baptist at 516 -599 -9402 that's 516 -599 -9402 or visit linbrookbaptist .org

01:02:55

that's linbrookbaptist .org chris arnzen here and i can't wait to head down to atlanta georgia and here's my friend dr james white to tell you why hi i'm james white of alpha and omega ministries i hope you join me at the g3 conference hosted by pastor josh vice and praise mill baptist church at the georgia international convention center in atlanta january 19th through the 21st in celebration of the 500th anniversary of the protestant reformation i'll be joined by paul washer steve lawson da carson vody balkan conrad and bayway phil johnson rosaria butterfield todd friel and a host of other speakers who are dedicated to pillars of what g3 stands for gospel grace and glory for more details go to g3 conference .com

01:03:50

that's g3 conference .com thanks james make sure you greet me at the iron sharpens iron exhibit booth while you're there i'm james white of alpha omega ministries the new american standard bible is perfect for daily reading or in -depth study used by pastors scholars and everyday readers the nasb is widely embraced and trusted as a literal and readable bible translation the nasb offers clarity and readability while maintaining high accuracy to the original languages which the nasb is known for the nasb is available in many editions like a topical reference bible researched and prepared by biblical scholars devoted to accuracy the new topical reference bible includes contemporary topics relevant to today's issues from compact to giant print bibles find an nasb that fits your needs very affordably at nasbible .com

01:04:40

trust discover and enjoy the nasb for yourself today go to nasbible .com that's nasbible .com

01:04:47

tired of bop store christianity of doing church in a warehouse with all the trappings of a rock concert do you long for a more traditional and reverent style of worship and how about the preaching perhaps you've begun to think that in -depth biblical exposition has vanished from long island well there's good news wedding river baptist church exists to provide believers with a meaningful and reverent worship experience featuring the systematic exposition of god's word and this loving congregation looks forward to meeting you call them at 631 -929 -3512 for service times 631 -929 -3512 or check out their website at wrbc .us

01:05:31

that's wrbc .us welcome back this is chris arnzen if you just tuned us in our second guest today is my pastor at least right now he is uh his name is david campbell and he is the pastor of grace baptist church of carlisle pennsylvania uh he started his position there as christ under shepherd for that congregation in 2002 and now he has accepted a call to north preston evangelical church in northern england in fact he will be leaving the united states in a matter of days so this may be the last opportunity i have to interview pastor david in the studio i hope to have many more interviews with him over the phone and perhaps when he visits the united states as well but it's my honor and privilege to welcome you back into the studio of iron sharpens iron pastor david campbell it's good to be with you chris thank you welcome yes pastor campbell and before we even go into our subject at hand the lord's day why go to church twice on sundays which is a book you wrote for day one publications among other books you have written for them uh tell us about a north preston evangelical church in northern england which has given you a pastoral call and after much prayer and heart -wrenching contemplation you have accepted their call and plan to fly there and serve as their under shepherd in in probably a matter of weeks though yes thank you chris uh this sunday sunday 20th will be my final sunday in grace baptist church after 14 years and three months so it's going to be an emotionally charged and difficult day i'm sure leaving a much loved people behind me we fly out on monday and i'm due to arrive in preston in the northwest of england in lancashire on the 30th of november and god willing begin my ministry on sunday 4th of december now this really is a huge change at many different levels obviously huge change of country i'm now going back to my native land at least as far as great britain is concerned i was 15 years in the northeast of england in the town of darlington before coming to america in 2002 and now with my wife i'm going back to the northwest of england there's about two hours between the two just on the other side of the country preston is a city i believe of about 140 000 people and it's just north of manchester and liverpool and it has a large muslim population and is really a strategic place for evangelism just north of that you're into a very beautiful part of england the lake district and to the east the lancashire fells and the yorkshire dales so being a lover of the outdoors and walking i am eager to savor the delights of that's a very beautiful part of the northwest of england so how did i come to be leaving grace baptist church and going to north preston i've heard it was because of me joining the church well actually chris it is to do with you but it's to stop you inviting me to come onto your show i thought this is the only way to escape no i shall be delighted to join you from england as well uh i was uh i was put in contact with the north preston church back last year and then the contact was renewed earlier this year i was due to be speaking at the banner of truth lester conference in april and i was asked by the north preston church to preach on the lord's days either side of the conference which i did and then was invited to come back with my wife at the start of our vacation in july spend a delightful weekend with the folks there and subsequent to that was given a unanimous call to that church and i felt very strongly that though it is a wrench to leave the folks here and we're leaving a daughter and son -in -law here but it is the call of the lord that i go so let me tell you a little bit about north preston evangelical church yes it dates from the 80s and under its first pastor david white it grew very considerably they were able to build and pay off a building in the mid 90s and things continued to go well until david's health around 2007 2008 necessitated him stepping down from the ministry they were vacant for a while they then called another man things did not go well with that pastorate and the upshot of it was that this brother resigned a lot of members left and in the fallout from it the elders either resigned or left and so it's a church that has been through the wars but in the love and kindness of god things have turned a corner there is a joy and a unity in the church the five deacons who have had to take responsibility for the leadership of the church are all fine men it's been a pleasure to get to know them a number of the former elders are still a part of the church and very lovingly integrated into its life and the the desire and need is for a pastor with some experience and the hope is that in days to come i may be able to lead them in the establishment of a new eldership so i'm not going to be doing anything about that all through 2017 other than just keep my eyes open and we will see how things go i think it's just a time for the congregation to get to know me a time for things to stabilize and hopefully to grow as the new ministry begins people there are very much looking forward it's very humbling but they're very much looking forward to my arrival with my wife and i'm increasingly looking forward to taking up the reins of ministry there will be very different from the previous two churches where there was an established eldership to work with i will be the sole elder at least to begin with and perhaps some of the listeners can identify with that it's no uncommon thing so i'll have the responsibility for mentoring some of these men and hopefully see how they develop as potential future fellow elders so there we are that's north preston evangelical church has got a website so please feel free to visit that website just google north preston evangelical church and there it will come up well i've got it right here it's npec .org

01:14:04

.uk and npec for north preston evangelical church npec .org

01:14:13

.uk and the church that you have pastored since 2002 where i am a member grace baptist church of carlisle pennsylvania that is a reformed baptist church is confessionally reformed adhering to the 1689 london baptist confession that website is grace baptist carlisle .org

01:14:37

grace baptist carlisle c -a -r -l -i -s -l -e .org how different to your knowledge is this church in north preston england to what you are now leaving well in some ways chris it will be very much the same other ways it will be very different at our recent congregational meeting and a report was given on the membership and we have got between 230 and 240 members of grace baptist at the moment you need to begin by striking 200 off that to get some idea of the size of the church the just over 30 members now perhaps double that maybe more in connection with the church and an attendance but so it's a very much smaller church than i've been used to so that's going to be very different straight away but as far as doctrine and worship they would be very much on the same page as grace baptist church carlisle it would be reformed in their theology and would have very similar approach to worship that we're familiar with at grace so considerable difference as far as the the size of the congregation uh but we're very much alike in terms of the things that matter most it will be a little easier to pastor in the sense of being a visitor to the congregation because i do love to visit and this will be a much more manageable number of people to visit regularly um so yes that will be different in some very important respects well i hope that uh our listeners in the uk when they are visiting the northwest of england or even those listening outside of the uk that visit the uk if they are in the northwestern area of of the of england that they come and visit you on a lord's day and especially we hope that those who live near enough to attend regularly and join that congregation those of our listeners who are without a church or perhaps the church that they are members of or are attending perhaps those churches are unfortunately unbiblical they are discovering that they have strayed far from the true teachings of scripture or perhaps never adhered to them to begin with we hope that there are many people that find a new church home with you as a result of listening to this broadcast and uh and i really do hope that you return often by phone and that will be on my dime i've just uh discovered that it's only when i interviewed uh mark johnston in wales it only cost about ten dollars for a two -hour discussion with him on the phone so i was very pleased with that very uh happy that it was not as expensive as i thought it might be but um and so before we even go into your topic at hand about the lord's day you had written a book that we briefly discussed on another interview handle that new call with care i guess you had to dust that book off that you wrote yourself and read it when you were making this decision i did read it and it didn't give me all the answers i think you're gonna have to put an appendix to it no it's an interesting fact that when i was called to grace baptist church which is really the the situation out of which the book came because when i was wrestling with the call back in 2002 i had no book that was really of any great help to me uh the most important source of help was apart from scripture was the biographies of ministers who had wrestled with the situation and it was in my mind at the time i must do a paper on this sometime give an address on accepting or declining a call staying put or moving on and reference some of this biographical material and i was subsequently invited by day one to actually contribute a book length treatment of it so that book came out of the struggles and it was a struggle i was given a call in march of 2002 and that the month that ensued was one of the most difficult months through which i ever lived everyone else was sure that i ought to accept the call i was not clear in my mind and for me the the whole situation is quite evenly weighed so i was thankful that eventually the lord did give me peace and i hope that the book i know the book has been helpful to others when it came to this there was wrestling but the wrestling actually was prior to receiving the call i had the months between april when i visited twice in july when i went back with my wife just to think through the whole thing in principle uh wrestling with going for example to a much smaller congregation uh what was perhaps uh you know on the surface of a narrower sphere of ministry also uh leaving the congregation here uh etc etc and i really came in principle to the conviction that it is for me for ministers to discern the lord's mind and to leave the whole issue of the breadth or narrowness of a sphere of ministry and the fruitfulness of that entirely in the lord's hands and a passage or actually more than a passage a section of scripture that helped me more than anything else was the last part of the book of acts which i preached through two or three years back and just thinking about the experience of paul here's this man height of his powers traveling far and wide and he goes to jerusalem and all of a sudden he's under lock and key and it was his ambition to go to rome it was his prayer to go to rome he sends the call to go to rome and he did go to rome but it was in very different circumstances and in a very different time scale from that which had been left up to him he would have gone for so it's what three years maybe before he gets to rome and all of that time he's under arrest and when he does get to rome this is a prisoner and not as a free man and he's under house arrest chained to a roman soldier and yet in that apparently much more restricted sphere of service the most amazing things happened we have letters like the letter to the philippians to the aphesians to the colossians to philemon which have under the blessing of god done incalculable good throughout christian history those letters came out of that period he could write these marvelous words to the philippians i want you to know that what's happened to me has actually turned out for the spread of the gospel because he's chained to all these soldiers he's sharing the gospel with them and as a result the gospel is spreading throughout the palace guard all of which is to say is that from what from a human point of view seemed a restricting of the sphere of his service actually under the power of god wonderfully enlarged it as history was to prove the bottom line is we have to leave these things with god to go from a congregation of 240 members to one that's just over 30 may seem as if you know you're placing your ministry in a much narrower sphere but god can use that in extraordinary ways it's not for me to question now i mean none of you listeners may have wrestled with that i wrestled hard with that and i really came through the impact of scripture to a settled peace and joy uh just to quietly trustingly leave it in his hands the upshot of it was when they when they gave me this unanimous call and it was important that it be unanimous because it's a small congregation i could have accepted it there and then and there was nothing of the wrestling for a month that there was uh when i was given a call to grace i i could have accepted it there and then i didn't because my loving congregation here these dear people here did not know what was happening and it was important that i go back and take time to explain the situation put it to the test of their counsel and their prayers and they have been wonderfully supportive hearts are sad it's a good thing that hearts are sad it's better that they be it's better that they be sad and that they be glad i'm going but i think there's a real sense in the congregation that this is the call of god and so i go with the the blessing of the lawrence people the blessing of the eldership the blessing of the congregation as a whole i know that i go with their love i know that i go with their prayers they rejoice for me although sad at the same time that i'm leaving so it's another little dimension to you know the kind of things that i've been writing about and it's been good just to see how that the principles are at work and just playing themselves out perhaps in a different way yes and i know that one of the major factors that was involved was that your age you're i believe 55 i am on the cusp of 56 okay chris yes i mean that's true i had 15 years just under 15 years in darlington i've been here for 14 years and three months i've said to many people i think i'm a middle distance runner my predecessor was here for 39 years jeff thomas has just retired after 50 years long distance runners i think i'm a middle distance runner chris and after nearly 15 years in darlington i was ready for a change and i think in god's providence the time has come in different ways for a change here and my hope is that god will renew my strength and spare me to perhaps if he so wills that give an equal amount of time to north preston evangelical church i don't know what the future will hold i mean solemnly we don't know what a single day may hold but uh yes at a number of different levels i think the time has come i've also always had the desire to go back and do something in my own country a lot of ministers come to america and in god's providence and i would not find fault with this because god is sovereign they stay but i am always delighted when men go back because the needs in great britain are so huge and so mark johnston has gone back and is ministering in wales dr simper ferguson has gone back and he's busy and active in dundee and of course in this wonderful writing ministry and i'm very just just very thankful for the privilege and open door to go back and do something i hope for the lord's cause in my own native land well i hope that everybody listening will pray for pastor david campbell and also pray for the north preston evangelical church and that website again is npec .org

01:28:30

.uk np for north preston ec for evangelicalchurch .org

01:28:36

.uk and also don't forget to pray for grace baptist church of carlisle as they seek for a new pastor and obviously that is going to be a very important event in the life of this church and the website there is gracebaptistcarlisle .org

01:28:59

gracebaptistcarlisle .org we're going to get our final break of the program today and when we return we're going to be touching a little bit on pastor david's book one of his books the lord's day why go to church twice on sundays and if you have any questions our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com

01:29:21

chrisarnson at gmail .com don't go away we'll be right back with pastor david campbell iron sharpens iron radio is sponsored by harvey cedars a year -round bible conference and retreat center nestled on the jersey shore harvey cedars offers a wide range of accommodations to suit groups up to 400 for generations christians have enjoyed gathering and growing at harvey cedars each year thousands of high school and college students come and learn more about god's word an additional 9 000 come annually to harvey cedars as families couples singles men women pastors seniors and missionaries 90 miles from new york city 70 miles from philly and 95 miles from wilmington and easily accessible scores of notable christian groups frequently plan conferences at harvey cedars like the navigators intervarsity christian fellowship campus crusade and the alliance of confessing evangelicals find harvey cedars on facebook or at hcbible .org

01:30:36

hcbible .org call 609 -494 -5689 609 -494 -5689 harvey cedars where christ finds people and changes lives iron sharpens iron welcomes solid rock remodeling to our family of sponsors serving south central pennsylvania solid rock remodeling is focused on discovering understanding and exceeding your expectations they deliver personalized project solutions with exceptional results solid rock remodeling offers a full range of home renovations including kitchen and bath remodeling decks porches windows and doors roof and siding and more for a clear detailed professional estimate call this trustworthy team of problem solvers who provide superior results that stand the test of time call solid rock remodeling at 717 -697 -1981 717 -697 -1981 or visit solidrockremodeling .com

01:32:02

that's solidrockremodeling .com solid rock remodeling bringing new life to your home thrive in financial is not your typical financial services provider as a membership organization we help christians be wise with money and live generously every day and for the fourth year in a row we were named one of the world's most ethical companies by the ethosphere institute a leading international think tank dedicated to the creation advancement and sharing of best practices in business ethics contact me mike gallagher financial consultant at 717 -254 -6433 again 717 -254 -6433 to learn more about the thriving we know we were made for so much more than ordinary life lending faith finances and generosity that's the thriving story welcome back this is chris arnzen if you just tuned us in our guest today for the second hour is pastor david campbell who has been the pastor of grace baptist church of carlisle pennsylvania from 2002 through this month in 2016 and he has now accepted a call a senior pastor of north preston evangelical church in northern england right now we're going to be addressing his book the lord's day why go to church twice on sundays and what was the catalyst that really compelled you to write this book to begin with pastor david well first of all thank you chris for the opportunity to come and talk about this day one uh that publishes this is some of the readers will know that is from the first day of the week that's actually the publishing arm of the lord's day observance society and when i lived in england i was involved with the lord's day or ldos as it's more commonly known as not to be confused with the lds the latter -day saints this is the lord's day observance society so it's quite an old institution and i was on their council and involved in you know some of the decision making with regard to day one so the very fact that i was on that council reflects my convictions about the fourth commandment being of contemporary relevance that the law of god continues to have its application to today that though we no longer gather for worship on the seventh day we gather on the first day it is still the outworking of the ancient sabbath principle that there is one day in seven now the lord's day the first day of the week that is set apart as a very special day a holy day a day that is to be different from the other days of the week and to be viewed very much as a gift the sabbath was made for man originally and the lord's day is his gift to his people for their benefit and blessing so i love the lord's day and i've always been committed to it and the catalyst for this book i suppose that the thing that really prompted me more than anything else was uh an article in the day one magazine by an english minister by the name of john benton john benton's name may be familiar to some of the listeners and this was a reprint of an article that he had contributed to evangelicals now which is a news christian newspaper that he himself edits and i think it was quite a similar title to this why go to church twice on sundays and he began by lamenting the fact that all through christian history there has been a practice of attending twice on the lord's day morning and evening or morning and afternoon and it's only really in recent decades that the church has in significant numbers ceased that time -honored ancient practice and then he went on to give i think my memory served me maybe seven good reasons for the practice of coming out twice on the lord's day it's so to seed in my mind it's dovetailed with the convictions that i've had as a pastor that you know members of the church should come out twice on the lord's day and it's something that i have endeavored to encourage we've never made it a matter of of ironclad obligation where it's never been a an issue of church discipline but nevertheless as a pastor and as a board we have tried to encourage attendance twice on the lord's day anyway uh i read this uh little article by by john benton and i thought i would like to write something for our own congregation so this uh booklet that day one has published the lord's day why go to church twice on sunday began as a booklet specifically for grace baptist church hmm and it followed much the same track as john benton's article but was considerably longer uh went into detail on a number of the reasons uh it subsequently came to the attention of the editors of the uh of day one and they have a series called sundays are great days and they have uh now just recently well that's in the past year i think it was i think it published last year and if you're familiar if the readers are familiar many of them with uh ultimate questions yes this booklet is the same size and in a not dissimilar format in that it's not just text there's lots of color illustrations uh just to make it an attractive uh booklet and it's probably about the same length as ultimate questions so you know that will give you some idea of of what it is crucially we have a listener in slovenia joe who says please ask brother campbell to address how one would who isn't the pastor or or an elder go about encouraging a young church to meet twice on sundays that has never met twice on sundays thank you for standing against unhealthy trends and stirring us onward to fidelity to christ well if it's not too bold a thing to say uh it might be helpful uh to this brother to actually have a copy of this booklet or a bunch of copies well this is this is the great thing about this is it's at such a price that you can actually buy multiple copies and give it out to the church maybe my suggestion would be that he would give or even if he's not able to access this to go and talk to his pastor if he does have a copy of this give it to the pastor and try to engage with the leadership and encourage them to think uh about sunday evening worship if if there's no uh progress in that and uh or whilst that's developing uh it might be good for this brother to start something in his own home maybe to have a little bible study a little prayer meeting so that uh yeah and to do it with the if possible with the support of the leadership of the church it's not taking folks away from something else and who knows how that might grow as god's people they meet together as a church on the sunday morning but then this brother has them perhaps to their home to his home and they pray together this maybe listen to a tape or a tape cd uh i'm getting old on the tooth here chris no tapes nowadays i was in a christian bookshop recently and they had some old stock and here was one book saying how to start a tape ministry and i thought the boys and girls and young people of grace baptist wouldn't know what a tape is so after that little digression back to i mean this is a really good question uh maybe have watch a video uh listen to a dvd cd and just have fellowship and see where that gets to and perhaps some of the lord's people who are part of that track will begin to appreciate the the blessing of of coming out twice in the lord's day you uh have uh given some precedents that were set in the old testament in the synagogue and in church history for this twice obviously in the old testament would have been sunday would have been on the sabbath the saturday sabbath but uh there was a twice uh a week observance for this uh day set apart by god so if you could uh yes it i mean the the roots of this go very far back and you have a pattern on the jewish sabbath of morning and evening sacrifice which would have been morning probably and sometime in the afternoon you have the words of psalm 92 it is good to praise the lord and to make music to your name almost high to proclaim your love in the morning and your faithfulness at night so again you have this balance of of the morning and the evening the synagogue patterned itself on the temple and on the sabbath day uh the the people met twice at the very same time as the morning and evening sacrifices were being observed in the temple and when you come into early church history now in terms of the the first century things are a little obscure but uh in subsequent centuries there's clear testimony to the fact that the lord's people habitually met in the morning and in the evening but you know even even in the scriptures you have the observance of holy communion is the lord's supper it was an evening meeting and paul of course gathered with the saints for the breaking of bread it was an evening meeting and paul went on till midnight and then right on till the following morning uh the saints are together in the day of pentecost it's nine o 'clock in the morning so they've gathered in the morning and they gathered in the evening for the lord's supper so there's evidence even in scripture there's an echo of it uh i would not want to say that the scripture commands us to meet twice on the lord's day but you can get away from the fact that have traditionally uh god's people have gathered morning and evening for worship and that has been the pattern all through church history would you say that much in the same way of tithing not being specifically a command in the new testament that christians should not look for reasons to do less than the old testament saint did in much the same way as you're talking about the repetition of times of worship on the lord's day i think that's a it's an interesting parallel i haven't thought that one through chris i mean i i would tend to agree with you that tithing is not an obligation but i think you would have a very good reason for not tithing uh at least tithing what the lord gives you but uh i think you know you you you see the pattern in the old testament pattern the synagogue the pattern in the new testament church and it was john benton who asked this question are we now in well let me get let me give you the quote are we wiser and better christians than all those who have gone before us or is it actually because we are succumbing to the secular spirit of our age which marginalizes god have we fallen into just doing the minimum and that's a very searching question uh one of the the sections of this booklet challenges god's people to examine themselves and to to ask well why if you don't want to come out twice in the lord's day or have a some kind of gathering with the saints again on the lord's day why is that is it because once is enough is it because you would rather be doing other things on the lord's day and if so what does that indicate about your spiritual state what does that indicate about your priorities and that is particularly searching for those who have been in the habit of coming out twice in the lord's and now are not doing that ask yourself is this a sign of growth am i a better christian a more useful christian or is it rather that this is indicative of a spiritual decline this is actually just a symptom of something else something deeper that really needs to be addressed harrison in mechanicsburg pennsylvania wants to know for churches that are far away for most in the congregation to attend twice would you recommend having an afternoon meal at the church itself where people would stay there the whole day and then have their evening worship afterward yes i mean there's there's different things that you can do historically the churches in my native land for example that the tradition was a forenoon and an afternoon service and then the evenings would be spent at home and fathers would catechize their children and you know they would just seek to put the lord's day evening to a good use and you know particularly in country areas where people walked to church and it may take them an hour a couple of hours to get there and they would meet and they would have you know they would bring something to eat and then they would have the afternoon service and then they would have to get to walk back before it got dark so it mean the practicalities of you know life in those days a morning and an afternoon service just dovetailed with that my friend john miller i was i was talking he's a church planter in clarksville tennessee covenant baptist church they've just recently had to relocate they have been you had been using a seventh -day adventist church and they've eventually rented a united methodist church building and they meet now in the afternoon and john was telling me that they had the afternoon service then they had a sunday school and then they had a fellowship meal and then they had the evening worship so things are much more compressed so yes i think it's a great thing when if a lot of people are traveling a great distance if that's really where the congregation is then let's not bind ourselves by laws that the bible hasn't but rather seek to as best we can observe this pattern and get the benefit and blessing of it you seem to emphasize in the book that one of the reasons you're recommending or urging the church to uh twice meaning twice on the lord's day is the fact that it is the lord's day and that people should be dedicating most of that day in uh worship of him and learning about him and singing praise to him etc and fellowshipping with his people yes uh morning and evening worship gives expression to the fact that god has given us not just a special morning but a special day that is a great help when it comes to keeping the whole day holy which is what we should be trying to do because it's our new testament sabbath the lord's day it gives a sense of beginning and ending the day with god as the church of god has historically done and i think these are great advantages that come from evening worship now arnie in perry county pennsylvania wants to know how do you answer objections to those who say that the twice uh meeting twice on the lord's day prevents intimate family get -togethers privately in their homes uh for especially for those who work six days a week well that's a very good question uh i would say first of all that there is nothing better that christians can do as families than come together to church and if possible to do that twice it's a great family thing to do and dad and mom kids they're together in god's house and the children are learning to worship god what better family thing to do it is a fact that historically i mentioned this a moment ago that you know historically that you know this is well documented in biography and in church history i think of my native land where very very strong views of the sabbath were kept uh it's one of the distinguishing marks of scottish christianity was its love for the lord's day and you would have the pattern of forenoon and afternoon worship and then in the evenings uh you know the whole time would be spent with the children family would gather father would catechize them they would sing and they would discuss the sermon and yes i'm sure human nature being as it is there were places where that was a weariness and it was done harshly but i have come across endless testimony chris from children who become ministers looking back on a godly father on a well -kept sabbath loving the influence of that so how do you spend the afternoon and i speak as a father i mean i we've got two girls who who are now adults and they're married and i am deeply thankful that they have high views of the lord's day themselves we had morning and evening worship they had an afternoon sunday school but we still had time together we would often go for a walk on sunday afternoon and we just enjoy being out together that's perfectly fine when they were older you know that we would have special times after the evening service when we're all relaxed at the end of the day there is no incompatibility between the observance of coming out twice on the lord's day and having quality family time which is a very important thing for the lord's day and i'm assuming from things that you've already said that we have to be careful no matter what conviction we are drawn to hold from our study of the scriptures and history and examining our consciences before god as to our motivations for doing things that we must be careful not to harshly judge other christians who view things differently than we do i agree and i would make it my starting point that there is no there's no commandment of scripture we're dealing with something that is it really begins for me with the fact that the lord's day is the lord's day and that you come you come to this question that you must ask how can i put the lord's day to the best use for the sake of my soul for the sake of my children for the sake of my fellow christians for the sake of the world i'm our witness uh we are bombarded with the world's six days god's book is a big book uh he's given us a pastor he's given us freedom he's given us time and place to meet how can we make best use of that and you turn to the bible and you turn to church history and you find that that the answer to that has been morning and evening and i would say have a very good reason for not doing it before you give up on it and considering all the benefits and blessings that there are that flow from that i would say be positive about it and you know even even to to christians who conscientiously don't believe that the fourth commandment applies to today uh who believe that they're at liberty to use the day as they would wish i would still say face up to the challenge of making the very best use of liberty that you believe that you have how can you best put that to use for your benefit and the benefit of others and the answer of church history is well here's one way and i say after all this time and the ancient pattern are we wiser than the whole church of christ uh and the experience of all the saints i think that that is the wisest and best use of the time that we have well i'd like you uh in the three minutes or actually less than three minutes about two minutes that we have left to really just unburden your heart and leave our listeners with what you most want etched in their hearts and minds today in this program

01:57:45

Robert Murray McShane great scottish divine wrote a tract called i love the lord's day and i i want to stress to people the lord's day is not a burden and don't think about it as something but of an exacting god but it is the gift of a gracious god who loves us who knows what's best for us and to come to the lord's day and to this whole question of how i'm going to use it with that in mind that god knows what's best for us he knows our physical needs he knows our spiritual needs he knows our emotional and mental needs and our need for one another our need for the lord's supper and worship and he's given us this day he's given us in this nation liberty and brothers and sisters and pastors and make the best use of that how can i best use the gift and i think it was dr joseph piper who spoke about use the analogy of fencing off the lord's day and i love that illustration fence it off from the other days of the week and guard it be jealous for it for your own sake and for your family's sake well pastor campbell it has been a joy to have you in the studio i hope it's not the last time you're in the studio but certainly we are going to make every effort to interview you by phone as often as we can in the future and the website for the church that you will now be pastoring is npec .org