Love and Truth and False Bifurifications

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ, based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the Apostle Paul said, �But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

In short, if you like smooth, watered-down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn�t for you. By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we�re called by the Divine Trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King.

Here�s our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth.

Truth, Love, and the False Bifurcation Between Teaching and Loving

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry. Pastor Steve, welcome. Thank you.

Thank you for having me. Yes. Are you going to give me like 10 seconds before you interrupt and turn over to a panel? Yeah.

That�s right. Well, our Tuesday shows, you know, are maybe a couple weeks delayed, but I think you�re referring to when Dizzy Gillespie was on the Tonight Show? Yes. It was quite some time ago, but, you know, he sure can play those horns well.

And then Johnny immediately turned to Bruce Hornsby in the range.

That�s right. Now, don�t forget, if you want to write Steve or follow him, you can do both of those. The following would take place under the Tuesday Guy at Twitter, and the emailing would be TuesdayGuy at NoCompromiseRadio .com.

Is that right? Sure. Or is it the Tuesday Guy? Sure. Am I on? Let�s see. Is this thing working? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I think I can hear you. Okay. Good. Yeah. We�ll see. What happens is I usually like the headphone volume louder than you do, but for your sake, I turn it down.

I think I must be deafer.

Well, you used to listen to louder music. Deaf. I think I listen to better music. Like? Go ahead. Go ahead. You name your favorite artist, and we�ll let the audience decide, because I think they�ll go,.

�Who

Well, you know what? For me, it was like, I never really liked Dire Straits, but I thought he could play the guitar. Yes, he can. See? Because my guess is you�re the Dire Straits kind of guy. Making movies on location.

See? I knew that. Did he sing a song with Sting, though? Yeah. I think he did. What was that called? Money for Nothing. Yeah, that�s right. All right. Well, to start off our show today, the tweet is a little aged, but not quite as old as the Johnny Carson show reference.

Is it like a fine wine? Does it get better? Steve. There�s this Florida guy, Twitter feed, and he posts things that are crazy in Florida. Just extreme depravity stuff. There was a guy, you�d appreciate this, just yesterday, June 5th, I believe.

And he was filmed on top of a police car, dancing. And he said he was running from vampires. How do you know he wasn�t? I did some kind of Twitter hashtag Barnabas Collins or something. So you can get a lot of interesting stuff on Twitter, including Francis Chan�s at Crazy Love.

Do you follow him at all? Negative. Yeah. Okay.

I mean, I�m a huge Twitter fan. Don�t get me wrong. I usually spend 15, 16 hours a day on Twitter.

Yeah, well, they say most people in America now consume eight hours of media per day. It�s a full-time job. Consume. Yeah, see, we�re consumers. Steve, I�m going to give you the quote from Francis�s Twitter feed, and then you can just talk to me about it.

What�s good? What�s bad? Do you like the guy? He seems like a nice guy, likes to surf, wears those tight t-shirts and jeans and stuff.

I like to say that I live to surf, and then I correct myself, and then I say I live to serve. Oh, that�s right.

I think that was Rob Bell. Hey, Rob Bell�s coming to Boston at the House of Blues.

That�s fantastic. Is he on guitar, or what�s he? Should we go? I think he�s playing with Paul Weller. I mean, what is it, an open mic night with Rob Bell?

No, it�s some opera tour or something.

Stand-up comedy with Rob Bell. Yeah, yeah.

I think you know what he�s turning into, Steve, Rob Bell, is who�s the guy that does the firewalking stuff? Tony somebody. Soprano. No. Tony� Tony Campolo. Well, see, there�s lots of guys out there like that, but he�s a different guy.

He�s a dark-haired, probably 50 now, chiseled kind of chin, and he does a lot of firewalking.

I don�t know. Firewalking, really not my thing. Yeah, okay.

Francis Chan, making disciples, so far so good, what do you think?

Making disciples is a great idea.

Isn�t about gathering people to listen to you teach. The real focus isn�t on teaching people at all. It�s on loving them.

Why do I feel like we should be breaking into Minnie Riperton right now?

Well, Steve, you know, I think here�s what�s happening out there.

People are like, who�s Minnie Riperton? All I�ll say is she had an amazing voice, and she sang a really dopey song called �Loving You.

What�s the one that�s �Loving Me, Loving You

Well, that�s �Sweet Caroline. That�s Neil Diamond. Oh, that is. Yeah. That�s correct.

Only it�s �Touching Me, Touching You. I�ve never seen Neil Diamond in concert or anything like that.

I actually saw him at Fenway. We were there after the first Saturday game after the bombing in Boston, and he was actually there in person. To do the whole spiel. Yeah, the shtick. Okay.

But I have seen Neil Sadaka. I�m just kidding. Sadaka is back. And so, Steve, tell us, is it wrong to make a bifurcation, a differentiation between teaching and loving? What do you think he was doing and isn�t teaching people loving them?

So many things I want to say here. I think a lot of people like to make this bifurcation, but those people are typically people who sit in the pew and who really don�t, they don�t take the full weight of teaching people as to what it is.

I mean, it�s a great responsibility to teach people. And in fact, when you spend many, many hours, I mean, how many hours do you spend preparing a Sunday morning sermon?

Well, in the old days, probably 30 to 60 hours, and then as I�ve grown in knowledge, it�s less and less. So, maybe 12 or something.

I thought you were going to say 60. As I�ve grown in knowledge and grace, 60 to 90.

No, it�s just less now because I have accumulated data and knowledge. And so, you know, it�s probably 10 to 12 or 15 or something, 20, I don�t know. 10 to 12.

Well, even so, you know, you think about that and you go, well, how much thought goes into our typical conversation, our typical, you know, interaction with people? So, a lot more thought and preparation goes into and, you know, study, obviously, into a sermon than a typical phrase or, you know, greeting or whatever that we throw out to somebody.

But it�s not loving to preach the Word of God. I�m like, well, it kind of is, because you don�t get up there on Sunday morning, correct me if I�m wrong, you don�t get up there to make yourself look good.

You go up there to proclaim the truth and for the good of the people. So, it�s for the glory of God and for the good of his people, right? And so, that�s not loving? I don�t know. It�s just a wrong bifurcation.

Making disciples, teaching people is loving. Now, it�s not all-encompassing, but there isn�t, you know, I need one of those Venn diagrams right now, you know. But it definitely falls in the loving camp.

It�s not a full definition of loving, but it is loving.

Now, I bet you, Francis would say, well, this is only Twitter and 140 characters, of course, I mean, you should teach the people because I believe in the Great Commission, teaching them to observe all that I�ve commanded you.

Of course, I believe all these things, but it�s just kind of Twitter. But Steve, you know, there�s this Twitter attitude with the folks like Francis Chan where they throw these things out and then they just hide behind, well, it was just Twitter.

And I just think you can get in a lot of trouble with this, and I think he�s trying to make this false thing between teaching and loving. And I would think the most loving thing you can do has nothing to do even with the people primarily.

It�s God has saved you and called you into ministry. And so, because he loved you, you respond with obedience slash love and preach the word to his people. �Peter, feed my sheep.

Petey. That�s right. That is exactly right. You know, or even as the Great Commission, you know, teaching them, make disciples. How do you make disciples? By loving them. He could have said that. Matthew 28, you know, 18 to 20, he could have said that, but instead he said teaching them to observe all that I�ve commanded you.

And so, you just go, well, okay, it sounds pretty much like commanded, teaching, I mean, these are all, those are the words of Jesus our Lord, so maybe we ought to do that. But no, instead we just, and you know, when you read it like that, actually, when you just read what he wrote, you�d have to say the loving them, what does that mean?

What does it mean to love somebody? Well, I think the way he�s phrased it here, you�d have to say it�s kind of emoting, you know, understanding them. Just sitting down and having dialogue with them, it�s kind of, you know, let�s just sort of powwow or whatever.

Well, there�s a time and a place for that, and I�m not excluding any of that. And I would even say that there�s a time for a certain kind of emoting, you know? But that can�t be the primary way in which you make disciples.

Pete Steve, even the definition of �make disciple doesn�t it mean a learner? I learn things, and when I try to memorize these Greek words in seminary, I think, okay, it�s got the root word M-A-T-H, math, and you have to learn math, and so that�s kind of how I learned the Greek word with association.

You have to teach people. You have to have them learn, so that means I didn�t know something, now I do because you taught me, and then I learned it. I learned it. Uh-huh. I learned it. I was thinking about Annie Get Your Gun, about learning.

How does that song go? I have no idea because I�ve never seen it. All right, how about this, Steve? When it comes to gathering people in a public setting and you�re to preach the Word, isn�t that an exhortation, isn�t that a declaration, isn�t that a proclamation of truth?

It is, and I mean, it�s not, well, I don�t want to delve too far into this, but it�s not like a time of sharing. It�s not a time of.

There goes my sermon for Sunday, and I spent 20 hours on that.

I just want to share. I just want to share what�s on my heart.

Uh-huh. Well, I already know what�s on my heart because I know what�s in my heart, so I�m trying to share God�s heart to you. Steve, a couple nights ago we had some dear saints from the church. You�ll know their names, Fred and Maxine were over to our house, and we were sitting around having dessert and coffee and tea, and they�ve been here for, I don�t know, 25, 30 years or so, and I think they�re 80 now.

They just both hit 80 or something close. So I had my two younger girls there, Maddie and Grace, 14 and 16 years old, and I said to them, as we talked about all kinds of things, fun things, and it wasn�t all Bible-centered, but then I said to them, �I�m very thankful for your testimony of behind-the-scenes ministry to Christ Church, and you�re the kind of people we�ve never had to say, �Please minister and use your gifts.

Both of you behind-the-scenes use your gifts and have for years, and talk to my daughters about why you do that and what are your motivations. And they said, �Well, because we love the Lord and we love His people.

Now, they were teaching my girls, but when you are taught of the grace of God, don�t you want to then go love people and be kind to them and serve them? And I think these things are connected. Petey Yes, but Jared Yes, but you should see Steve�s face.

Petey Yes, but that�s, you know, make disciples just by loving. I don�t even know what that means. You know, sit around the campfire, put marshmallows on a stick, I don�t know, whatever does that mean?

Let�s make s'mores together, I don�t know.

Jared Somebody said, �I�d be interested to learn whether this week actually came from, I think they meant this tweet, came from Francis Chan or from the Crazy Love Team. Well, if it came from the Crazy Love Team and I was Francis Chan, I would say, �Why don�t we undo that tweet

Petey Delete, delete. Jared Steve, have you ever been to a multi-site campus?

Steve I just, you know, I always like to search my memory banks before I answer a question like that. No.

Petey Well, we can talk more about this another time, but in the latest Christianity Today, do you have that by the way? Steve Yes, I do. It�s in my office actually.

Petey What�s up with all the beards? Steve I don�t know. I try not to get envious because I really can�t do it. I mean, I could go like a week, I could go a month and it wouldn�t look anything like that.

Petey Yes, but I don�t like the whole beard thing because it�s showing other people that men are masculine and what if they want to, for that day, be a different gender?

Steve. It kind of disenfranchises people who are somewhere else in gender fluidity. I just thought on this and the whole thing drives me nuts. You know, you may feel more masculine one day than the next and you may feel, I just, that whole thing.

I�m sorry. All apologies to people who are on the gender spectrum. It doesn�t really exist anywhere except for in your mind.

Petey Steve, in this article, and we�ll talk about this more in detail later, but I did find it fascinating that out of the 5 ,000, easy for me to say, number of multi-site campuses in 2012, by 2015 there�s going to be 8 ,000.

That�s quite a jump. Steve Yeah, that�s not encouraging. Petey But here in Christianity Today, the most fascinating little info blog, info deal, it said 15 to 30, those are the big numbers, and then under it it said the number of minutes recommended as travel time between campuses.

So if you�re going to have a campus, it should be 15 to 30 minutes before you show the screen.

Steve. It�s always about numbers. You know, I have many problems with a multi-site campus, but how about this? The real purpose, well, I�ll get to the slippery slope argument first. I think the slippery slope argument is this.

If you go to a multi-site campus, the next step is what? Staying home and watching it on the internet. Because if, you know, the main purpose of multi-site is so that you can all have one preacher, right?

Because he�s so great, you wouldn�t know what to do without him. And here�s the truth. You�re never going to get to meet him. You�re not going to be able to talk to him. You�re never going to be able to see him.

Well, you�ll see him in person sometimes. But the goal is to have as little interactivity as possible with the masses. And I�m like, I don�t know that that�s the right, you know, the right model.

Doug Steve, I don�t have any respect for multi-site campus stuff that would be long-term. I mean, maybe you say, we just need to do this for four weeks as we�re transitioning. The guy that we hired has got to move from Alaska.

I don�t know. But long-term, I have no respect. So, why don�t they just say, you know what? We will publish where the primary preaching pastor is going to be in person. Why do they have to keep that under wraps?

So, what they often do is they�ll say, well, our pastor today is going to be at one of these five campuses. You just don�t know which one. Why do you think they tell them?

Pete. Because they don�t want to tell you ahead of time where the Shekinah glory is going to be.

Doug. Because if they do, what would you, you would.

Drive to the campus where the guy was there? Pete. Well, I don�t know why they have to tell you. Why can�t you just kind of like either put on your special Shekinah glasses or, you know, just sort of look on the horizon and see where the biggest glow is coming from and that�s where you go.

Doug Well, maybe a lot of these campuses that are multi have the neo-Calvinistic charismatic slide bent to them and then they just know because they get some uninspired utterance.

Pete Well, you know, if I went to one of these churches, which I wouldn�t, but if I did, I�d like try to move into the middle of all the campuses so that I, you know, in the area that was in the center of all these, so I could just kind of make a quick trip to whichever one I thought, you know, I�d have feelers out.

I�d probably even like put a spy on the main preacher so I could find out which way he was going. And then quick detour, you know, that way.

Douglas Well, our pastor�s not here today, but our band is.

Pete Well, or like, you know, you went looking for Johnny Carson, but you wound up with Ed McMahon, you know, so.

Douglas. It�s so true. Alright, you�re talking today, Steve, about multi-side, about Twitter stuff, is there anything else that�s in your mind that you�re just dying to talk about?

Pete. Mmm, dying to talk about? Probably not.

Douglas. Alright. Then I want to bring your attention to The Spectator. Do you read The Spectator very often?

Pete I�ve seen it from time to time, usually when people post articles about it.

Douglas. Alright. Here�s a super fascinating article written by Matthew Parris, P-A-R-R-I-S. May 27th, 2015, The Spectator. As a gay atheist, this is the title of the article, �As a gay atheist, I want to see the church oppose same-sex marriage.

Pete. Well, a few observations. First of all, he�s not gay, because gay means happy. He�s homosexual. Secondly, he�s not an atheist, because there is no such thing as atheists. They�re just people who suppress the truth and unrighteousness to the point where they think they�re atheists.

Douglas. Steve, here we go again. The deconstruction of terms and vocabulary and what it means to me and what it means to you, I mean, can�t we just get along?

Pete. Yes, we can, but first we have to establish truth. We have to go with what is true and reveal the works of darkness.

Douglas. So this guy, Matthew Parris, he talks about Moses and remember when Moses came down from Sinai and the people, Moses� people, they were dancing, kind of this orgiastic love affair with themselves and the golden idol.

And so then he, this writer, gives a revised version of what was going on. And I thought it was fascinating insight from the spectator. And it came to pass as soon as he came nigh, that is Moses, on to camp, he saw the Irish referendum�s huge majority for gay marriage and the dancing and Moses� alarm was palpable.

And he took a copy of the pink paper and flourishing it said, �We have to stop and have a reality check, not move into denial of the realities. I appreciate how these naked revelers feel on this day.

They feel this is something that is enriching the way they live. I think it�s a social revolution. We need to find new language to connect with a whole generation of young people, the prophet concluded, then casting off his garments.

Moses said, �Hey, lead me to the coolest gay bar in the camp. And then the writer says, �Don�t laugh with a couple of adjustments for updated circumstances. I am quoting the Archbishop of Dublin, Dr. Martin, almost verbatim.

The Archbishop was responding last Sunday to Irish people�s endorsements of gay marriage by a margin of almost two to one.

Pete. Well, I mean, the leaders of the so-called church have no more Christ in them than this man claims to have. I mean, they're just, they're atheists who found an easy way to make a living, you know?

And so, they go into quote-unquote ministry. It reminds me of one of my favorite movies, which the title is escaping me, but it's one of those Jane Austen movies, Sense and Sensibility, where the lead male character is going to go in the ministry and you know, he never speaks a word about God or the gospel or the Bible during the entire movie, and you're just like, he would be an absolutely horrible pastor.

Well, okay, this is the Church of England. This is what they do, right? I mean, for the most part, you know, you're going to be hard-pressed to find men who fill those pulpits all over England. I mean, are there exceptions?

Yes. But you're going to find a lot of atheists just looking for an easy paycheck.

Pete I think there's probably a lot of men filling the pulpits who, for that particular Sunday, think they're women. And so, you just are what you are. We are the world, we are the children.

Pete. And they're not there to make disciples, they're just there to love on the people.

Pete. See, that's right. Okay, so now the writer, Mr. Parris says, even as a gay atheist, I wince to see the philosophical mess that religious conservatives are making of their case. Is there nobody of any intellectual stature left in our English Church, or the Roman Church, to frame the argument against Christianity's slide into just going with the flow of social and cultural change?

And then he said something fascinatingly. Time was, even in my time, when there were quiet, understated, sometimes quite severe men of the cloth, often wearing bifocal spectacles, who could show us moral relativists a decent fight in that eternal debate.

Now there's only emotional witness of the ranting evangelicals, most of them pretty dim. Pete.

Well, I mean, I don't know exactly what to say to that, other than this. When people are parading around and celebrating their vote for homosexual marriage, that is to say, redefining what God defined as marriage, what they're really celebrating is just a godless, pagan worldview where everybody is free to do whatever they want, and they're really celebrating the damnation of thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions of souls, because they can't be bothered with the God who created them and sustains their lives.

Pete Steve, as I watch people parade around and go crazy with all this stuff, I say to myself, but for the grace of God, I probably have the biggest poster marching around for rights of I don't know who, I don't know if I would have been a gay rights protester, but I would have been pro-abortion or whatever else.

Pete. See, I would have been politically indifferent no matter what back in the day, so it wouldn't have been that big of a deal to me. What I do know is I would not have been offended by it. I would not have been bothered by it.

It would have been a shrug, just a big shrug to me. Steve.

Worthy and Magic Johnson highlights or something like that, where they had a good deal on Falstaff beer. Yeah, that would be about right for me. But thankfully, the grace of God can penetrate through the hardest, most recalcitrant heart, and I know that's my heart, and that was my heart, was Steve's heart.

If you want to write us, you can write us at infoatnocompromiseradio .com. Steve, where do they send the big jugs of maple syrup and stuff like that?

307 Lancaster Street, West Boylston, 01583. He actually gave the address.

Of course I did. Thanks for listening to Tell Your Friends or Enemies, No Compromise Radio.

No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible-teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life-transforming power of God's Word through verse-by-verse exposition of the sacred text.

Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 10 .15 and in the evening at 6. We're right on Route 110 in West Boylston. You can check us out online at bbcchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.

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