November 24, 2020 Show with Ernie Springer, Dr. Joel Yeager, & Dr. Dan O’Roark on “Coronavirus & Leadership of the Church”

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

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Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron. This is a radio platform in which pastors,

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

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

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

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It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next two hours and we hope to hear from you the listener with your own questions and now here's your host

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Chris Arnzen. Good afternoon

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Cumberland County Pennsylvania Lake City Florida and the rest of humanity living on the planet earth who are listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com

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this is Chris Arnzen your host of ironsharpensironradio wishing you all a happy Tuesday on this 24th day of November 2020 and we have a very controversial issue that we are addressing today one that sadly even divides the body of Christ not only the body of Christ or the church at large in general but it even divides theologically reformed

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Christians perhaps even in the same congregation I know that there are sadly tragically even church splits occurring over what we have in store for us today in our topic and we are going to be addressing a new book titled coronavirus and the leadership of the

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Christian church a sacred trust broken and we have three guests to do this today we have first of all

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Ernie Springer who is founder of old paths publications let me first greet

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Ernie it's great to have you on the program and it's been years since we've communicated and it's it's so wonderful to have you back in connection with me brother well thank you

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Chris it's great to be on I appreciate you giving us the opportunity and tell us about old paths publications well old paths publications is a nonprofit incorporated entity started almost 30 years ago

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I guess you might call it in the midst of one -man public publishers you know who had extra time on their hands people like Don Kistler with Soledad Gloria and people like Kevin Reed Presbyterian Heritage publications and various others

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I might some of which were my mentors I undertook the process of looking at some older reformed and cured in and Presbyterian literature much of which was just in my personal library that I used to buy from the antiquarian booksellers you know they used to go overseas and ship the books back and then send out a physical mailing list before the internet became a thing but one time

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I actually bought a brand new book and I looked at it and said this is the exact same book as the one that's in my library that's 200 years old and I started thinking about how

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I could do this on my own and cashed in a 401k savings plan at a time that I was much younger realizing age 59 and a half was a long ways away so I decided to invest in some publishing and it's really just been a ministry just to produce items you know we did a number of volumes of John Calvin sermons and a couple books on pastoral theology that were in fact even used in some seminary courses as required textbooks so it's really just been a joy to be able to get some good truth from what

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I like to refer to as old good guys well it's great to have you back on the program and we have with us two first -time guests who are both physicians as well first of them is dr.

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Joel Yeager who is founder and operator of heritage family health in Newmanstown Pennsylvania he's also a diplomat of the

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American Board of Family Medicine and a contributor to the second opinion project and it's wonderful to have you join us for the very first time ever on Iron Trip and Zion radio dr.

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Joel Yeager thanks Chris it's my pleasure to be here I'm looking forward to the couple of hours together and I'm assuming

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I'm pronouncing your last name correctly that is correct just think of Chuck Yeager okay and tell us about heritage family health in Newmanstown Pennsylvania well our office is located in an old barn which we renovated about ten years ago next year's our 10th anniversary

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I say us because my wife Luann Yeager is also my physician partner so she and I own the practice that's an independent practice it's sometimes what we call cash practice which means we don't submit claims to any insurance company we've actually cut that out of the mix and that's freed us up to practice medicine the way we were trained to do so and focus on patients without all the encumbrances of insurance companies so I've always argued that that actually makes our practice probably better in the long run because we can focus on what we actually were trained to do

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I actually wrote about that in a book two years ago called transforming health care together a model for restoring the covenant of trust so that outlines some of our vision here so we have a large practice of close to 7 ,000 patients and we continue to see one or two or three new patients every day our practice continues to grow and interestingly it's grown tremendously during the past six months as I think many patients and their families have gotten frustrated with other offices and came in because they were attracted to the type of care that my wife

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Louann and I offer here at the office. And this is a general practice

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I'm assuming general medicine practice? Correct it's a family medicine practice we also have a large sort of a sub specialty practice in obesity medicine

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I'm technically not board certified as an obesity medicine physician but we see a large amount of that we've helped patients to lose probably over 25 ,000 pounds of weight in the past nine years.

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Wow. Well and if anybody wants to find out more about this practice you can go to heritagefamilyhealth .org

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heritagefamilyhealth .org and last but not least we have

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Daniel O 'Rourke, Dr. Daniel O 'Rourke of Ballard CVA Heart Institute in Johnston City Tennessee.

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He's also a diplomat of the American Osteopathic Board of International Medicine and Cardiology I'm sorry

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Internal Medicine and Cardiology and a diplomat of the Certification Board of Nuclear Cardiology and a diplomat of the

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National Board of Echocardiology and serves as a fellow of the American College of Cardiology.

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It's great to have you join us for the first time as well Dr. O 'Rourke. Thank you

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Chris for having us greatly appreciate it. And am I pronouncing your last name correctly? You most certainly are.

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Great because I was tempted to say Roark but I'm glad I didn't. Well tell us about the

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Ballard CVA Heart Institute in Johnston City Tennessee. Well basically I very much admire

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Joel's practice setting I'm in the office setting I'm in a corporate setting so this is not a practice that I own.

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I am employed in this setting but basically I practice non -invasive cardiology at this stage of my life.

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I am about 62 years old and I'm working about three quarters time but I see patients for consultation for general cardiac problems and then

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I do interpretations and imaging studies such as echocardiography and nuclear as you mentioned

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I was boarded in those areas. So we have a thriving practice and we go to a number of locations here in Upper East Tennessee and it's been very very rewarding.

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Great if anybody wants to find out more information about that practice you can go to BallardHealth .org

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B -A -L -L -A -D Health .org. Well Ernie going back to you this book that you have published and have contributed to as a co -author

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Coronavirus this is a very timely book obviously with the subtitle and the leadership of the

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Christian Church a sacred trust broken what were the factors the compelling factors that led you to have this book published and how did you get a hold of Dr.

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Jaeger and Dr. O 'Rourke to contribute to it with you? Okay well let's see

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I think the best way to approach answering that is you know as I'm sure we can all agree there are issues and decisions in life for which we have more or less certainty about however from the onset of you know the announced virus back in March as well as you know subsequent state and Commonwealth directives being issued by the governors and so forth as I view these actions you know of the church and dialogue with pastors and elders

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I knew so deeply and with complete certainty at least in my mind

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I mean more than I probably ever felt that discontinuing the public Sabbath Lord's Day worship was wrong never would

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I have imagined that my spiritual leaders would be locking me out of God's house you know not only you know where my sensibilities shocked by you know this unimaginable concept of locking

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God's people out of their church building but beyond simple feelings this what I would call stay away from church policy was without biblical support and that is how it was being presented initially there was no biblical support being offered at least in my church and as time and dialogue progressed what emanated for so obviously by most who argued for this lockout is that it was one of human consideration medical collaboration unity opinion peer coordination and and even you know in government cooperation and yet what was missing was direct clear and conclusive biblical support for ecclesiastical interruption so you know

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I was involved in you know respectfully communicating this with my pastors and ruling elders and not really getting much of any kind of response only general responses that they offered to the entire congregation after about three months of this and feel rather frustrated someone mentioned to me in the congregation said oh did you read the writing that the letter that dr.

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Yeager wrote well I'm like dr. Yeager I didn't even know who he was he was singing up in the choir in the above me you know

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I was beneath him you know so I never actually saw him I guess but and and then

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I did a lot of my searching on the internet looking for writings and articles and I happen to come across one on the

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Aquila report I believe it's called ever written by Anna Rourke and I didn't know either of these men

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I figure I had to try and find out you know who they were and how to get in touch with them well you know

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Joel was a little bit easier he had a website he had his I believe his letters posted on there that he had written about this which was

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I'll let Joel maybe tell that later but you know it got circulated rather widely and so I reached out to him via email and from that point forward never had still not having actually seen each other in person we've had lots of written communication and phone calls and text messages and interaction on this subject which actually helped to strengthen

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I think one another mutually and just to know that there is there's someone else out there who actually feels the same way and likewise with Dan Rourke after I was a little tougher to you know

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I couldn't get a quick connection through Aquila and I searched you know social media Facebook LinkedIn various other things and eventually got to Dan and Dan got back to me and likewise we've had the same level of communication that I've had with Joel and we just really compared in notes and communicated for for some time and it was it was very helpful very you know spiritually encouraging

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I mean you know your title of your your program iron sharpens iron I can say that we were doing that and a real had real positive results well obviously the thing that Bible believing brothers in Christ use as their most compelling reasons to obey governing authorities secular governing authorities or civil governing authorities over shutdowns and bans and so forth is they will repeatedly say and as did a guest

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I had on this program I've had both sides of this issue by the way represented on iron sharpens iron radio because I know that the body of Christ has people of differing opinions on how when and where to obey the civil government when it comes to anything involving worship services and when a line should be drawn and so forth and this this included as someone who is actually from at least one of the denominations represented today the

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Orthodox Presbyterian Church but the the thing that is continually brought forward as the compelling reason that we should cease at least for a reasonable period when the government says do not gather and we should obey them with certain restrictions when we do gather is that we are ordered in the scriptures or commanded in the scriptures to obey the governing authorities that God has ordained over us even when those authorities are evil unless they are requesting of us or even demanding us to sin now let's go to dr.

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Yeager on this as both a Christian and a physician what is the problem with that reasoning when you might have somebody in the body of Christ who is opposed to what you have written in this book and say no we're supposed to be obeying the government no matter how evil they may be how matter or left -wing they may be no matter how opposed to them we may be unless they compel us or attempt to compel us to sin how do you respond to that well

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I would actually like to hear Dr. O 'Rourke talk about that shortly because he's done a masterful job in the book on outlining the concept of sphere sovereignty which

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I'll have to admit was a somewhat new concept to me I've been thinking about coronavirus more from the aspect of the medical community but as I've been thinking about you know historical figures

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I mean I've thought about Dietrich Bonhoeffer and his belief that it was

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God's call to participate in an assassination plot on Hitler and you know that of course would be very opposite the concept of we simply obey those in authority over us because that's what the

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Bible asks us to do so I think for me one of the issues has always been a concept of truth and I had a good friend of mine push back recently and say we have to be careful how you use the word truth because truth refers ultimately to God's truth you know biblical revelation but I think it's actually broader than that I mean it certainly does include that but as Christians we have to be able to understand what is true and what is false and I began to realize fairly early on probably as early as April that what

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I was hearing from a medical standpoint or even from a news media perspective on coronavirus simply did not square with what

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I had learned in medical school what I had experienced in residency what I had seen in clinical practice from the time of my medical student days

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I came to medicine a little bit later I'm 52 but from the time I've been a medical student until now it's been 20 years so if you add my wife's experience plus mine it's a collective 40 years of experience and as I was looking at that it's like what

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I'm hearing in terms of lockdowns and shutdowns and CDC recommendations besides the fact that they were completely opposite of what they would have been a few months prior didn't strike me as being true and so I think that's an aspect that we have to ask as well are we obligated as believers to obey a government mandate if it actually is not true and I still maintain that this whole issue has been an issue of truth what is actually true what is coronavirus what you know what's its implications for society is it any different than a bad case of influenza which if you really look beneath the surface you discover that it actually isn't so to me

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I guess the first aspect would be the concept of truth and I think certainly there's people's opinion but I'm more interested in what is actually true if we're being told that this is you know the worst like to it you know society is that actually true is what we're being told about the effectiveness of social distancing etc is that actually true does that actually square with what we've understood for the past 10 to 20 years so you know that's that's the aspect of truth the sphere of sovereignty is probably an even even bigger aspect and I would defer to dr.

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O 'Rourke on that because I think he's had a masterful piece in the book on that great well dr.

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O 'Rourke let me also add into the equation something that I forgot to mention when I posed the question to dr.

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Yeager the other most frequently recited reason that those who are defenders of having the church obey the civil government in matters of when and where and how we are to gather for worship with of course even those folks would have limitations but the issue of demonstrating love for neighbor is neck -and -neck in importance with obeying the governing authorities that God has ordained over us and some would even say that the truth involved in these mandates is not necessarily of the highest importance some might even say if the government has convinced the population that if we wear purple hats we will keep

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COVID away and the major portion of the population believes that we should wear purple hats just because we are demonstrating to our neighbors we care about you we don't want to frighten you we are concerned about your health and therefore don't think that we are cavalier or careless or nonchalant about your safety and so on so adding that into the equation if you could answer the same question about how to respond to these folks and why they are not these

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Christian folks who believe that we are certainly to obey the government when it has restrictions over the church within a certain level of reason even they as I said don't believe that we should allow the government to command us in every single aspect of worship but too much for the comfort of my guests here today obviously so if you could explain your reasoning well thank you for the question

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Chris it's a very very vital question of course I'll start first with the with the sphere of sovereignty and I'll just give a very brief thumbnail sketch of my views here which

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I believe are gleaned from scripture first of all we have in Matthew 28 the

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Great Commission that all authority in heaven and on earth has been given Christ so he is the supreme king of every aspect of life we know that from scripture that there are four governing authorities we are to govern ourselves as individuals we have family government we have church government and we have what we would call civil government or the civil magistrates a craft are those all refer to the same thing so all of these areas while they have distinct jurisdictions neither of them are derived from one another all of these governments come from God himself and most importantly that we are therefore beholden in our functioning and whatever sphere we are in operating in at the time we are beholden to God's holy infallible inspired word as to how we are to conduct ourselves in these areas it is important to note that whichever governing authority we're in any authority that humans have is purely delegated from God we have no authority as husband as church officers even in even in our subcategories of individuals and families when we go out and start businesses or we engage in the arts or sciences or whatever endeavors we engage in all of that is a delegated authority so it must be governed solely by scripture so getting back to Ernie's original point that is one of the major areas of concern for us in this whole

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COVID narrative is that a lot of the response of the church was not based on a response by scripture so so getting more specific to the civil magistrate we have a fairly lengthy section in the book talking about this but we know from scripture and then we as Presbyterians you know we also subordinate standards use the we know from the primary authority of scripture and in our standards that the government of the church is not derived from the state and it is distinct from the state the state likewise is not derived from the church it is distinct but both as the other two spheres of authority are all under the umbrella of God and because the church is a distinct government it has a distinct and unique government the civil magistrates cannot enter in in any manner shape or form now you know to be clear there are things that we could do as church members that if two members of the church got into an altercation and someone stabbed another person well obviously the state has an interest there because there is certainly overlap in our various callings and our stations in life but as far as ecclesiastical government is concerned the state has a duty before God to protect the

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Church of Christ to promote it to keep it safe the reason that the church is not taxed is because it's not tax -exempt it's not taxable because it's a separate government and so therefore whenever the state tries to interfere with the gathering for worship or any other ecclesiastical decisions that are made by the proper governing authorities of the church and we have every duty and right to resist and disobey with regards very briefly

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I'll touch upon the idea of love your neighbor as yourself this is a very important consideration and one that we don't take lightly but of course we know from the teachings of Christ and the

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Apostles that love is not a sentiment or emotion but it's adherence to the law of God Jesus said if you love me you'll keep my commandments in the

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Great Commission though we are to disciple the nations and Christ said we're to teach them everything that I have commanded and so therefore the law of God is supreme so when someone says to me of whatever whatever they're trying to mandate regarding COVID it has to be shown that my action or inaction is a contrary for the

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Word of God I think a lot of church leaders have failed in this area and that's why we have rejected that motion we're going to our first station break right now and if anybody would like to join us on the air with a question of your own you can send that question to Chris Arnzen at gmail .com

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Chris Arnzen at gmail .com C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com

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as always give us your first name at least your city and state of residence and your country of residence if you live outside of the

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USA and please only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter let's say you are a physician and you're afraid of the backlash that you will get from others in your field perhaps even in your practice something like that well we could readily understand you'd want to remain anonymous perhaps you are unhappy with the direction your own elders and your own church has taken or have taken in regard to government mandates that in fact or should

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I say affect your congregation well we would understand that you would want to remain anonymous you don't want to publicly say anything negative about your pastors or your congregation in fact we wouldn't mention the specific names of any pastors or churches anyway but we understand if you want to remain anonymous for reasons like that but if it's just a general question we ask of you to please give us your first name at least your city and state of residence in your country of residence if you live outside the

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This is Pastor Bill Sousa Grace Church at Franklin here in the beautiful state of Tennessee Our congregation is one of a growing number of churches who love and support

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Iron Sharpens Iron Radio financially Grace Church at Franklin is an independent autonomous body of believers which strives to clearly declare the whole counsel of God as revealed in scripture through the person and work of our

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Lord Jesus Christ and of course the end of which we strive is the glory of God if you live near Franklin Tennessee and Franklin is just south of Nashville maybe 10 minutes or you are visiting this area or you have friends and loved ones nearby we hope you will join us some

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Lord's Day in worshiping our God and Savior please feel free to contact me if you have more questions about Grace Church at Franklin our website is gracechurchatfranklin .org

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that's gracechurchatfranklin .org this is

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Pastor Bill Sousa wishing you all the richest blessings of our Sovereign Lord God Savior and King Jesus Christ today and always

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Lord Jesus Christ my name is Bhanu Gadi I'm a pharmacist in New York which is the epicenter of the latest crisis the world is going through in Psalm 139 verse 14 the psalmist offers praise to the

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Lord like this I praise you because I'm fearfully and wonderfully made and wondrous are your works that my soul knows very well he saw

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God's goodness and mercy kindness and the beauty in what God has designed and he has erupted into praise in any crisis or problem brothers and sisters our only fallback position is to trust

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God's design and once we do there is nothing for us to do but to erupt in praise to him when the whole world is searching for a solution

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God in his infinite mercy has given us what we need to address this illness which can be very serious such is the beauty of his design knowing that design how can we not erupt in praise to our great

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God like the psalmist did may God bless you and give all of us wisdom to see greater things in his design thank you so i'm dr tony costa professor of apologetics and islam at toronto baptist seminary i'm thrilled to introduce to you a church where i've been invited to speak and have grown to love hope baptist church in corham long island new york pastored by rich janson and chris for mcdowell it's such a joy to witness and experience fellowship with people of god like the dear saints at hope reform baptist church in quorum who have an intensely passionate desire to continue digging deeper and deeper into the unfathomable riches of christ in his holy word and to enthusiastically proclaim christ jesus the king and his doctrines of sovereign grace in suffolk county long island and beyond i hope you also have the privilege of discovering this precious congregation and receive the blessing of being showered by their love as i have for more information on hope reform baptist church go to hope reformed li .net

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that's hope reformed li .net or call 631 -696 -5711 that's 631 -696 -5711 tell the folks at hope reform baptist church of quorum long island new york that you heard about them from tony costa on iron sharpens iron welcome back this is chris arms and if you just tuned us in our guests today are ernie springer founder of old paths publications dr joel yeager founder and operator of heritage family health in newmanstown pennsylvania and dr daniel o 'rourke of ballad cva heart institute in johnson city tennessee they are all contributors to the book we are addressing today coronavirus and the leadership of the christian church a sacred trust broken our email address is chris at gmail .com

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if you have questions chris arms in a gmail .com and give us if you're sending in a question your first name at least your city and state of residence in your country of residence dr yeager let me start with you uh again on this next question uh let's start separating fact from fiction when it comes to the coronavirus i'm sorry we had you accidentally unmute brother can you start again okay i'm sorry i just wanted to interject uh a follow -up to dan's comments if i could if i won't throw your your plan off too much oh no no go ahead okay i mean it's just a thought and about the love of neighbor i mean that that seems to be the mainstay of many who approaches with you know genuine care and concern but you we hear this ad nauseam and you know the church's emphasis leader's emphasis seems to be on the second greatest commandment to men yet they are giving that priority over the first greatest commandment to god and with it is really the first table of the law and it's you know actually which of course includes the fourth commandment actually it's not an either or but by attempting to honor both together with priority of the first we don't neglect or do any violence to the intended love of our neighbor or the second greatest commandment they're not mutually exclusive but a compliment for one another and and when i study the scriptures and you know and look at the matters of love of god versus love of man i mean it's the greater significance in scripture is is that um the love of god you know it takes precedence over the love of man it's never to be separated from obedience to his commandments and the commandments are to be kept always and it's the and the very it's the very evidence of love of god by obeying god's commands but what i found and i guess maybe this is the you know what i say as one particular emphasis where that argument of love of neighbor tends to break down and that is um you know i concur as a matter of personal obedience the sixth commandment applies to individuals responsibility you know if i'm known to be sick and contagious it would be requisite for me to upset myself for the protection of others but where do you draw the line in degrees of sickness and i'm not trying to get into the medical side here let that to the doctors but but if i have a you know seasonal influenza others who may not have been vaccinated may catch it from me they may even die i may have a bacterial sinus infection that could be caught in developing the pneumonia and someone may die even a simple cold uh for which there's no cure you know could be life -threatening with someone with copd or a compromised immune system and they might die but you know knowing that the concept of asymptomatic you know is unclear at best and even the world health organization stated at one point that it's rarely a case for concern churches choose the caricature one who's otherwise healthy and exhibiting no symptoms and assume he or she to be pre or asymptomatic and anyone in the congregation could have a contagious deadly disease besides covid and we wouldn't charge them with wearing a mask because of that or you know we never did before and we shouldn't now and i guess i would postulate that to make the assumption that someone like myself or anyone may be an unknown disease walking death sentence so to speak to another member without proof fact or evidence it's really to bear false witness against them and to impair his motives and reputation and the shepherds of the church want to show love for their neighbor but it doesn't appear they want to show it to everybody because in bringing you know act you know accusing someone who's otherwise healthy of potentially being sick really is i think following the ninth commandment you know and that it's just a thought that i think the love of neighbor concept breaks down at least in that regard and do you care dr or work to add any of the other issues into the discussion that are in your opinion very routinely false things that are presented as facts presented as scientific and medical facts that you even hear doctors and physicians and scientists spouting in public in the media that you have a disagreement with i'll give you an example i have to be honest that i was a bit disappointed uh after hearing some scientists give a very believable presentation that the masks especially the types of masks that your typical person is wearing that they buy at walmart are not really going to be doing anything to prevent the spread of the coronavirus and i was very disappointed uh after going to my own cardiologist after i had experienced congestive heart failure back in july that my cardiologist insisted that i wear the mask even when we were alone just the two of us in the examination room and he even gently chastised me can you please pull your mask up over your nose after i had already told him that i had a difficult time breathing with this thing on but if you could add anything to the discussion that is relevant to of separating fact from fiction i'll just have two brief comments uh i'll let joel expound upon the masking issue he dealt with that quite extensively in the book but uh that that would be one of the areas that we have yet to um there's much confusion over the purpose of medical masks uh but to make a long story short uh what we are being asked to believe is that very tiny particles can be filtered by any mask and even even the masks the n95 masks that we physicians will put on when we go into the patient's isolation uh even those masks you have to provide complete protection uh the masks mainly were designed to uh obstruct bacteria surgeons wearing masks is to keep spittle out of the surgical wound uh but the idea that uh viruses can be filtered has actually been studied for a hundred years and we've really had no randomized controlled trials uh to prove that there's any benefit from that so that's one false disease i think in the current context uh this is very relevant to the exact time we're in now uh and and it's really hard to to deal with this other than to call it really a false case lie and that is that a positive pcr test uh irrespective of symptoms equals a case and uh that that has really been the genesis for the massive numbers of cases uh we can perhaps discuss later the problems with the pcr test but what we have done is we have allowed the media our public health officials to redefine what a case is a case refers to a person with a disease a sickness um not asymptomatic people not pre -infected people um there was some good clarification early on uh we were calling these case fatality rates but i think infection fatality rate there's a more accurate term but uh right now we have the notion that a positive pcr test blood tests that many people are getting if you have a positive test you have coveted negative you don't and that violates a whole host of medical precincts but those are the two areas the masking and the redefinition of a case that i would consider and ernie i know you're not a physician but do you have anything to add to that part of the discussion um no actually i don't think i do i would probably defer to joel he might have more to say on it and uh let's let's address for a moment something that's very serious um it has been uh it has been asserted by many who are whistleblowers if you could call them that uh that hospitals are falsely uh determining in writing in the documentation the cause of death of many patients as the coronavirus which really throws the statistics off kilter as to an exaggerated number of coronavirus related deaths because these hospitals get extra funding the more patients they have that have perished from coronavirus and when the fact of the matter is that they may have died of cancer but they also had coronavirus and therefore they will list coronavirus as the cause and perhaps uh perhaps they wouldn't do with something as severe as cancer but you you get the idea that they may have died of something completely different than coronavirus but because they were diagnosed as having it that is listed as the cause of death and uh dr o 'rourke let's start with you this time uh yes there definitely have been have been monies extra monies paid to hospitals for covid diagnoses i've not had a chance to research that in any great detail but there apparently are monies that go to states as well from the federal government but there's certainly i'm familiar with one whistleblower it was a pretty popular youtube video from several months ago where there were patients being listed as having covid who actually had a negative test i have not i have not seen anything of this nature uh but again there is really no there is really no disincentive to not diagnose someone with covid um the the money factors is one issue um but also whenever whenever patients have a positive test that also leads to uh the bastardization of the death statistic and many people and i think this is appropriate they have made a distinction between between dying with covid versus dying from covid and again uh there is now emergent data that appears that anywhere from 50 to 90 percent of the pcr tests are actually false positive uh so that has greatly reduced the number of quote -unquote cases and the number of deaths but even even taking it at face value many of these patients and you alluded to this chris is that they have what we call significant medical comorbidities uh they have heart failure eopd they're on oxygen they have kidney disease these people are very frail and they are susceptible to a multitude of triggers to to cause their death in most healthy people a common cold very rarely would cause death although it has been reported but if someone who has a multitude of medical problems even something as quote -unquote simple as a common cold could put someone over and cause their death so that would be the distinction between dying purely from the virus viral pneumonia all of its different quali versus the viral disease in this case covid -19 uh being uh being a trigger that just pushed the patient over the edge and then they ended up dying of their underlying disease state well we have to go to midway break right now the midway break is a longer than normal break in the show because grace life radio a 90 .1

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fm in lake city florida requires of us a longer break in the middle of the show because they are required by the fcc to localize this program to lake city florida along with their other programming uh so they have their own public service announcements and other local things in the middle of the show while we are airing simultaneously our globally heard commercials so we ask of you to please use this time wisely write down as much of the information as possible for as many of our advertisers as you can so that you can more frequently and successfully patronize our advertisers keeping in mind that if you keep patronizing our advertisers you will you will more than likely keep them happy which means they will keep renewing their advertising contracts on this program and we absolutely positively require the funding that comes in from our advertising campaigns in order to exist so please try to write down as much of the information as you can from our advertisers and respond to them as much as you can even if it just means that you're contacting them to thank them for sponsoring iron sharpens iron radio if you can't patronize them in another way by using their services products or what have you at least say thanks for sponsoring iron sharpens iron radio i really love the show and also send in your own questions for ernie springer dr joel yeager and dr daniel o 'rourke on this issue that we are discussing coronavirus and the leadership of the christian church is sacred trust broken our email address is chris arnson at gmail .com

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chris arnson at gmail .com don't go away we'll be right back with more of our discussion after these messages from our sponsors iron sharpens iron radio depends upon the financial support of fine christian organizations to remain on the air like the historical bible society the historical bible society maintains a collection of christian books manuscripts and bibles of historical significance spanning nearly a thousand years the mission of hbs is the preservation and public display of ancient scripture dissemination of scripture to provide tools equipping believers in christian apologetics with evidence for the bible's reliability and to introduce reformation literature and christian art to a broader audience since 2004 hbs has toured schools and churches throughout the northeast united states reaching thousands of believers and non -believers alike who are hungry for knowledge of the bible hbs's founder daniel p buttafuoco attorney at law is committed to sharing this collection along with an inspirational historical message that will captivate you and your church come journey their website historicalbiblesociety .org

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today thank you daniel p buttafuoco attorney at law for your faithful support of iron trump and zion radio james white of alpha omega ministries and the dividing line webcast here although god has brought me all over the globe for many years to teach preach and debate at numerous venues some of my very fondest memories are from those precious times of fellowship with rich jensen and the brethren at hope reform baptist church now located at their new beautiful facilities in corham long island new york i've had the privilege of opening god's word from their pulpit on many occasions have led youth retreats for them and have always been thrilled to see their members filling many seats at my new york debates i do not hesitate to highly recommend hope reform baptist church of corham long island to anyone who wants to be accurately taught discipled and edified by the holy scriptures and to be surrounded by truly loving and caring brothers and sisters in christ i also want to congratulate hope reform baptist church of corham for the recent appointment of pastor rich jensen's co -elder pastor christopher mcdowell for more information on hope reform baptist church go to hope reformed li .net

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that's hope reformed li .net or call 631 -696 -5711 that's 631 -696 -5711 tell the folks at hope reform baptist church of corham long island that you heard about them from james white on iron sharpens iron radio here's what gary demar president of american vision had to say about iron sharpens iron radio recently good to be back chris i always enjoy our time you uh i have to tell you one of the better interviewers out there and i've been doing this for 30 more than 30 years wow that's some compliment how much do i owe you for that you don't have to owe me anything we're in good we're in good shape i'm glad you said it on the air so i don't have to brag about myself tell your friends and loved ones about iron sharpens iron radio airing live monday through friday 4 to 6 p .m

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eastern time at iron sharpens iron radio .com hi this is john sampson pastor of king's church in peoria arizona taking a moment of your day to talk about chris arnson and the iron sharpens iron podcast i consider chris a true friend and a man of high integrity he's a skilled interviewer who's not afraid to ask the big penetrating questions while always defending the key doctrines of the christian faith i've always been happy to point people to this podcast knowing it's one of the very few safe places on the internet where folk won't be led astray i believe this podcast needs to be heard far and wide this is a day of great spiritual compromise and yet god has raised chris up for just such a time and knowing this it's up to us as members of the body of christ to stand with such a in prayer and in finances i'm pleased to do so and would like to ask you to prayerfully consider joining me in supporting iron sharpens iron financially would you consider sending either a one -time gift or even becoming a regular monthly partner with this ministry i know it would be a huge encouragement to chris if you would all the details can be found at iron ironradio .com

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forward slash podcast oh this is pastor bill saso grace church at franklin here in the beautiful state of tennessee our congregation is one of a growing number of churches who love and support iron iron radio financially grace church at franklin is an independent autonomous body of believers which strives to clearly declare the whole counsel of god as revealed in scripture through the person and work of our lord jesus christ and of course the end of which we strive is the glory of god if you live near franklin tennessee and franklin is just south of nashville maybe 10 minutes or you are visiting this area or you have friends and loved ones nearby we hope you will join us some lord's day in worshipping our god and savior please feel free to contact me if you have more questions about grace church at franklin our website is gracechurchatfranklin .org

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that's gracechurchatfranklin .org this is pastor bill saso wishing you all the richest blessings of our sovereign lord god savior and king jesus christ today and always every day at thousands of community centers high schools middle schools juvenile institutions coffee shops and local hangouts long island youth for christ staff and volunteers meet with young people who need jesus we are rural and urban and we are always about the message of jesus our mission is to have a noticeable spiritual impact on long island new york by engaging young people in the lifelong journey of following christ long island youth for christ has been a stalwart bedrock ministry since 1959 we have a world -class staff and a proven track record of bringing consistent love and encouragement to youths need all over the country and around the world help honor our history by becoming a part of our future volunteer donate pray or all of the above for details call long island youth for christ at 631 -385 -8333 that's 631 -385 -8333 or visit liyfc .org

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that's liyfc .org as host of iron sharpens iron radio i frequently get requests from listeners for church recommendations a church i've been strongly recommending as far back as the 1980s is grace covenant baptist church in flemington new jersey pastored by alan dunn grace covenant baptist church believes it's god's prerogative to determine how he shall be worshiped and how he shall be represented in the world they believe churches need to turn to the bible to discover what to include in worship and how to worship god in spirit and truth grace covenant baptist church endeavors to maintain a god -centered focus reading preaching and hearing the word of god singing psalms hymns and spiritual songs baptism and communion are the scriptural elements of their corporate worship performed with faith joy and sobriety discover more about grace covenant baptist church in flemington new jersey at gcbcnj .squarespace

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.com that's gcbcnj .squarespace .com

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or call them at 908 -996 -7654 that's 908 -996 -7654 tell pastor dunn that you heard about grace covenant baptist church on iron sharpens iron radio are you a christian looking to align your faith and finances then you'll want to check out thriving financial we're not your typical financial services provider we're a not -for -profit fortune 500 organization that helps our nearly 2 .4

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million members be wise with money we provide guidance that reflects your values so you can protect what matters most we help members live generously and strengthen the communities where they live work and worship learn more about the thriving story by contacting me mike gallagher financial consultant at 717 -254 -6433 again 717 -254 -6433 lending faith finances and generosity that's the thriving story charles headings burgeon 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

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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 and please never forget folks that solid -ground -books .com

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but also remember those who are lost in your life because they need a good solid biblically based christian book even more than your brothers and sisters in christ do god may use a book that you give to a lost friend or loved one to draw them to an eternal life in christ so remember you're saved and unsaved friends and loved ones alike when you go to solid -ground -books .com

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and remember tell them chris arnzen of iron sharpens iron radio sent you before we return to our guests today in our discussion of the coronavirus and also how the church has broken a sacred trust not every single congregation obviously but how many churches have broken a sacred trust that god has entrusted them with as under shepherds over his flock before we return to that discussion we just have a couple of important announcements to make first of all this friday we are pleased to have returning as a guest my dear friend of many years dr james r white of alpha and omega ministries dr white has not yet settled on an exact topic but i'm sure whatever it is it will be fascinating he always does a great job whenever he's on the show no matter what we're talking about and to follow him during the second hour of that same broadcast is a friend of his that we are having for the very first time ever on this program by the name of john l cooper john l cooper is the lead singer the bassist and the music writer and producer of the musical group known as skillet and he has written a new book titled awake and alive to truth finding truth in the chaos of a relativistic world so that will be this friday the day after thanksgiving uh dr james r white in hour number one and john l cooper in hour number two and of course we have excellent programs lined up every day so try to tune in every day possible to listen to iron sharpens iron radio i'm sure you'll be blessed and edified and folks if you love this show and you don't want us to disappear i urge you please help us because we are struggling financially very seriously the hysteria connected with the coronavirus pandemic has hurt us very badly financially because it has hurt many in our audience who donate to us or used to and also who have advertised with us but had to cut back advertising because of the way their own livelihoods have been seriously damaged as a result of the hysteria of the coronavirus pandemic so if you love this show please go to iron sharpens iron radio dot com click support then click click to donate now you can donate instantly with a debit or credit card in that fashion that's iron sharpens iron radio dot com click support then click click to donate now you can also mail in a check and donate the old fashion way via snail mail to the address that will appear on your screen when you click support at iron sharpens iron radio dot com if you'd like to advertise with us as long as whatever it is you are advertising is compatible with what we believe you don't have to believe identically with me but you need to be promoting something that is at the very least compatible with what i believe and please send me an email to chrislionson at gmail .com

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and but i need a church in the subject line and i i will give it a shot i'll try to help you find a church and as i said i've already helped many people in our audience find churches all over the planet earth so hopefully i'll be able to help you too and send that email to chris arnson at gmail .com

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chris arnson at gmail .com and put i need a church in the subject line that's also the email address where you can send in questions for our guests ernie springer dr joel yeager and dr daniel o 'rourke on the theme today coronavirus and the leadership of the christian church the sacred trust broken and uh our email address again is chris arnson at gmail .com

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chris arnson at gmail .com let me start with you ernie uh i don't know how widespread awareness of this book's existence is yet but have you gotten any negative feedback on it i have gotten negative feedback on some other interviews that i have conducted with guests that would hold to a similar or identical position that you three men hold and that the book promotes uh there are christians out there even reformed christians who think that we are being childish and acting like spoiled brats and crybabies whining about simple things like always wearing a mask wherever we go because why would we want to not only threaten the lives of others by not wearing these masks obviously we don't believe we are threatening anyone's life but they think it's such a a simple and unburdensome thing that that we are being uh for lack of a better term we're being jerks uh selfish jerks by not just going along with the program but uh so i have had opposition myself uh for airing programs like this but have you gotten any negative feedback yet ernie well um i wouldn't necessarily classify negative um there are some dissenting views but it's to date it's been cordial um i'm you know i don't view any uh opposite position on things in a negative light but it's more of an opportunity and i hope to be able to dialogue with people if they do uh have opinions that are different i mean christians should be able to reason with one another on these matters or as your your uh shows uh they would you know sharpen each other's iron on this um and most of all try to look for the scriptures to bring there upon the subject what we need to know as believers and you know i think um you know in the beginning there was i hadn't even really thought about putting this in a book i you know old pads had kind of uh you know been been putting mothballs from the matter of uh publishing books and we had some other avenues that we were uh utilizing it for but um it was it's interesting that um through communications with dan and joel dan made a comment one time and which i think bears uh quoting here um it was uh he said it was back in june because at that point i knew that something had to be done but i just really couldn't quite put my finger on he said but as i continue to ponder all of what has transpired these past few months the keys now that a foundational issue we have to deal with is persuading so many of our brethren that the suspension of lord's day worship is a really really big deal i never thought i would live to see the day when such conversations would be necessary and quote and i and i that really struck me as i thought about it and realized you know you need to be like the puritans in the 16th and 17th century with their the packet hearing concepts you know putting things out there for the public that you know to see and to read and think about and and so i kind of pulled you know old heads out of the law calls i guess and decided to publish it again but you mentioned about the myth to you know the issue of you know just a simple little thing and you know you know and you know thinking about that as i think all three of us have thought about this there's there's a really important concept for christians especially for christians and that's the matter of christian excuse me of liberty of conscience now that's what people think well you know this isn't really a matter of conscience uh this isn't you know they don't think this is a moral issue they don't think this is a they just think this is a matter in different you know out of your chorus and something that really we don't need to have a major concern about not real you know just a circumstance of activity for the church but when you really get down to it and joel addressed this from the very beginning of our interview here that it gets the heart of truth and that is if what we are being told if what we're being asked to do by masking or by you know closing a church or distancing or whatever else if these things are not true then they're a lie and and and christians can't be complicit implicit in a lie and therefore it is a moral issue and you know there's a great statement in the westminster confession of faith and probably in other reform confessions too that god alone is lord of the conscience and has left it free from the doctrines and commandments of men which are in anything contrary to his word or beside it matters of faith or worship so that to believe such documents or to obey such commands out of conscience is to betray true liberty of conscience and the requiring of an implicit faith and an absolute blind obedience to destroy liberty of conscience and reason also so i think the answer to the person who's saying you know wear the mask it's not a big deal if you know if they're a christian they need to understand it's it's at the it deals with the heart of truth versus non -truth and uh both of you as far as the physicians involved dr yeager and dr o 'rourke it is quite interesting uh that in the media if the media gives us any accurate uh percentage of who is in lockstep agreement about the shutting down of all uh gatherings which would include worship services in fact there was a hasidic jewish synagogue that is going to be fined fifteen thousand dollars by the mayor of new york city i believe that was the fee that they had come up with but it was nonetheless a fee of thousand a fine of thousands of dollars many thousands of dollars because they refused to obey the local mandates on public gatherings and they had a very large wedding celebration that included many thousands of people in this very large facility but if we are to get any kind of barometer from just watching the media we get the notion that most in science in the medical realm are in lockstep agreement with wearing of masks and with not gathering with large groups and that we should not even only restrict things that involve the weakest and most frail among us like the elderly but these mandates and restrictions should even include those who are young and in robust health and strength uh so in your own experience are you both in a tiny minority in reality is the media giving us a false impression here and have you gotten negative feedback from your colleagues and let's start with dr this time yeah great question um i think that certainly what we're seeing in the media is something to be quite honest i never thought i would live to see but that is uh where again we're back to the concept of truth that i mentioned and that ernie just talked about we have a tremendous agenda for truth actually truthful information uh to be squelched and those who believe a different narrative than what the mainstream media would tell us become ostracized the interesting thing i think many physicians are employed by large corporations and you know quite frankly it comes down to a matter of their job if they speak out against the corporation's narrative or mainstream media's narrative you know they'll most likely be fired and unfortunately that's happening across the country i'm sure you've heard of america's frontline doctors which was started by a dr simone gold a jewish er physician from california she's been practicing er medicine for over 20 years her father was a physician a very credible person but started to push back against the mainstream narrative initially formed something called the second opinion project and then that morphed into america's frontline doctors in collaboration with association of american physicians and surgeons which is an independent organization representing independent physicians since 1945 so they've been around for quite a long time when you actually begin to see the number of physicians that are pushing back against the narrative it's actually quite bigger than what the media would ever lead us to believe i'm sure you heard about the white coat summits that were done in dc there was two of them done by america's frontline doctor yes and pushing back on the fact that covid actually can be treated in outpatient settings it can be treated quite effectively and quite easily in many cases again we can't make this a blanket statement for all but you know those youtube videos were trending the highest in social media and you know were shut down and so we see things being shut down we see things being removed very interesting speaking of mass there was a great article that i ran across from a canadian dentist from 2016 and this was published in a dental journal this was way you know four years pre -covid and i was looking at the use of masks and dental settings and i don't have the article right in front of me the title was something along the line of revealing look at masks why they don't work and i had seen that article maybe back in march or april and when i was working on the book i decided to go back and and find that again so i clicked the hyperlink that i had saved in my files and i was met with this amazing note it said if you're looking for dr so -and -so's article on masks it's been removed because it's no longer relevant in today's climate and when i looked at the credentials of the dentist he was not only a dentist he also had a phd he had a doctor of science he was also a fellow of the royal college of dentists of canada so not necessarily your average dentist but that article had been removed which is a real big red flag for free speech civil liberty university discussion you know the whole classic concept of university unity and diversity of opinions it's one thing to to disagree that's what healthy debate is all about but you don't go just simply removing evidence that previously existed because it's no longer relevant and as dr o 'rourke mentioned as i mentioned in the book we have decades of research regarding masks and their lack of effectiveness so i think you know to the concept of how many physicians actually believe the narrative if you followed the media you would think all physicians believe the narrative but there was another very significant movement called the great barrington declaration from a couple of months ago yes three i signed it actually okay great well you know i just read the other day that that uh the total number of signatures worldwide is 700 000 uh in support of that 50 000 50 000 of which are physicians and scientists wow you know that's a large number of people again you would not know that reading mainstream media you would think that all all physicians believe that we should be isolated and social distance but at least 50 000 across the world do not believe that so you know what the three of us are trying to do is just present the truth and you know our goal is not to create an argument but it is to create a discussion and you know i found and i'm sure you all have found as well but you know in my discussions with patients over the years on things that they have questions about or issues that they disagree with you know if you hear where they're coming from uh honestly acknowledge their questions and and then just proceed to you know unpack it explore it uh present a counter uh a point you know many people are so receptive to that and i had a patient just this morning actually who came in and you know almost every one of my patient encounters somehow ends up on the covet subject and i'll have to say they're the ones that bring it up usually not me but till the end of the patient encounter uh this fellow came in for his diabetes that he said to me he said can i pray for you and and he did he proceeded to pray for me and ask that god would protect our practice and you know that happens pretty pretty often actually and that's a real blessing so i think it's easy to feel like we're isolated and ostracized uh but i just am simple enough to believe that truth ultimately prevails and we keep speaking the truth and see where it gobs ultimately in control of that and uh dr o 'rourke have you uh actually experienced any negative feedback from colleagues or patients and uh you could also add anything to what dr yeager has said about the false impression we were all given from the media that we have to follow the science and that means that all scientists is uh unanimously unanimously uh in favor of all the restrictions that we're hearing about the wearing of masks inside our homes outside our homes uh the separation of a minimum of six feet and not going to any events that have large numbers of people gathered and on and on if you could respond to both of those issues about your own personal experience of negative feedback and also the public perception of the unanimity of opinion amongst physicians and scientists i'm very also happy to report that i've really not had a lot of negative feedback um in my own practice um the number of quote -unquote true covid believers is very small uh most of my patients are skeptical we have a large number of patients who could be guests on this program and speak to this topic quite quite relevantly and quite excellently so i'm very pleased about that there has been a few personal areas where some relationships very few in number but have been strained because of the fear factor in fairness to the individuals when you live in a state where the governor has been very heavy -handed we understand that context can can lead to misunderstandings uh but it is very true that propaganda does work and this has been nothing but a massive propaganda episode from the very very beginning uh to add to the uh the notion of uh medical groups and everything uh there's a lot more opposition than the mainstream media um let's go on joel mentioned some of those areas i'll mention uh the american association of physicians and surgeons it's a smaller medical group but for decades they have been the anti -ama and somewhat heroic in my mind and they have led the fight against many aspects of the covid narrative including bringing to light that there are effective outpatient treatments as dr jaeger said hydroxychloroquine the use of vitamin d zinc those types of things for preventing cases from getting serious that require hospitalization and and lastly there are there are very many outstanding uh physicians and epidemiologists who have opposed this i'll just mention one john he's a professor of epidemiology at stanford uh he blew the whistle on this back in march he wrote an article saying that the case fatality rates are being misrepresented the denominator is how many people are actually infected and to put into perspective uh you know the strength of this man's opinion uh in 2006 he wrote a paper which is the most widely cited medical paper in history and basically the essence of the paper was that 90 percent of all medical articles are junk so uh that's uh that that has been a very powerful paper and i must say from my own review of literature for 40 years uh there was a lot of that going on so to say we must follow the science well we must follow the science and many areas of covid not only is the mainstream narrative not following the science but they're actually overturning uh standard uh practices with regards to uh viral respiratory disease and testing and how we look at the probabilities of testing and what are the uh what are the positive predictive value of a positive test some of these are very detailed uh statistical analyses but they're very very important for doctors and as i said earlier in the interview the basic notion that a positive covid test means you have it a negative test means you don't is just completely false and it turns decades of medical statistics and uh you know medical uh epidemiological use and those types of things totally turns them all on on its head okay we have a listener in western suffolk county long island named christopher and christopher wants to know what do you do if anything in your medical practices in regard to the recommendations of the civil government to prevent the spread of the covid virus and i guess we'll start with dr jaeger since we just heard from dr o 'rourke we'll start with dr jaeger and then dr o 'rourke if you could answer christopher's question sure well i we uh handle this the way we've always handled any other illness um again following the science following the um the evidence about is this really any different than the flu so how we do this in our office um we uh we wipe the rooms down between each patient we've always done that that's always been standard uh practice where we wipe the counters doorknobs uh exam tables etc down with termicidal wipes between uh absolutely every patient visit so we've simply done that we've always washed our hands before and after seeing patients so we continue to do that each of these things with extra diligence our office is probably the most unique office physically in in america it's in an old barn so just physically being able to distance six feet is impossible we do not require masks in our office unless people have sickness because for the reasons that i've outlined in the book about the ineffectiveness and lack of evidence of masks presently we do isolate people who are sick if they call in with you know symptoms suggestive of covid or any other illness we have them call when they arrive and then they come around to a back door uh call us on the phone or knock on the door and one of the nurses meets them and puts them in a room that avoids their contact in the area so just essentially common sense ways that one would always use to avoid spreading any other type of illness that's how we're handling it and dr o 'rourke uh yeah joel's summary is very good i would add as cardiologist uh my my involvement with coronavirus is mainly secondary especially in the hospital setting uh critically ill patients uh from whatever cause pneumonia influenza respiratory syncytial virus covet 19 often develop cardiovascular complications but in the office setting we do things similarly to what dr jaeger and his wife do um but it is a good opportunity for me to educate patients obviously it's just the basic hand washing most importantly self -isolating when you're sick with a fever out illness those types of things but as you might guess as a cardiologist many of my patients are elderly and i do spend a lot of time encouraging them encouraging them not to wear a mask uh very briefly uh when we wear a mask for a prolonged period of time with every exhalation water vapor in each one of our exhaled breaths and the pores of the mask become saturated and there have been studies that have shown uh that this uh this moisture uh wicking of the mask does enhance the adherence of microbes and many of my patients have heart failure they have copd uh there was one study that i looked at recently that showed a 13 -fold increase in the chief respiratory illness for people who work masks in a prolonged fashion so those are some of the things i've been doing uh just to quote uh alex merritton he's been a frequent guest uh on on fox uh with uh uh i'm drawing a blank on his name uh very very famous guy that a lot of people watch but uh but basically uh he says virus going to virus and that's that's really the truth uh there's very little humans can do to prevent the spread of a virus uh the mitigation measures don't the spread of viruses is still under much research but it's probably a combination of droplets and and aerosols and uh there's just really not a lot you can do and uh many have appropriately advocated in my view that we should have gone for herd immunity uh very early on in that be healthy who have a very low risk of serious complications or death let them get exposed let them get infected many times their infection is asymptomatic at which time they are very little anybody else but that goes a long way towards protecting the most vulnerable in our society yeah if you could uh that's a very important point because some who claim to be uh physicians and scientists and i guess that they're telling the truth about that but they have scoffed at the whole concept of herd immunity as being something laughable uh some have uh in in the media if you could explain a little bit more in detail about the importance of that well basically it's a concept where when you have a sufficient number of people in a community who have been exposed to a particular disease uh then there's either a complete or partial immunity we know with regard to the

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SARS -CoV -2 uh that that g -cell immunity is just as important if not more so important than that comes from antibodies but basically when patients have immunity and there is strong evidence that we also have some inherent immunity crossover immunity from our past exposure to the what we call the common coronaviruses which are very common causes of mild flu syndromes and common colds so the notion being that if you have school children college age people and then people in the working ages are exposed they're healthy they get these diseases they generally don't become seriously ill they generally don't spread the disease but then they have some immunity to it and then in essence it reduces their future exposure their future illness from exposure and that leads to more protection of the vulnerable for those of us old enough we we remember the days of chicken pox and needles parties uh i remember when i was a little boy all of us had measles mumps rubella chicken pox and uh you know a lot of times you had five siblings in a family and it's the youngest little brother didn't have chicken pox yet and they found out someone up the street had it mom would would send him up and get him exposed so the common use of third immunity even amongst white people has been well known and well described for a long time and we do have uh oh by the way christopher uh please give us your full mailing address in uh western suffolk county long island because you have just won a free copy of the book we are addressing coronavirus and the leadership of the christian church of sacred trust broken compliments of old paths publications uh we have uh joseph in south central pennsylvania who has a question and he provides a very lengthy quote uh from martin luther that i will have to abbreviate uh due to time restraints here uh let's see where i should begin uh where enough preachers are available in one locality and they agree to encourage the other clergy to leave in order not to expose themselves needlessly to danger i do not consider such conduct sinful because spiritual services are provided for and because they would have been ready and willing to stay if it had been necessary we read that saint athanasius fled from his church that his life might be spared because many others were there to administer his office similarly the brethren in damascus lowered paul in a basket over the wall to make it possible for him to escape in acts chapter 9 verse 25 and also in acts chapter 19 verse 30 paul allowed himself to be kept from risking danger in the marketplace because it was not essential for him to do so this is all in the backdrop of plagues and diseases that luther had witnessed in his own day and if he believed that it could be very wise and prudent to unnecessarily to avoid i'm sorry unnecessarily exposing oneself and one's congregation to diseases why wouldn't you feel the same way and i guess probably uh we'll start well whoever started speaking there if you could identify yourself and you could keep that attorney yeah okay should address this first um and and i appreciate the question um certainly that letter of martin luther has been uh i should say certain snippets of it have been bandied about you know in uh support of this idea of shutting down or leaving your your parish or pulpit or church for a time you know the concerns about you know risking lives and so forth but you know what's really interesting though is that you need to read the whole letter and in anything we you know can't take something out of context and when you do read this letter you find some interesting facts that have not been forthcoming even by those who have used you know these these snippets first of all luther says nothing is suspending worship rather that the city had enough preachers and that spiritual services are provided for um it's noteworthy that in and of itself that um there was not a wholesale abandonment of the city where the plague was in fact luther and and others and chaplains there um stayed on on board in fact luther in the same letter states and i have this in my book those who are engaged in a spiritual ministry such as preachers and pastors must likewise remain steadfast before the peril of death we have a plain command from christ a good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep but the hireling sees the wolf coming and flees for when people are dying they most need a spiritual ministry which strengthens and comforts their consciences by words and sacrament and in faith and in faith overcomes death and so you know it's it's there's overwhelmingly you know evidence that that um you know those who were avoiding the plague are spoken of by luther as being weak in the faith and given over to fear in fact he uses those phrases he calls them weak and fearful and i think ultimately the point that luther is getting across at least with regard to those people is go ahead and flee or you know such a one as you are really of no value here to minister to the sick and dying you know we need people we need men here who are confident and trusting in god and willing to lay down their lives you know and not fear you know and are not negligent with regard to their responsibility before god to fulfill their role as pastors so again context and looking at the whole letter is very important and we have to go to our final break it's going to be a lot more brief than the last breaks if you have a question submit it immediately because we're rapidly running out of time and we will get to as many of you who are already waiting with questions we'll get to as many of you as possible as time permits our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com

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chrisarnson at gmail .com don't go away we'll be right back after these messages hi i'm buzz taylor frequent co -host with chris irons and on iron sharpens iron radio i would like to introduce you to my good friends todd and patty jennings at cvbbs which stands for cumberland valley bible book service todd and patty specialize in supplying reformed and puritan books and bibles at discount prices that make them affordable to everyone since 1987 the family -owned and operated book service has sought to bring you the best available christian books and bibles at the best possible prices unlike other book sites they make no effort to provide every book that is available because frankly much of what is being printed is not worth your time that means you can get to the good stuff faster it also means that you don't have to worry about being assaulted by the pornographic heretical and otherwise faith insulting material promoted by the secular book vendors their website is cvbbs .com

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browse the pages at ease shop at your leisure and purchase with confidence as todd and patty work in service to you the church and to christ that's cumberland valley bible book service at cvbbs .com

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that's cvbbs .com let todd and patty know that you heard about them on iron sharpens iron radio 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 brooke baptist at 516 -599 -9402 that's 516 -599 -9402 or visit linbrookbaptist .org

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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 welcome back and dr jaeger we'll start with you we have an anonymous listener who says i am several months pregnant are there extra precautionary measures i should be conducting as a pregnant woman to prevent getting the coronavirus and is there any known case of the coronavirus affecting an unborn child to answer the latter not that i'm aware of i'd have to research that specifically but early on in uh covet 19 i read of three er physicians at a hospital somewhere i forget which state it was in they were all female physicians and they all continued to work in the er seeing covet patients because the risk to the fetus is quite low we actually have a staff member who's pregnant here in the office and soon to deliver in a few weeks and has worked here throughout the whole time we have tried to have other staff see you know particularly sick people but the reasonable precautions is is what i would suggest for that and you have anything to add dr o 'rourke uh not so much to the specifics but just in general as we have to keep in mind uh this goes back to ernie's discussion of the luther letter we really cannot conflate this disease covet 19 with black plague or as dr jaeger has pointed out uh the mortality rate uh in uh people under the age of 70 who are healthy uh from covet is actually less than that of influenza so basically we just need to take the usual precautions try to avoid people uh who are sick especially if they have a fever all of us and try to wash your hands but there's really really no major things that they need to be doing differently than what we've always done we have ronald in eastern suffolk county long island new york who says if masks are really not helpful at all in preventing the spread of the coronavirus why do surgeons wear masks in an operating room well i think dr o 'rourke had mentioned that earlier the idea was preventing spittle that might have had bacterial contamination into the surgical field i mean it's very interesting because in one of the white coat summits there was a 40 -year neurosurgeon as she had practiced neurosurgery for 40 years and she said i've lived 40 years behind a mask referencing her time in the operating room and she said prior to this you know covet we've never ever even considered that masks were effective in preventing viral spread i found that a very interesting comment coming from a neurosurgeon who works behind a mask in an operating room well let's see we have uh cj in lindenhurst long island new york who says can you tell us why this is such an important issue to disobey what seemed to be relatively simple requests or even mandates that people wear masks wherever they go and uh i guess ernie you could start with that and we'll have our other two guests quickly wrap up because we're running out of time well um again i think i talked earlier about it being a simple matter of the mask and yet it really isn't so simple because it does get at the heart of truth and therefore becomes a moral issue um i think ultimately we have to consider what has been um demanded or required by leaders in the church um genuinely of course on their part um has had a divisive effect within the church i mean you know and and our whole purpose in producing this book was really to be a positive help you know a primer a guide for for the future of the christian church we wanted to encourage the you know church leaders to take this to heart is coming from brethren who respect and honor their serious undertaking and we do so because you know that the sheep of the church under their fold you know really want to pray you know like psalm 150 we want to praise the lord we want to praise god in his sanctuary and and so you know it's a significant matter it's not a simple one it gets at the very such of the most important act as a believer and that is giving glory to god praising god making our chief well uh dr jaeger if you could have 30 seconds and dr awok 30 seconds just to wrap up what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners today dr jaeger yes i would circle back to what has just been said and that's the concept of truth uh dan had mentioned briefly a few minutes ago about the uh fatality rate being essentially equivalent in fact probably less than the fatality rate of influenza and that is the medical fact any uh respected epidemiologist has acknowledged that so it's very important for us as physicians and also as believers to speak truth not a narrative but truth so i really would echo the concept of truth that's i'd like uh the listeners to remember dr awok your final words all right just to say that again the foundational premise of our book was that worship should not have been interrupted because of the covet 19 premise uh i would just encourage all of our listeners that they are keeping the aspects of the sixth commandment related to this as long as they don't go to church unhealthy and potentially contagious they have they have violated none of god's law and we are commanded in scripture to gather for worship and one of the arguments i made in the book is that not even church officers have the right to keep healthy people away uh from the house of god as we worship on sunday and so we should gather to do so and we should encourage our church leaders to never consider uh lockdowns in the church again and finally ernie if you could provide uh the any kind of information where our listeners could get a hold of this book i believe that your best contact information for old paths publications is your facebook page correct um that's that's true that we do have a facebook page of course the the book was um printed through a website and a service called lulu .com

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it's you know www .lulu .com the actual url address for the book is a little more complicated but if you simply go to there to the search section on the main page and type in the title of the book pretty much most of the title that you will or even my name or you will find that book and it's we encourage you to get it and you know see what it has to say and you could also go to cvbbs .com

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cumberland valley bible book service and if they don't have it in stock they will order it and we want to thank all of our listeners who sent in questions because you are all receiving a free copy of the book if you give us your full mailing addresses and cvbbs .com