Q and A with Tuesday Guy

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Pastor Mike and Pastor Steve are back in the studio and talk about a variety of topics on today's show that range from sin and the Message, to questions that are frequently asked by Christians. Pastor Mike asks Pastor Steve some questions, which he answers in The No Compromise fashion: 1. Why become a Christian? 2. What steps do I take to become a Christian? 3. What is sin? 4. Why do we call Him Jesus? 5. Is it a sin to lie about my weight? 6. Should I feel guilty about enjoying earthly pleasures? 7. What is The Great Commission? 8. What do I do when the Bible is not clear? 9. Is gambling a sin?

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Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.
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No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ, based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the
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Apostle Paul said, "...but we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you."
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In short, if you like smooth, watered -down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn't for you.
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By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we're called by the
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Divine Trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King. Here's our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth.
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Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry. Today is Tuesday. Do you know what Tuesday means? I have no idea.
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What's Tuesday in Espanol? Do we know? Is that a miracle day? No, that's Wednesday. That's Midvah.
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Uh, you know, I've forgotten. Mueves. Rancho. Mueves. It's move.
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I don't know. Okay. All right. Well, Steve, I do have in front of me today, before we get going, my
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Holy Land oil that I purchased back in 1990 in the
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Holy Land. And so, since our microphones, I don't know, I don't really feel like we have the anointing in the last few shows,
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I've got here three little vials, as you can see. Olive oil from Galilee, holy soil from Jerusalem, and holy water from the
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Vatican, from the Jordan River. Now, don't you think that's pretty, that's too clear to be the
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Jordan River? Yeah. What I'm concerned about, though, is it says it's all packaged in Tulsa. That's what
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I don't really... Well, it says something about here, China. Oral Roberts University.
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I've kept this just because it's a constant reminder to me, Steve, that sanctification is not easy.
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No, sometimes it takes a little olive oil, a little holy soil, and a little holy water. I want to know this, though.
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There's holy soil contained here. There's holy water. Why isn't it holy oil?
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That's a fine... See? I guess there's nothing holy about oil. Okay. Well...
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Holy soil. Do you spread that out on a vampire's crypt or something to keep them from going back?
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Now, I have a question for you, Steve. This is going to get into my inner psychological workings here and all, I understand that.
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Yes, I'm here to help you. But even speaking of Freud and in Vienna, I went to some
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Catholic churches to see them, these great cathedrals that make your eyes just want to go up and look into the heavens transcendently looking at God.
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But when I walk in past the... They'd make my eyes water thinking all the money wasted on them, but...
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Allegedly. And so when I walk past the water basin, it's technically called something that I can't remember.
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Why is it that I, a Protestant evangelical, want to put my fingers in the water, not to dab my forehead and then my right side, left side, and then middle in the
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Catholic dobbing salute, whatever it is. What do they call that? Yeah, they call it the dobbing salute.
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No, that's the holy dobbing salute. But I almost want to give them my
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Protestant dirt or filth. You want to see if your fingers are going to burn when you put them in the holy water,
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I'm saying. Well, kind of. If I put it in a squirt gun and shot a werewolf on the lost boys in Santa Cruz, would it really work?
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Hmm. I don't know. Scientific minds want to know. Don't touch wet paint. Well, we want to touch wet paint.
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Don't put your hands in the holy water, Protestants. It makes me want to do that. Sin, sin, sin.
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Well, while we're thinking about sin, let's look at the Message Bible. I wonder what it says about sin.
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We really need some, there needs to be some appropriate intro music. I know. Mario, would you just please put in some,
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I don't know, Jeopardy music now or something? Or Mariachi band or something? Mario and the Mariachi band.
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Mario's concert here the other night at Bethlehem Bible Church with his sidekick, Gil. Gil and Mario did the album
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Tulip. I think you can go on Tulip the album and download it for free. Yes, you can. Calvinistic rap. Mm -hmm.
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What's their next album going to be? Well, I think they're going to some kind of Pentecostal, I'm not really sure.
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I thought, well, what would the Message Bible say about the second coming?
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And I wanted to pick a passage that, it's pretty scary actually in 2 Thessalonians 1.
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So today's message moment. Today's message moment, and this is about the second coming of Christ.
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And this trouble is a clear sign that God has decided to make you fit for the kingdom. You're suffering now, but justice is on the way.
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When the master Jesus appears out of heaven in a blaze of fire with his strong angels, he'll even up the score by settling accounts with those who gave you such a bad time.
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He'll even up the score. These people, they gave you such a bad time.
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Oh, he's going to rally the troops as it were on your behalf. His coming will be the break we've been waiting for.
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I didn't know God ended sentences in prepositions.
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Would God do that? He might whereunto. It took me a second to get that at.
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Well anyway, I could keep reading, but it just wouldn't do us any good. So well, that's really, you know, the second coming is all about making things even for me.
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Well, that's good to know. Yeah. Well, another message moment brought to you by the proud sponsors at NAV Depressed.
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Okay, so Steve, tell me, anything happening with you personally? If somebody was going to ask you, how's
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Steve doing these days? You're many years over 50, and how's
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Steve Cooley doing? Tell us something about Steve we don't know. Well, my outer man is decaying, and I'm rejoicing in that.
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You know, you are. I just had some minor physical issues. My knee was the size of a volleyball here a couple weeks ago.
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It's now pretty much normal, but you know, just the normal arthritis, aches and pains. But you know, the exciting thing is have a grandchild number four, you know, in the works and pretty excited about that.
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And we know she's going to be a girl, because see, I was the one who said it's going to be a girl anyway, because that's all we ever have.
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But which is fine, you know, since 1978, girl, girl, girl, girl, girl, girl, girl, girl, girl, girl, girl, girl, girl.
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All right, well, that's a little... Now we had first the message moment, then we have the Esteban moment.
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Si. Momento de Esteban. Gracias. Okay. Steve, I was looking at some questions online about Christianity, so I typed in questions that are frequently asked of Christians.
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So frequently asked questions are common questions Christian asks, ask questions intellectuals ask about Christianity, frequently asked questions,
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FAQ, et cetera. I thought that might prove to be good fodder today for No Compromise Radio.
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For Fodder Day. It's... If we were in Belgium, it'd be Happy Fodder's Day.
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How about that? Like we did over the show, Fodder Day. It's Fodder Day. So, I've just got a few questions.
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I think I'll ask the questions and then you can give them to me in No Compromise style. By the way, R .C. Sproul's conference,
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I think we've talked about this on the air, called No Compromise Conference. What is up with that? I don't know, but I'm so upset that I'm gonna go and protest.
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If I didn't have our lawyers at No Compromise Radio working on the music for The Message, I'd probably send them down to talk to R .C.
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at his swank St. Andrew's Palace. With a cease and desist. I think that'd go over well.
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Immediately. Do you think I'd get kicked out of Ligonier's program if I did that? Most likely. Am I even in it still?
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You get the left foot of fellowship. Well, let me see if I can tell this story in a way that will not give more guilt to the innocent parties involved.
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Bring more shame upon yourself. My brother Pat is a pastor and he's at the
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Ligonier Doctorate of Ministry program. I'm gonna give the nicer version. And anyway,
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Pat and I were both taking classes there. I was auditing since I already had my demon at Southern.
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Pat needed to get his demon at Ligonier. That's why I happen to be Baptistic and he's gonna turn out to be a
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Paedo -Baptist. That's the demon of Paedo -Baptism. Anyway, I was sent a grade in the mail.
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They thought I was Pat. You know, you see how that could happen. Sure. Avendroth, Avendroth. And so then
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I made a PDF of it and then I made some kind of harsh comments about Pat's work attitude and class and demeanor and everything.
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And then I sent it to my brother and I sent it via email and I said, Pat, I think
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I got this by mistake. I'm not sure if this was meant to come to me or not, but here it is.
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Actually, it worked. It was classic. Well, yeah, it was classic.
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Yeah, it fooled Pat. Probably, you know, he probably needed the defibrillator to get it going again.
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All right, well, let's just ask some questions. Some of these, Steve, are serious and some of these aren't so serious, but these here are on about .com
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under religion and spirituality slash Christianity. Why become a Christian?
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You know what? That is actually a good question. Why become a Christian? So if someone were to ask, why should
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I become a Christian, you would say what? Well, here's what I would say. The Bible presents several very convincing reasons to become a
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Christian. Here are six life -changing experiences worth considering as reasons to convert to Christianity.
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See, they're doing this whole metanarrative deal so you have the story approach. So if somebody asks you the question, see, they're trying to do the,
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I've got a story to tell you. Now, I think it's dopey here on about .com, but Steve, I was listening to Vern Poythress on Christ the
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Center, and when asked about God as he's evangelizing people,
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Poythress did a Vantillian rap. Just kidding. He answered in a
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Vantillian style. Reptilian, Vantillian? You know what? Maybe that should be the next album for Mario and Gil.
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Reptilian? Vantill. Well, maybe. We wouldn't even have to put a space on it or anything like that.
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And we could ask, I don't know. We could have evidence that demands a verdict, but we'll hand it out as a door prize.
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How catchy would this be as a song? Presuppositional. Apologetics, you know? Evidentialism?
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You best forget it. You know what? You best forget it. So I liked it that Poythress would say to unbelievers, so when did you stop believing in God?
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Because then they started to talk about their own life story and then he would preach the gospel right out of that. That's a great question because, you know, what's inherent, what's embedded in that is they did believe in God.
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You know, it gets right back to the Romans 1 issue, which is, I think, where do you want to be in evangelism?
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You know there's a God. You're just suppressing that truth. So, you know, I - You know there's a God. You're suppressing that truth, suppressing that truth.
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So it's a nicer way of saying, when did you start suppressing the truth about God and unrighteousness? So true.
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Romans 1, by the way, for you listeners today that like questions and answers, that like tests, that like exams, quizzes, if you ever are stumped, proverbially, what's a proverb for stumped?
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Figuratively speaking. At the end of your rope. If you're proverbially at the end of your theological quiz rope, then you just write down Romans 1.
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You're grasping at straws. Yeah, write down Romans 1, space, FF period, Romans 1 following, then you're covered.
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It covers every single thing because that may be the rest of the chapter. It might be the rest of the book. The rest of the book, yeah.
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Romans 1. If I read Romans 1, FF, I'd go, oh, the whole book. That's right. All right, but tell me the real reason, though.
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If somebody asked you, why should they become a Christian? We could give many answers. One, because it honors
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God and glorifies God, right? Forget what it does to your status before God. It is honoring to God.
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It's a fragrant aroma to God. Because you're a sinner and you need forgiveness of sins. I like that too.
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Okay, that was short but sweet. Let's see. You can tell this is very
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Pelagian, semi -Pelagian, Armenian. What steps do I take? Uber Pelagian.
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What steps do I take to become a Christian? How do I do it? Well, you only have to take one step because God takes 99 steps towards you and you make the last step.
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Yes. You make the call. All right, let's see what else do we have here? Oh, okay. Something like this one might be good.
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What is sin? For such a small word, a lot is packed into the meaning of sin.
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So what would we give them? The six Hebrew words and the six Greek words for sin? Yeah.
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Well, I mean, we know that sin is technically missing the mark. It's being less than perfect.
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It's failing to live up to God's standard. And that's something that we all do. If the commandments can be boiled down to love the
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Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and your neighbor as yourself, we don't even do that. Okay, Mike and Steve today on No Compromise Radio.
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Let me ask you another Steve question. Yeah. Another Steve question. Specifically for Steve.
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Why do we call him Jesus if his name is Yahshua? Because we don't speak
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Hebrew. I don't know. I mean, why do we call him Jesus? You know, why do we say believe instead of pastuo?
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Because we don't speak Greek. Now, I'm gonna throw you a little zinger here.
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I got on christianmingle .com's 10 most frequently asked questions. I think it's a Christian dating site.
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Yeah, which thankfully I have never been to. See, how great is that? It's awesome. So there's a lot of questions about Christianity, but I thought
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I'd throw one out of left field to Steve. And this is Christian Mingle's.
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Off the Green Monster. Uh -huh, this is the first most frequently asked question. Remember, this is a romantic dating site for Christians.
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Is it a sin to lie about my weight? Only if you're overweight. Oh, yeah.
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Well. Somebody asked my weight,
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I just say it's adequate. Oh, all right.
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Why are Mormons even allowed here? That's another question. That's a good question. See? That's a very good question.
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Okay. Oh, boys. All right, one other question here from Christian Mingle's 10 most frequently asked questions.
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What does it mean when they list their favorite TV show and movie as Dancing with the Stars and Footloose?
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Just the first half. I'll tell you exactly what it means.
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It means move on, you know, skip, pass. Okay. My favorite show is
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Dancing with the Stars. Well, that tells me, you know. Next real question for Pastor Steve today, no compromise right now.
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Real question. Should I feel guilty about enjoying earthly pleasures? Now, see, that's a great question to ask because that cuts to the heart of our worldview.
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Earthly pleasures. Yeah, well, I guess you'd have to define earthly pleasures. You know, I mean, if you're gonna say, like,
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I enjoy - Malt. Malt. Yeah, and I enjoy having my grandchildren around.
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Is that an earthly pleasure? Yes, it is. You know, I mean, it's certainly not a heavenly pleasure.
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So should I feel guilty about that? No. Should I feel guilty about having a malt? No. Should I feel guilty about,
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I don't know, Starbucks coffee? No. So, no.
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Would you ever tell people on the radio what your dogs are named? No, that's proprietary information.
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Okay. Well, yes, I would. Okay, come on, come on, lay it on us. This is -
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If we had an email, of course. I can't get any emails. Yeah, Starbucks, Kona, and Latte.
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Now, what was the fourth dog's name before it died? Mocha? No, we didn't have a fourth dog. Okay, next question, real question.
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What is the Great Commission? Is that a real question? Yeah, yeah, next page, flip it over. Are you kidding?
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It's out of Matthew 28, 18 and 20. It's going to make disciples. Right, but you know what
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I like, Steve? I like the S. Lewis Johnson zinger. Now, that is, of course, the Great Commission to us, but the
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Great Commission was the father charging the son to go die for the elect. That's a greater commission, isn't it?
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Well, it is, but, you know, I mean, if you say, oh, no, I'm sorry, the Great Commission is actually the father sending the people to go, well, where's that?
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I never heard that called the Great Commission. So, you know, he's got a great point, but it's just too intellectual for me.
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Next question, what do I do when the Bible is not clear? Muddle along, well,
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I don't know, maybe get some counsel from, you know, that's so broad.
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I mean, here's what I typically find. People want the Bible not to be clear when they want to do what they want to do, but the
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Bible's very plain and most important matters, and if it's not, then you have freedom.
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Don't you think most people, when it comes to decision -making, they want the Bible or they want
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God to inform them or direct them in such a way where they don't have to use their mind?
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God hasn't told us how to make every single decision in life. He's told us lots of things, but people turn the will of God, the will of the
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Lord. Don't be foolish, Ephesians 5, verse 17, but know what the will of the Lord is. They've turned the will of the
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Lord into what's God's will for my life, completely making it self -centered. Yeah, a list of do's and don'ts or whatever, and, you know,
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I think the other side of it is that people feel free to completely disregard the
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Bible when it is clear. I mean, I think specifically of Amy Grant when she got divorced, and, you know, what was her explanation?
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She said, well, God wants me to be happy, and I'm like, what's the verse on that one, you know? Well, let's just keep asking people till they tell us what we'd like to hear.
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Yeah, well, and there's that too, right? Well, I think the Bible says this and this and this and this, and then they just go, okay, well,
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I'll go to Pastor Mike instead, see if he'll give me a different answer. Steve, I don't want to over -exaggerate something.
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Is that even proper to say, over -exaggerate? Hyper -exaggerate, I believe is the technical term.
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Hyper -exaggeration. I don't want to hyper -exaggerate, but when people come in and ask me a question about their life in a pastoral counseling setting,
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I can see the look on their face within about 20 seconds if I give them an answer, but they came to me for a different answer, and then they're like, okay, this is shot.
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No sense wasting my time here because I didn't get the answer I'm looking for. I think that's a U2 song, actually.
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Yeah, I still haven't found what I'm looking for. Still haven't found the answer. I want you to tell me. I usually end those kind of sessions pretty early, and then as they're leaving the parking lot, they always roll down their windows and crank up that song.
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Well, I usually ask them the next question, and that is, what do I do when the Bible's not clear? What do
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I do when the Bible's not clear? I have another question for you, Steve. Clean up the page. This is a very interesting question.
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Is gambling a sin? Gambling. Yeah, I mean, it's, yeah.
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It's discontent with what God has provided. It's greed, so yeah.
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I mean, people say, well, is the lottery sinful? Yeah, I think it is, because it typically is greed.
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Now, I did carve out an exception for somebody I won't name, but - They bought a chicken, gave it to you, and you should rest it.
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No, they were pretty new on the job, and it's a place where you could get fired.
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If you don't buy one? Well, maybe that would just be one of the things that kind of ultimately would lead to them firing you, and so this person just kind of said, well, it's a buck, or it's two bucks, or whatever, so I'm gonna just join the pool.
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So, and I'm like, well, if that's your attitude, and you don't normally play, but they're like, hey, it's 10 kajillion dollars this week.
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We have to play. Only a stupid person wouldn't play the lottery this week, and, you know, so -
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Can't you just say, if you were on the job, though, and someone said, we're having a big pool for a lottery deal, and you say, oh, you know what?
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Thanks for asking, but I don't play the lottery. You could say that. Did you hear Pastor Steve's phone?
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On the other hand, you could get a page or something during the show. Yeah, maybe that's somebody telling you that don't talk about them on the radio, that you gave them advice to gamble.
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Now, when I go to the stores around here for gambling purposes. No, I don't go for gambling purposes.
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When I go just to go get a soda, and people are lined up trying to get their cool, extra longs, extra cartons of cools, and then they've got about five packets of Ritz crackers with fake cheese and fake peanut butter on the inside, and then they buy $50 of scratches, and then they wanna scratch the tickets in line.
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You're supposed to buy them. Let me just clear it up once and for all. This is proper protocol. You buy the scratchers. For all our no -code scratchers.
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If you're stupid and poor and greedy, you buy the scratchers. Then you get back into line, scratch, and then get to the front, and then they give you, after you're $50 spent, they give you your $2, so you can buy another $2 scratcher, then go back to line again.
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You know, I don't endorse. Man, I don't condone or anything like that, but it really is, you know what the lottery is?
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It's a tax on the stupid and greedy and the poor.
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Right, because basically there's no other way to squeeze money out of poor people, so what do you do? You promise them riches, and here's a little statistical fact.
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If you go to, and I'm not in any way endorsing this, if you go to a casino, the casino keeps about 12 % of the money that is gambled.
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That's what they keep. You know how much the state keeps? 50%, 50%.
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Schools win, too. Ugh, yeah, yeah, because all the money then goes straight to the school.
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No, it doesn't. It goes straight into the general fund, or they dedicate it to the schools, and then they cut the school funding.
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It's all a big game. If you wanna buy lottery tickets, all I can tell you is you might as well throw your money out the window, because it has about the same effect.
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Well, I was thinking about having a new no -compromise scratcher. Ha, ha, ha, ha.
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If you, pfft. It's a fundraiser. It's a fundraiser. Ha, ha, ha.
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We need some new equipment. Steve, maybe if you give money towards the no -compromise scratch tickets, we'll have an extra 30 -minute show that you only the special subscribers get.
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Mm, and they can listen to it some other time. I don't know. Yeah, the scratcher.
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We'll call it the scratcher show. Ha, ha, ha. Well, today on No Compromise Radio, we've pretty much talked about nothing and everything at the same time.
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How is that possible? It's kind of a Jerry Seinfeld episode. Yes, did you have Geritol when you were a kid watching wrestling?
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I never took Geritol. Okay, I never did either, but I could use some right about now. They sponsored that show, is what you're talking about.
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Yes, they did. Wasn't it just loaded with alcohol and other drugs? Well, probably. Did you just snap a pencil?
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I just snapped a pencil. What is going on? Today's show, Mike Abendroth, Steve Cooley. You can write us at info at nocompromiseradio .com.
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No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.
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Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life transforming power of God's word through verse by verse exposition of the sacred text.
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Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at six. We're right on route 110 in West Boylston.
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You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.
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The thoughts and opinions expressed on No Compromise Radio do not necessarily reflect those of WVNE, its staff or management.