July 22, 2025 Show with Luke Peterson on “Bringing the Gospel of God’s Sovereign Grace to Costa Rica”

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Live from historic downtown Carlisle, Pennsylvania, home of founding father James Wilson, 19th century hymn writer

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George Duffield, 19th century gospel minister George Norcross, and sports legend

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Jim Thorpe, 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.

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And now, here's your host, Chris Arnzen. Good afternoon,

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Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, Lake City, Florida, and the rest of humanity living on the planet

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Earth who are listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com.

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This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Tuesday on this 22nd day of July 2025.

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Before I introduce my guest for the day and our topic, I just wanted to tell you about an odd circumstance involving

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God's providence. Yesterday, which would have been

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July 21st, when I was beginning to prepare to promote today's program, which involves church planting in Costa Rica, I was on my computer and looking for graphics on the

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Internet to use in the promotion of today's program.

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And I was in particular looking for a graphic of the map of Costa Rica.

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And just as I was looking for that, listening to the television at the same time with Fox News on, and they had a breaking news announcement that actor

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Malcolm Jamal Warner had tragically died of an accidental drowning in Costa Rica while his family and he were on vacation there.

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And I was totally stunned because I was looking for a map of Costa Rica when

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I heard this news. Most of you who have any clue who

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Malcolm Jamal Warner is will most remember him for his role as Theo, one of the children of Bill Cosby in The Cosby Show.

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And I believe he was portraying Bill Cosby, that is,

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Theodore Huxtable, I believe was the name of the character. And I just found out today that my old friend

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Steve Camp, who many of you are familiar with, he's a Christian recording artist, he's a

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Reformed Baptist, and he is currently pastoring in Florida. Well, he had a three -hour encounter with Malcolm Jamal Warner years ago in a studio where Steve Camp was involved in recording some music, and he was specifically working on a song that was a response to the

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Black Lives Matter movement called All Lives Matter. And although Malcolm Jamal Warner, who was in the studio with Steve, took great exception to this song, even threatened

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Steve that if he were to show up at a rally where Black Lives Matter was protesting, if he were to show up there with his own group to promote an

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All Lives Matter theme and publicly perform his music and so on,

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Steve was told by Malcolm that he would be met with violence. And that included at the hands of Malcolm Jamal Warner himself.

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But oddly, Steve seemed to still nonetheless have an enjoyable, in -depth conversation with him for three hours.

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We can only hope that seeds were planted, that eventually, by God's sovereign grace, took root and blossomed in genuine faith in Christ before Malcolm Jamal Warner perished.

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The actual day of his death was Monday, July 20th.

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And I'm sorry, Sunday, July 20th. But that didn't make the news until yesterday, the 21st.

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So we should all pray for his family, that this grief and mourning draws them closer to Christ and even results in the salvation of many, if not all, in his family.

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But today, as I just hinted in that little story, we are going to be talking about Costa Rica.

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And in particular, we have as a guest today, Luke Peterson.

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And he was strongly suggested to be a guest on this program by my pastor,

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Simon O'Maney of Trinity Reformed Baptist Church of Carlisle, Pennsylvania. He urged me to consider having

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Luke on the program, and if my pastor urges me to do something like that,

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I have nothing but the highest appreciation for his discernment and wisdom.

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And so I took him up on that suggestion immediately, and I was very grateful that Luke Peterson was available to be on the program today.

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Luke is a confessional Reformed Baptist church planter in Costa Rica, originally from North Carolina, and he's addressing bringing the gospel of God's sovereign grace to Costa Rica.

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And it's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the very first time ever to Iron Trip and Zion Radio, Luke Peterson.

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Thank you, brother, so much for having me. It's an honor to be here today. It is an honor to have you on the program.

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And before I forget, I want to make sure that I announce to our listeners that you,

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God willing, are going to be preaching at the aforementioned Trinity Reformed Baptist Church of Carlisle, Pennsylvania, where I am a member, and that is going to be

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Sunday, August 3rd, I believe? That's correct. And our services are at 1 .30

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in the afternoon here in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, because of the fact that we're using the facilities of Carlisle Baptist Church, so we have to wait for their morning worship to conclude before we use it.

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And if you want more information about this preaching engagement for Luke Peterson and for all other details that you might want to find out about Trinity Reformed Baptist Church of Carlisle, Pennsylvania, go to trbccarlisle .org.

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That's trbccarlisle .org, and Carlisle is spelled

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C -A -R -L -I -S -L -E, trbccarlisle .org.

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But before we get into your ministry, this exciting new ministry to Costa Rica—and I know that you have been involved in Costa Rica already, but this is a new chapter in your involvement there that we're going to be addressing—we have a tradition here on Iron Shrub and Zion Radio whenever we have a first -time guest, we have that guest give a summary of their salvation testimony that would include the religious atmosphere in which they were raised, if any, and the kinds of providential circumstances our

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Sovereign Lord raised up in your life that drew you to Himself and saved you. So, let's hear your story, brother.

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Yes, amen. Amen. Thank you again, brother. Again, as I said, a pleasure to be here. I pray that the

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Lord would be honored in our time. Again, my name is Luke Peterson. I'm married to my beloved bride,

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Courtney, nearly 13 years now, coming up in a few weeks. And by God's glorious grace, we have two children—Harper, our daughter, who is 10, and our son

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Judah is 7. I'm originally from the mountains of North Carolina—West Jefferson, to be precise.

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It's kind of hard to find on a map. It's a small mountain county of 25 ,000 or so people.

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In fact, there's much religion there. I think I recall when I lived there, growing up there, we counted once upon a time that in just that county of 25 ,000 people, there were over 81

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Baptist churches alone. And so, from an early age, I remember going to church.

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Grew up in a very religious environment. It's the South, where everybody would tell you that, of course, they're a Christian because they made a decision when they were young.

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But I really don't recall, unto the Lord, the truth of the gospel being distilled into my life.

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It's very likely that my ears were hardened, and my heart was hardened in that sense.

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But I grew up in a fundamental Southern Baptist assembly, where easy -believism and decisionalism were very present, very encouraged.

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But I don't recall hearing the gospel in its fullness, speaking on the forgiveness of sins offered in the name of Christ through repentance and faith.

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Because every service was really about someone coming to the front, praying that prayer, making that decision.

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And the best way to say it about my own life is that I was completely enamored with my sin growing up, but content to claim that I was a

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Christian because I thought that I'd made a decision when I was seven years old. But what the Lord later revealed to me was that I had faith in a decision, not in the person of the

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Lord Jesus Christ, and I was trusting in myself and my own works. I was not united to Him by faith, but instead was very self -righteous, and there were no fruits in my life, and I was headed straight for hell.

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And in the Lord's kind providence, when I was 17, 18 years old, there was a youth pastor that came to this church, and he directly confronted me in my sin and told me that I wasn't a

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Christian. And I was angry with him for telling me that, but he said, Let's do this.

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I want you to read the Word of God, and after you've read it, we have discussions. You tell me then if you think you're still a

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Christian. And so through that year, between 17 and 18 years of age, I read the

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Word of God, and the Lord saved me. Through that, especially in a passage like John, that tells us,

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If you love me, keep my commandments. And just seeing that love is at the center of a relationship with Christ.

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So I had no fruits, and it was when I was 18, in the Lord's kind providence, that He granted me repentance and His grace.

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And so I think John 3 really hammers home that which I say about my own life, that which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the

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Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, You must be born again. And so it was then, by God's sovereign grace, that He saved me when

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I was 18 years old. This would have been 2008. And from there, I was originally planning to be an anesthesiologist.

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I wanted to go and make as much money as possible. But the Lord removed every desire from me at that point.

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And when I was 19, I attended Appalachian State University, and then ended up later going to Southeastern Seminary.

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So that's a little bit of my conversion. I won't get into the whole ministry aspect right this moment unless you desire me to do so, brother.

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Well, I just think it's interesting that you began wanting to knock people out for a living, and then you transitioned to being used of God to wake people up and bring them to new life.

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So when did you realize, and what were the circumstances involved, that God had called you to be a missionary?

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And then even later, or could have been simultaneously, that you believed you had the call upon your life to become a pastor as well?

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Yeah, absolutely. 2009, about a few months after my conversion,

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I was still a part of this church in the mountains of North Carolina. And there was a mission trip scheduled that we were going to take to Mexico.

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And then at that time, in 2009, that's when the swine flu broke out. I'm sure some of you may remember that.

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It diverted our plans, and that's how we ended up getting connected, and we went to Nicaragua.

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And so, just to give you a little bit more of context of what I grew up in, this was also a church that when you see someone generally converted, especially a man, and he's serious about the

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Word of God and the things of God, then the next couple weeks, he's probably going to start preaching. And so that was a challenge for me growing up in that.

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But through discipleship from my uncle and this youth pastor, who eventually had to leave this church for Calvinistic convictions, they really encouraged me to really consider the ministry and that desire to do that.

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But it was really part and parcel because of the trip to Nicaragua that started stirring my affections for missions and really the work of the ministry.

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And it was in August of 2009 or late July that we went down and we were connected to a pastor there who was working in a little small town.

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Didiamba is the name of it. So about an hour and a half south of the capital city of Managua.

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But through those trips was really just what stirred up a lot of my zeal for missions.

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But at that point in my life, I would say it wasn't really a spirit rock conviction, but more of it was a romantic idea of missions.

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I like the idea of it. And so from there, I didn't really act on those longings, if you will, towards missions, but really consider getting prepared for ministry.

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And so that's when in 2009, I decided to transfer from Appalachian State University, where I was just in finance, just a generic degree, but to focus on going to Southeastern Seminary, the college at Southeastern Seminary in Wake Forest, North Carolina, which was a

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Southern Baptist seminary to study pastoral ministry there in Christian studies.

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And so that's what I focused on for the several years that I was there. But I think during that time, and then just continuing through that process,

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I had a great desire and zeal and a hunger for the Word of God, just an insatiable one, but also really just weighing and just being held captive by the thought of how many are perishing without the

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Lord Jesus Christ. And so it was probably 19, 20 years old when

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I really just wrestled with going into the ministry and didn't obviously understand the implications to that.

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And then, of course, by down the road of laboring in another church plant, and that helped confirmed that conviction and that calling, because obviously there's a subjective nature to the pastoral call, but we don't simply allow that subjective nature to determine whether a call has to be confirmed by Christ Church.

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And so after seminary or during seminary, we moved to plant a church in the mountains of North Carolina with that same youth pastor who was at the previous church that I grew up in.

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And this would have been the first Calvinistic church, other than a Presbyterian church in the area, but definitely the first Calvinistic Baptist church.

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And so through the course of time, it wasn't overnight, I could say, but the Lord really gave me, I believe, a pastor's heart and a desire to labor.

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And so that started in 2009 and really was confirmed until we planted in 2011.

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Now, according to your testimony, the youth pastor had to leave the previous church because of his

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Calvinistic convictions. When did you begin to develop these convictions? Yes, first semester at Southeastern.

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I had been attending at that point. My now wife, I went to her parents' church.

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It was another Southern Baptist church, but the youth pastor, we got to know each other and spend some time and do some studies together.

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And then one day out of the blue, he asked me if I would like to study John Calvin's Institutes to Christian Religion with him.

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And of course, I said yes. And so that was really my introduction. Now, keep in mind, it was very

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Arminian where I grew up in. But also at that time, I'd started listening to a man named

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Mark Driscoll. And so Mark Driscoll was very influential of that Calvinistic stage.

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But I remember it was a very deep struggle for me at first to really wrestle with Calvinism. And I remember one of my first years at Southeastern that I decided

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I'm going to read entirely the Bible through and look for every instance of the election and just see. And obviously the

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Spirit convinced me that that was the case. But that youth pastor was very influential as well.

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That was from my in -laws, my current in -laws church, and just guiding me along the way.

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And why is it that you immediately wanted to study the Institutes? Were you just humoring this brother or did you already have a deep -seated curiosity?

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What was the deal there? Yeah, I think one was I had a hunger and I just wanted to devour anything.

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And of course, this man taking interest in me and wanting to spend time in disciplining was significant for me.

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And it meant a lot to me. Also, you heard the first couple semesters of being at Southeastern, the

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Arminian Calvinistic debate that was there. And so it really piqued my interest. But I pray that my posture was

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I just want to see what the Word of God teaches. And so John Calvin had been cited in classrooms in different places already at Southeastern.

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So I think that that piqued my interest even more. Great. And as far as Mark Driscoll is concerned, where is he these days theologically?

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Is he still a professing Calvinist? To my knowledge, I don't believe he is.

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I saw a post not so long ago that he would say some unpleasant things toward Calvinists.

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It seems that he has went more of the charismatic camp. Obviously, I don't believe he's qualified.

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And so he left there at Mars Hill and decided he was going to go plant another church kind of on his own accord, which

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I assume he's still there in Arizona. I guess it's Phoenix. But very unfortunate to see just that instance.

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But as far as I know, I don't think he would claim the Calvinistic banner any longer.

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Well, we are going to our first commercial break. And if anybody has a question for Luke Peterson, our email address is

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ChrisArnzen at gmail .com. ChrisArnzen at gmail .com.

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And as always, give us your first name, at least your city and state of residence and your country of residence.

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If you live outside the USA, don't go away. We're going to be right back after these messages. James White here of Alpha Omega Ministries announcing that this

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September I'm heading out to Pennsylvania to speak at two events that my longtime friend

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Chris Arnzen has lined up for me. On Thursday, September 18th at 11 a .m.,

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I'm speaking to men in ministry leadership at Chris's Iron Sharpens Iron radio pre -pastor's luncheon at Church of the

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Living Christ in Loisville. Then on Sunday, September 21st at 1 .30

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p .m., I'm speaking at Trinity Reformed Baptist Church of Carlisle on the theme, Can We Trust the

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Bible is the Authentic and Inerrant Word of God? I hope you can join Chris and me for both events.

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For more details on the free pastor's luncheon, visit ironsharpensironradio .com.

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That's ironsharpensironradio .com. For more details on Trinity Reformed Baptist Church of Carlisle, visit trbccarlisle .org.

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That's trbccarlisle .org. God willing, I'll see you in September in Pennsylvania for these exciting events.

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I'm Simon O'Mahony, pastor of Trinity Reformed Baptist Church in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. Originally from Cork, Ireland, the

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Lord in his sovereign providence has called me to shepherd this new and growing congregation here in Cumberland County.

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At TRBC, we joyfully uphold the Second London Baptist Confession. We embrace congregational church government.

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And we are committed to preaching the full counsel of God's word for the edification of believers, the salvation of the lost and the glory of our triune

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God. We are also devoted to living out the one another commands of scripture, loving, encouraging and serving each other as the body of Christ.

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In our worship, we sing psalms and the great hymns of the faith. And we gather around the Lord's table every

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Sunday. We would love for you to visit and worship with us. You can find our details at trbccarlisle .org.

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That's trbccarlisle .org. God willing, we'll see you soon.

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And we're now back with Luke Peterson, and we are talking about his church planting work in Costa Rica.

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And I'd like to know, when was it and how did this develop in your mind and heart to enter into a mission field in a

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Latin country? I don't even know if you had previously spoken a word of Spanish, but then moving from that to specifically wanting to plant roots and plant a church in Costa Rica.

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Yeah, absolutely, brother. Going back to what I mentioned earlier, after we planted the church in 2011 there in West Jefferson, North Carolina, we continued to go twice a year to Nicaragua, as we developed a relationship with that pastor.

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And so we continued to support the work there, traveling usually twice a year is what it ended up being. And to make a long story short, we found out, unfortunately, that he had been dishonest with us about the actual work that he was doing there.

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And in fact, he had been aiding the communist government and using a lot of the things that we had been helping with, including building a church building to kind of promote whatever the communists would like there, and they would give him a kickback from that.

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And so that happened around 2016. And after we got back from that trip, myself and another fellow elder, we had a difficult elders meeting where we decided that either we're going to stop working completely in Nicaragua and pull out altogether, or if we're going to continue, then we need to send someone down to beat boots on the ground for us.

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And so the other elders, the two of them at the time, looked at me and said, we think that should be you.

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Now, keep in mind, during this time, I was bivocational, I had great desires and aspirations for full -time ministry, but yet had not had that opportunity come my way.

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And my wife was still working at the hospital. Our daughter was born in 2015.

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And so for us, I would say when we first decided to go to Nicaragua, it wasn't really that we felt a call that we could do nothing else, but more of an open opportunity where we could labor full -time ministry.

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And we love Nicaragua, that country. But as you mentioned, we didn't really speak Spanish. And so in 2017, that church sent us to Nicaragua to labor and really to the first year studying language learning.

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And so that was initially how we got there. And, of course, I know we'll talk about it in a moment.

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But that conviction, that calling to be and serve in Latin America, especially

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Costa Rica, became much clearer to us later. And we'll get there, I'm sure.

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But that was 2017 that the church originally sent us to Nicaragua. And it was to labor with another missionary couple that was already there.

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And we originally went just with a two -year commitment, thinking that we could accomplish everything in two years if we wanted to.

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But we were very unwise. And the Lord really helped us to see that.

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And so we labored in Nicaragua for a year. And about nine months in,

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I preached my first sermon in Spanish. It was extremely difficult. I just wrote out my sermons in Spanish and learned how to pronounce each of the words and the letters.

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And there's actually another pastor down there. He's originally from Venezuela. He would sit down with me and go word by word along with me through my sermon manuscripts and help me to pronounce the language.

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And so our goal was to eventually plant Reformed Baptist Church in the capital city of Managua.

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But in God's difficult but kind providence, we were forced to flee the country after only being there for one year due to political turmoil with the same communist regime.

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If any of you recall, Daniel Ortega, an Andalusian. So he is still there and still in power along with his wife.

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And so we weren't in direct persecution, but we just got caught in between the protests that were happening and the communist government.

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And so that same year, this would have been May of 2000, April of 2018, going into May, I was invited to attend a

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Spanish pastors conference in North Bergen, New Jersey. And it was there that I met several

37:34

Costa Rican pastors. And our elders, the ascending church in North Carolina, decided that it was going to be too dangerous for us to return to Nicaragua.

37:44

And so that's when they pitched the idea to us to move to Costa Rica because there was a group of five families in the northwestern part of the country desiring to see the confessional church established.

37:56

And I think Proverbs 16 is very correct to think through in this process was a man's heart plans his way, but the

38:05

Lord directs his steps. Praise God. Now, whatever happened with the scam artist that was stealing money from you and actually funding the cause for communism?

38:19

Yeah, he's still there. We've had some conversations since then. I mean, he is a professing believer in Christ still.

38:28

Yeah, yeah, he's still a professing believer in Christ. And he would have articulated as he didn't really have a choice that he had to provide for his family.

38:37

And the communist government would give him enough to have his sustenance. And so we just parted ways and told him that we couldn't in good conscience work any longer with him.

38:48

And it broke our hearts because we had a very close relationship with him and his family. And so that was that was a significant challenge to us.

38:56

Well, one of these days I've got to introduce you to a friend of mine, Lou Vega.

39:01

He is pastor of Covenant Presbyterian Church in Houston, Texas.

39:08

PCA congregation. And Lou is a native of Cuba. And his family fled

39:16

Cuba just in time before the fall of Cuba to Castro and the communists.

39:25

And Lou has a passion to bring the gospel to those enslaved by communism and even rescue children out of communist controlled countries.

39:41

And he's involved in a ministry called Pedro Pan, which is a takeoff of Peter Pan.

39:48

And they rescue children out of Cuba and so on. So one of these days

39:54

I've got to introduce you to he's coming back on Iron Trip and Zion Radio for another interview.

40:00

And we just haven't picked an exact date yet. But so tell us now about this new work.

40:11

Now, I remember at one point. You were a missionary there, if I'm not mistaken, in Costa Rica, and now you've turned from missionary to church planter, correct?

40:28

Yes, that's correct. And so when we were invited in late July of 2018 to come to Costa Rica and the elders were sending church were in agreement.

40:39

What ended up happening was that we we joined another reformed Baptist church that was there.

40:46

It had been established since 2014. And we became members, my my wife and myself.

40:51

And and it was then because of this group of five families that were desirous to see a church established and planted.

40:58

But they didn't have anyone to lead them. But that church set us apart, set me apart as the church planter there to the town of Liberia, which is

41:10

Liberia for my English speakers and Liberian Spanish. And so by God's grace, that is when we started,

41:19

I think, cultivating more conviction about what the Lord would have us to do in realizing that in most normal circumstances, you can't plant a church and see it established in two years.

41:31

And so when we left for Costa Rica, really, our heart was as long as the Lord would have us there.

41:37

We wanted to be there and to labor. By God's grace, the pastors of the church that's now meeting in a town called

41:44

Miramar, they had done a lot of the groundwork already. And so they had been traveling really twice a week for a year and a half, maybe more at this point.

41:56

They had afternoon services on the Lord's Day and a midweek Bible study on Thursday. But again, they just kept praying for a man to be raised up.

42:05

And so that is when we got connected providentially to them and the other sister churches there.

42:12

And at the time when we went to Costa Rica, there were only two Reformed Baptist churches in the country. By God's grace, there are eight now.

42:18

It is really encouraging to see. But I think that was when the shift was, you know, their really desire to see a healthy, biblically organized church, which is far and few between, to find in Costa Rica.

42:35

Very difficult to find, not even Reformed Baptist churches, but let alone churches that preach the gospel. Are you aware of the

42:43

Reformed origins of the works that were proclaiming the doctrines of grace before you got there in Costa Rica?

42:53

Yes, yes, a few of them. I think primarily we affectionately call the church, the

43:00

Reformed Baptist Church of Los Lagos, which is the town that's in the greater metropolitan area of San Jose.

43:06

We affectionately call that church our grandmother church. And it was really in the early 2000s that a missionary, a man named

43:14

Steve Henning, was laboring there. He was an independent fundamental

43:20

Baptist and started growing in convictions toward the things of Reformed.

43:26

Hallelujah. And he became Reformed while he was on the mission field.

43:33

But that created problems for him. I'm sure it did. Yes, he lost his support.

43:44

And then he went to the Reformed Baptist Church, Grace Reformed Baptist Church in Mebane, North Carolina, asking for help.

43:51

And they agreed to kind of help and really become his new sending church, for lack of a better term.

43:57

And so he set really the process of Reformation off there in Los Lagos.

44:02

There was another man who's still a pastor there today by the name of Eric Rosales, a dear brother of mine.

44:08

And so they were laboring together. But in God's difficult providence, Pastor Steve Henning went to be with the

44:15

Lord in 2009. He died of colon cancer. But the

44:20

Lord provided three other men to be raised up as elders in 2011.

44:26

And so they labored faithfully there, all of them still dear brothers. They don't all still pastor that same church because they have since then been sent out to plant other

44:37

Reformed Baptist churches in areas where there are saints gathered together. And so we like to attribute

44:44

Los Lagos really as the beginnings of the Reformation in Costa Rica. And I tell people all the time, what you have to understand about Latin America is that the

44:53

Reformation never got there. And so what we're seeing today, and I'm convinced, is after 500 years, we're seeing the

45:00

Reformation finally get to Latin America. And so it's a wonderful thing to behold. We give thanks to the

45:06

Lord for it. Amen. Well, tell us about the adversaries to the gospel of Jesus Christ and also specifically to Reformed theology that you and your brethren are facing on a regular basis there in Costa Rica.

45:28

Yeah, well, if you're familiar with Latin American geography and the countries, you'll know it's a

45:34

Roman Catholic country. It's even enshrined in the Constitution of Costa Rica. And so depending on what survey you look at, 60 to up to 70 percent of Costa Ricans identify as Roman Catholic.

45:49

Is it mainly nominal or they have high percentages of zealous, very deeply religious

45:58

Roman Catholics? I think the younger generation is going to be more nominal. So it's not uncommon to find someone say, well,

46:05

I'm a Catholic, but also an atheist. But the older generation, they're quite serious about Roman Catholicism, about being the one true church.

46:17

And especially when you get into more rural areas, I think you find a more serious adherence to Roman Catholicism.

46:24

But it's still very supernatural, mixed in with a lot of superstition. And even you'll see at times animism and different things that come about because of that.

46:36

And so it is definitely a stronghold. The people of Costa Rica largely are still enslaved to Roman Catholicism.

46:44

And so that's a big opponent to Reformed theology, to the gospel itself. Last week, we're in Costa Rica.

46:51

We're doing Bible distribution and evangelism door to door. And I can't tell you how many times we had the question, is this a

46:57

Catholic Bible or an evangelical Bible? In the sense that they didn't want to take it if it was an evangelical.

47:03

But we got to have good conversations with them. So I think 2 Timothy 3 probably sums up a lot of Costa Rica is that they have a form of godliness, but deny its power.

47:14

You see that quite often. Now, on the other hand, while there is a large majority of Roman Catholics there, on paper, it says that 15 % of Costa Ricans are evangelical.

47:26

But what we really find by that, what's meant by that is, well, one, they're Pentecostal. And the majority of these

47:33

Pentecostals are oneness Pentecostals, which deny Trinity outright. So those are the two major opposition that you have, which is why

47:46

Sola Scriptura is such an important doctrine to bring to bear in the country of Costa Rica. Yeah, that's interesting that the majority of Pentecostals there are oneness because they would be a minority,

47:58

I think, everywhere else in the world. So how did that come about?

48:04

Do you know? I don't know the history. Obviously, there's a lot of prosperity gospel there, too.

48:10

But, you know, we interacted, and it was new to me, interacting with a lot of these that deny the

48:16

Trinity. I'm not sure of the exact history, brother, but I know that a lot of the prosperity gospel and the mixing here and there has been imported into the country.

48:28

Yeah, I know that the prosperity gospel, the word of faith movement here in America, ironically, with the

48:40

Trinity Broadcasting Network, which doesn't seem to care that much about the seriousness of the

48:45

Trinity, they somehow have eventually become extremely ecumenical with oneness

48:53

Pentecostals. And it's very strange because typically oneness

49:01

Pentecostals take their view of Unitarianism extremely seriously to the point where they have accused

49:13

Trinitarians and worshiping three false gods. So that is interesting.

49:19

Well, what about the cults? I mean, obviously, oneness Pentecostalism is a cult because not only do they deny the

49:26

Trinity, but they actually have a lot of other requirements for salvation.

49:34

In fact, if you're a real hardcore oneness, like in the

49:40

United Pentecostal Church International, you have to speak in tongues as an evidence that you're saved.

49:49

Not that you just have been baptized by the Holy Spirit, but that you are actually regenerate.

49:57

That is a litmus test with them. But anyway, what other cults are there that are competing with the gospel?

50:07

Yeah, Jehovah's Witness is very prominent as well. And by God's grace, even in the church that Lord Willen will be serving in, there are several who have been converted out of Jehovah's Witness.

50:20

Mormonism, there's a ward pretty much in every town. Wow. In the smallest of towns.

50:27

And so you'll see that quite common in just this super, super nice buildings. And a lot of times, right near downtown, they didn't get as close to downtown as the

50:37

Catholic churches got, but they still got to get there. And then I think the best way to describe it is, this is where I would say

50:45

Costa Rica is a little bit unique than maybe some of the other Central American countries. There's a lot of, probably the best way is those who would just say that they are spiritual, one with nature, a lot of pantheism.

51:00

And it's very popular in the tourism sector there, the yoga, the eco travel, all of these things being one with nature.

51:09

I don't know if I have an exact word to put on it, a name for it, but probably attribute a lot to the occult.

51:15

You see things that are very dark there. But a lot of spirituality that's there, but not a lot of gospel.

51:23

Yeah, I can remember growing up on Long Island, there was a prominent

51:30

Roman Catholic newspaper called the Long Island Catholic. In fact, I even to this day have continued a longtime close friendship with a friend,

51:45

Pete Sheehan, who worked at the Long Island Catholic for many years, but then since moved to Ohio, still in journalism.

51:55

And we have an interesting relationship because he's very frustrated that I refuse to identify him as a brother in Christ.

52:04

But I mean no malice behind that. I make it clear that it's because I love him and care about his eternity that I have to tell him the truth, that he has a false gospel.

52:15

But the newspaper that he worked for while on Long Island, the Long Island Catholic, in the advertising section, you would see all kinds of crazy ads, like even

52:29

Buddhist meditation being promoted by Roman Catholic priests.

52:36

And all kinds of strange New Age stuff that the priests and even nuns would be involved in.

52:48

But really strange stuff that the Roman Catholic Church, in trying to win over the population wherever they are taking root, they accommodate and become very inclusive with religions outside of even

53:11

Roman Catholicism, let alone Christianity. But we have to go to our midway break right now.

53:17

And once again, if you have a question for Luke Peterson on his new work in Costa Rica, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

53:29

Give us your first name at least, your city and state, and your country of residence. Don't go away. We're going to be right back after these messages.

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It's such a blessing to hear from Iron Sharpens Iron radio listeners from all over the world.

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Here's Joe Riley, a listener in Ireland, who wants you to know about a guest on the show he really loves hearing interviewed,

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Dr. Joe Moorcraft. I'm Joe Riley, a faithful Iron Sharpens Iron radio listener here in Atai, in County Kildare, Ireland.

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Going back to 2005, one of my very favorite guests on Iron Sharpens Iron is

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Dr. Joe Moorcraft. If you've been blessed by Iron Sharpens Iron radio, Dr. Moorcraft and Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming, Georgia, are largely to thank, since they are one of the program's largest financial supporters.

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Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming is in Forsyth County, a part of the Atlanta metropolitan area.

54:33

Heritage is a thoroughly biblical church, unwaveringly committed to Westminster standards, and Dr.

54:39

Joe Moorcraft is the author of an eight -volume commentary on the larger catechism. Heritage is a member of the

54:44

Hanover Presbytery, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone, and tracing its roots and heritage back to the great

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Protestant Reformation of the 16th century. Heritage maintains and follows the biblical truth and principles proclaimed by the

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Reformers, Scripture alone, grace alone, faith alone, Christ alone, and God's glory alone.

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Their primary goal is the worship of the Triune God that continues in eternity. For more details on Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming, Georgia, visit heritagepresbyterianchurch .com.

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Hope Reformed Baptist Church in Corham, Long Island, New York, pastored by Rich Jensen and Christopher McDowell.

58:52

It's such a joy to witness and experience fellowship with people of God, like the dear saints at Hope Reformed Baptist Church in Corham, 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

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For more information on Hope Reformed Baptist Church, go to hopereformedli .net.

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01:06:11

Welcome back. Before I return to my fascinating discussion with Luke Peterson and his church -planting work in Costa Rica, I do have some important reminders for you.

01:06:22

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Last but not least, if you're not a member of a biblically faithful, Christ -honoring, theologically sound, doctrinally solid church, no matter where you live on the planet

01:08:33

Earth, I may be able to help you find a biblically faithful church, as I have done with many people spanning the entire globe in the

01:08:41

Iron Trippins Iron Radio audience, sometimes helping folks to find churches that are biblically faithful just a couple of minutes from where they live.

01:08:49

And that may possibly be you, too, if you're without a church home. So no matter where you live in the world, please send me an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com

01:08:59

and put I need a church in the subject line. That's also the email address where you can send in a question to Luke Peterson on his church planting work in Costa Rica, and that is chrisarnson at gmail .com.

01:09:13

As always, give us your first name at least, city and state and country of residence. We have

01:09:19

Humberto in the Bronx, New York, who wants to know, I'm assuming you have a lot of absolute treasures of the

01:09:28

Reformed faith translated in print in the Spanish language. Can you tell us the sources of this

01:09:37

Spanish material and name some of those things that you do have translated into Spanish?

01:09:46

Yeah, absolutely. Good question. I'm not sure if I'm super familiar with absolute treasures, but I can speak on some other translation work if that'll hit it.

01:09:58

Oh, yeah. You keep telling us a long list as you can. Yes, there's obviously in the years past, it's been harder to find solid, faithful, biblically centered material in Spanish.

01:10:12

Chapel Library is obviously one that has done a lot of good work. Right now, too, they're really the brothers out of Ecuador.

01:10:22

Jorge Rodriguez is his name. They've been working actually with a brother from Cuba as well, and one of the pastors in Costa Rica works on the translation committee.

01:10:31

It's called Legal Bautista Confesional, and so it is like a confessional

01:10:37

Baptist heritage, something along those lines. But wonderful works that are being translated.

01:10:43

A lot of the modern Reformed Baptist authors, Dr. Waldron, Dr. Barcelos, Dr. Renahan, different things are coming out through them, and so that's been super helpful in a lot of ways.

01:10:55

Obviously, some of the more distinctly confessional and 1689 material is now just really finally coming out in greater quantities.

01:11:07

But I think the challenge, speaking of Costa Rica, in many countries in Latin America, knowing other pastors is actually getting those materials.

01:11:16

So that's a big challenge. Usually when a team comes down to visit, we go. We always take at least one suitcase full of solid, faithful materials.

01:11:26

But there are several churches in Costa Rica that are really working to build their theological library to help better equip their members and also to hopefully convince some of their

01:11:37

Catholic friends as well as their Pentecostal friends. Amen.

01:11:43

Well, if anybody wants the specific websites and the order information for these

01:11:52

Spanish works, just send me an email at chrisarnsen at gmail .com, and I'll reach out to Luke Peterson, and he could provide me with that information.

01:12:01

And by the way, you mentioned Sam Waldron. He's going to be returning to Iron Trip and Zion Radio on Wednesday, August 6th for an interview.

01:12:12

I'm not 100 % sure of our topic at this point, but we will definitely have one before then.

01:12:18

So if you love the writings and preaching of Dr. Sam Waldron, who is president of Covenant Baptist Theological Seminary in Owensboro, Kentucky, mark your calendars for Wednesday, August 6th, and he will be joining us.

01:12:39

Let's see here. We have August, who is located in Massapequa, Long Island, not far from where I was raised.

01:12:55

And August wants to know, have the folks in your church in Costa Rica come to the point where they can easily understand your preaching since the

01:13:08

Spanish language is not your native tongue, and do you hear compliments about it? Yeah, that's a great question, too.

01:13:16

I'll say it this way. God's people have been very patient with me in learning Spanish, but at the same time, the

01:13:22

Lord has helped me tremendously to be able to communicate, to preach regularly. And even though we've been back in the

01:13:28

States since 2020, I've taken multiple trips per year in various countries, not just Costa Rica, but really through Central America to really maintain.

01:13:37

That doesn't mean every once in a while there's a slip up or I say something wrong or the right word doesn't come out.

01:13:43

But overall, confidently I can preach well in Spanish without any hindrance.

01:13:52

And that really was due to when we moved to Costa Rica in July of 2018, I began preaching three times a week and teaching, preaching and teaching,

01:14:02

I should say, three times a week. And so that gets you flowing very quick. So I remember those first days

01:14:08

I would write everything out in English and then translate into Spanish word by word. And the first days it took me about eight hours to, to comb through one manuscript.

01:14:17

And then I'd go working on my pronunciation for most of the day. But now by God's grace,

01:14:24

I don't have to do it to that extent. I'm able to have a lot of freedom and liberty in Spanish.

01:14:30

So very thankful. And I attribute it to just being with the Lord's people there and not being in those missionary bubbles, but just being with the people without any kind of pride.

01:14:40

Just attempt to speak the best that you can, and you'll find God's people are very gracious. Praise God.

01:14:48

Let's see. We have Naomi in Nashua, New Hampshire.

01:14:57

And Naomi says, you've already mentioned of the rivals to the gospel, primarily being the

01:15:05

Roman Catholic church and the oneness and Apostle cult. And there are some

01:15:12

Mormons and Jehovah's witnesses there as well, but is a large threat, nominalism and secularism.

01:15:21

And tell us how that takes form in the majority. Yes. Yeah.

01:15:28

Another good question. Yeah. I think with, with the younger generation, secularism is on the rise.

01:15:34

You see that quite often, especially in the capital region of San Jose, you see that happening.

01:15:40

And, you know, as I mentioned, the people who are content, well, you know, I was raised Catholic, but I'm an atheist, that kind of mentality.

01:15:46

So it is a big pressure there. And in Costa Rica does have,

01:15:52

I guess say some close connections with the States in the sense that usually what you see in the

01:15:58

States will trickle down at some point in time. And so unfortunately that is one reality of the growing secularism that happens.

01:16:05

And the other one, this might be tied together, the new age mysticism. That was the word that I couldn't find earlier.

01:16:13

That's another one that, that is very prominent. And it really, you interact.

01:16:18

And there's really two different types of people that you interact with. There are the Costa Ricans, those who live there.

01:16:24

And then you interact with a lot of Americans or even Europeans who are there as tourists or even expats.

01:16:31

And so you see quite a wide variety, but, but yeah, secularism is a huge one as well.

01:16:38

Well, tell us about the actual makeup of the areas that you are primarily laboring in as far as urban versus rural, you know, a place of industry or agriculture, you know, that kind of thing.

01:16:57

Yeah. So we're, we're in the Northwestern part of Costa Rica. You've got your map for four or so hours, about an hour from four hours,

01:17:06

I should say from the capital area, about an hour from the border of Nicaragua, Costa Rica, seven provinces.

01:17:11

And we're located in the province of Guanacaste. And you'll find there, they're also the best beaches in the world, even though I'm a little biased on Guanacaste.

01:17:22

So you have a lot of tourism because of that, but also in actually the, where most, the majority of people live.

01:17:29

It's a more rural area still yet. Liberia has 80 ,000 or so inhabitants, but it's a very farming, agriculturally based society there.

01:17:41

I kid around a lot of times with people and tell them it's the Texas of Costa Rica. And so you'll find a slower pace.

01:17:47

It reminds me a lot of the South, but it is more rural and a lot of farming, a lot of cattle, a lot of ranching that goes on there.

01:17:56

So it's a bit different than San Jose, where you have 3 million people and very urban.

01:18:03

And the average income and lifestyle of the folks there?

01:18:10

Yeah, I think the latest update, minimum wage is between, after conversion,

01:18:16

I think $800 to $900 a month. And so, you know, most homes are going to be double income.

01:18:22

It's, it's not, it's not a third world country. And I think that's the difference in some of the surrounding regions.

01:18:29

Like when we lived in Nicaragua, like the monthly salary for every home was around $200 a month.

01:18:35

Very sparse that. And so Costa Rica is more of developing country. And so I would,

01:18:41

I would estimate just the average family probably brings in $1 ,500 to two grand a month and live on that.

01:18:47

But it's very tight. And it's also a society that's very entrenched in debt.

01:18:53

And so a lot of people are in debt and just cannot get out when you have, you know, credit cards, 50, 60 % interest rates.

01:19:01

And so it's very challenging for a lot of people, but a recent survey also put out that Costa Rica is the most expensive country in Latin America now.

01:19:10

And, and so I saw that, I don't know how to compare that to each one, but we definitely can feel the expenses there.

01:19:16

And I know the people feel it as well. For example, we're living in Virginia now.

01:19:22

We can live cheaper in Virginia than we can in Costa Rica. Now you had mentioned due to a listener question about secularism being a rival of evangelism.

01:19:37

What about some folks within your own circle of conservative

01:19:48

Christianity, conservative evangelical Protestant Christianity who may despise

01:19:54

Calvinism? Do you have a significant number of independent fundamentalists that might hate

01:20:02

Calvinism or Wesleyan Armenians or folks like that? Yeah, I know there are some, there are some in the various parts of Costa Rica.

01:20:13

I haven't met personally anyone who is actively hostile to Calvinism.

01:20:19

That could just be my lack of exposure. But I think one thing is true that just because there is such a lack of faithful gospel preaching churches,

01:20:28

I sense a lot more of charitableness about individuals who come from those different backgrounds.

01:20:36

And so there are some, you know, independent, fundamental style -esque Baptist churches that I've known.

01:20:43

But also at the same time, there's a lot of cordiality, cordialness for different pastors in different places.

01:20:51

And so my experience in interacting with various brothers, even Armenian brothers, has been very warm and encouraged to at least see the gospel going forth.

01:21:01

I don't sense that same kind of tension that perhaps we have here in the States between Armenians and Calvinists, although I'm sure it's there.

01:21:12

I would like to be more optimistic, but is some of the warmth that you're getting from non -Reformed brethren who are just totally ignorant about what the doctrines of grace stand for?

01:21:26

That could be very well true, brother. Very well true. And do you have any anecdotes and other kinds of stories you can relate to our audience about folks who have come to Christ and perhaps some unlikely conversions and that kind of thing?

01:21:46

Yeah, absolutely. That's a wonderful question. I'll never forget, there's a sister, dear sister in the church.

01:21:53

She's still there, still a member. Doña Ana, that's what we affectionately call her. When she started first coming to the church, she was coming because her daughter and son -in -law were attending.

01:22:05

And really, we weren't even a church yet. We hadn't been constituted. So we were still in that planting phase. And I remember she would always, one, encourage me on my

01:22:14

Spanish. She was a school teacher and she knew the effort. She would be very encouraging to me.

01:22:20

But I also remember that when she was directly confronted with the gospel, and having conversations with her, she told me that she wants to believe what

01:22:29

I'm preaching. But the hardest thing for her is knowing that if she believes what I say to be true, that is the true gospel, then all of her family or ancestors, that means they're in hell.

01:22:40

And so that was a significant difficulty for her. By God's grace, the Lord converted her.

01:22:46

And she's still faithfully walking there in the church. But I know it's a common experience. There's shame that comes from families when you leave

01:22:54

Roman Catholicism. You've left the one true church. And so that is a serious obstacle for many of them.

01:23:03

They just are afraid to count the cost of what that means to suffer that shame from family and that loss.

01:23:13

Yeah. I've heard that same kind of thing all my life after being born again, where people would rather—of course, they don't realize the logical consistency of this— but it appears they would rather follow their ancestors and their family to hell than follow a system of faith that teaches that they have the false gospel and are there.

01:23:50

They just don't even want to hear what you have to say because of that. And that's quite a tragedy.

01:23:58

And of course, we believe in a sovereign God, and we don't know how he may have communicated the gospel to many of these people's loved ones and ancestors.

01:24:10

Just because we don't hear with our own ears someone that we love profess the gospel while they're dying, if we're not there when they pass, they could have believed, and we just don't know about it.

01:24:29

Or even if we're there, they might be unable to speak. There's all kinds of scenarios.

01:24:35

No, that's exactly right. And please give us some specific ways that our listeners can pray for and support what you're doing there.

01:24:48

Yeah, thank you. Obviously, we desperately need the prayers of the saints.

01:24:56

And Lord willing, this September, there's a tentative plan to be sent out by Emmanuel Baptist Church here in Verona, Virginia.

01:25:04

And so we need prayers towards the work of the ministry, which obviously I'll be primarily engaging myself in pastoral ministry, but the work of church planting and seeing men raised up.

01:25:16

We know, as the word tells us, that the harvest is plentiful, but the labors are few.

01:25:23

And so we must take the Lord, our Lord, at his words when he begs us to pray and bids us to pray and to take that into prayer.

01:25:32

So praying for more faithful men to be raised up, praying for the work of the ordinary ministry there in the

01:25:42

Reformed Baptist Church of Euredia. We need God's help to continue shepherding the saints there.

01:25:49

There's 22 members currently in the church and a few that are looking to join in membership.

01:25:54

And so we're so thankful for that. But we recognize that this is not something, humanly speaking, that we can do on our own.

01:26:02

We need the help and the power of the Holy Spirit to accompany the gospel as it goes forth, that it would go forth in power and penetrate those hearts that are hardened to Roman Catholicism, to prosperity gospel, whatever it may be.

01:26:15

And so prayers are a huge way. Obviously, the practical things, if anyone, is we always need good,

01:26:22

Reformed, printed material. And so tracts to books, those are always things that I've encouraged other churches if they wanted to help.

01:26:33

That's a huge way that they can help. And it's a culture where when you're either preaching on the street or evangelizing, you enter into a lot more pleasant conversations than in my experience here in the

01:26:45

States. People are genuinely willing to talk about the things of the Lord. It may become difficult when they won't budge on their

01:26:54

Roman Catholicism, but they're still willing to take a Bible or take a tract and read it. And we've even seen fruit from that and people coming to the church and eventually being converted and become members.

01:27:06

And so those are some practical ways. Of course, praying for the churches. And there's always an open invitation for anyone who wants to come and see the work.

01:27:15

And we can introduce you to it there firsthand. Now, are there any cultural differences that might be not common here in the

01:27:27

United States, where even evangelicals over there in Costa Rica are a part of perhaps doing things every day and approaching a whole host of subjects in a unique way that may raise eyebrows from American evangelicals?

01:27:53

And, you know, they might say, really, that's what they think? That's what they do? Anything unusual there?

01:28:00

Well, the one that comes to mind for me, especially in this is probably true of most Latino cultures, is the issue of time.

01:28:06

Americans are very punctual. Especially Reformed Baptists. That's right.

01:28:14

And so there you need to learn to be flexible. You know, and so things go at a slower pace.

01:28:22

Sometimes there's not always a plan until you're right before it. But it's also something that I've tried to exhort the brethren there about that, you know, time is significant.

01:28:33

And being on time, especially to corporate public worship, is important in the eyes of the

01:28:38

Lord. It's not an American thing. And even other Costa Rican pastors have echoed this in saying, well, you know, you're robbing, stealing from the

01:28:46

Lord this time. And so that's been a unique cultural challenge, you know, especially for us.

01:28:53

And so you need to be flexible. But also, you know, there has been tremendous strides and progress within the

01:29:00

Reformed Baptist churches to this end of time. But just being flexible as a whole and realizing that you, especially with your brothers and sisters in Christ there, you're going to be warm and welcomed in immediately.

01:29:15

And so there's a very affectionate culture, very close culture, very familiar culture.

01:29:21

And so they love to be hospitable to you. And that's just a wonderful thing. I think that was just probably just a difference for us.

01:29:28

We're just seeing how open and inviting, even when you're going door to door evangelizing, people would invite you in to have a cup of coffee and then sit down and you have a captive audience.

01:29:40

Wow. Well, that's interesting. That's good to know. Now, as far as worship music is concerned,

01:29:47

I know that it's probably a wide variety outside of the Reformed faith, especially.

01:29:54

But are people in your congregation singing more traditional music, like many

01:30:02

Reformed Baptists do, with the same kind of instrumentation and melodies that we are accustomed to here in the

01:30:11

United States and in the UK and so on? Or is there a different flavor there when it comes to worship music?

01:30:19

Yeah, it would be very, very similar to what we're accustomed to in most Reformed Baptist churches. Very historic hymns.

01:30:26

There are lots. Of course, they've been translated, different things. And usually the accompaniment is actually a track, but a piano on track is usually just because, at least in our situation and in many others, there's not anyone who can play the piano within the congregation.

01:30:41

And so there is a lot of a cappella singing, as the Lord has helped his people to grow and their singing abilities here.

01:30:49

So, yeah, it would be very familiar. The order of service and worship would be something very familiar to most

01:30:56

Reformed Baptists here, stateside. Does the average member of the church there really understand the doctrines of grace?

01:31:07

Do they understand what the confession teaches? Yes. Yes. We, I'll just speak from the

01:31:15

Reformed Baptist church in the Euredian. When we were there, we would probably, as we call it here, something along the lines of substantial subscription to the confession.

01:31:25

And so not perhaps every single, you know, dot and tittle of the confession, but they would need to have a general agreement toward the substance of it.

01:31:35

And especially if there was something they had questioned on, they needed to be teachable about it.

01:31:41

And so it would be very difficult, as we told several Arminians, it would be very difficult for them to submit with a clean conscience to a ministry like that, and their conscience would be perpetually struggling with that.

01:31:55

And so, yes, there has to be some kind of adherence to the confession. And so usually for many, it's new.

01:32:02

And just to keep in mind, put it in perspective, most of the believers in the

01:32:07

Euredian are probably first generation Christians. And so there's not a long history even of being a

01:32:14

Christian. And so some of it's new. But we do have classes where we teach the confession. There's a lot that's recorded.

01:32:20

And we try to go, you know, encourage those who are attending part of that membership process to read through the confession, the constitution.

01:32:27

Are there any concerns or anything that they need more further explanation on?

01:32:33

But yes, the members, to answer your question, would have a good knowledge and would be in agreement with most of our shared principles from the confession in 1689.

01:32:42

Okay, we have Kyle, who is writing from West Valley City, Utah.

01:32:54

And Kyle is asking, very often you hear stories about the mission fields in foreign lands where people who have strict religious and theological and doctrinal standards wind up cooperating with those that differ from them greatly, sometimes out of necessity, especially when they are trying to meet physical and financial needs.

01:33:22

Of people in the community. Is this something you face and how far do you go when something like that is going on?

01:33:33

Yeah, that's another good question. It's a challenge. I think one of the benefits, the blessings of this country is there is a lot of solid, faithful, biblical preaching churches there, not so much.

01:33:50

And I'll speak broadly to Latin America, especially Central America. And so I would say there are things that you're willing to work alongside and labor with other churches in.

01:34:02

But there can only be so much that you can labor in if there is a significant doctrinal difference.

01:34:09

And so there's a challenge in that. I think a lot of times, too, the mission field and it's lonely.

01:34:15

And so you don't find a lot of like -mindedness. I mean, when we were in Nicaragua, for example, there was not a single

01:34:22

Reformed Baptist church in the whole country. It wasn't until March of this year that one was established.

01:34:29

And so there are things that you'd be willing to do. For example, I was part of a

01:34:34

Calvinistic Baptist church there as we were learning Spanish. They allowed me to preach and they asked me not to touch certain of the

01:34:41

Reformed distinctives that they didn't agree on. But I think it just kind of depends. But never should we compromise and never should we be willing to pull back on our theological convictions in order to labor.

01:34:56

And what ended up happening is inevitably in the work of mission so often is that people start compromising and compromising.

01:35:03

And eventually you're doing nothing more than social work because you're afraid to even speak the message of the gospel. And so it's a hard balance when we need much wisdom.

01:35:11

But I think there must be—we need to be charitable and willing to engage.

01:35:18

But there comes a limit to how much we can do depending on where that theological difference is.

01:35:25

Now, as far as areas in Central America where barriers have not yet been broken and there are unevangelized communities,

01:35:39

I know that in South America there are such places. Is there anything like that in Central America?

01:35:47

Yeah, there still is. There's still, depending on which country you're in, some indigenous. In Costa Rica, for example, there's several tribes,

01:35:58

I guess you can call them that. Most of them speak Spanish. There's probably—there's one that I'm thinking of close by, one at Costa, that's probably 2 ,000 people.

01:36:07

There's others that speak a language called Patois. And so they're still there.

01:36:14

I think when you get closer to Mexico, Guatemala especially, northern

01:36:19

Guatemala, you'll find a lot more unreached. Nicaragua even had some. They speak another language on the eastern part of Nicaragua, Miskito.

01:36:28

And so there's still, yes, a lot of unreached. Costa Rica is a little bit unique in that sense.

01:36:34

And it's a little bit more modern, as I mentioned, a developing country. But there still are, even in Costa Rica, some indigenous presence that have not heard the gospel or don't have the gospel in their language.

01:36:45

And are you aware of any mission works that intend to break those barriers with those groups?

01:36:52

Right now, in Costa Rica, I'm not aware of anything. It's obviously one thing that we would like to consider how we can be helpful there.

01:37:00

The advantage is, as I mentioned, a lot of those in Costa Rica do speak Spanish. And so they're a little bit more.

01:37:07

I know several sister churches, one in Guatemala, the capital city of Guatemala. And I know that there's been some desire to see more work going there.

01:37:16

There's actually a brother that I met when I was preaching a conference in Guatemala City on marriage.

01:37:21

He came up to me and said that he was from one of these places where they spoke a different language.

01:37:27

His parents didn't even speak Spanish. And he came to study in the capital and wanted to take the gospel back to them.

01:37:34

And so there's several examples of that. But it's really, I mean, we're really at the beginning of these kind of labors and works.

01:37:42

And I know there's been some history missions in Central America, but I don't think all of these places have been reached with the biblical gospel.

01:37:51

And as far as the culture there, are there things that are not as aggressive as we see here in the

01:38:07

States and even in the U .K. and other places where leftism is rampant?

01:38:14

Not only political leftism, but moral leftism, homosexuality, feminism.

01:38:23

I mean, you could even have a politically leftist area that's totally sold out to communism or collapsed by the weight of communism that is not very friendly towards homosexuality or feminism.

01:38:37

But as far as that's concerned, how is that showing itself, proving itself to be in the culture there?

01:38:47

Yeah, yeah. Costa Rica is still very committed to socialistic principles. What you do see, though, there, however, with that being said, the

01:38:57

Roman Catholic Church still has significant influence. Now, there are still a lot of the LGBTQ stuff there, but it's not as prevalent and common.

01:39:05

It's not culturally accepted or tolerated, as you would see here. In fact, there was legislature just legislation last couple of weeks that went through in Costa Rica to ban children from attending any kind of pride event in Costa Rica.

01:39:19

Yeah, and I've heard that that was one of the biggest downfalls to the shock of the

01:39:30

Democratic Party here in the United States. They have gone so far left that they began losing the

01:39:37

Hispanic vote even here, that people that were Hispanic, Latin American who may have voted

01:39:48

Democratic their whole lives and maybe even for generations, but they just jumped ship because of the just absolute insanity in that area.

01:40:00

Yeah, that's right. That's exactly right. And another example is abortion. It's illegal in Costa Rica.

01:40:07

And so that is another gift of God's common grace there.

01:40:12

Now, it was homosexual marriage was illegal up until 2020. And then 2020 during COVID, they had a very left president who snuck it in without anybody noticing and passed it and put it on the wall in 2020 during COVID.

01:40:28

So unfortunately, that is legal by the law of the land in Costa Rica now.

01:40:33

But overall, I think you'll see a lot more conservative politically overall, albeit you'll have many that would still favor those left leaning policies and tendencies.

01:40:49

Well, we have to go to our final break. And before we go to the break, I want to remind you folks that this

01:40:57

Thursday and Friday here on Iron Trip and Zion Radio, we have another two -day debate, live two -day debate between Nazarene Pastor Jared K.

01:41:11

Henry and Reformed Baptist Pastor Jeremiah Nortier.

01:41:17

And this time, these two men are debating the extremely controversial subject.

01:41:25

Can Christians attain total freedom from known sin in this life?

01:41:33

Jared K. Henry, the Nazarene, is affirming that thesis, whereas Reformed Baptist Jeremiah Nortier is obviously opposing or denying that thesis.

01:41:46

Mark your calendars for this two -day debate. We already had these men debate two weeks ago on the ordination of women, where Jared K.

01:41:58

Henry, the Nazarene, was affirming that, and Jeremiah Nortier, the

01:42:03

Reformed Baptist, was opposing or denying that. But this is a different subject and perhaps even more controversial and more even touching on the very gospel itself.

01:42:16

So I hope that you will mark your calendars and tune in for this very exciting debate this

01:42:23

Thursday and Friday here on Iron Trip and Zion Radio. But if you have a question in mind that you'd like to ask of Luke Peterson, I would highly suggest that you send the question now because we're rapidly running out of time.

01:42:39

ChrisArnzen at gmail .com. ChrisArnzen at gmail .com. Give us your first name at least, your city and state, and your country of residence.

01:42:47

Don't go away. We'll be right back after these messages. This is

01:43:00

Pastor Bill Sousa, Grace Church at Franklin, here in the beautiful state of Tennessee.

01:43:05

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01:43:14

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01:43:27

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01:43:33

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01:44:05

This is Pastor Bill Sousa wishing you all the richest blessings of our sovereign

01:44:10

Lord, God, Savior, and King, Jesus Christ, today and always.

01:44:20

I'm Dr. Joseph Piper, President Emeritus and Professor of Systematic and Applied Theology at Greenville Presbyterian Theological Seminary.

01:44:37

Every Christian who's serious about the Deformed Faith and the Westminster Standards should have and use the eight -volume commentary on the theology and ethics of the

01:44:47

Westminster Larger Catechism titled Authentic Christianity by Dr. Joseph Morecraft.

01:44:54

It is much more than an exposition of the Larger Catechism. It is a thoroughly researched work that utilizes biblical exegesis as well as historical and systematic theology.

01:45:05

Dr. Morecraft is Pastor of Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming, Georgia, and I urge everyone looking for a biblically faithful church in that area to visit that fine congregation.

01:45:17

For details on the eight -volume commentary, go to westminstercommentary .com, westminstercommentary .com.

01:45:25

For details on Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming, Georgia, visit heritagepresbyterianchurch .com,

01:45:32

heritagepresbyterianchurch .com. Please tell Dr. Morecraft and the

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01:45:46

Keith Allen of Lindbrook Baptist Church, a

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Christ -centered, gospel -driven church looking to spread the gospel in the southwest portion of Long Island, New York, and play our role in fulfilling the

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01:46:47

We believe in salvation by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. This salvation is based upon the sovereign grace of God, was purchased by Christ on the cross, and is received through faith alone, apart from any human merit, works, or ritual.

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Salvation in Christ also results in righteous living, good works, and appropriate respect and concern for all who bear

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01:47:24

That's L -Y -N -Brookbaptist .org. This is Pastor Keith Allen of Lindbrook Baptist Church, reminding you that by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves.

01:47:36

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01:47:42

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01:50:36

Welcome back, and folks, please do not forget that this program is paid for in part by the law firm of Botafogo and Associates.

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01:50:54

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01:52:04

And now we're back with our conversation with Luke Peterson. And before I go to a listener question,

01:52:12

I want to make sure that you really highlight those things that you most want to convey to our listeners before we run out of time.

01:52:28

Absolutely, brother. Yes, thank you. Yeah, I think it's just my prayer is that.

01:52:36

Within my lifetime, we can see. I would love to see the

01:52:41

Lord wills 50 Reformed Baptist churches in Costa Rica planted and established. And they're there.

01:52:48

Each of those small towns need a gospel witness. And not only that, but the penetrating into Central America where we're at is very strategic.

01:52:55

We want to root ourselves in the Reformed Baptist Church of Liguria, kind of work from there, raise men up,

01:53:02

God willing, to be sent out into these other countries and see that the rest of Central America really impacted through the gospel.

01:53:10

And I think one thing that I want to communicate to my brothers and sisters listening is that time is very short.

01:53:18

The night cometh and we need to put our hands to the plow and see the gospel advance and spread.

01:53:24

Wherever God has providentially placed us. And most of the time, people aren't called to go overseas to serve, but they're called to be faithful and serve within the context of their local church.

01:53:34

And so I press all my brother and sister to that end. Okay, we do have, let's see, we have

01:53:48

Emmanuel in Rochester, New York, who says, Does the

01:53:55

Costa Rican media have a fair share of evangelists, either the ones that are from the

01:54:05

United States that they translate or the native folks who are doing a good job of presenting the gospel, or is most of it fluff and heretical?

01:54:19

Yeah, I would say the majority of it, at least that we've come into contact with, would be fluff and heretical in his words.

01:54:27

It'd be hard to find a lot of good stuff there, but that's changing by God's grace. And so there are progress to be made in a lot of healthy material and media, but still, it's not the level that we would like to see.

01:54:41

Now, is it, as he asked, is most of it homegrown, local folks who are evangelists, or are they using

01:54:54

American televangelists and radio evangelists and having it interpreted?

01:55:02

Yeah, it's mostly things that would come from other countries, especially the States. There's still some of the homegrown

01:55:11

Costa Rican, but the majority of it would be coming from the States and translated.

01:55:17

Even like the new Apostolic Reformation, that's a lot that comes in, a lot from the States. But on an encouraging note, there is still good material.

01:55:26

So many people, I mean, 80 % of the people, when we were listening to their testimonies of the church and the radio, they heard a

01:55:33

Paul Washer sermon, and the Lord used it to save them. Now, was he speaking Spanish?

01:55:39

Because I know that he does speak. He was, yes, he was speaking Spanish. But others come with John MacArthur, having his stuff translated, being benefited greatly.

01:55:49

And usually that's what you see. People would come kind of as a stepping stone out of these false churches or these watered -down gospel churches, hear something like a

01:55:59

John MacArthur, then start pursuing what's Calvinism, and then continue to go what's a

01:56:05

Reformed Baptist church. A lot of places all over the world,

01:56:11

English is very commonly spoke, especially by younger generations. And you have folks who are nearly just as fluent in English as their native tongue.

01:56:22

Is that the case in Costa Rica? Yeah, it's very widely spoken.

01:56:28

I don't think it would be theologically, so you'd struggle there. But just your generic, especially because of tourism, a lot of English spoken, especially in the church where we're going to be laboring

01:56:40

God willing, probably around 50 % of the people can speak enough English to have a conversation. But yes, it is a lot more spoken than it was in Nicaragua.

01:56:50

Well, I'd like you to make sure that all of the websites and all the contact information that you want our listeners to remember are repeated and give our listeners in detail a reminder of the name of this new church planning work and so on.

01:57:12

Yes, absolutely. The name of the church that we'll be laboring in, and I'll say it in Spanish first and in English, is

01:57:19

Iglesia Bautista Reformada de Liberia, and it's the Reformed Baptist Church of Liberia there in Costa Rica.

01:57:26

Most of the media comes from YouTube, so they have a lot of that there. A lot of the churches don't even have their own website.

01:57:35

Another publishing ministry that I mentioned that would be good, especially for Spanish speakers listening, is

01:57:41

Legal Bautista Confesional, and that's a lot of good translation work.

01:57:47

And of course, Chapel Library has been wonderful. I think our listeners can find that fairly easy.

01:57:54

But yes, those are mostly another. If you're searching on YouTube, there's a lot of wonderful hymns that have been recorded in Spanish by our grandmother church,

01:58:06

Iglesia Bautista Reformada de los Lagos, and their YouTube channel is actually titled

01:58:11

Fe Reformada TV, and so you can find it there. That should be a few to get oriented in the right direction.

01:58:21

Well, I would like to give you the website of Chapel Library, since you mentioned it.

01:58:27

I've ordered many things from them over the years, and their material is so inexpensive and so rich in theology, and the reprints of the most brilliant minds of Christendom for the last several hundred years are readily available through Chapel Library.

01:58:50

And these days, their material is far more attractive, even physically, than it used to be.

01:58:59

Really wonderful eye -catching covers and colors and so on. We'll go to chapellibrary .org,

01:59:08

chapellibrary .org. Well, I want to thank you, Luke, for being such a wonderful guest.

01:59:14

I look forward to return visits from you. I'm looking forward to you preaching on Sunday.

01:59:21

Is it August 3rd? That's correct. Amen, brother. At Trinity Reform Baptist Church of Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

01:59:28

Once again, the website for that church, if you'd like to visit when Luke Peterson is preaching, is trbccarlisle .org,

01:59:38

trbccarlisle .org. Well, I want to thank everybody who listened as well, and I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater