Superficiality in the Church

This is Apologetics Live!

To answer your questions, your host, from Striving for Eternity Ministries, Andrew Rappaport!

Well, hello there.

No, it's not Andrew Rappaport.

It's Drew.

I'm back hosting for Andrew.

He could not be on tonight, so he asked me if I would fill in, and of course, how can I

just say no to that?

And I'm not traveling this week, so I get to be here.

It's one of my favorite places to be.

I am waiting for my co -host in all things podcasting, Chris Hough.

He will be joining us at some point tonight.

And we're going to be talking about superficiality in the church.

That's what we're going to be getting into.

And we're going to explain what we mean when Chris gets in here.

But if you would like to be a part of the show, maybe talk about tonight's topic, you can go to

ApologeticsLive .com.

You can click on the duck, make sure that your audio and video is working,

and then come on in.

And I would love to bring you on in.

Also, when you come in, make sure that your camera is on, because that's how I know you're ready to come in.

If your camera doesn't come on, I don't know if you're having some kind of technical difficulties.

So make sure your camera's on.

I'll bring you in, and then we'll have a discussion about tonight's topic.

But Andrew did want me to read a letter that was sent in

to the ministry.

Now let me bring it up.

It's rather long, so you will have to bear with me.

It says this.

It says, Dear Brothers, I would covet your prayers and those of other

brethren that you know.

In December, I had my stress test that's required by the DOT for me to drive a truck.

The Friday after New Year's, my

cardiologist called

and gave me an appointment to come in, because one doctor read it as negative and another as positive.

This past Tuesday, as a precaution, I was scheduled for a heart

catheterization.

Fifteen minutes in, the doctor stopped, said he could see the problem.

In two areas, I have 20 % of my heart functioning.

Lord willing, this Tuesday, I'm having either a double or triple heart

bypass.

It may be a triple, because they may replace the stent I already have.

It's amazing how our Father answers our prayers.

I've been praying for Him to draw me closer, and He definitely did that.

But I don't want you to pray so much for me as for my family, my

friends, doctors, nurses, and all that I come in contact with.

That they'd see the Lord and King through me, and would be brought to

Him for redemption or a closer walk.

I want Him glorified.

In the almost 70 years He has allowed me to live,

I definitely, without a shadow of a doubt, can say Jesus Christ is the Messiah, the way,

the truth, and the life.

I know I'm preaching to the choir, but I desire so much for others to know the truth.

Please pray for my family, especially my wife, because she had surgery the day after

Christmas on her foot, and is down for a couple more months.

We've been through a lot of battles this past year, and starting off this year, but our Heavenly Father is

merciful, gracious, faithful, compassionate, and loving.

There is no one like Him.

We are in a spiritual battle, but our King has won.

We must continue to pray and seek Him, and fend off the evil one, the world, and the flesh.

I love each one of you, and praise God for you, and allowing our paths to cross here.

But I so look forward to the day that we'll be the bride of Christ, and we'll forever, and we'll

never part, and we'll serve and worship our Lord and King Jesus Christ throughout eternity.

Hallelujah.

What a Savior.

And this was a letter sent in from Grady Adams, and Grady Adams is a

longtime supporter of striving for eternity.

So make sure you keep him, his family, the situation that he's going through, the operations, the

doctors, nurses, everyone that he comes in contact with, in your prayers.

For those that are non -believers, that they may come to know the Lord through this

situation.

And for those who are believers, whose hearts may have become fallow ground, that

that ground would be broken up, that they would come to see Christ ever more lovely and

ever more beautiful, and then be drawn back to Him.

So make sure that you keep him in your prayers.

Now, before we get started, let's get into some in the news.

In the news is, of course, one of those things that we just have to do here.

And in case you missed it, or have been living under a rock, this is an election year.

This is an election year, and it seems to be a pretty important one, right?

And we just had the Iowa caucus.

The Iowa caucus is usually a pretty big

primary election, or a primary poll that's taken, and it usually gives it

kind of a good, at least in years past, it would give a good kind of test to see who was going to

be the nominee for the general.

And this past caucus, well, Donald Trump, I think he got what, like 52 or

something like that?

It was something like the highest anyone had ever gotten.

Well, then you had, of course, Ron DeSantis, who is a true conservative.

And then Nikki Haley after that.

And then Vivek Ramaswamy, who has been kind of a charismatic

firing on all cylinders person in all of the debates, really going after a lot of

the other nominees.

And he dropped out of the race, received only 7%.

And then immediately after dropping out of the race, went to back Trump and endorsed Trump.

And I think it's very interesting because while he was running

for president, it's almost like Trump and the MAGA supporters

forgot he was running for president.

And so then they hated him.

And now that he's dropped out and supporting Trump, they love him again.

But the thing that really kind of baffled me when we're talking about Vivek Ramaswamy

is if you follow his Twitter, he always posts things,

one of them being God is real.

And he would do this in his town hall meetings that he would go to.

He would say, God is real.

He would talk about God.

But the problem is he's a Hindu.

When he says God, he does not mean the same God that we mean.

But yet he gained this following of Christians that thought

he was some kind of a Christian because he would say things like God is real.

The problem is, especially once you start dealing in Hindu, is you start going, okay, which God?

Which God is real?

Now, we know there's only one God.

Now, I think Vivek belongs to a sect of Hinduism that

believes that there is only one God.

And I think they believe kind of where no matter what you

call him, it's the same.

Whether you call him Allah, whether you call him Jesus, whatever name you give to him, they believe

it's the same.

I believe that's his position.

I'm not 100 % sure, but he speaks God, singular, is real.

But he does not mean the God of the Bible that we mean.

Because if he meant what we meant, he wouldn't just say God is real.

He would say Jesus is King or Christ is Lord.

He would not just leave it open.

So we need to be very careful when we...

Are you going to come into the shop?

I don't know what my wife is doing, but she's in the kitchen looking for something.

And she's trying really hard not to get into the shop.

But you did see her hand when she was in this cupboard right here.

But anyways, so we need to be very careful with the people that we're following who reference God.

And this is becoming a problem that I see with people who back Trump.

Because if it's one thing that we've said on here for certain is that we know there's nothing that identifies

Trump as a Christian.

Absolutely nothing.

Nothing in his behavior, with how he acts, with how he walks, how he speaks to people, how he lives.

Nothing in Trump says that he is a believer.

And yet he has gained this entire evangelical following that if

you so much as question Trump, they act like non

-believers and come after you.

It's really amazing.

So we really need to be careful who we're backing, who we're endorsing.

Personally, I'm a fan of Ron DeSantis.

I don't know who you're a fan of.

Let me know in the comments if you have one particular person that you're following that

you hope gets elected.

And one of the things I really don't like about Trump is during his

presidency, his first presidency, he was this president that was going to

overturn Roe.

Can you stop that please?

It's really loud.

That was going to overturn Roe, and he was going to put an end to abortion.

And then Ron DeSantis, who brought bills in

Florida now, we would reject heartbeat bills.

We would say that heartbeat bills are – they don't stop abortion.

We would say they just regulate abortion.

They tell you – they say you can't kill your baby after here, but you can kill your baby before this time.

Trump criticized that and said those bills were too harsh.

I'm sorry.

They are not harsh enough.

They don't go far enough.

If you're allowing for a baby to be murdered at any time, it's not far enough.

And all this told me was that Trump is not the conservative that he claims to be.

Trump is not as against abortion as he claimed at one time to be.

He is not concerned with saving the lives of

babies.

My thought – now, this is just my opinion.

This is my thought.

Trump is just an opportunist.

He's looking for an opportunity just to get back into the office to do all the things that just he wants to do.

The people that follow him are following just a personality.

He's not a conservative.

There's nothing really conservative about him.

In fact, he very much acts the way the other side does.

That is why I look and I go if you have a candidate like Ron DeSantis who is

actually a conservative, we would say you need to get rid of the heartbeat bill, though, and you need to bring in an abolition

bill.

If you have someone who is an actual conservative like Ron DeSantis,

why would you not back him?

If you claim to be a conservative and have these conservative values, why would you go for someone who is

definitely not conservative and meets nothing of the conservative criteria?

That baffles me.

That baffles me.

Let me go to the comments here.

We see Cathy.

Cathy says she's for DeSantis.

Yes.

Dee says politics.

Ugh.

I'm right there with you.

I'm right there with you, Dee.

I don't really follow politics anymore, just what I see on Twitter when it comes through my

feed.

So I don't really follow a whole lot of stuff, but there's some things that I go when I look at them and I see

Christians backing certain people, I go what

about that person is Christian or conservative or how can you have a good

conscience in backing that person?

Doesn't make any sense to me.

Dee also says heartbeat bills are a compromise.

Yes.

Yes, they are.

Absolutely.

We want abolition bills that do not compromise that say abortion is murder, and

it should be criminalized.

My wife needs two forks from the – why do you need two forks?

You're only one person.

Okay.

KT.

KT says I don't consider DeSantis a conservative.

Okay.

That's –.

KT, that's actually the you're actually the first one that I've heard say

that.

Oh, DeSantis is Catholic.

That's true.

Well, I didn't say he was a Christian.

I said he was a – or did I say he was a Christian?

I don't know.

One of you may have to rewind and check that out.

I did say he was a conservative.

He was a conservative, and Kathy says I don't watch the news.

Just read Daily Wire.

Yep, I just catch whatever comes across my Twitter feed.

That's about it.

Anyways, moving into the topic tonight, superficiality within the church.

And this is one now, when I reached out when Andrew told me he wasn't going to be here and

asked me if I could host, I reached out to Chris, and I said, hey,

what's something you want to talk about tonight?

And if he ever gets here, he can join the conversation.

But he said easy -believism.

And I said, okay.

Come on.

Melissa just told me to drink some water or a fresca.

I am a little bit sick going through some allergies at the moment, so you'll have to forgive me.

But Chris said easy -believism, and I said, okay, that's good, easy -believism.

Why don't we just do superficiality throughout the whole church because that will encompass

easy -believism.

So when I speak about superficiality, when I look out into the

church, what I notice and what a lot of people notice I know Andrew would notice the same

thing.

Is that there are a lot of people, pastors included, within the church

that are not actually teaching their people theology.

They're not teaching them doctrine.

They're not teaching them the deep, beautiful things of Christ

so that they may worship and honor Christ properly.

In fact, what it is, and it starts with easy -believism, it's the, as long as you

say you're a Christian, then you're good.

Did you pray the sinner's prayer?

Okay, then you're good.

You can come in.

And then when you go into the church, they never speak about sin.

They never give the gospel.

They never say anything that would be considered judgmental because they don't want to be viewed as judgmental.

They tiptoe around certain things in the Bible, and they never address the hard issues.

They never speak of sin.

They never – and one of the things, I just said it, that they never do is give the gospel.

They will never call a sinner to repentance so that that person may be rid of their sin,

come to Christ, and be saved, being reconciled to the Father.

They never do that.

They keep everything on the surface.

They keep everything simple.

And there's a lot of problems when you do that, when you keep everything simple in that way.

When you never address hard topics, when you never get into doctrine, when you never get into

theology, when you never actually open the Bible and teach it,

you allow for people to come in your church and bring their bad teaching or

bring their bad beliefs.

For example, if you never talk about the Trinity and dive into the triune

nature of God or the hypostatic union of Christ, you may have

someone that comes into your church that is from a holiness

Pentecostal or an apostolic Pentecostal or oneness Pentecostal background where they

reject the Trinity outright.

They don't believe in it, and so they come in.

You never talk about it.

They think they're correct in their position because they've never been challenged, and they've never been given good

teaching.

What is bad about that?

If that person dies, having that bad, wrong belief of who God

is, they go to hell.

And that is something we want to avoid.

We don't want anyone to go to hell, especially if it should be the pastors,

the leadership in the church that are teaching these things to the people so that they can wash their

hands and say, I have led my people.

I have done my due diligence.

I've done my work.

I have equipped my people.

If they reject it, then it's on them, but I have done the work.

I have led them.

I have shown them the meat.

I have given it to them to eat, and if they do not repent of

their false belief, then they will go to hell.

But if I'm a pastor, if I'm in leadership, my job is to

give that to them.

My job is to lead them and teach the things of God.

I mean, there's nothing else to be taught in the church except the things of God,

and so they keep everything on the surface.

It's go along to get along.

Well, that's your opinion.

You bring in a different opinion, that's your opinion.

We're not going to challenge it.

We're not going to dive into it.

That's your opinion, and then you get into relativism,

right?

You start looking at the Bible as something that's just relative.

Well, if you have your interpretation, and you think your interpretation is true, and I have my

interpretation, and I think my interpretation is true, someone has to be wrong,

because we can't both be right.

Someone has to be wrong.

But if relativism is true, and you just believe what you believe, and that works for you, and I

just believe what I believe, and that works for me, and we just have this false sense of unity,

then we can't know anything is true.

If we believe relativism is true, because again, they can't both be true.

Two conflicting ideas can't be true, especially when we're talking about things of Scripture, about the things of God.

God has revealed Himself to us in His Word.

God has revealed what we are to study in His Word, and we are to

study Him, who He is, how He operates, how He

moves, the things that He does, how He works in our lives.

But we are also to study who we are.

Who are we apart from God?

Who are we when we are in our fallen sinful state?

We're enemies of God, which leads us to then we are to study how we are to

know God, soteriology.

So basically, in case you weren't paying attention, I just ran through the three basic

categories of systematic theology.

Theology, anthropology, soteriology.

Who is God?

Who is man in relation to God?

And how does man come to know God?

So many people in the church do not know those things.

And here's a quick way you can find out.

If your church still has Wednesday night study, okay, if you have a small group or something,

just ask the people, say, do you know more about your favorite

sports team than you do the attributes of God?

Because if that's the case, I highly doubt you know God.

One of the things that's the greatest study we can ever engage in is

the study of God, the attributes of God.

When we study the attributes of God, it

makes us realize how small we really are.

And how big he really is.

And how much he is worthy

of true worship.

Kathy's saying here, you forgot homardiology.

I think that's how you spell it.

And what Kathy means is the study of sin.

Yeah, well, that would be included.

I would include that in anthropology.

Because sin is what separates us from God.

So when we study God and we study the holiness of God, and then we move into

anthropology, the study of man, we realize what separates us from God, and that is

sin, homardiology.

So because we have a sin problem, then we move to soteriology.

How do we come to know this holy God?

And how can we be joined with him?

So you're right, homardiology is in there in systematic theology.

I would put it into the anthropology category, because that is

the distinguishing marker that separates us from God.

Let's see.

Let's see what Melissa says.

Melissa says, we cannot truly worship God if we don't know who he is.

Exactly.

Exactly.

And that's why, you know, one of the things, if you listen to Chris and I for any number of years, you know one of the

things we talk about all the time is worship, and what true worship is, and what it means

to worship God.

And of course, the examples that we always give is we give Bethel, we give Hillsong,

those who follow Bethel in Hillsong, basically anyone in the NAR,

because they're not worshiping God of the Bible.

They're worshiping a God that they have created in their own mind.

Because if they knew, this is to Melissa's point, if they knew the God that they

were to be worshiping, they would not be singing those songs, they would not be worshiping in that way.

There's no way you can.

Which is why, once I realized that, I had to move away from singing those songs, from playing

those songs.

I was cut to the core, and I know Chris was too, because when we

see how holy God is, and then we see the type of songs that are sung to him,

Jesus Is My Boyfriend songs, songs that could actually be

sung to my wife, they're shallow.

And this is another thing that has made the church very superficial, very surface level

teaching, is worship.

Worship music, the type of songs that are sung.

Because they're very shallow in their theology.

It's not like the hymns of old, or even the psalms, those of you who would sing the

psalms during your worship.

Hymns actually present theology.

They teach you through singing who God is.

Now I had, Chris and I had, when we were starting podcasting, we

had this interesting back and forth with someone who was very pro -Bethel, very pro -Bethel.

And we were talking about moving to hymns, moving

to singing old hymns.

And this person said, well, and they were a singer.

Basically the whole family was musically inclined and did worship.

And they said, well, we can't sing these songs because they're just too hard to sing.

And I said, well, they're, she said, they're just too

wordy.

And I said, yeah, they're too wordy.

They are wordy because they're teaching more theology than whoa, whoa,

whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, yeah, yeah, yeah.

All right.

Worship songs today are not worship songs.

They're entertainment.

And I'm not talking, and I'm talking about the Bethels, the hill songs.

You guys know this.

I'm talking about those who we would look at and we would say,

that's not worship.

That's not worship of a holy God.

That's something for entertainment.

So one way that shallow believing has made its way into the

church is through worship.

Let's see what we have in some of these comments to see what some of y 'all have said.

Obedience, Mr. Tracy B.

Obedience is worship, Abraham and Isaac.

I would agree.

I would agree.

Obedience is worship.

In fact, when, now, when I say worship, I don't just, I was referring to just the singing portion of,

say, a service.

But worship is actually to be the entire life of the Christian.

It is to be one big life lived out in worship to the Lord.

So how we throw obedience in there, worship to God.

Because God has said, I am to live this way, therefore, I

live this way.

And me living that out from a heart that has been changed, that now desires

to please my Lord rather than displease him, that obedience

is worship.

It is considered worship.

So that's a very good point.

Let's see what Dee says.

A friend invited me to her Calvary Chapel church in SoCal.

I wanted to leave, the music was so bad.

Was that the same, I wonder if that was the same Calvary Chapel, the Chuck Smith,

where Lonnie Frisbee came through and they had the Jesus movement, the Jesus people movement.

Because that's actually where modern kind of contemporary

Christian music was actually born, was through Calvary Chapel, through Chuck Smith's church when

all the hippies came through there.

That's actually where vineyard music was born as well.

Kathy also says, Wordy is good.

Yes, Wordy is very good.

Let's see.

You must have seen some of the worship in Florida.

I like what Kathy says here.

She says, I only listen to Gettys and City of Light and old hymns.

I would throw in Brian Sauve's Psalms, kind of what he's doing with the

Psalms.

I think that's putting music to Psalms and kind of making it sing.

Because a lot of times when you come to the Psalms and you think, well, how do I sing the Psalms?

They don't seem really singable.

And I think one of the things that he does that's very good is he helps to make them singable.

He puts them to music probably in a way that none of us would ever think of and makes them pretty singable.

So I would throw in Brian Sauve.

Now Dee says something here.

I'm going to push back a little.

I'm going to push back a little bit.

She says, Sovereign Grace.

Now I would agree.

Sovereign Grace has done some good things.

But recently, no, maybe it wasn't recently.

Maybe it was a year ago.

I don't remember.

Someone sent me a podcast episode that Sovereign Grace did.

And they were talking about the types of songs that you should sing in church.

And basically their position, Bob Coughlin, Devin, I think his name is Devin Coughlin.

I think it's Bob Coughlin's son if I remember correctly.

Their position was basically if the song

is biblically true and people worship to it and it can glorify

God, then you can sing it and it doesn't matter who it came from.

I think that's a bad position to take.

That's a very bad position to take.

And let me tell you why I believe that's a bad position to take.

Once we start saying and we start compromising on the songs that we sing, and let's say

we throw out a Bethel song and we say this is a really good song.

It's biblically accurate.

Bethel does have some songs that are biblically accurate.

That's true.

Hillsong has some songs that are biblically accurate.

That's true.

Once we start throwing those songs out for the people to

sing, here's where we get in trouble.

When we put those words on the screen for people to follow along, we have to have

the name of who's singing it, where it came from, so the

ministry or the group that put it out, and then the CCLI,

the licensing number for that song.

These songs aren't free.

Now, one of the things that you're doing when you put that song up there and you put all that information up there,

you're pointing your people to that bad ministry because they're

going to think, well, if we sang this song in church, their ministry must be

okay to follow.

No, you don't want to point your people to the false ministry, even if they have one or

two good songs that seem appropriate to sing in church.

Not only that, with that CCLI licensing number, I just said those songs aren't

free.

You have to pay to use that, and that comes through different programs that churches use.

So not only are you pointing your people to that ministry, you're now helping to

fund that ministry.

So now you're giving them money.

So we need to be very careful.

Those are some things that I don't think the guys from Sovereign Grace have considered

when talking about that issue, but those are some things that we need to consider.

We don't want to point people to false ministries that are going to teach bad theology.

We don't want to give them money either because we wanted to pay for the licensing to sing their song.

So Melissa says, that's right, Drew.

Thank you, sis.

I always appreciate your encouragement.

Kathy says, that's why we should use hymn books like long ago.

Hey, I'm not against it.

I'm all for it.

I'm for hymn books.

Bring them back.

I'm all for it.

Let's see.

I'm going to attempt to read this name.

It says Petty Fogging Pharisee.

Okay.

It says, agree, a broken clock may be right twice a day, but it's still a broken clock.

That's exactly right.

That's exactly right.

And Facebook user says, what is his name?

Again, you'll have to be more specific.

Let me know what you're talking about in the comments so that I

can speak into that.

Melissa Owen says, most of the mega churches are creating zombies when they sing these

endless mantras.

That's very true.

That's very true.

And I believe Dr. MacArthur's talked about this.

I think Justin Peters has talked about this, that they get into these, they

sing these 7 -11 songs, right?

Seven words, 11 times, and they're just repeated over and over and over again.

And it's put to music.

And what that does is that kind of gets the person out of their mind and they're not thinking about what they're

doing or who they're singing to.

And it kind of creates this zombie -like person where they're kind of in this

trance and they're just getting into the music.

They're getting into the melodies.

They're getting into those seven words that are just being sung.

And they think they're worshipping when they're not.

And that's another reason why I say, part of what has brought

surface -level teaching into the church is the music.

Now, hold on.

We have a comment here.

This guy, I'm pretty sure he's a heretic by the name of Andrew Rappaport.

Let's see what he says.

He's going to give us a hard time tonight even though he can't be here.

He says, but the music makes me feel so good.

Well, I hate to burst your bubble, but it's not about you.

It's not about...

And I know Andrew, he's throwing things out there for us.

People will say that.

They will say, but this music makes me feel good.

It makes me feel a certain way.

It makes me feel like I'm getting closer to God.

Okay.

The worship service is not about you.

The worship service, and especially the singing portion, is

about God.

It's the point where we come together as a unified body and we lift up

our voices to sing the praises to the Holy God.

It's not about me.

Look, this is...

Okay, let's get into this now.

This is also why I believe...

Now, I'm not really against bands, worship bands and stuff, but I think we should do away with them.

Reason being, you have these songs and they're written in keys

that the only person that can sing the song is the person on stage singing it.

No one else can sing the song because they can't match her key.

This is why hymns, and why I love...

I think it was Kathy that said, going back to hymn books, this is why hymns are written in

five parts.

They're written in five parts so that everyone can sing and everyone can

lift up their voice to God.

It sounds beautiful when you do that.

I will take the congregation singing

from a hymnal, lifting up their voices to God in unison over

the big church band and the girl singing at the top of her lungs in high C where no

one else can reach.

I will take the congregation singing from the hymn book any day because I

think that sounds so much more beautiful when you have the actual people of God

lifting up their voices to the King.

One of the things that that does because, again, our songs should

teach theology.

The songs we sing should teach about the beauties and the holiness and the great

things of God.

When we sing that way to one another, we are ministering

to one another.

I'm a firm believer we should get back to that.

Here's what Dee says.

What about a choir?

I'm in the choir.

Hey, I'm for the choir.

Why?

Because in the choir you have five parts.

They can help lead the congregation and everyone in finding their part in the

song.

I'm all for choirs.

Yes.

Let's see what else we got.

Kathy says it is worshiping God, not man, not me.

I'm glad Andrew came in and commented because it reminded me of something that he told us.

My second time actually meeting Andrew was in Indianapolis.

We were doing a conference together and we were talking about worship.

He said when he was a pastor, he had this

worship leader and I guess he was kind of a young guy and he would put together these songs to sing and

Andrew would sit in the front row.

When they would sing the songs, Andrew would point to himself and he would point to the ceiling.

He'd point to himself and he'd point to the ceiling.

What he was saying is he was relaying a message to that worship leader to say, is this

song about me or is this song about God?

Is it about me or is it about God?

Most of the popular songs today are not about God.

They're about me.

They're about what God does for me.

I am the name on the marquee

and God is just the footnote.

Worship is 100 % about God.

Absolutely.

That's one of the things that church has made.

Let's get back into the superficiality of it.

The church has made itself, its services, its messages all

about the people and not about God.

How can I say that?

Because I've sat in services where they have not

talked about God but they have talked to the people in the congregation or

in the audience and they have said basically

behavior modification.

You're doing this.

You must do this.

Or last night I got a word from the Holy Spirit and he just spoke it to me plain as day.

You're gonna do this.

And then the message just becomes all about the people and what the people are going to do and it has

nothing to do with God.

I'm sorry but that's not a message that was given by the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit, his job is not to elevate you.

His job is not to point to you in any way.

His job is to point you to Christ.

The Holy Spirit's job is to elevate Christ, to magnify Christ and

then take you and point you to that Christ.

That's the purpose and role of the Holy Spirit.

So that then when we come to gather together in worship or

even on a Wednesday night, whether it be a Sunday morning, a Sunday night, a Wednesday night, whatever you're meeting, the

focus should be Christ and Christ alone.

It should be coming to worship the one who gave his life for us.

It should be coming to want to know who is this God and who is the Christ

whom he has sent on our behalf so that we can be reconciled to him.

It's not about us but yet in our American idea,

we have turned church basically into a form of the American dream.

It's basically become the business model or it functions like a business model.

This is all for you.

You are the customer.

You are the consumer.

So we need to do things for you.

And of course, enter what?

Pragmatism.

Once we start making the wrong person, you, the consumer and the

customer of what we're offering, now we've got to keep you there.

Now we've got to get you to keep coming back.

You've got to keep coming back through the doors so we develop

different ways to keep you there.

You don't want to come to the Bible meeting because we're just going to be going through Scripture and talking about Christ and then

having a prayer meeting where we're praying for one another and the needs that we may have and

that we're lifting up Christ and pointing people to him.

You don't want to do that?

Okay, well, what if we have a cookout?

If we have a cookout, then will you come and listen to what we have to say?

Okay, what if we bring a bouncy house?

Do you like bouncy houses?

If we bring a bouncy house, will you come and bring your neighbor too?

We resort to pragmatism.

These really distractive ways in order to bring people in thinking that it's

going to work.

But Dr. White has said this and I think he's absolutely right.

He says, what you save people with is what you save them to.

If I'm using gimmicks to get people into the church so that

they will listen to me, what happens when I stop doing that?

They're going to stop coming.

At that point, we know they weren't there for God in the first place.

They weren't there because their heart was changed.

They were there because they wanted to be fed.

Think about when Jesus fed the 5 ,000.

What happened the next day?

They followed him.

They wanted to be fed again.

And he didn't feed them.

And what did they do?

They went away.

Is that not the American church today?

Give me entertainment.

Fill my belly.

Make me want to come back.

If you're not coming for Christ, then you're not coming to Christ.

And if you're not coming to Christ, there's no reason for us to consider you saved.

But those people who keep coming up with gimmick after gimmick after gimmick in order to pretend

that the goats are sheep and then keep them there, those are the people that they're

never going to step on anyone's toes.

They're never going to say homosexuality is sin.

They're never going to say quit living with your boyfriend and girlfriend.

They're never going to say those things.

They're going to say, oh, well, who am I to judge?

Well, if you're in a position of leadership, you're in the position to say, thus says the

Lord.

And you must.

If you are a person, and you don't even have to be a person in leadership to do that.

If you are a mature believer, grab someone and say, hey, this is how you are living.

This is what Scripture says.

Repent and come to the Lord.

Now, I saw some comments that I wanted to get.

Here's one.

Bond servant for Jesus.

Melissa, she says, that reckless love doesn't know who God is.

That's absolutely true.

And, of course, Chris and I have done numerous episodes on Matter of Theology talking about

this song, Reckless Love.

If you write a song that says God's love is reckless, you know nothing about God's love.

There is absolutely nothing reckless about God's love.

Nothing.

Scripture doesn't teach it.

Now, Scripture teaches us, I

had to get that fresca.

Scripture teaches us many things about God's love.

Scripture teaches us that God's love is relentless.

It's always pursuing.

Scripture teaches us that God's love is precious.

There's none like it.

God's love is what we would call, God being loving, is what we would call a

communicable attribute.

It's an attribute that God has, but it's one that he shares with us, so we understand what it means to

love.

However, our love does not match the type of love that God has.

When God loves, he loves perfectly.

When we love, we do not love perfectly.

A lot of times, our love is based on circumstances.

It's based on feeling.

It's something that happens, if someone does me wrong, it

may affect the way I love them, but not with God.

We can see this in the Gospel.

God loves us, and we can see that his love is unchanging for us because even

though we have repented of our sin, we desire the things of God, we want

to live righteously, we want to pursue the holiness that God has

said we are to pursue, and we want to worship him accordingly.

When we sin, he still loves us the same,

but he can only do that because of Christ.

God's love is not reckless, and Corey Asbury, the person who wrote that,

does not know God.

He does not know God, he does not know God's love.

Some churches in our area, churches look like movie theaters with big screens

and recliner movie seats.

That would be part of that pragmatism movement that would be trying to make the people feel comfortable.

Let's not make church feel like church.

This ain't your grandma's church.

We don't have wooden pews.

We've got recliners.

So come on in, grab your recliner, get your $10 Starbucks drink, have a

good time.

We're going to exegete some movies.

We don't want church to feel like church.

Then you end up with a bunch of Andy Stanleys.

Who say the Bible is not the foundation of the Christian faith.

That's what you end up with.

Let's see what else we got.

Oh, Jason Cave is here.

What's up, brother?

Jason.

Jason told me some news, but I'm not going to tell it to everyone.

But I want you to know, Jason's got some good things going on in his life.

But I would ask you to continue to pray for my brother Jason here.

My fellow Georgia boy.

He's got a lot of good things going on right now.

But pray for him.

That the Lord would continue to bless him.

Jason, I don't know if you want to put good news type stuff in the comments.

I will read them because we would love to rejoice with you.

Even though you know I already have.

We've talked on the phone.

But anyway, let's see what...

Was lost but now am found.

I thought Joel Osteen was saying who am I to judge.

Yeah, Joel Osteen was one of the ones who said that.

When he went on Larry King, he was asked about...

I think this was when Mitt Romney was running for president.

And Mitt Romney, of course, is a Mormon.

But he had a big evangelical following.

And Joel Osteen went on Larry King.

And Larry King was basically trying to ask Joel, is he a Christian?

Is he not a Christian?

Is he going to go to heaven?

Is he not going to go to heaven?

Because he's a Mormon.

And Joel Osteen says, well, who am I to judge?

I mean, he believes in Jesus.

I believe in Jesus.

Just who am I to judge?

I don't know.

I don't know.

Oh, and we got someone in the background that I'm going to leave there.

Let him stew for a minute.

But when Joel Osteen came to that position and said, who am

I to judge?

What's the one thing he's forgetting?

He's forgetting that God has already spoken on this.

What he should have said was, the Word of God says, if you deny Christ,

you're going to hell.

And the Jesus of Mormonism is not the Jesus of the Bible.

If it was, they would have no use for the Book of Mormon.

And, of course, that was where that I don't know, I don't know was where

of course Steve Lawson took that to the Shepherds Conference and he dinged the pulpit in a big

way saying, give us some men who know the truth.

And Chris has a funny story about that.

But let's bring Chris in.

What's up, man?

If you can't get here on time, I guess just get here when you can.

Hey, man, you know, that's just what you do.

Oh, and we got Andrew here.

An hour into the show, now everyone wants to show up.

Well, I just literally walked in the door and kind of got unpacked.

I just figured I'd pop in.

Just because I was curious who the mystery guest was that was backstage.

I was listening to you while I was...

It's just me.

It's not really a mystery.

It's just Chris.

I already said he was coming anyway.

Andrew, where are you traveling to?

I was in Ohio this past week.

Spoke at Providence Church, Providence Baptist Church, I forget.

In Mansfield, Ohio, which was nice.

Great congregation there.

Although it was cold.

A whopping 5 degrees.

It was 9 degrees here yesterday.

Yeah.

Justin Peters is talking to him.

He's telling me how in Montana it was negative 30.

He's always trying to tell me I should move out to Idaho or Montana with him because the weather is the same as

Pennsylvania.

I was like, dude, I left the house at 58 and you're telling me negative 30.

He goes, yeah, that's a 90 degree difference.

Yeah, no, I'm not doing that.

Thanks.

Uh oh.

It was 9 degrees yesterday.

It was the lowest I saw it get to.

Today I saw it get down to 14. 12 or 14.

Something like that.

It's cold.

I don't like it.

So we're in the show.

You've already had your pre -millennial drink there?

Your fresca?

I've got another one too.

Pre -millennial dispensational drink.

I'm glad you had that.

So I wanted to just I was listening to what you were saying and I literally just

got done bringing stuff in the house so I could jump in real quick and then kind of

sit down and unpack and all.

When you were talking earlier about the Bethel and the music.

The three of us have discussed this plenty of times, but there may be folks who are new and they haven't

thought through this.

You brought up the issue of, okay, if you're properly doing CCLI, you're

going to be sending money there.

Some will say, okay, but what if we don't?

What if we print the words and not do that?

Then we're not funding them.

Is it okay then?

And I know a church that does this.

They don't put the author on there where it's from so you can't

say, hey, they're supporting Bethel or Hillsong because no one knows it.

So I want you, if you could engage with that and then a second one to engage with that we hear a lot is,

but what about, and it is well of my soul.

That was written by a guy who later in life walked away from the faith.

Is it the same thing?

I'll listen offline.

I know we've discussed this a number of times and these are the pushbacks we get.

It would be good just for new people listening to listen to that.

I'll say also just in case you didn't, by the way, did you read Grady's letter?

I read it at the beginning.

Next week, Drew and I are going to tackle the Remnant Radio's podcast.

They did an episode responding to critiques from cessationists like us

here.

We're going to take a look at what they say and see whether they were really fair with cessationist arguments.

We'll see.

Just to kind of spoil it a little, they tried to argue the cessationist side on

the points that they're bringing up.

There are some things that they're not considering when they're trying to take on the cessationist side.

When they're trying to come to our side and argue as us.

There are some things that they're not considering.

Before you answer the questions I asked, I'm going to bring someone in here just because I see him

backstage.

He hasn't been here in a while.

I can't leave him.

I gave him grief Sunday.

I was at his church speaking.

I'm like, hey, we don't see you anymore.

He's like, okay, I'll...

I listened, but offline.

I gave him a little bit of grief.

Here he is, the man, the mythical legend himself, Mr. Cole.

Good evening, fellas.

Good to see you.

Howdy, howdy.

It's nice that you're here.

It's been a while.

I like that you guys are talking about some of the music stuff too.

I'm a fellow in that realm.

Right.

I'm going to admit something before I go.

I'll just say this.

Cole can attest to this.

I saw something for the first time I've never seen in any church ever before while doing

the worship singing in a church.

I saw a baby at the piano.

I'm talking like an infant, like a month old.

The woman in the church at his church that plays piano just gave birth.

She's in church with a baby straddled and she's still playing the keyboards.

I was like, okay, that's a first.

And that's commitment, by the way.

That is.

That's got to be hard with a little baby who could just start crying at any time and she's

playing away.

That's awesome.

I'm the only one at the church that's not a part of that family that plays in the band.

Everybody else but me is related in some way.

Wow.

Whether by legal status or by blood, it's a family band.

It's great.

I'm going to let you guys answer the question while I finish getting the house unpacked.

Thanks for doing the show, guys.

I'll see you guys next week.

We'll have a fun discussion.

I always make the mistake of almost hitting end instead of just leaving.

Don't hit end.

Don't do that, Andrew.

Let's make sure he gets out safe.

Cole, did you want to stay on or do you want to go backstage?

I don't mind if you don't mind if I opine.

Okay.

I'll start off and then Chris, you can jump in.

Cool.

Hold on.

Let me remember what he said.

He said printing off the words.

He was talking about not reporting CCLI.

What about that and what if we do that?

Then what about.

It is well with my soul or a song like that?

Here's the problem.

One, if you're not reporting CCLI, you're probably in sin.

You're stealing.

That's an issue.

At the same time, even if you have the words printed out or you just have the words on screen, no author, people can

still Google where that's from.

I like this song.

Let me see who wrote it.

You've still done the same thing.

You can hold up your phone and say, S -I -R -I.

I'm not going to say it because my devices will go crazy.

You can say that and the device will listen to the song even if it's not the

original artist.

It's easy to look them up.

That was the point I was going to make about that.

People can still Google.

They can still look it up.

It doesn't really matter.

You haven't solved anything.

When it gets to it is well with my soul, and I've said this.

I think you've taken a different position, but I've said it on our podcast.

I would say don't sing that song.

I want to be consistent.

Don't sing it.

We're not limited by songs that we can sing.

We have a whole wealth of songs to sing.

People only pigeonhole themselves to a few songs that they sing anyway.

Why?

We have hundreds, thousands of songs that we can sing.

Not to mention, the Lord gave us a songbook.

We can sing the word.

I would say there are.

A lot of other songs out there that communicate the same messages as well.

Here's another layer to that.

You and I have talked about this before.

It's that.

I can't remember the name of the writer of the song now.

Horatio Stafford.

Yes,.

Some theological convictions.

And things changed towards the end of his life.

Absolutely.

His goal in that.

Wasn't to.

Actively be involved and actively deceiving, actively twisting the Scriptures for

sordid gain.

Being a tool of the enemy right here and now.

Wrapping the sweet truths of Scripture in dangerous, damning poison

that people like Bethel.

Do.

I would put Hillsong in that category.

I would put Elevation in that category.

There's that.

To the point of we just won't report it to CCLI so

we won't pay them.

We won't be contributing and funding false teaching and heresy and things that lead people astray.

That's one route you could take.

I would say.

At that point.

Why even play the songs if you're not going to do that.

Number two,.

Ephesians 5.

If you know, if you've listened to MOT, if you've listened to Apologetics Live if you've heard

Justin Peters talk about it if you've heard a whole host of others others talk about this

and you know the truth and you know that these people are false teachers and you know

that they are maligning the very name of God.

That they are taking His name in vain.

If you know those things yet you still choose to use the songs that they're putting out.

What you're doing is you're going against Ephesians 5, 11 -13.

Ephesians 5, 11 -13 it says.

And do not participate in the unfruitful works of darkness but instead even expose

them.

For it is disgraceful even to speak of the things which are done by them in secret.

But all things become visible when they are exposed by the light for everything that becomes visible

is light.

So by you participating in and putting those songs before people

that's what you're doing whether you realize it or not whether you want to say that you are or you aren't.

You're giving hearty approval to music

and people that are holding themselves up standing on a platform saying that this is truth

and because they put a fantastic beat and some beautiful melody behind it.

It's okay.

It's okay, we can handle that.

No, no, no you can't.

That's going against multiple commands in scripture the Lord cares

how He's worshipped that's one of the points of scripture is to

sanctify us more and more into the image of the Lord Jesus Christ.

And it's so that we know how to live so that we know how to live in this world so that we know how to operate within the

church we know how to operate within the home we know how to operate within society in a

way that reflects His holiness.

And again, that's if you know the truth if you've heard these things and take it a step

further if you're like, yes I agree.

Chris, Drew, Cole.

I agree that.

Jen Johnson, Bill Johnson they're heretics, I agree that they're false teachers and that they're wolves

and that they need to be exposed and avoided but then you still choose to dabble in that.

Going back to the financial piece you have to remember in today's world with

the way that streaming services work the way that YouTube works.

So here's my question how is a band, you and I have done this.

I've done it for over 15 years.

You've done it for probably the same amount of time.

How is a band supposed to rehearse and practice these songs if they can't listen to them.

Because anywhere you go to listen to them you have to pay for it even if you

rip it illegally.

Again, that brings in a whole other layer.

There's a simple solution but it's a hard solution and I say it's a

simple solution because the solution is don't listen to them don't

use them in your churches.

Period, paragraph, end of discussion.

The hard part is you may like the songs.

I do.

There are songs Chris Tomlin for example.

That dude was somebody I looked up to for the longest time.

I had the opportunity to serve with him at Passion City Church for the first couple years that Passion City was up and going here in Atlanta.

Got to know him, got to know his family.

Got to know his band, love that guy but I

don't listen to his music.

I don't.

Even the older stuff the stuff that's a lot more theocentric, christocentric still, because why?

Unfortunately, it contributes to him financially and he's partnering with false teachers

and it's not something we do and we stand on.

And we go, look at me, I am holier than thou and I'm looking down my nose at you.

Because I'm doing this and you're not you're still listening to the songs.

But he's not a heretic.

The goal of the instruction is love and the goal of the instruction is going.

God wants to be honored as holy and he's told us how he wants to be worshipped and singing songs

on the Lord's day when it's supposed to be set apart for him written by false teachers is not how he wants to be

worshipped.

Right.

You're muted, Cole.

It was on my soundboard, my bad.

But on that financial note with these old songs, like the one that Horatio wrote

nobody's benefiting from that unless you're streaming their version of it.

And that kind of goes towards a lot of the old theologians.

A lot of those guys, there are whole sections of their stuff in the theology if I can get it out of my face

that we've said, no, we don't like that portion that doesn't fit scripture anymore because semper

reformata, as Sproul would say we're always reforming

and the old dead guys aren't here to benefit and they're not here to argue.

So we can use the old songs.

And I'm sure someday down the road I think I saw it in a chat somewhere at one point, somebody said

these songs at these ministries if it gets to a point where we no longer have the kind

of, like Disney they just had Steamboat Willie is now public commons if you haven't

seen the games and all that.

Oh man, it's awful.

Just to make the point when these songs go public commons and nobody's benefiting from them anymore there's a

conscience issue there.

Now instead of a hard -line look you're supporting a false type of ministry of sorts.

One of the books I'm reading this month this is my third time through it.

The Gospel According to Jesus by John MacArthur.

I would argue that and Drew, you and I have talked

about this a ton.

I would argue that a lot of these issues like this that we're seeing within the church are the product

of easy believism gracist, as Daryl Harrison calls them.

Where it's all about accept the Lord into your heart.

Invite Him in.

There's no talk of repentance, there's no talk of depravity there's no talk of the holiness of God there's

no talk of a need for.

Your need, your absolute need.

For Christ to regenerate your heart there's no begging there's no

pleading on the Lord's day from a lot of these churches in our country and all over the world that

are saying.

I beg you, please.

Don't wait another minute, don't wait another second.

Behold, today is the day of salvation, you need this and why.

And so we have churches that are filled with professing believers in the Lord Jesus Christ who don't possess faith.

They haven't been granted that.

And one of the ways that we know that is the fruit.

Drew, when I popped on, you had that Joel Osteen the whole judging thing, how many times have you and I

heard it, how many times have people listening to this or watching this right now have you heard.

Don't judge, don't judge, don't judge Matthew 7 -1, don't judge, well read the rest of Matthew 7.

The tree and its fruit, read the rest of Matthew 7.

Lord, Lord.

Those people who were calling His name knew who He was knew what He was about, knew what was

required of them and yet what does He say to them, what do they say to Him.

Did we not prophesy in your name, did we not heal, did we not

fill in the blank, did we not hold worship services did we not lead worship on the Lord's day, were we not pastors.

Did we not do this, were we not that.

And He will say away from me I never knew you and so why.

Yes we don't judge in a condemning way.

We have to be fruit inspectors and we have to have the boldness, the courage and the love to point that out

and to say no, this is not the fruit of one of one showing absolute faith in the Lord Jesus

Christ.

Why did Christ come, what was His message.

Was His message just come as you are, was His message of

just come and you can.

It's okay, there's grace there so you can sing these songs or you can live this lifestyle or you can you

can be a carnal Christian or.

No, repent, the kingdom of God is at hand.

That's why He came and so we have all over this country.

And the minute you bring it up, don't judge, don't judge, well it's like no I'm not judging.

Like you're meaning it, I'm being a fruit inspector.

It's called discernment and fear for your soul because.

Don't get me started.

I saw a meme that's been going around that it's this guy and girl talking and the girl says only God

can judge me and the guy says you realize that's worse right.

That's terrifying.

I've had people say well I can't talk to them about this because

who am I to judge.

Well this is who you are to judge.

Do you love this person?

Do you want them to go to hell?

What's the goal?

Paul said in Timothy is the goal of your instruction love?

Then it's not judgment that's not.

We've got to get away from that.

And I love what you entitled this episode superficiality in the church because it isn't just

it's through and through,.

I started thinking about that when we were texting yesterday.

And it's.

If you're listening to this, stop and ask yourself this question and this is an honest question that you've got to ask yourself.

When was the last time you confessed your sin to a fellow believer?

When was the last time you called a brother and said I'm really struggling with X, Y, and Z.

I'm really wrestling it doesn't matter what it is.

When was the last time you sincerely talked to a sister in Christ and said I'm really struggling with

comparison or body image issues or being a mom or being a wife or whatever it is.

When was the last time you got real with your brothers and sisters.

Or is it just a.

Superficial surface level and I'm checking this off a list.

I'm on the roll sheet of a church so I'm good.

I'm a part of a local church so I'm good.

If I don't show up I get a phone call.

When I have issues I make a phone call.

I have a neighbor of mine whose kids desperately need the community like I've got there at Providence where

Andrew came down and preached.

That is the biggest thing that has been the biggest change even in the churches where there was a lot of people and

I was involved with the worship bands and the stuff and turning the knobs and the tech and all the people

that would bright shiny people show up.

I went seven years at one point without hearing from the pastor of a church that I walked out of he

never called me never anything.

And then he was like hey do you want to come fix our stuff.

That's another story I did but it's a good story.

It was part of another good thing that God did in my life.

However I'm just trying to make the point where I'm at now compared to there's a church

downtown my neighbor.

She's got two kids two dads her one kid just accepted Christ while he was in

lockup which was great and I invited him to come down to church.

It's right here in our neighborhood it's literally around the corner from our house and she would rather go downtown

to the place with the fancy coffee shop in the front and sit in the dark and hide.

She told me that here at my kitchen table she would rather sit and go in and do her own thing

with Jesus and leave.

And it's like that's not church community of believers where you can be.

You as a tree can be pruned of all the bad stuff and that way you can start producing good fruit in

your life.

You just said a thing that a lot of people say I just kind of do it my own way.

I do my own way.

God understands.

No he doesn't.

What he understands is what he has told you to do and what he has told you to do is what he expects you to do.

And then even going back to this whole idea of not judging

who am I to judge.

I can't talk to this person about this because I don't want to be seen as judging.

People will literally let their children be on the path to hell say

nothing to them about it as long as they are not viewed as judgmental.

Well are you going to wrestle with the devil and say not my child and risk being viewed as

judgmental.

Or are you going to show the greatest form of hate you can by saying I don't want to be

judgmental.

I'll pray for you.

None of us are ever going to fully attain that but the

superficiality is also a product of that easy believism.

I don't want to be seen.

It's ok.

I can do just the bare minimum

count the costs take up your cross daily.

Are you doing that.

Are you putting the group before the individual or is

it all about your needs your wants, your desires, your sin, your pride your insecurity which is the flip side of

pride or is it no I care about the

lord I'm putting what he wants in the group before the individual.

Yep.

Absolutely.

So let's get to some of these comments here.

Chris I saw you reading one.

I think we did too.

Andrew come up with something harder next time.

I meant to say it at the beginning but I'll say it now.

I told Chris an idea we should do for this episode since Andrew wasn't going to be here

was John Nelson Darby's invention of dispensational premillennialism.

I didn't acknowledge that.

I'm here for it I'll come back.

I was texting with him yesterday a little bit about it.

We had some back and forth which he never replied to when I answered his other question.

Let's see what this is all about.

Facebook user.

I don't know who Facebook user is.

This doesn't seem like something Haps would say.

Definitely not.

Darren.

The church is superficial.

The church age is over.

The Holy Spirit is not in any church.

I would disagree.

God caused his elect people to get out before May 21,

2011 when the day of judgment began.

You guys know what that reference is?

I don't.

I don't either.

Oh it's on family radio.

False prediction of the Christian apocalypse.

I think this guy is trolling a little bit.

I think he's trolling a little bit.

His first thing that comes up is Wikipedia which I wouldn't hold a.

He probably couldn't hold a candle.

They couldn't hold a candle to truth most of the time generally when it's something in their favor to bash on.

Yeah.

That was an interesting comment.

Move on.

Let's see what Moses says.

I'm confessing my sin.

I used to copy music on cassette tapes that I got from the library.

I used to record the radio when I was a kid.

I did the same thing.

I had a boom box that sat on my desk and I'd put cassette tapes in it and record off

the radio and listen in my Walkman.

I had a Walkman but I also had the CD player Walkman but I

couldn't get the music from the radio onto the CD so I still carried around a Walkman.

The CD player Walkman would always skip.

Even the anti -skip one would always skip.

That's because you weren't wearing JNCOs.

You had to have enough.

You had to have enough distance between your leg and the discman.

But all it would do is smack.

Then it would smack your leg and swing back.

Some people have a lot of guilt and shame and are afraid of how people will treat them in a church

they would rather hide.

Let me jump on that for a second.

That's a very good point.

Church hurt is a very real thing.

Some people do have a lot of guilt and shame and are afraid of how people will treat them in a church.

Absolutely one of the things you can expect sinners to do is sin and people

will let you down guaranteed.

That brings up a couple of good points.

Number one, they're still family.

Number two, there's still an imperative and command of the Lord and it's for our good His glory and

our good.

Number three, that is also an admonition to make sure that you are not just the kind of

person.

Where you are confessing your sin.

And you're two to one another because you need it but when others come and do that as well.

That you are not reacting.

But responding in a way that glorifies the Lord and is according to the scriptures if

it's sin that's repented of it's like I need to confess this to you.

There's a responsibility now of you to Galatians 6 to come up underneath that person as the Lord

will show grace and you need to help them shoulder that help them carry that.

But watch yourself you don't fall into sin but you need to be that kind of person that you would want

to be there for you.

And be a physical picture.

Albeit still in the flesh of what Christ would be to that person.

That's a good point.

Did you want to add anything Cole?

I'm kind of one of those people that head a lot of the church.

My stream yard allows you to put your name and then a title or something at one point mine said post

charismatic survivor.

I've been through the ringer.

I get it.

Me and Chris can tell you some stories just from the past 5 years 6 years and

let's just say we still haven't had a pastor

reach out to us.

The old pastor of that church.

I took 7 years off of being around church and it was pretty dark it was pretty horrible.

I still get his email blast out where he does this little blurb

about stuff and this little blog thing.

I read it every once in a while and it takes me everything I have to

not just hit reply all.

I exercise a lot of restraint on that one because it's bad.

There was one time I did not exercise restraint.

I sent a letter to all of the elders.

It was a good letter.

It was pretty long it was detailed.

Multiple revisions and drafts.

I had 3, I know at least 2 but maybe 3 people read it

over and over again before I sent it.

Chris was one of those people and it was chock full full of scripture.

Everywhere.

It was just full of scripture.

If this was a college paper you could have said I just plagiarized scripture.

It was just full of scripture.

Not one reply not one reply from any of them.

It was detailed specific events very

specifics.

Not one reply which was very concerning because

of everyone who had already known everything that was in the letter.

Nothing was secret or surprise they would have all known all of this stuff.

But the fact that none of them replied and these were serious issues

basically said all I needed to know.

I think the big goal is to when you come across people that

have been through that you know where they've been through.

Just think about where you went and then be there for them.

I have premium access to a discord server that is of a

fairly popular journalist that's not Christian at all however there's a lot of Christians in his

server and a lot of these guys don't go to church and some of them are truckers so it's kind of rough but

nonetheless they do Bible studies in a non -Christian server and

there's a lot of mix of people in there and I've learned a lot talking with these guys and trying to

encourage people to go back to church and about 4 or 5 of us band together and it's funny.

Sometimes I'll find myself getting into one of these conversations with somebody and a brother will show up and he's like I saw you in there and

I was like you're just in time and I hand off the witnessing and it's like

being on a digital street corner sometimes.

And there's a lot of church hurt in these servers and the internet, I've been here

I've got receipts all the way back to the 90's of being on the internet from being in the 7th grade and

it's a wild place.

There's a lot of people that this is a refuge and the only place they find

connections with people are here and you've got to encourage them to go touch grass or read the Bible

so I'm like what's the one guy that does the game repeat.

I think that's his name.

He's been on here.

His whole ministry is based around that just

connecting with people asking them where they've been and being a part of their lives.

And eventually they want to hang out with you.

And if you want to hang out with me see me on Sunday morning because that's my life.

I don't do the bar scene anymore.

It's fam it's here and it's at church for

the most part.

We should do an episode on church hurt.

I don't think Andrew's done an episode on church hurt yet.

That might be something.

We should do an episode on that we've done one

2019.

I think we did it.

That leads to a lot of

superficiality because a lot of these churches pop up because people have been church

hurt.

When they pop up what are they not going to do.

They're not going to do anything to step on anyone's toes because they don't want to run people off because they've been hurt.

It swings all the way back to the far extreme side.

And then you end up with the maroon 5 of Christianity take the girl with the broken smile and

ask her to stay a while.

They take advantage of them.

That's the worst I've seen.

And then it's church hurt all over again.

When they figure it out a lot of these guys and gals here they don't want to.

They're like no I just want Jesus.

That's a whole other rabbit hole to go down.

I'm here for it.

I'll go pull up some of my notes on how I handled leaving that church.

Ultimately.

Probably good stuff for the cessationism conference.

I'm excited for that one.

I want to hear more about that.

Where is that one.

I forget Andrew was talking about it on Sunday.

You have to hit him up for that deets on that one.

Do you know where the cessationist conference is.

It was supposed to be.

And now it's not I don't know why.

We'll have to find out the information on that.

An episode on church hurt would be really beneficial.

There are so many people in churches that have been church hurt

and they don't ever talk about it.

And then what happens when they don't talk about it no one knows that they're a person that they can go

to when they have been church hurt and say help me how did you

get past it.

Or you don't know you stepped on their toes and next thing you know they're gone.

Because no one said anything exactly.

Let's see if we can get some comments here.

Melissa says I'm still struggling with fitting in at my new church.

It's been really hard and sometimes I don't feel like I fit in.

I'm wondering why don't you think you fit in in your church.

What makes you think that.

Do they have bad teaching.

Do you go to a Layton Flowers type church.

Why don't you think you fit in.

Let us help you.

Let's see what else we have.

If you all see a comment you want me to bring up.

Humble Clay says it's definitely hard nowadays when words equal violence.

Humble Clay.

Definitely hard.

Nowadays when words equal violence.

Oh my goodness man do we not see this all the time.

It was just when was it.

I can't remember if it was Andrew.

Yeah it was Andrew on the episode that I had to leave early a couple weeks ago.

I think he was going to talk about something in the news that was someone said that they raped me with their words

or something like that.

So you say something someone doesn't like.

All of a sudden now they can say they raped me with their words.

Words can hurt.

But not just because you don't like what someone said.

If it's a malicious.

If it's a malicious.

If you know someone's deepest darkest secrets and you use them against them as a weapon.

Yeah that hurts but just because you don't like what someone says yeah.

We see that a lot in the twitter sphere.

Someone doesn't like what you said which by the way this is completely off topic.

I was having a back and forth with someone on twitter the other day and it was about

abortion and this person said more women and children

women and infants are dying in states that have restricted abortion

than states that have I said hold on.

So.

100 of the time a baby dies in an abortion

100 of the time.

So you're going to tell me that a state that restricts

babies dying that leads to more infant deaths.

Make that make sense to me.

That sounds like they're massaging the statistics a little bit.

Just a little but it was a very interesting conversation.

Because.

She brought up someone that had apparently got arrested for having a miscarriage

and she kept saying and this was in Ohio and she kept saying such and such

they were charged with having a miscarriage.

And I brought up the news articles and I said no they weren't charged with having a miscarriage.

They were charged because of what they did to the body after they miscarried.

You're misrepresenting what happened.

And she didn't want to listen to that.

But apparently I guess I portrayed myself as a victim or something and made everything all about me.

I don't know.

It's very interesting.

So let's see.

Melissa responded.

It is a reformed Baptist church my family had been

attending for an entire year before anyone welcomed us.

Very interesting.

It has been difficult getting to know fellow believers and sisters there.

Well that's very sad to hear.

Well.

Reformed Baptists you know they've got good teaching.

Seems like they don't have good manners.

Maybe they don't do potluck enough they're not Baptist enough.

You know what.

Melissa that's what you need to do.

You need to do a potluck.

What you do is you go on to Google and you flip the P for a B and you spell it Baptist

and then you'll be good.

You'll find one.

I got them.

Jokes aside that's a rough spot to be when

you've been there that long and you don't feel like the body is a body you're just hanging out with other limbs in the bin.

That's a good analogy.

I'd want to know if you bubbled that up to anybody in leadership.

That would be a you could be the one to bring the church

together or be the one to be used to do that and say look we need to do something to loosen

people up amongst each other and tighten this community up.

Because I've been here this long it may not be accurate maybe

it's just me.

What does scripture teach about the coming together.

Forsake.

Not.

We should be coming together.

It should be a joyous time a time of communing with one another.

It should be fellowship.

Those are all things that should be taking place.

It's not just come be stoic and learn good theology.

This is where it gets a little hard because you're in a place that you know is going to teach

good theology.

But the relational aspect isn't there.

But it should be because that's a biblical aspect of the church relational.

So we have to have that.

She says I'm bringing the bacon.

I don't know anyone that turns down bacon.

And she says I think my husband and I need to meet with the pastor.

Yeah that would be good.

That would be good to say hey look pastor we've been coming here a year.

No one on leadership or really in the church has hardly even talked to us welcomed us.

We need to start abiding by what scripture says about relationships within the church.

We need to start having this aspect.

Are we brothers and sisters or are we strangers that come to hear good preaching and learn good

theology.

That would probably be a good thing to do.

Yeah.

That's something.

It shouldn't happen.

The church should be setting the tone.

For community family the church should be setting the tone.

Drew knows these guys but I've gotten to know a couple of guys who were seals.

That whole thing about seals and the brotherhood I don't know.

If you guys heard this past Thursday off the coast of Somalia.

These seals were conducting what's called a BBSS meeting.

I don't know what's going on out here.

Pause.

We'll put a pin in that one and we will come back to that.

Humble Clay does make a good point.

Invite the pastor to supper.

That's a great thing too.

Invite your pastor, his family have a meal fellowship with them talk

to them about what's going on.

That could be something when he hears that

something that could break down that dividing wall that you have there

and he's back.

I'm going to have to go here in a second.

We only have 15 minutes left.

I know the thing is

this past week.

These two seals were off the coast of Somalia performing a mission at night.

In the ocean.

Trying to climb up a wire ladder on a boat in high seas

and a wave came and knocked one of the seals off and his swim buddy jumped in after him.

They're missing.

I haven't heard whether or not they've been found at last report they were missing.

Where is that kind of mentality in the church?

Where is that kind of mentality of you can't get rid of me

regardless of what happens to you.

I'm there regardless of what you need.

I'm there.

Unrepentant sin.

The whole church discipline.

Where is that mentality.

I'm not going to give up on you.

I'm never giving up on you.

Because you're my brother.

We're going to do whatever we have to do.

It takes what it takes.

I got you.

I do think this is a good place.

Maybe we can wrap it up a little bit early.

We don't always have to go the two hours.

We covered a lot of things tonight covered a lot of ground with a lot of topics as it pertains to

the church and its superficial state.

I want to thank Chris for coming in even though he was late.

You need to tell those west coast people.

They can talk to you.

If you're not on east coast time you're wrong.

We want to thank Cole for coming back in.

It's been a long time.

Hopefully you'll be able to come on more like the days of old when

you were pretty much a regular.

Life happens sometimes.

I totally get it.

We want to thank you for tuning in.

Go grab your my pillow and continue to make every

day an eternal day for the glory of God.

We'll catch you next week talking about remnant radio and how they tried to argue

from the point of a cessationist while not being one.

We'll see you next time.

Good night.