Perry Noble and Coram Deo

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston.

No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ. Based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the apostle

Paul said, but we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

In short, if you like smooth, watered down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn't for you.

By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we're called by the divine trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her

King. Here's our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio ministry. My name is Mike Abendroth, and I found it was interesting doing

Todd Friel's Wretched Radio Show for two hours on Tuesday, two hours on Thursday. My show is about 24 minutes long.

Actually, it's 24 -30 without bumpers, without bumpers. And Friel has two hours, and so they're 20 -minute segments, and then you go to break.

And so it's almost like doing six shows for Friel. And so I didn't tape it all last week.

I just taped his shows. I don't think you can access those shows unless you're part of the Wretched Club.

You can get short little podcasts. That's all you can get, but it was a great opportunity for No Compromise Radio ministry to get the worldwide audience, national.

What would I like to talk about today? I have no idea. No, I do have some ideas, just a few rambling comments.

The first rambling comment is, there's a whole Perry Noble issue. Perry Noble is a self -professed pastor, and Perry Noble says that he was wondering why there's a big hubbub when he had

Highway to Hell as a opening song for Easter. And here's the issue when it comes to Highway to Hell for Easter.

Did he lie or did he not lie? I don't really care about that. But he wanted to try to blank people off when he did that.

And so he said he prayed, and they try to seek the Lord's face, what they do in a service.

And so then, you know, let's try to get people mad. Get the religious people, the old people, the uncool people.

Let's get them mad when it comes to a worship service. And so you can just type in Perry Noble, and you can, you know,

Google it, and you can get this pretty fast. You can go to Phil Johnson's blog. There's a variety of different blogs that have talked about this.

It's probably old news by the time this plays. But I wanted to remind people that the key issue is ecclesiology.

And ecclesiology helps us when it's, well, what is ecclesiology? It's the doctrine of the Church. And so when it comes to a worship service,

I try to talk about this even in my new book, The Sovereignty and Supremacy of King Jesus, the audience is the king.

The audience is not the people who, to use the Near East king motif, are using peacock feathers to fan the king.

It's not the people who are the grape feeders. They feed the grapes to the king.

It's not to the executioner who stands by willing to do the king's judicial executions.

It's not the ministers of the king standing around. It's the king. You go before the king.

And so the worship service question should always be, how will this please the

Lord? Should this please the Lord? That is the issue, as R .C. Sproul always says when it comes to Latin terminology, quorum

Deo, an audience of one. How do we please the Lord? And actually, when you think about it,

He is the one to whom we have to do. And so when you have

Revelation chapter 5, talk about that worship. I mean, can you imagine?

There's worship going on now in heaven and we will then enter in. Worship is already going on and then when we die, we will enter that.

But it's almost as if Sunday morning, we're joining a worship service. Worship service already in progress kind of thing.

Listen to Revelation chapter 5. It's a great passage. Worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you are slain and by your blood you ransom people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation and you have made them a kingdom and priests to our

God and they shall reign on earth. That is an amazing thing.

Earlier in the passage, it says, in between the throne and the four living creatures and among the elders, I saw a lamb standing as though it had been slain.

Literally slaughtered. A freshly slaughtered lamb. The interesting thing though, here in Revelation, that lamb is now standing.

That lamb was slain on behalf of all those the Father had given to the Son. The Son died for them and then was raised from the dead.

He raised Himself from the dead, the text would teach us. The Father raised Him and the Spirit did. Our great triune

God. So, when it comes to worship services, if you are a seeker -sensitive person and if you have a seeker -sensitive methodology, how can we get them in?

How can we please them? Feeding pragmatism, asking yourself, you know, we've got to get the right kind of consumer in here and we've got to cater and kowtow and bow toward their consumeristic tendencies.

Everything is haywire. It's all a haywire versus how can we please the

Lord today? We want other people to be pleased. We want the congregation to be pleased with a

God -centered, a high view of Christ, exalting worship service.

We want all that. But if you had to pick, I mean, the good news is we don't have to pick, but if you had to pick offending

God or offending people, which one would you do? You would say, if you had any brains at all,

I think I'd rather offend people. I have to answer to God and give an account one day. Let not be many of you teachers, right?

James chapter 3. And so, if we have to offend someone, let's offend the people.

Now, the good news is, like I said before, there are very mature congregations and congregations who are maturing and you don't have to offend them because they will gladly accept what the

Word of God teaches. And frankly, there are many things in the Bible that are quite offensive.

Quite offensive. So, regarding Perry Noble, why pick out something asinine like playing

ACDC's Highway to Hell to start the service, an Easter service? And by the way, I think it was the band

Hillsong, something like that. It wasn't even a good rendition. I personally don't listen to ACDC anymore, but before I was saved,

I do. And so, I still, if I'm someplace in here, that riff to start off, I know what it is.

And it was just a bad job. It's poorly done. You know, what evangelicals in that camp think are cool isn't cool anymore.

Unbelievers know it and thinking evangelicals know it as well. As my father would say, a day late and a dollar short.

Trying to be cool. Well, you know, I would like to have a church body that says, you know, we are taking

God into consideration and we want to please Him, but we are going to do everything we can short of tampering with the

Scripture to make sure uncool people fit in, to make sure nerdy people are welcomed here and loved.

This is not the place for the cool people. We are wretched, sinful people, despised by the world and forsaken by them.

But God, God has demonstrated and continues to demonstrate His love towards us that while we were yet sinners,

Christ died for us. And so if you're, you know, a nerdy person or a dweeb or a dunce or a social misfit, you have a home here at this place.

This place where sinners who are redeemed by the blood praise the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

So, when it comes to Perry Noble and him saying, you know, let's try to make these people mad, I know when

I preach a message at Easter probably some people are going to be mad and I'll talk about how you can't get to heaven by your own goodness, by your own merits, by your own work, that you can't be good enough, that you'd have to be perfect to get to heaven and only one is perfect.

Therefore, laying down the need for Christ Jesus and the solution to their sin problem and maybe they'll hear something about sin and enemies and hatred and wrath and curse and blood and they won't like that.

But I hopefully will have a smile on my face and I guarantee you when I greet them at the door on the way in or on the way out,

I will smile and say, welcome. My goal is not to make them mad. The cross alone is offensive enough.

The cross is alone offensive enough. We don't have to add offense by being complete jerks about it and playing highway to hell.

If you're going to pick something, there's a lot of other songs that are worse than that.

And so, No Compromise Radio Ministry, Perry Noble has a problem and his problem stems from a lot of things, but one is a poor ecclesiology and he's got the same problem

Hey Haters has, Stephen Furtick. And Stephen Furtick's problem is, and he said it, you could pull it up, pull it up,

Stephen Furtick, Hey Haters, and then on the other associated YouTubes to the side of Hey Haters, you'll see what his goal is and his goal is to get people to church and save them from what and to whom

I'm not sure. As he goes on, his message becomes more spurious as time goes on.

He has said the right things in the past, but lately I wouldn't trust him at all. And he says, well, we're trying to get people to the church and once you get saved, basically we're done with you.

I guess maybe that's why he didn't like that lady and her special needs child that yelled or attempted to yell

Amen, but it came out as a grunt and then the ushers quickly escorted that mom and that disabled boy because we wouldn't want to offend any of the cool people in the congregation.

How shameful, how sad, how repugnant. I was very encouraged by Todd Friel during the first message at the

Wretched Radio Psalm 119 Conference held here at Bethlehem Bible Church. And there was a baby that wasn't being too loud, but enough that everyone could hear and this mother was getting ready to take the baby out and Friel said during his opening message, you know,

I love that sound, don't take the baby out and encouraged the mother to stay right where she was.

Now when the kids scream in their heads off bloody murder, then for the sake of others, I think a mom or a dad can take a kid out.

I get that, but I was very encouraged. And so when it comes to Perry Noble, you can just imagine one of your heroes of the faith doing what he did, can't you?

Can you imagine MacArthur doing that? Boyce, William Carey, R .C.

Sproul. Just give me a mature saint like that, Donald Gray Barnhouse. You can ask yourself the question, who does that?

Who does that? And I'll tell you who doesn't do that. Godly, mature people who understand the issues.

People are playing fast and loose with the Church of God and they just do whatever they want. We are told to preach the Word. We are told to read the

Word. We are told to explain the Word. We are told to give and Lord's Supper, baptism, sing and pray, exalt the

Lord. We're told to do all those things, but we're not told purposely try to offend the grandmas and the religious people by doing idiotic things, childish.

You know, if you said, I like to listen to ACDC while I'm working out. Well, that's one thing.

I don't even like to do that now when I work out. But if you were to do that then, but say,

I would never play that in a church service, highway to hell, then I think you're thinking maturely. Because children, they don't know when to do one thing and when to do another.

They just are immature and as they grow up, they realize, oh, time and place, time and place, time and place.

So far from being a legalist, I am a biblicist. At the core of my being,

I want to do what the Bible says. And the Bible clearly states that the cross will offend. The stumbling block is going to be the cross of Christ Jesus, His substitutionary atonement,

His death for and in the place of sinners, assuaging God's just and holy wrath that we earned, that we deserved, yet Jesus took on our behalf.

And God confirmed that by raising Him from the dead. And so if you're going to have people stumble on the cross, and Jews stumble, because how can you have a man, like from Deuteronomy, it says, cursed is the man who dies on the tree.

That's a curse. That makes me stumble, the Jews say. And then the

Greeks, they think it's stupid. You mean to tell me one man, a Jewish man, dies out in a nondescript place in the middle of Palestine 2 ,000 years ago, and everyone's theological destiny is based on their, eternal destiny is based on their view of whether that man's

God or not? So there's all kinds of foolishness that the Greeks and the Gentiles would consider when they think of the

Gospel. But when it comes to Perry Noble, I think we've heard plenty and seen plenty.

And here's all Perry Noble has to do. Here's the great news about being a Christian or a

Gospel minister. Hi, I thought about this more and more and more. That was a bad decision.

I've asked God to forgive me. And I would ask that you would consider this part of my spiritual growth and pilgrimage.

And would you continue to pray for me as I mature and want to be more like Christ? And what do you do?

Then you go, all right. But it's the defense afterwards. It's the defense that gets it.

Just like with a kid. And if a kid comes up to you and says, you know, Dad, I sinned. Please forgive me. Of course

I do. Gladly, open arms. But when a kid just refuses to and hunkers down, then you've got to get the pry out.

You've got to get the leverage out to try to get that out of him. You know, it's grow up and repent and quit it.

And we're going to apply pressure until something happens. But these guys get so big. So many people tell them, you know, all these things.

Yes, men, bodyguards for Furtick and other things. This is rockstar mania.

This is rock star mania. And if you've got enough followers, who cares if a few don't follow? And then if there's any kind of discernment, any kind of questioning, any kind of saying, you know what, let's use this as an example of what not to do.

Let's not try to blank people off before they come to the service or while they at the service, especially if they're religious and old and traditional and mainstream.

Let's just go for the jugular and see how we can, you know, torque the gospel. No. I want to honor

God. And I want to say, what's the most worshipful song we can sing today? And if you don't like Jesus Christ is risen today, okay, then pick a different one about the resurrection.

Pick a different one about Christ is alive. Pick the regular song. So you have an Easter service.

Every Sunday is like a resurrection Sunday service for Christians. So don't even have it. I can go for that.

If it was up to me, I'd probably do that. And so here on No Compromise Radio Ministry, you can always write me at info at nocompromiseradio .com.

Haven't got a whole lot of letters lately, but that's okay. And we can talk about this very issue. Now, here's the last little bit of information that I'll leave with you today regarding this

Perry Noble issue is the bad news is a guy like James McDonald is defending

Perry Noble. Now, maybe they're good friends. And I understand that.

But here's what I would rather have seen James McDonald of Harvest do. Perry Noble and I are friends.

I think his theology is good. I think his methodology is on the right trajectory.

I think he made a mistake when he did that. But in light of that, I'm still friends with people who aren't perfect.

And I'm still friends with Perry Noble. I wouldn't say it was a good thing to do. And I'm not trying to defend his actions on that particular thing.

I will defend his person because I've seen him behind the scenes and 95 % of the stuff he does is copacetic.

Something like that. See, that is so much better than getting on your blog and saying, you know, we got to look at all these things in love and these discernment ministries and, you know, basically a grown -up view of hey, haters, by Furtick.

It's the same thing. One was just childish and the other's more finessed.

And so today on No Compromise Radio Ministry, we'll just say no to Perry Noble's ministry until he can figure out his right ecclesiology.

I'd be very, very hesitant. Same thing with Furtick. Why would I want to listen to and be taught by someone who doesn't even understand theology?

Now, they may understand some theology and they might be great preachers. They might have winsome personalities.

They might have rock star kind of ambiance. That doesn't really matter. I don't care about that.

And I don't even care if you have every eschatological detail taken care of or picking away every pixel, as Furtick talks about.

I don't care about that. But on the main one, do we not? If you're a pastor today and you don't understand that the audience that you're trying to help your congregation focus upon is the

Spirit of God, the Son of God, and God the Father, the triune God, one God, that we have

God as our audience member. If you don't know that, then I think you ought to go back to seminary.

I think if you did go to seminary, they probably taught you that to have the right ecclesiology.

So here we have seeker -sensitive movement, audience is key, exegete the audience, audience is the one that's important, high bulls worn, etc.

Then they realize that didn't really work and then there was a rebound effect against that kind of thing, along with other things too.

And here we have the emergent church, which is opposite to that. It's a postmodern alternative to seeker -sensitivity and the shallowness that comes with it.

Well, now we're going right back to it again, growing right back to it. The consumer audience, and what should we do?

And you know what happened back in the 1700s when people started thinking about how can we get people into our church and how can we get more people into our church and how can we make this place more inviting to people?

The key doctrines started going out. The gotcha doctrines, the oh that just stuck in my eye and that hurts doctrines, like the sovereignty of God and salvation, like limited atonement, like the doctrine of reprobation, like God is king and we're not, like God sits in the heavens and he does whatsoever he pleases, like the transcendent doctrine of God's holiness and no one's like God.

He's above us. He's different. He has a different kind of righteousness, an alien righteousness.

He's just so different than us. And so those doctrines go out and more people come in, but those more people, especially immature and unbelievers and liberals, they want a softer, gentler

God. They want a God that's only close and not transcendent. They don't want a transcendent God who's decided to become close at the pinnacle of, with the pinnacle being

Christ Jesus' incarnation. But we want a God that's, you know, he walks with me and talks with me along life's narrow way, but you've got to say that in a cool way with cool glasses, a cool video, and a cool band.

So I don't really get it. I don't see where people are drawn to the furdicks and the nobles just because they can make cool videos and they,

I don't know, maybe some people think they look cool or they talk kind of neat.

Are there little, you know, nobles masculine in his discussions and his buddies with Mark Driscoll?

I don't get that. If you're going to have a masculine ministry as a man of God, how about teaching the transcendent glories of Christ Jesus?

How about getting a glance of God's transcendent holiness like Isaiah did, and then you'll realize this great

God who saved me and forgiven me, that's a God that I could worship, that I must worship.

I'm compelled to worship. I want to tell other people to worship that God for the glory of the nations.

I think that's what would happen. And so on No Compromise Radio today, I'm sure this is probably old news, but for people who want to defend

Perry Noble like James MacDonald, I just don't get it. I mean,

I do stupid things. I do bad things. I've done stupid things and sinful things, and my friends haven't abandoned me, at least my real friends haven't, but they could say,

I disagree with what Mike did. He said he won't do it again. He's repented and onward and upward.

That's the Christian life. That's why we love the active obedience of Christ Jesus and his payment for our sin.

But more than that, his righteousness given to us, clothed with the righteousness of Christ.

So the issue really is not, what about pastors who make mistakes? The issue is, what about pastors who don't even have a clue about ecclesiology?

And here's the big issue. I think both Furtick and Noble do know ecclesiology, but they don't want to do it.

They refuse to do it. That's my guess. That's my guess that they've been taught. I believe

Furtick went to Southern Seminary. I'm pretty sure of that. So he's been taught ecclesiology. He's been taught church history.

He's been taught these things. But once the rock star stuff comes along, watch out.

Watch out for the rock star stuff. Watch out for the celebrityism of Christianity. But that's another show for No Compromise Radio Ministry.

So today we are talking about Perry Noble, and maybe we could talk about things like being organic, missional, relevant, having community, authentic community, intentional community, conversational community, core community, lead pastor community, etc.

Well, I don't know. This seems like this is a long segment here on wretchedradio .com, but this is nocompromiseradioministry .com.

If you'd like to go to a church in the local area, Bethlehem Bible Church, bbchurch .org, you could pull up videos there.

You can see there are videos, and you can just see how non -seeker -friendly we are, and how non -seeker -friendly

I look. I actually just keep my head shaved close to the bone, so no one has to worry about any kind of pastoral moose.

Did you know before I preach, I have a whole team of people? And I go to wardrobe, and I go to makeup, and they make sure

I have some spritzer and some green M &Ms. Get everything ironed.

They give me the proper microphone. I get a little dabble -do -ya for any kind of broil cream that I need.

And they make sure that there's not any kind of hair that's on my chin or any kind of soul patch that's there.

And then, to how great thou art. When how great thou art starts, that's when I walk out.

Actually, that's what Benny Hinn used to do. I don't know if he still does it or not, but he would enter the arena to how great thou art.

Unbelievable. Can you imagine? That is unbelievable. So, with the right view of ecclesiology, how the church is run, we do everything for the

Lord. And we say the Lord is pleased when we preach about Him, sing about Him, pray to Him through Christ Jesus' great advocacy and His mediatorial work as high priest and sacrifice.

And it's all about Christ Jesus and His glory. He will not give His glory to another. And we are bit players when it comes to worship.

We don't add any glory to God, but we ascribe the glory that is due

His name. And we have a summons from the King to worship this Sunday, exclaiming

Jesus Christ as Lord. You can check us out online at bbcchurch .org

or by phone at 508 -835 -3400. The thoughts and opinions expressed on No Compromise Radio do not necessarily reflect those of WVNE, its staff or management.