June 20, 2017 Show with Josh Buice on “Knowing God: A Biblical Understanding of Discipleship (Part 2)”

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

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Carlisle, Pennsylvania it's iron sharpens iron a radio platform on which pastors

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Christian scholars and theologians Address the burning issues facing the church and the world today

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

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Matthew henry said that in this passage quote We are cautioned to take heed whom we converse with And directed to have in view in conversation

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To make one another wiser and better It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next hour

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And we hope to hear from you the listener with your own questions Now here's our host chris arnton

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Is Good afternoon cumberland county pennsylvania lake city florida and the rest of humanity living on the planet earth who are listening via live

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Streaming at iron sharpens iron radio .com. This is chris arntzen your host of iron sharpens iron wishing you all a happy tuesday on this 20th day of june 2017 and I would appreciate it if Those of you listening could

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Make a point to pray for me today June 20th is a bittersweet date for me.

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It is my wedding anniversary and my late wife As many of you know went home to be with the lord for eternity in 2011 today would have been our 25th wedding anniversary.

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So I would appreciate your prayers that the lord gives me peace of mind and heart today

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And that uh, he does not allow sadness and grief to overcome me as It occasionally does uh visiting me in waves unexpectedly, so I would appreciate that very much

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Well today is the is also the day before I head off to new york city to the foundations conference that is the sermon audio conference that they

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Began recently as an annual event in the chelsea area of manhattan

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And please pray for me play pray for my friend Joe, ignacio who's being who will be accompanying me there

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Uh, he is the second oldest son of the woman who led me to christ Uh 30 years ago

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And he is not saved. He's not a born -again believer And he actually requested that he uh, if he could accompany me to this event and he is god willing he's going to be uh,

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Picking me up tomorrow morning early as we head off to amtrak and then head to manhattan uh for the next three days, so please pray that the lord blesses us during those three days and especially that Joe, ignacio receives the gift of eternal life as a result of hearing the

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Great men of god speaking at this event some of whom Are mutual friends of my guest today

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Uh, that is pastor josh bice Senior pastor of praise mill baptist church of douglasville, georgia.

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He's a blogger at deliveredbygrace .com And he's director of his own annual conference the g3 conference in atlanta, georgia

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And today pastor josh and I are going to be continuing a discussion That we began last week

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Which is also the theme of the conference Knowing god a biblical understanding of discipleship

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And it's my honor and privilege to welcome you back to iron sharpens iron radio pastor josh bice

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I'm glad to be with you chris And uh, let me give our listeners our email address.

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It's chrisarnson at gmail .com If you have any questions That's chris a r n z e n at gmail .com

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and please give us your at least your first name Your city and state and your country of residence if you live outside of the good old usa

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And if you need to remain anonymous because your question involves a personal private and intimate matter

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We understand that and we will grant your request to remain anonymous That's chrisarnson at gmail .com

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and if anybody wants to find out more about pastor josh bice Uh, we've already have we already have had him give his testimony many times in this program

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You could go to praise mill .com p r a y s mill

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Mill .com That is the website for praise mill baptist church in douglasville, georgia, and you can find out more about him and that church but uh pastor josh

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Uh as you know Uh, because i'm assuming you picked the theme for the conference the g3 conference coming up in january

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Knowing god a biblical understanding of discipleship Uh is that theme and is our theme today?

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Can you define discipleship? Yes, sure, I think chris that um, first of all, we need to define what a disciple is and so a disciple is merely a follower or a learner

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Who studies about or under? jesus christ and so You could certainly say that about anyone for that matter

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But as far as christianity is concerned, it's people who follow christ.

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So you hear people often Defining themselves as a follower of christ What does that mean?

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It means they're a disciple of christ And the word disciple just boiled down to the basic Necessity of a definition would mean a learner and so People who are learning about christ and following after him following his teachings

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You know, jesus said if you love me keep my commandments and so people who follow christ

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That they seek to live a life that's in complete submission to jesus. And so Discipleship is

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Both going out and making disciples and then also teaching them in an ongoing process, so When jesus gives the great commission, he says go and make disciples of all nations

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But oftentimes people, you know confuse that as going and just making converts and then the the work is over But that's just you know, really that's where the work begins and so once a person professes faith in christ, they must then be nurtured and they must be cared for under the faithful teaching and the exposition of the word of god in the context of a local church and that's

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Really the that you might say the the basic elements Surrounding what it means to be a disciple and what discipleship looks like And the theme of the 2018 g3 conference coming up, uh, january 18th through the 20th, correct

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That's correct. Actually on the 17th we're going to be Holding our first annual spanish conference

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And we'll be having several guest preachers preaching in spanish on wednesday

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And then we'll be moving into the english conference on thursday friday and saturday.

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So again, both conferences will be On the same theme the theme of discipleship

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And i'll be giving more details, uh during this broadcast about that conference, but the theme is very interesting because uh some

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Might take a glance at that theme and there they may say to themselves. Wait a minute This seems like it's two different topics knowing god and a biblical understanding of discipleship.

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They seem like two different topics, but in reality uh being a disciple Becoming a disciple

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Is how you do? Because how you do come to know god deeper and deeper.

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Is that right? That's right So being a disciple you are you are learning more and more about god you are growing in your knowledge of god so there's an awful lot of What we would call anemic christianity today.

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There's an awful lot of Superficial shallow christianity. So the local church

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In many contexts, unfortunately is what we might say It's um, it's a mile wide, but it's only an inch deep

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And so there's not a lot of theology that's being taught so people might you know go through You know the context of their local church life for 15 or 20 years

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And really not be able to define propitiation They might not be able to tell you what you know

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The hypostatic union is and so when we think about knowing god, we need to know some things about god

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We need to know about his attributes. We need to know about what he has done in salvation in saving centers

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So these things are, you know, extremely important And so, you know being a christian is more than just showing up for church once or twice a week

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It's more than just you know, knowing john 3 16 Or having a bible with your name on it

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You know, so christianity is far greater than that. And so at the heart of christianity

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The local church should be pressing upon the body of christ in that particular context

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To really put some effort into knowing god we'll put effort into a lot of things Such as sports, you know business and various other things that we have passions for But if we really are children of god, we should have passions for god.

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We should desire god. We should want to know more about him and so Discipleship is really not one thing that the church does.

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It's really the central thing that the church does Amen and and as our mutual friend james white has put it and I am paraphrasing because I don't have a

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A transcript of this from him, but he has said something to the effect

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If you really love your wife You are not going to be ignorant about the color of her eyes

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You're not going to be ignorant about Her favorite foods her favorite pastimes the things that she finds most precious and delightful in her life and therefore if those things would not

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Be a mystery to you if you truly love your wife Then how on earth could you love god truly love him and be totally ignorant of very important aspects?

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About him his character and what he teaches and what he commands Right, absolutely

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Yeah, I mean if we think that we love god, we need to be putting forth some effort Into knowing more about him knowing who he really is

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And so it's one thing to know You know a god of your own imagination. It's a completely different thing to know the god of holy scripture amen

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And speaking of james white, can I have a drum roll, please? I'll just imagine

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I hear a drum roll Or perhaps even trumpets sounding um

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Dr. James r white after a long absence from iron sharpens iron radio is returning as our guest god willing this coming monday

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June 26th 4 to 6 p .m. So please mark your calendars For this monday, june 26 4 to 6 p .m.

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Eastern time for our interview with dr James r white of alpha and omega ministries. It's been so long since uh, dr

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White has been on this program. I think we were recording the programs with reel to reel at that time

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I mean, it's been seems like it's been ages Uh, and he actually was my very first guest

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Ever on iron sharpens iron when I began the program in 2005 2006 somewhere in that area in new york

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And then he was also, uh, the first guest that uh launched The program when

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I relaunched it in 2015 So, uh, he is a very dear

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Friend and very important to me in my life, but mark your calendars for that And he's also speaking at the upcoming g3 conference

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So i'm looking forward to seeing him face to face and having fellowship with him We already have a couple of uh questions for you pastor josh

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We have jenny in ben salem, pennsylvania Would you kindly go over some points on why and how a christian should have biblical understanding concerning discipleship

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It often appears to me that most christians actually shy away from discipleship because they simply do not know the fundamentals of discipleship

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And I would probably add to that that it may sound even like a frightening concept to some people

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But uh, if you could pastor josh answer jenny from ben salem, pennsylvania's question

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Yeah, so jenny asked a really good question I think that she's getting to the heart of one of the reasons for the conference this coming up.

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January is because so many times as we think about the subject of discipleship, it can be

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It can be a very intimidating thing because we often think we have to go to You know, you know a lot of different resources or we have to read a lot of different books and become experts on a particular discipline that we house under the umbrella of discipleship, but really

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If you think about it the scriptures Are our driving guide and foundation for what it means to make disciples and to disciple

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Disciples of jesus And so there's much said in the bible about how we are to go about this business

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And if you look at say titus 2 for instance, you see the older are

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Told to and instructed to train the younger and you see that type of pattern as far as god's church in the early days

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And really when it comes down to you know Where the rubber meets the road at the heart of discipleship is the commitment of the local church to the preaching of god's word

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And if the if the church has a high view of god and a high view of his word Then the church is going to have a healthy methodology of discipleship

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But where there's a low view of god's word a low view of the scriptures Then what happens is you tend to be more engaged in pragmatism and various other things that might say, you know,

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I like to to define pragmatism as the golden rule of pragmatism is quote unquote, whatever works do it and Unfortunately, so many churches

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Fall prey to that type of thinking But really what we need is we need to have a high view of the scriptures that drive us to preaching the word of god teaching the word of god explaining

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The word of god because if you want to know god you have to go to the source his own revelation of himself

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Which is found in in the scriptures and so God has defined himself.

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He has revealed himself for us Through creation, but in special revelation the word of god we have god's own self -revelation of himself and so we

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Go to that source and we learn and we study and we read and we find out what the prophet said

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And then we come to the new testament We see what the apostle said and we just continue to build our understanding of god and his character and how he loves to save sinners and so You know, it's okay to read great books like j .i.

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packer's knowing god, for instance You can read other books, you know from more of a modern day um author show but the fact of the matter is simply this if you want to really understand how to make

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Healthy disciples how to engage in in growing a church in a healthy way You know really we just need to be bound to the scriptures and you know any church that has a high view of the word of god really teaches the people to surround the pulpit to Surround the pulpit and to just long for the warmth that comes from the preaching of scripture

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And then to gather in small groups and do the same thing And then to encourage one another through the faithful, you know reading of the bible meditating upon god's word

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That's where you're going to really start making disciples and then discipling those disciples as they come to faith in christ

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Amen Well, uh, thank you so much, uh, jenny for the question and uh, jenny, uh, we have uh, your your city and state in bensalem, pennsylvania

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Please give us your full mailing address because you have just won a book by one of the speakers

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At the g3 conference coming up in january Of paul david tripp you have won his book parenting

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Four gospel principles that can radically change your family And that was a winner of the evangelical christian publishing association's book of the year award for christian living so, uh

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Retailing for twenty two dollars and ninety nine cents quite A pricey book there and that is yours free of charge.

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Of course, if you're not a parent Please read it glean what you can from it and give it to a parent

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If that is your wish, but that would be a good idea and we thank you for uh participating in today's show with a great question, uh, we have a listener

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Uh in eastern suffolk county, new york We have ronald

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Who says this may be a bit off topic, but it relates because you are having a conference

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How do you react to a group of christians? Who constantly repeat the refrain i'm so conferenced out

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There are far too many conferences going on and I think it is taking away from the primary functions

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Of our duties and responsibilities to the local church. How do you uh respond to that?

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I've heard that too I don't know if you have heard it Yeah, i've certainly heard it. Um, I would agree with You know with the idea that we have a lot of conferences

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If you're conferenced out, maybe you're going to too many conferences, or maybe you're just going to the wrong ones

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And that's certainly true, I mean you can you can really go to some some bad conferences and there are some bad conferences out there, but But the fact of the matter is simply this when it comes to the local church

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You know our commitment is first and foremost to the local church Any parachurch organization or ministry that exists should be for the purpose of coming alongside the church not to You know get the cart before the horse or let the tail wag the dog so to speak

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Parachurch ministries exist to help the church And so conferences really good conferences where you put forth some effort in knowing and learning and growing in your faith

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Can be a wonderful thing for the local church imagine if you had

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Just you know 15 or 20 families from a local church that went to a good solid theology conference each year

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Imagine how that would help How it would encourage how it would you know promote? Healthy methodology and healthy discipleship within a local church.

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And so again I would say that if you find any parachurch ministry or conference is trying to Take the the priority away in the spotlight away from the local church, then you need to avoid that type of ministry

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But most good conferences that I know of and I know that this is the commitment of the G3 conference is that we want to Help the local church and we want to strengthen the local church and encourage the local church and we want everyone to know when when the conference ends is that You can't be a member of the

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G3 conference that you're a member of your local tangible visible new testament church And it's time to go home and get back to work and so If you're conferenced out

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Maybe you need to take a season off of going to so many conferences and maybe pull back and go to one or two a year

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And really try to just put your focus into how god could use you in your local context

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And I think that another thing that should be considered is people need to Re -evaluate their priorities because a conference can be a real

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Breath of fresh air. It can be an energizing thing. It can be a a thing that really

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Returns zeal back into your life uh, and Those people who are conferenced out and i'm not saying as as you

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Obviously you you agreed for the legitimacy of that feeling or belief but at the same time

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You if you feel conferenced out you should be asking your question. Are you? Feeling too tv'd out

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Are you feeling too footballed out or baseballed out? or hockeyed out

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Or basketballed out or movied out or whatever it is that you like to do uh

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And another thing to consider and i'm sure you agree with this pastor josh

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Even though you are a pastor Your pastors can't be an expert on everything

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And one of the reasons you have a conference i'm sure pastor josh is that you don't even think you're an expert on everything Otherwise, it would be the pastor josh bice conference

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And uh, even if you have somebody of the intellectual level And the level of brilliance of our mutual friend.

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Dr. James r white. He is not an expert on everything he Shies away from discussions on eschatology because that's just not his

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Area of study and there are other things That uh are not his areas of study. I don't know how much he knows about sweden borgianism

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But uh, but you Your pastor your local pastor cannot possibly be an expert on everything and uh

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There's nothing wrong with going to conferences to learn things that your pastor doesn't know just like There's nothing wrong with reading books and reading commentaries

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And uh listening to a sermon audio and all that kind of a thing. Am I right?

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Yeah Yeah, absolutely. I mean we listen to programs like iron sharpens iron for instance, and it's a way to it

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You know be encouraged another thing is Going to conferences you tend to rub shoulders with people that you don't normally, you know

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Have the opportunity to rub shoulders with that's right I look for you know, uh, these conferences like the g3

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I look for you know Just great opportunities to reconnect with old friends and to be encouraged in how god's using them and their particular area of ministry

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And so it's always just a really encouraging time But again, we're reminded at the very last.

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Amen of that conference that it's time to go home It's time to get back into the trenches

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Sometimes it's not always like the breath of heaven where we're serving and so conferences can be

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You know a wonderful tool to encourage struggling pastors struggling christians

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And people that are young in the faith as well And so, you know, i'm not one that that looks at conferences as a bad thing

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But I do look at conferences as a parachurch ministry something that can never take the place of the local church

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Amen. Well ronald in eastern suffolk county, new york You have also won a free book by one of the speakers at the g3 conference uh paul david tripp

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He wrote the aforementioned parenting for gospel principles that can radically change your family.

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So you'll be getting that Uh, probably in about a week or so So, please give us your full mailing address and we'll have cumberland valley bible book service ship that out to you

25:05

And by the way for those of you who have been patiently waiting for any books or bibles that you've won

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By submitting questions to iron sharpens iron radio. I just received word today That the owners of cvbbs .com

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Todd and patty jennings are caught up now Uh, they're caught up shipping out everything that was backlogged

25:28

And waiting to be shipped out to our listeners And I apologize for any tardiness in that uh whole thing and that whole matter and uh, so god willing you'll be getting

25:41

Your books and bibles In about a week or so since apparently everything has been shipped out that is due to be shipped out

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Um And in fact before i'm going to go to a break right now because I don't want to Interrupt you mid -sentence and we're very close to Uh the time that we are supposed to be going to a break

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Uh, in fact, if you know what i'm going to do is i'm going to uh, email you a question from slovenia and Our listener joe our faithful listener in slovenia

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Has a question for you and i'm going to email it to you So you have it right in front of you and you can mull it over during the break

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And i'll read it right now and you can answer it when we return Dear brother chris. Thanks for blessing us today with pastor.

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Josh. Please address the question about how local church pastors are best Our two best disciple believers during the regular sunday worship gatherings, especially in light of the fact that the majority of southern baptist convention churches

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See worship services as mostly geared toward evangelizing the lost who may be in attendance

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Is this traditional tendency originating with finney? An appropriate focus for many churches.

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Well, I assure you if it originated with finney, it can't be It can't be or it can't be an appropriate

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It is an inappropriate but can't be appropriate but anyway We'll have pastor josh, uh answer that question when we return from the break and if anybody would like to join

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Joe from slovenia with a question of your own Uh, give us an email at chris arnzen at gmail .com.

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C -h -r -i -s -a -r -n -z -e -n at gmail .com Don't go away.

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That's batterydepot .com Paul wrote to the church at galatia for am

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I would not be a servant of Christ Hi, I'm mark lukins pastor of providence baptist church

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We are a reformed baptist church and we hold to the london baptist confession of faith of 1689

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We are in nofolk, massachusetts We strive to reflect Paul's mindset to be much more concerned with how

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God views what we say and what we do Than how men view these things that's not the best recipe for popularity

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But since that wasn't the apostles priority it must not be ours either We believe by god's grace that we are called to demonstrate love and compassion to our fellow man

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32:09

Welcome back This is chris arnzen if you just tuned us in our guest today for the full two hours with about 90 minutes to go is

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Pastor josh bice senior pastor of praise mill baptist church of douglasville, georgia Blogger at delivered by grace .com

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And director of the annual g3 conference and we will be discussing in a bit one that is coming up In january our theme today is a continuation of a theme that we began last week

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Knowing god a biblical understanding of discipleship If you would like to join us on the air with a question, our email address is chris arnzen at gmail .com

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C -h -r -i -s -a -r -n -z -e -n at gmail .com

32:51

And before the break pastor josh, as you know, I read a question to you from joe in slovenia

32:57

Who says please address the question about how local church pastors are to best disciple believers during the regular sunday worship gatherings especially in light of the fact that the majority of southern baptist convention churches see worship services as mostly geared toward Evangelizing the lost who may be in attendance is this traditional tendency originating with finney?

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And an inappropriate focus for many churches. Thank you very much for addressing my question

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Yes, so joe, I would simply say that The whole idea the whole tendency or the commitment of many churches to spend sunday morning

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Primarily focused on just preaching to the unbeliever Is it's really just an incorrect model of of what it means to be a part of a local church so again we have

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Assumptions and the assumption would be that the majority of the people sitting out there are unbelievers and if if the majority of the people sitting out there are unbelievers, then you probably need to Spend the majority of the time preaching the gospel to them and doing evangelism

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But but if they're members of a local church then they must be treated like Believers and they must be discipled in the faith.

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And so the best way that pastors can do this is to preach the full counsel of the word of god and if you go and see how

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The apostle paul spoke to the elders in ephesus the church in ephesus and at chapter 20

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He said that he had preached the full counsel or the whole counsel of god's word and so what we need to do is we need to be committed to Rightly handling the word of god and we need to be committed to preaching not just the easy text or The evangelistic text you might say

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But to preach the totality of scripture And so this is a massive problem today

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When you think about churches that are anemic they're a mile wide and inch deep and all that type of imagery

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The reason for that in many cases is because you have ministries that are very much

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Committed to just doing evangelism on sunday rather than preaching The full counsel of god's word and discipling believers, for instance

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Um since I live in the atlanta area i've you know for many years been attending brave games

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I'll go to many different games and It's interesting when you go to a game and i'm sure that this is the case in many different cities

35:32

But if you go to the brave game You'll notice that there's an awful lot of stuff that's going on around the game in these modern baseball parks

35:39

You'll notice that there's restaurants and there's you know things and games for kids

35:45

You know to practice their pitching or their hitting There's various different shops you can go into and during the game

35:55

You can walk the entire perimeter of of the baseball park and you can find that there are people engaged in laster and Fun things and various different shops and restaurants and various different, you know, uh activities surrounding the game

36:12

While the game's going on and pretty soon the game ends and as it comes to a close they realize, you know

36:18

They've spent time at the ballpark on that day, but they haven't really Engaged in watching the game

36:25

And I think that that's the way it is around the church in many cases There are an awful lot of people today that will say that, you know, they'll make statements like this.

36:32

They'll say Well, I just don't feel like i'm being fed. I don't feel like i'm growing Well, I think that if that's really the case,

36:40

I think you need to evaluate some things ask this Are you over serving in your local church?

36:46

Are you constantly away from the pulpit? Are you constantly disconnected from?

36:52

The the life of the church if the first and most authentic mark are the first mark of an authentic church

36:58

You might say Is the preaching of the word of god and I believe that that is indeed the case Then being disconnected on a regular basis from the pulpit

37:09

And the preached word is detrimental to your faith, it's detrimental to your discipleship and your progression in the faith

37:18

For instance, if I were to take a cell phone and put it on a desk And then take the charging cord and put it one inch away from the device.

37:27

It's not going to charge it It has to be connected And so we need to be very much connected to the pulpit.

37:35

We need to be connected to The preached word and then the pulpit the preacher needs to be committed to preaching the word faithfully

37:42

So both are extremely important And when there's a disconnect from the right preaching of the word and Surrounding yourself or involving yourself or engaging in the regular preaching of the word

37:56

And there's going to be problems in a person's life and there'll be problems in that local church Amen, uh, well, thank you joe in slovenia

38:04

And I know you're a parent because we have your daughter's mailing address In georgia where to ship the book that you've just won parenting for gospel principles

38:16

That can radically change your family one of the many written by one of the many speakers at the upcoming g3 conference in atlanta paul david tripp and We thank you for giving us your daughter's mailing address in georgia

38:33

To make it much more affordable to ship to you Or should I say to make it much more affordable for cumberland valley bible book service to ship to you

38:41

At no cost to you or to orion sharpens iron radio. And as I said to you last time joe

38:48

Please try to make uh arrangements to get to the united states In january during that period of time the 18th through the 20th

38:58

To attend the g3 conference in atlanta And you can you know, you can have a combined purpose in that visiting your daughter and whoever else

39:09

You have uh here in the states uh in your family And of course to keep your priorities, correct, you should be going to the g3 conference first But I would love to meet you face to face and have fellowship with you so please try to make those arrangements

39:26

Um and speaking of that question that joe asked Although this has been a caricature thrown at us who are reformed the caricature

39:40

Doesn't exist for no reason at all because unfortunately there are some reformed churches that very rarely ever evangelize the lost during their

39:51

Uh sermons which very often can be Lectures and so on now, that's not the kind of preaching that you and I are used to By any stretch of the imagination, but I know that it exists.

40:04

I visit I have visited reformed churches And no slam intended against our pato baptist brethren, but they usually are uh pato baptist churches that have sometimes

40:17

Uh, nothing more than an academic lecture, uh, and of course, this is this would be a minority amongst those uh

40:26

Thoroughly calvinistic on fire presbyterian churches. I'm not trying to broad brush by any stretch of the imagination.

40:32

I'm talking about a minority of presbyterian churches that can Have the atmosphere of a seminary classroom rather than hearing any evangelism to the lost so is the opposite problem something that you are equally

40:49

Uh concerned about these of the problem opposite to what joan slovenia was talking about well, definitely

40:55

I think that As I would say We need to make sure that we're committed to preaching the word

41:00

And the totality of the word on the lord's day not just preaching a warmed up. John 3 16 sermon every single week

41:09

I think that each week you can do a faithful job of Of preaching to and speaking to the unbeliever that might be in attendance.

41:18

I know at our church We frequently have visitors on a weekly basis so i'm

41:23

Constantly aware of the fact that there It's it's very much probable that there are people on a weekly basis in the church gathering

41:32

That aren't genuine followers of christ that aren't genuine christians And so I want to make sure that at some point in that sermon

41:41

I take an opportunity to point them to jesus christ to cast Themselves upon the mercy of christ to call upon the lord.

41:50

Jesus christ for salvation I want to make sure that i'm doing that on a regular basis because For one chris,

41:57

I was a lost church member. So um, you know just as I said before I think that we don't need to assume that everyone in the church is lost but You don't also want to just Assume that everyone in the church is safe.

42:10

That's right You know in the bible belt where I serve There's an awful lot of people that have you know become members of local churches that Don't really have any clue as to what the gospel is.

42:21

So I want to make sure that i'm preaching the gospel And telling people pointing people to faith in christ alone for salvation

42:29

But that's not always going to be the totality of the sermon the text of scripture will always

42:35

Bring about the main Topic of the sermon. Okay, so it's not the sermon that determines the topic.

42:42

It's that it's the text That determines the topic And so but it doesn't matter if you're preaching as I am through ephesians and you're coming to the very end of that letter

42:52

And you're dealing with the armor of god the imagery that the apostle paul employs about being prepared for the you know for the battle of the christian life

43:04

That you can still preach the gospel in that sermon you can still point people to faith alone in christ alone and so I think that any preacher that's called to preach the word of god needs to be consistently

43:17

Preaching the gospel and pointing unbelievers to faith in christ. Amen. And as one of your

43:23

G3 conference speakers has informed me todd friel He was an ordained minister and discovered that he was lost.

43:34

I mean that phenomenon is not uh without precedent Abraham kuyper was led to christ as a pastor by an elderly woman in his own church

43:47

That's right. It's very common. In fact, I preached my first sermon 12 days before the lord saved me.

43:53

Wow, so Um, it's very very possible that on any given lord's day there are numerous people sitting on church pews that You know are not genuine

44:05

Christians and so we need to be aware of that and we don't need to neglect the preaching of the cross and pointing people to you know to faith in christ because again, that's our hope and so It doesn't matter.

44:18

It's not as if we need the gospel to be saved and then suddenly we don't need the gospel anymore

44:23

So I think that you have on one side of the coin You might have people that are guilty of not preaching the totality of the word of god because they're just basically doing evangelism every week

44:34

And then on the flip side of the coin you have people that say well, you know People that are already saved they don't need to be hearing the gospel consistently.

44:42

Well, yes, they do We need the gospel every single moment of every day Yes, and as uh my dear friend peter

44:52

Jeffrey of port talbot wales As he has said in the title of a book that he wrote a number of years ago christians need the gospel, too

45:04

The gospel is not just for the lost That's right And uh

45:12

Let's see, we we have another uh listener, uh rj and white plains, new york

45:19

That uh, he he asked do you think there are too many celebrity churches

45:26

Or churches where the pastors Think they're celebrities or are wannabe celebrities

45:33

Where they just preach and they're finished their sermon They duck behind the pulpit and they're never to be seen again until the following sunday

45:42

And the church has really become more like a theater Where people hear music and may hear a sermon perhaps even an edifying one

45:51

But there is no shepherding taking place. Is this phenomenon more widespread than we may realize?

46:01

Well, I certainly think that it is out there. I don't know how widespread it is I know that there are plenty of really faithful pastors that you might call celebrity pastors that don't treat their pulpit that way that are very much involved and engaged in the the the life of the congregation

46:19

I do think that there is a problem with celebrity. I do think that there are people who Have neglected their own pastors and have turned to parachurch organizations and conferences and conference speakers

46:33

Uh, you know, basically to pastor them i've had people call me and ask for advice on things

46:38

I i'm happy to give advice and I have a blog and I I write articles and so that just simply lends itself to questions and answers but at the end of the day

46:49

Um, i'm going to give an answer But i'm not i'm not given the responsibility of shepherding that particular individual if they're not a member of my church

46:56

And so I want to be very cautious to give pastoral advice to people that that i'm not putting my shoes under their table so to speak and looking at them face to face and talking with them and spending time with them and caring for them as a as a sheep and a shepherd relationship, so again,

47:16

I think that You have pastors that are you know, you might say the wannabe

47:22

Celebrities that you know don't have any interest in caring for the flock and that's certainly not what pastors

47:28

You know is or is defined as in the scriptures and then you have the flip side of that You have the church that you know is very much interested in listening to the celebrity pastor

47:39

But not not so much interested in you know Dialoguing with or counseling with or you know having the oversight of their own

47:49

Pastor their own pastors the elders of that particular local congregation and that's a tragedy as well

47:57

Yes, and that's uh, don't you think that's one of the dangers of Growing a mega church or a very large church now some

48:05

Churches by god's grace have been preserved in their theological purity and their ability to shepherd very large flocks john macarthur's

48:16

Congregation immediately springs into mind grace community church In uh, sun valley california, but they also have enough elders and enough gifted men

48:25

To shepherd that a church that size but there are some churches. I know Of a woman a very godly woman, a friend of mine

48:35

Who is a member of a very large charismatic church? in new york city

48:42

And I asked her one day Uh, so is your pastor a personable person?

48:49

Is he a likable guy? And she said well, I would like to think so i've never met him

48:55

You know what i'm saying? So that that concerns me Yeah, I mean, yeah,

49:02

I mean I think that the idea and again i'm i'm very much committed to the single the single church

49:09

Single campus church model i'm not a fan of You know the multi -site church model.

49:15

I do think that at times, you know, you have people that that uh grow these these mega network

49:24

You know type of church settings and you know You have people that go many years without meeting their pastor and I think that's certainly not a healthy model

49:34

Uh, I have a question that I am, uh Trying to enlarge here.

49:40

Well, let me before i'm doing this. I'm going to give our email address Uh to our listeners if anybody would like to join us on the air with a question of your own

49:51

Our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com chrisarnson at gmail .com

49:58

Uh, please give us your first name your city and state Your country of residence if you live outside of the usa

50:07

And uh, if you need To remain anonymous because it's about a personal and private matter

50:15

Then obviously we will respect that request of yours and uh, so, uh

50:23

We thank you for uh Submitting questions to us even when they are about intimate and private and personal matters uh

50:34

This is from a pastor I might as well give a plug to his church this next question

50:41

Pastor george jensen Who is the lead pastor of enola first church of god in enola, pennsylvania?

50:51

And uh, I am reading his question now, let's see here It's for some reason i'm having a hard time enlarging this

51:01

Font I have a question for your guest. Here it is I just joined you so you may have addressed this

51:09

I am convinced That the best people to disciple children

51:15

Who have made a genuine profession of faith in christ? are parents of those children

51:23

However, many many christian children are not blessed with christian parents

51:31

What do you think is? What do you think is the the next best way?

51:37

for the church to disciple children Who do not have christian parents?

51:43

to do so And that's a pastor george of enola first church of god in enola, pennsylvania and um

51:52

That's an interesting question. So i'm assuming pastor george is referring to Either couples who are visiting a church and and are recognizing that they are not

52:02

Saved they're not members of the church. They're just visiting and I also know there is a phenomenon that's been going on probably for centuries where lost

52:13

Parents want the church to babysit for them and they drop the children off At churches, but if you could respond to pastor george's

52:22

Question in fact, you know what i'm going to do because we have to go to a break Could you respond to that question when we return from the break

52:30

And uh, don't go away. Uh, we will be right back god willing with pastor. Josh bice

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Right after these messages And we look forward to hearing from you and your questions at chris arnson at gmail .com

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Harvey cedars where christ finds people and changes lives Welcome back.

01:02:14

This is chris arnds in before I return to our discussion with pastor Josh bice of praise mill baptist church of douglasville, georgia

01:02:22

On knowing god a biblical understanding of discipleship. I have some important announcements announcements to make uh this week thursday and friday

01:02:34

Sermon audios the foundation conference will be held Uh, june 22nd and 23rd.

01:02:42

That's thursday and friday of this week at 350 west 26th street in manhattan in the chelsea area of new york city

01:02:51

And I am thrilled that I am heading out to new york city tomorrow to be a part of that conference

01:02:57

Speakers include dr. Stephen j lawson. Dr. Joel beecke phil johnson the executive director of grace to you the radio television and publishing ministry of john mccarthur uh, todd friel of wretched tv and wretched radio and more if you would like to join me at the g at the

01:03:19

Almost at the g3 conference, which will be coming up in a second If you want to join me at the foundations conference in new york city go to the foundations conference .com

01:03:30

the foundations conference .com And register there if you cannot make it to manhattan

01:03:37

If you live too far away or your schedule does not permit your travel to a new york city

01:03:44

Then you can listen and watch the conference via live streaming at the foundations conference .com

01:03:51

The foundations conference .com and also sermon audio .com sermon audio .com

01:03:58

After that god willing I will be heading off to maine in august portland

01:04:04

Maine to be exact to fellowship conference new england And that will be held at the deering center community church in portland maine featuring such speakers as pastor don curran

01:04:17

Who is the eastern european coordinator with heart cry missionary society, which is an organization founded by paul washer

01:04:24

My dear friend pastor mack tomlinson, who is an author and pastor of providence chapel in denton, texas

01:04:33

Pastor jesse barrington who was on our program recently. He is pastor of grace life church in dallas, texas a sister church of grace life church in lake city florida

01:04:44

Who runs grace life radio that airs iron sharpens iron radio every day? And also pastor nate pickowitz who is our guest

01:04:55

Next tuesday the 27th of june to discuss his book reviving new england

01:05:01

Pastor nate pickowitz is also pastor of harvest bible church in gilmanton ironworks, new hampshire If you would like to register for the fellowship conference new england go to fellowshipconferencenewengland .com

01:05:14

fellowshipconferencenewengland .com And then following that in november from the 17th through the 18th in quakertown, pennsylvania

01:05:23

Uh, the alliance of confessing evangelicals is having their quakertown conference on reform theology on the theme for still our ancient foe

01:05:35

And that is one of the lines from martin luther's classic hymn a mighty fortress

01:05:42

And if you would like to join me at that conference Uh go to alliance net .org

01:05:50

Alliance net .org click on events and then click on click on quaker Click on quakertown conference on reform theology

01:06:01

And the speakers at that conference include kent hughes peter jones tom nettles

01:06:06

Who I have interviewed many times, but I met tom nettles for the first time face to face at the last g3 conference.

01:06:13

What a Honor and privilege that was and I also interviewed him on site with a portable recorder

01:06:20

What a precious brother and what a gift to the body of christ tom nettles is dennis k hill and scott oliphant they will all be speaking at The quakertown conference on reform theology november 17th through the 18th at grace bible fellowship church in quakertown, pennsylvania

01:06:37

Once again go to alliance net .org Alliance net .org

01:06:43

click on events and then click on quakertown conference on reform theology And last but not least the aforementioned g3 conference founded

01:06:53

By my guest today. Josh bice A pastor of praise mill baptist church in douglasville, georgia

01:07:00

Uh, the g3 conference returns to atlanta, uh, january 18th through the 20th featuring god -willing paul washer steven lawson vody balcom hb charles jr.

01:07:12

Tim challis Josh bice who is my guest today our mutual dear friend?

01:07:17

Dr James r white of alpha omega ministries tom askell the president of founders ministries anthony methenia michael krueger david miller

01:07:24

Paul trip whose book we have been giving away todd friel of richard tv and richard radio derrick thomas and martha peace

01:07:33

And of course as we've been saying there is also a spanish conference The day before the english conference on january 17th, if you would like to register for this conference

01:07:45

Go to g3 conference .com g3 conference .com and then click on G3 conference 2018 and you can register there

01:07:55

And we will uh ask pastor josh in just a moment about the discount that's still available uh, and uh, also

01:08:03

I have to remind you That uh, iron trip and xyron radio is an urgent need of donations

01:08:13

Uh additional donations a number of you have been very generous to us and um

01:08:20

We I I thank you more than the english language can possibly convey to you

01:08:27

Uh, how grateful I am to you For your generosity as some of you have even given to iron sharpens iron multiple times some of you have uh begun to make it as a part of your monthly giving and I am so Thankful and grateful to god for you and grateful to you

01:08:47

I've been praising god every time I receive a gift from one of our listeners in the mail

01:08:54

Uh, just go to if you'd like to join them and help out iron sharpens iron radio go to iron sharpens iron radio .com

01:09:01

iron sharpens iron radio .com And click on Support and then

01:09:11

Uh, you will have an address a mailing address where you can mail checks made payable to iron sharpens iron radio

01:09:19

So, uh, I appreciate that Please never ever ever ever siphon money out of the regular giving that you are accustomed to to your local church

01:09:28

And never take food off of your family's table If you are struggling to make ends meet, but if you are blessed above and beyond your ability to do those two things then please uh

01:09:39

Donate to iron sharpens iron radio. If you love this program you think it's important if it's a part of your daily habit

01:09:47

Uh, I would love to receive any kind of support you can give if you want to advertise with us Send an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com

01:09:55

chrisarnson at gmail .com And uh, just put advertising in the subject line.

01:10:02

So thank you so much for putting up with me With these public appeals for donations and advertising, but i've been urged to do so By uh those who already advertise on iron sharpens iron uh, so I uh

01:10:20

I really appreciate uh, all of the encouragement and support I receive from all of you out there who have already

01:10:27

Uh taken steps to help us out here Uh now we are returning to our discussion

01:10:34

Uh We are returning to our discussion with pastor josh bice senior pastor of praise mill baptist church of douglasville, georgia blogger at delivered by grace .com

01:10:45

And director of the annual g3 conference that I just mentioned we are discussing part two

01:10:52

Of knowing god a biblical understanding of discipleship, which is also the theme of the 2018 g3 conference and before we return

01:11:01

Uh to pastor george jensen's question, uh pastor josh Tell us about the discount that is still available for those registering for the g3 conference

01:11:11

Yeah, chris the discount is basically that the rates are set to uh raise on Monday, so that's june the 26th

01:11:22

And typically we have a schedule you can see on g3 conference .com That there are certain dates throughout the year where we have to raise our registration rates and that's simply because of all of the

01:11:38

Funds that are required to put on a conference like the g3 And so it always pays to just register early.

01:11:45

So again people that want to pay Less for a conference can certainly take advantage of that by registering early and we always like to spread the word as much as possible

01:11:56

Beforehand so that people can you know secure their seat and get a good hotel That's close to the conference many people.

01:12:03

Uh last year mentioned that they would have liked to have stayed on site on campus At one of the two hotels there and so those properties are also located on the travel page of the g3 conference .com

01:12:17

And you can go ahead and get a room reserved on site if that's what you would like to do Just to make it easy so that when the conference is over or if you need to rest in the middle of the day

01:12:26

You can certainly just walk right back to your hotel room. So again, all of that information is available on the website and rates will be set to raise on next monday

01:12:40

Great, and again, the the website is g3 conference .com That's g and then the numeral three not the word g3 conference .com

01:12:51

Well, uh as you know before the break, uh pastor George jensen lead pastor at enola first church of god in pennsylvania, and that's spelled e n o l a first church of god in pennsylvania uh, he asked about uh

01:13:10

I'll repeat his question. I just joined you so you may have addressed this I am convinced that the best people to disciple children who have made a genuine profession of faith in christ are the parents of those children however

01:13:21

Many christian children are not blessed with christian parents What do you think is the next best way for the church disciple children?

01:13:29

Who do not have christian parents to do so? And he has given us a second email pastor george

01:13:38

Not only those that have been dropped off at church or babysitting as you stated But also children who are brought to church by their christian grandparents not by their parents

01:13:49

We have this phenomenon in our church Unfortunately, the grandparents are christian, but the parents are not it is a sad thing

01:13:57

But we certainly don't want to lose an opportunity to disciple these children Obviously, it's also a very precious and wonderful thing that the grandparents are taking these children

01:14:06

But obviously you would want the parents to be involved in that as well But if you could respond to pastor george jensen's question sure,

01:14:16

I think the The situation that's being articulated would be I guess you could approach it from a couple of different ways

01:14:23

I think the best way to reach those kids And the children with the gospel to disciple them

01:14:29

Would be to evangelize the parents. So I think that going after the parents with the gospel

01:14:36

And trying to be very much intentional about that would be a really good means of reaching the children ultimately if you have

01:14:44

The parents who come to faith in christ and then you can disciple them to then turn and disciple their own children

01:14:52

If they're simply just being brought to church by grandparents or brought to church and dropped off for instance

01:15:00

You can always go about that in a couple of different ways beyond you know evangelizing the mom and dad you can also if your church has good ministries to Young people you can certainly focus on the gospel and teaching the gospel and then putting into the hands of those particular children good resources so one of the things

01:15:23

I think would be An advantage here would be to just be giving good books and good resources to these children to help them

01:15:31

Read and understand number one. What is the gospel and then second of all, how can they grow in their faith?

01:15:38

And to encourage them to cultivate You know a love and a desire to to grow even in a home environment where it might not be modeled so to speak

01:15:49

I remember when I became a christian in the southern baptist convention context

01:15:56

They had a theme years ago that when children would Respond to christ and be baptized

01:16:03

They would give you this little thing called a survival kit and it had all types of you know information in there about how to Start your journey, you know of faith and how to be encouraged in the faith

01:16:17

I haven't seen one of those little survival kits in many years, but what

01:16:23

I I think would be really good thing for churches to do would be to have good resources a list of resources or A collection of resources that could be handed off to to children in such circumstances.

01:16:36

So evangelize mom and dad and then Preach the gospel teach the gospel to these kids and put into their hands good resources.

01:16:44

That would be Three really good practical ways of of doing that Well, thank you.

01:16:50

Uh pastor george jensen Of the enola first church of god.

01:16:56

Uh, I have your website, but I do not have your mailing address. So, please Email me with your mailing address because you have also won a book titled

01:17:06

Parenting 14 gospel principles that can radically change your family which obviously goes hand in hand with your question by Paul david tripp who is one of the many speakers at the g3 conference hosted by my guest pastor josh bice, so please make sure we get your

01:17:25

Mailing address and we'll have cumberland valley bible book service ship that book by paul david tripp out to you

01:17:32

Uh, now, let me give a plug to pastor george's church by giving the website. It's enola

01:17:39

Cog .com. That's e n as in nancy. O l a c o g for church of god dot com e n o l a c o g

01:17:50

Dot com thanks for listening pastor george and keep listening and spreading the word About iron sharpens iron radio in enola pennsylvania and beyond Uh, here's something that's a bit off topic, but since it's

01:18:03

I think it's important I will ask I will Read you the listener's question

01:18:11

Uh, even though we addressed it the last time you were on the air and we also addressed it yesterday when phil johnson was my guest

01:18:18

And also because this is a first time questioner Connor in carlo town ireland, and I have no idea if i'm pronouncing carlo town uh correctly,

01:18:30

I know i'm pronouncing town correctly, but C -a -r -l -o -w would seem to be carlo town, but i've learned the hard way that When people are from foreign countries, you never know how you're butchering the pronunciations of their names or the names of the cities where they live

01:18:45

Uh, I had the experience of eating in an authentic irish restaurant in in new york city

01:18:53

Owned and operated exclusively by people from the republic of ireland And my waitress told me that her name was anya

01:19:03

And I said to her When I wanted another glass of water, excuse me, can I have another glass of water on you?

01:19:09

And she says pardon me. What'd you call me? I said I called you anya. What did you call me that for?

01:19:14

I said isn't that your name? And she said no, it's on you. You know, so what can

01:19:19

I say? A subtly a subtly different way of pronouncing it that I my ears can't detect and she had no idea what

01:19:26

I was saying In fact, she said I thought you were calling me an onion but um Anyway, uh carlo in carlo.

01:19:34

I mean, i'm sorry connor in carlo town. Ireland says Dr. James white of alpha and omega ministries has suffered in my view slander and libel recently due to his recent muslim dialogue

01:19:47

With kadi, what is your view? What is my view of the slanderous?

01:19:55

Comments and yeah, and and of course, I know that you do agree that it is slander and libel but perhaps you could just comment on that for our listener who's

01:20:04

Did not hear our discussion apparently the last time. Yeah Yeah Well, first of all,

01:20:09

I think that it's okay to disagree with someone on position It's okay to disagree with someone on on methods for instance as I mentioned in that previous conversation chris i'm a member of A baptist church.

01:20:22

I pastor a baptist church in atlanta, georgia or just west of atlanta and we are you know partnering church with the southern baptist convention

01:20:33

There are many different people within the in many different churches Within the sbc that I don't agree with on many different things certain theological positions and certain

01:20:45

Methods that are being employed in those particular circumstances And it's okay to disagree with people on things

01:20:52

But it's not okay to slander and to harm someone's character

01:20:58

And so I think the scripture is very clear when we read the bible we see words and warnings about slander and about gossip and about You know statements that might be used for harm rather than building up in the faith

01:21:14

And so if you differ with james white on certain ways that he's approaching conversations and dialogues

01:21:21

With you know the muslim community. I don't think that you have a right to slander his character in the process and so It's uh, it's you know, again, it's extremely

01:21:33

Unfortunate that some people think that they can hide behind keyboards And just write things that are very much harmful to people james white is a friend of mine.

01:21:43

He's A faithful apologist. He's a gift to the local church I believe that his ministry is very much interested in coming alongside and helping the local church not, you know

01:21:54

Distracting people and detracting people from their commitment to their local church so to Take aim at someone because you think that you should do it a different way

01:22:06

And to harm their character is simply not profitable second of all Again, as I mentioned before, you know, there are different methods that can be used in reaching people with the gospel many of james white's debates are very much

01:22:22

Um, you know, uh intense you might say in many different ways. He goes for the jugular.

01:22:28

He he does not shy away from preaching and teaching the true gospel of jesus christ even in his his formal debate settings um, but sometimes there there's a need to have just a cool -handed dialogue with people that are certainly

01:22:46

Embracing a false religion such as the religion of islam um, they have

01:22:52

False religious documents. They have a false prophet that they Uh that they worship in many ways.

01:22:59

They have a false god that they worship But again, there's also a lot of misconception that floats around on certain news outlets about what muslims actually believe

01:23:11

And so I think it would be very uh, it'd be very healthy for us to understand number one.

01:23:16

What does the religion of islam? What does it teach and what does The religion of christianity teach what are the differences and then use those?

01:23:26

Dialogues as an open door to reaching people with the gospel telling them the truth of the gospel

01:23:33

So I think that these attacks on james white These recent attacks I think are extremely unprofitable

01:23:40

And you know certainly don't have a true foundation to stand upon. They're just nothing more than slander

01:23:47

And uh, I can't help but think That there is a billy the kid phenomenon, uh going on not with everybody that's criticizing.

01:23:57

Dr White but I can't help but think that there is a billy the kid phenomenon And what I mean by that is that just like there were a lot of wannabe gunslingers back in the 19th century and early 20th century,

01:24:11

I believe If i'm not mistaken that wanted to take down billy the kid because uh in one sense, uh, they

01:24:20

At one time viewed him as a hero and then later Uh viewed him as a rival and they wanted to conquer somebody that was far more well known and popular and sought after uh to bring attention upon themselves and uh,

01:24:37

I think that that unfortunately is some of the Phenomenon that we are seeing taking place and i'm not going to Uh ever identify who

01:24:47

I think is doing that for that reason because i'm not a mind reader but I just can't help but think that there are people who are trying to siphon away, uh attention and support from dr white and And draw it towards themselves and they're perhaps envious of his gifts and his stature and his uh popularity

01:25:08

Uh and his level of success and achievements and brilliance, I mean, do you think i'm off base there?

01:25:16

No, I think you're right on target I do think that however You've probably given a lot of ammo to certain people on the internet who are going to go around putting memes out on Facebook and twitter with uh, dr.

01:25:28

James white in a cowboy hat Well Well in some sense as the old saying goes i've been

01:25:37

I am in advertising and have been uh Most of my adult life and as the saying goes no advertising is bad advertising

01:25:48

But um, thank you, uh for your question connor

01:25:54

Uh, and interestingly we have another listener in ireland. I don't know if this is just a quote quote coincidence

01:26:02

Obviously, it's providential but I don't know if these two even know each other or if they're sitting in the same room

01:26:09

But we have joe in kildare county kildare ireland

01:26:17

And joe and county kildare ireland says first of all, thank you so much for the g3 conference this year

01:26:23

I'm assuming he's talking to you I listened to it in full In full via your g3 app on my phone and would heartily recommend it to the listeners my question for pastor bice

01:26:35

For the subject at hand is in light of acts chapter 6 verses 1 through 4

01:26:42

In terms of the priority of the ministry of the word and prayer Where does discipleship factor in terms of importance for elders or pastors?

01:26:53

I guess he left off the words come in. I think that should have been at the end of that sentence Where does discipleship factor in terms of importance for elders or pastors come in?

01:27:02

I have heard some liken the practice to waiting on tables and therefore excuse themselves from discipleship

01:27:08

Claiming the ministry of the word and prayer is their main responsibility Can your guest please offer his opinion from his understanding of the scriptures on this important topic?

01:27:19

Yours in christ joe in county kildare ireland And you know what i'm going to do is i'm going to email you joe's question and have you answer it

01:27:29

When we return from our final break, okay pastor bice Very good, and if anybody would like to join us, we are running out of time rapidly

01:27:39

Uh, so please email us at chris arnzen at gmail .com Chris arnzen at gmail .com

01:27:46

and please give us your first name your city and state And your country of residence if you live outside of the good old usa

01:27:55

And you may remain anonymous if it makes you feel more comfortable Uh, don't go away.

01:28:01

God willing. We will be right back after these messages with pastor josh bice Hi, i'm chris arnzen host of iron sharpens iron radio here to tell you about an exciting offer from world magazine

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01:32:28

That's batterydepot .com Welcome back This is chris arnes and if you just tuned in to iron sharpens iron our guest for the last 90 minutes in the next 25 minutes to come

01:32:40

Has been and will be a pastor josh bice of praise mill baptist church of douglasville, georgia blogger at Delivered by grace .com

01:32:50

and director of the annual g3 conference coming up in january 18th through the 20th with a spanish

01:32:57

A conference on the 17th of january Go to g3conference .com

01:33:03

for more details about registering for those events G3conference .com and today we are discussing and have been discussing knowing god a biblical understanding of discipleship part two and We have been getting a lot of listeners with questions coming in here today and We had joe

01:33:25

Uh Was the last listener that we had I believe joe in uh county kildare ireland

01:33:35

And his question to you. I will repeat his question Uh, and while i'm doing that when i'm getting this question ready

01:33:43

If you'd like to join him with a question of your own our email address is chris arnson at gmail .com

01:33:48

chris arnson at gmail .com and pastor bice, uh

01:33:53

The question from joe in ireland is in light of acts Chapter six one through four in terms of the priority of the ministry of the word and prayer.

01:34:01

Where does discipleship factor in? in terms of Importance for elders or pastors.

01:34:07

I have heard some liken the practice to waiting tables on waiting on tables and therefore Excuse themselves from discipleship claiming the ministry of the word and prayer is their main responsibility

01:34:20

Can your guest please offer his opinion from his understanding the scriptures on this So I i'm assuming he means that the pastors

01:34:30

Are excusing themselves from discipleship, but i'm not 100 sure on that. I think that's what he's where he's going.

01:34:36

But if you could comment Yeah well, if it's the pastors or the elders of the church who are

01:34:46

Excusing themselves from discipleship then They're excusing themselves from what god's called them to do as pastors uh in acts chapter six you have

01:34:56

What I believe to be the first institution of the office of deacon and you have seven men who were chosen to basically

01:35:07

Save the church from the first church split And you had you know widows that were not being you know cared for properly and so In order for those, you know ministries to take place and for faithful ministry

01:35:22

Uh practical ministry to take place behind the scenes of a massively growing church in acts chapter six you see that they were basically given instruction to Uh, you know call out from among them seven men who were full of the holy spirit to take care of that task and so it was

01:35:46

It was those particular Men in that particular context who were given that charge

01:35:52

And it was the apostles who were then freed up to give themselves fully to the word of god in prayer

01:35:57

And it specifically states that in verse number seven of act six that the word of god continued to increase

01:36:05

And the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in jerusalem so If you look at that text, you see discipleship connected to The preaching and the teaching of the word of god as the word of god increases

01:36:22

Disciples are made and they're able to then grow under the preaching of the word of god.

01:36:28

So Elders should not excuse themselves from discipleship because that's not serving tables serving tables is the practical

01:36:38

Ministries of the church. That's the practical nature of the church But you know discipleship and making disciples and teaching disciples

01:36:47

The word of god is very much the calling of an elder Well, thank you joe from county kildare ireland and by the way, uh joe from county kildare

01:37:01

Asked for the name of our other Listener from ireland because he missed the name

01:37:06

And that's connor and uh connor is from carlow town c -a -r -l -o -w town in ireland so that's interesting that joe and county kildare didn't even know that That that connor in carlow town was writing in so perhaps you guys can be

01:37:27

Become acquainted with each other and become friends if you do not already know each other thanks for writing in and by the way,

01:37:35

I apologize to joe and to connor, but We cannot ship the free books that we offer overseas because it would just be astronomical for carmelan valley bible book service to add overseas shipping to the already mounting costs

01:37:53

Of of shipping nearly daily, uh free books to our listeners who live here domestically

01:37:59

So I uh, I am up. I am. Sorry that we can't uh send you up free books overseas, but if you come to the g3 conference

01:38:07

And I met at least one person there uh from the uk uh

01:38:13

At the last g3 conference and I know I met a few other people from different foreign countries Uh, if you come to the g3 conference,

01:38:22

I would love to meet you and I will give you a a free gift if you meet me at the iron sharpens iron radio exhibitors booth

01:38:33

Uh, and thanks to josh bice. I will be manning in an exhibitor's booth there god willing at the g3 conference

01:38:39

So we'll give you some kind of a gift if you attend And show up there uh at the booth um

01:38:47

We have a first -time listener Uh bud from jacksonville florida

01:38:54

And he says first it was a it was a privilege to meet pastor bice earlier this year

01:39:00

At the shepherds conference. He's speaking of john macarthur's Conference in california,

01:39:06

I assume I enjoyed a few minutes of conversation with him my question given the evident downgrade that seems to be

01:39:16

Accelerating within the southern baptist convention, particularly the increased emphasis on unbi unbiblical seeker sensitive felt needs church growth methodologies

01:39:27

Along with a necessary diminishment of doctrine such practices demand What is what is it that compels you and praise mill to continue the affiliation?

01:39:40

I'm curious as to pastor bice's observations on the current state of the southern baptist convention

01:39:46

Thank you so much for the opportunity to pose this question and thank you for a terrific show. That's bud in jacksonville, florida

01:39:53

Yeah Well, I do remember meeting bud. It was it was definitely good to uh talk with him there at the shepherds conference, but Um to the question

01:40:04

I would simply state it as follows There is I believe a downgrade in many ways there continues to be there has been for many years within the sbc

01:40:15

There continues to be what I would call unhelpful unbiblical methods that are being encouraged from some of the leadership of the sbc

01:40:27

And so i'm certainly not happy at all about that One of the things that people need to know they're outside of the sbc

01:40:34

Is that the sbc does not have any bearing upon our church? So our church is an autonomous church

01:40:42

Located just west of atlanta, georgia, and we don't take any orders from the southern baptist convention

01:40:50

Southern baptist convention is a voluntary network of churches And it's also a very large network.

01:40:57

So within that umbrella or underneath that umbrella you might say There are very healthy ministries

01:41:05

That we can partner with So what we like to do is we're doing a lot of mission work we planted a church in ecuador about about five and a half six years ago now

01:41:18

And we spend a lot of time and money, uh there on the on the mission field

01:41:24

Um, we do partner with other ministries within the sbc that we can trust

01:41:30

But what i'm getting to is simply this they don't tell us what to do. We tell them what to do

01:41:35

And if we don't like the direction that the sbc is going we can pull back as much as necessary And so I think that it's extremely important for us.

01:41:44

It's the conviction of myself and my fellow elders at our church that we want to make sure that we're

01:41:51

Understanding that we're going to stand and give an account before the lord on every single dime that we invest in any particular ministry

01:41:59

So if we're giving to ministries within the sbc that are unhealthy Then we're going to be held accountable, you know for that particular choice.

01:42:07

And so we want to be careful in that So we're trying to uh make wise and careful decisions on who we partner with But we don't think that just pressing the eject button all together at this point would be the best decision

01:42:23

We think that we can help um steer And encourage and promote good methods and proper biblical doctrine within the sbc by staying a part of the sbc and instead of just Completely severing ourselves from that particular network of churches

01:42:44

If we can find good healthy profitable Ministries within the sbc and partner with them then that's going to be a good means of us helping to encourage and to promote those healthy methods and healthy theology, so I hope that that answers the question

01:43:01

I'm, certainly not happy and pleased with everything that I see in the sbc, but I do see

01:43:06

Some really bright spots And i'm encouraged by those particular, uh individuals and ministries and we want to stay close to them and partner with them when we can

01:43:17

Great and by the way, bud, I don't know if you are already a member Of a faithful bible -believing church out there in jacksonville, florida

01:43:28

Uh, but if you're not I heartily recommend the church Pastored by a dear friend of mine out there in your neck of the woods

01:43:37

And that's sovereign grace family church in jacksonville, florida pastored by my dear friend keith foskey

01:43:45

And the website for sovereign grace family church Is s g f c for sovereign grace family church

01:43:55

Jacks .org and that's spelt j a x dot org so it's s g f c

01:44:02

Jacks .org For sovereign grace family church in jacksonville, florida If you are not a member of a church,

01:44:10

I urge you to visit A sovereign grace family church and i'm assuming that your pastor wouldn't mind if you are already a member of a church

01:44:19

I'm sure he wouldn't mind you visiting a sovereign grace family church Anyway, especially if they're having a special event.

01:44:25

I know that they have annual conferences and so on and if you do Uh visit there or if you're already a member there, please send my warmest greetings to pastor keith foskey and his lovely wife

01:44:37

Uh, I would appreciate that very much and I hope to see them again soon and hopefully

01:44:43

Uh, I will see them at the g3 conference. I'm not certain of that, but I hope so Let me ask you a quick question

01:44:50

Uh, what would have to happen in regard to bud's question? What would have to happen?

01:44:56

for you to uh, finally break ties with the southern baptist convention and I know there would probably be a number of things but uh,

01:45:04

But also on top of that are you required to financially support the denomination that that muddies the waters for some people who believe that uh

01:45:14

As the scriptures say that light cannot have fellowship with darkness And they would apply it to a christian belonging to a denomination

01:45:26

That has elements within it. I mean there are there are genuine christians in denominations that are far

01:45:32

Uh more unbiblical than the congregations currently a part of the southern baptist convention, although they you that denomination as you know had quite a long period of extreme liberalism but there are

01:45:48

Brothers in christ in the united methodist denomination. There are brothers in christ in the pc usa

01:45:54

There are brothers in christ even in the united church of christ Uh and other denominations like that that have a reputation a notorious reputation for liberalism and apostasy

01:46:08

Uh, what would have to happen for you to say? I'm sorry. I've got to cut ties here

01:46:14

Yeah, I think it would have to be something that would be along the lines of heretical. Um, and and there are again, certain people certain voices that would say well, there are certain people in the sbc that That are teaching, you know things that are very close to the heretical lines and I get that but again, that's um, that's

01:46:37

That's not the the the foundation of the sbc. There are crazy uncles within the sbc

01:46:45

They make their way to microphones out here write things they promote themselves they promote their own agendas

01:46:54

And there are certain groups within the sbc, um that I certainly don't agree with um on various different levels

01:47:01

There are certain schools that I certainly wouldn't send any money to within the sbc

01:47:07

Um often on certain levels simply because I don't agree with their methods.

01:47:12

I don't agree with some of the things they're promoting and teaching However, that's not the case by and large.

01:47:19

I think that there are many ways that we can still You know effectively partner within the sbc network and we're seeking to do that but if there if there ever comes a time when the sbc becomes an inclusive denomination, you know, uh, you know people who are um

01:47:36

You know actively promoting an lgbtq agenda and you know if there ever if there's ever a day where the sbc decides that they're going to you know, allow that to be

01:47:47

Something that we promote and accept then that would be that would be an issue for me

01:47:52

We would definitely sever relationship immediately um, if there's ever a doctrinal change to the baptist faith and message that would include um

01:48:05

You know heretical statements or that would further Water down what's already there, which

01:48:12

I believe has been watered down over the years From the second london baptist confession of faith you can read the baptist faith and message and see elements that that look back to The the london baptist confession of faith, you know the 1689

01:48:30

And you see that again, it's been watered down over the years if if a further downgrade were to happen where that document would would be uh,

01:48:42

You know changed and altered in such a way to take the gospel of jesus christ and to veil it to further uh veil it behind a veil of Ambiguity, uh, then

01:48:57

I would certainly say I think we need to press the eject button at that point But as it stands now, you do have some crazy uncles

01:49:04

You do have some things that I don't agree with you do you do have some methods even this year There was a particular sermon that was preached where one particular man was encouraging voice inflections and mood music to draw people

01:49:19

Down to the front of the church at the end of a sermon You know, I I wanted to just just cringe when

01:49:26

I heard that type of thing But again, that's not something that's mandated if you're a part of the sbc you're not mandated to use those methods

01:49:35

We have voices of reason that that speak against that within the sbc we're trying to Promote as much help as we can within this group within this network of churches

01:49:48

And if we get to a point where we feel like we're not being profitable In that regard then we'll need to make those decisions at that time

01:49:57

By the way, I forgot to uh tell bud, uh, since you are a first time listener

01:50:04

Bud in jacksonville, florida. Not only are you winning? a book by one of the speakers at the g3 2018 martha peace the excellent wife

01:50:17

You're also winning a free new american standard bible. So please give me your full mailing address in jacksonville, florida

01:50:24

Where we can mail those two items and obviously if you are married, you might want to give the excellent wife

01:50:31

To your wife as a gift or perhaps to your daughter or anyone else that you know that May one day be married or already is married

01:50:40

But I just wanted to let you know that as a first time listener you win two of those

01:50:47

Those two things I should say and thank you very much for listening and I hope that you remain a regular and loyal listener

01:50:54

To iron sharpens iron radio keep spreading the word about the program in jacksonville, florida and beyond We have murray in kenross, scotland

01:51:05

What are the pros and cons of a one -to -one discipling? Where individual needs are recognized and addressed or a set of discipleship program for example jack millers

01:51:18

For either an individual or a group Yeah Uh, so I guess the question chris is uh tailored to the idea of like small group discipleship.

01:51:30

Is that correct? I'm assuming that's uh from murray and kenross scotland. If you want to clarify murray shoot another email to us

01:51:38

Well, I would simply say that as far as small group discipleship whether it's one -on -one or in a small group

01:51:44

I think that that's extremely helpful. I think that it's it's necessary even within the life of the church

01:51:51

I think that we see that in titus 2 for instance, we see that Uh in deuteronomy when we see parents being urged

01:51:59

And commanded to take seriously their calling to make disciples in their own homes

01:52:04

So small group discipleship is something that were mandated to engage in But I wrote an article on my blog that was published this morning

01:52:14

Titled why your small group cannot be your church and the whole idea of the article is just saying that while Um discipleship in a small group is necessary and good and healthy and profitable to our souls

01:52:32

We need something more than that small group. We need preaching too where in small groups you have

01:52:37

General discussions or you're reading a book or you're reading through the scriptures and you're dialoguing back and forth

01:52:44

You're having q a and someone's being very intentional about investing in someone in a discipleship concept

01:52:53

Uh, you don't necessarily have the preaching of the word of god teaching and preaching I believe are different things

01:52:59

So I think that there's overlap, but I think that there are different things. I think you see the word didasco being used

01:53:06

Uh in the word of god for teaching and I think you see the word Caruso and other words used in the new testament for the act of preaching

01:53:16

So in in the preaching of the word you have a herald who's standing there passionately declaring a message from the king

01:53:23

And there's not a lot of dialogue that's taking place. There's not a lot of q a that's taking place and so What we see is we see that the church needs preaching too not just Uh dialogue not just q a

01:53:38

We also need to recognize the fact that in a small group setting That the observance of the ordinances is not taking place

01:53:46

And we need to observe the ordinances with the whole church with the collected Or the collective body of believers within that particular church context

01:53:55

And so that's essential. You don't need to have small groups having baptisms Alone, you don't need to have small groups

01:54:03

Observing the lord's supper alone. You need the the gathered church for those church ordinances

01:54:10

And then also you need to just have the whole church together Um the the whole body together not just body parts

01:54:18

Just like the imagery that we see paul using as he writes to the church at corinth

01:54:23

And as he alludes to the human body talking about that every body part matters

01:54:30

We don't need to just have certain body parts gathered up in little in little groups and little

01:54:35

Saturday morning coffee shop discussion groups. We actually need the whole body to come together and in fact

01:54:44

As we read the new testament, we see the need for the offices of the church the the work of an elder is essential and the work of deacon is essential and oftentimes you have small groups that don't have the work of of the elder and the work of Deacon taking place in those particular contexts and then finally

01:55:02

I would simply say that That we need to make sure that we're gathering to sing One of the great ways that you can encourage faithful discipleship in the context of your local church is to sing really good songs and to have musicians who are

01:55:19

Skillful in their use of musical instruments and be able to lead appropriately and to sing the gospel together

01:55:27

With a diverse group of ages and races and sexes coming together to sing

01:55:33

The one true gospel of jesus christ that brings us all together. So in the life of the church you have

01:55:39

Scripture reading public reading of scripture singing you have various different ages diversity there

01:55:46

All engaging in discipleship and so you need more than just a small group. You need the whole church to come together as well

01:55:54

Amen well, thank you murray and kenross scotland Please continue spreading the word about iron sharpens iron radio in scotland and the uk and beyond um

01:56:05

We have a listener that has a question that could really be uh expanded into a full show or several parts

01:56:14

But uh, we have bb in cumberland county, pennsylvania That asks, uh,

01:56:20

I know that the host of iron sharpens iron chris arnzen has a complementarian understanding of gender roles

01:56:27

I was wondering if your guest josh bice also has that conviction and if so How does he explain someone like martha peace?

01:56:38

Speaking at the g3 conference. That's a fair question Yeah, yeah, very fair question

01:56:44

Uh number one, yes, I am a complementarian in my view of of uh gender roles

01:56:50

Uh, not only in the home but also in the life of the church second of all martha peace

01:56:56

Likewise is a complementarian in her view and martha peace will be leading a breakout session for women

01:57:03

She's not going to be preaching to men She is invited for the purpose of of teaching women

01:57:10

And so we want to encourage wives to come ladies to come Along with their husbands and to come and learn the word of god.

01:57:18

And so that's the purpose of Of an invitation like martha peace and we think that she can be used to encourage other women who come to the g3

01:57:27

Now do you think there are any circumstances? In fact, I know that you believe there are some circumstances where a woman

01:57:32

Can legitimately speak to a mixed crowd of christians of both men and women not preach to them

01:57:38

But for instance rosaria butterfield spoke to a mixed audience at the g3 And there are women who have given their testimonies in very conservative churches even in grace community church where john macarthur pastors

01:57:50

Johnny erickson tata has spoken there. So What are these circumstances where a woman can speak in your opinion?

01:57:58

Yeah, I think that it's very clear as we look at the word of god that that a woman is not to She's not to hold authority over over a man with the the handling of scripture

01:58:09

So she's not to engage in the preaching And the teaching of the word of god to men

01:58:16

I have a very firm Conviction about this and that's why I wrote the article that I wrote on my blog

01:58:22

Addressing what I believe to be a clear compromise as it relates to uh, beth moore

01:58:29

But I think that I think that as it pertains to say rosaria butterfield coming as she did last year

01:58:36

I think that You know speaking to a mixed group as you're sharing your testimony as you're sharing how you came to faith from You know a homosexual background and that type of thing.

01:58:47

I think that that can be very profitable and useful Especially as it pertains to that issue.

01:58:54

That's of such great controversy today But yeah, we're not we're not asking Rosaria or martha peace to come and preach to men

01:59:03

That was not the invitation and that certainly did not happen And so we want to be very clear as to where we stand and the convictions that we hold here at the g3 conference

01:59:13

And women give their testimonies in churches all the time while standing in baptismal tanks. So Absolutely, and uh, well, uh bb you have won a free copy of the excellent wife biblical perspective

01:59:26

By martha peace compliments of focus publishing And compliments of cv bbs .com.

01:59:32

We're out of time And if you'd like to visit the website of praise mill baptist church in douglasville, georgia go to praise mill .com

01:59:39

Praise mill .com and also the g3 conference website is g3 conference .com

01:59:44

G3 conference .com. Thank you so much pastor bice Thanks to all of you who wrote in questions and I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives