Lovingly Eviscerating Defend and Confirm Podcast on Voting - Conclusion

AD Robles

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00:01

Hey, alright, well, let's jump right into it today.

00:08

So yesterday's video, the part three of the response to the Defendant Confirmed podcast on voting,

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I thought it was awesome. I thought it was really good content, I broke down a lot of things in a very direct, but I believe very fair way as well, but it didn't do that well on YouTube.

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So if you haven't seen that, go back to yesterday's video and watch it. I think you'll get a lot of value out of it.

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And if you like it, please share and all that kind of thing. But yeah, let's jump into it today.

00:34

We're going to complete this today, no matter what happens, if this video is an hour long, we're going to complete it today.

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And so before I say that, though, today's the last day to pre -order my book, How to Defeat the Woke Church Movement.

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I was writing some of it earlier today, woo, my goodness, it's going to be good. It's going to be really good.

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So if you're looking for like a very accessible handbook on how to confront the major problems with the woke church social justice movement,

01:02

I definitely recommend this book. Go ahead and pre -order it. I'll put the link to it in the description of this video.

01:08

It would definitely help out that project and support that to be published as soon as possible. And anyway, please consider doing that.

01:16

Thank you for your support. Thank you for watching the video. Go ahead and push the like button, push, push it, push the like button right now, like button right now.

01:24

And let's dive right in. That's right. So, so we're trying to preserve a category of otherwise faithful Christians who have dumb ideas.

01:33

Yeah, that's right. And I would pray that they'd do the same for me when I have done. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. So the idea here is being that, look, it's, it's, it's a dumb idea to vote for Democrats, but we want to affirm someone's

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Christianity. Look, everyone has dumb ideas from time to time. And so when I have a dumb idea,

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I would hope for the grace to not be church disciplined. And so when they have a dumb idea like voting Democrat, you should give them the grace to not be church disciplined.

01:59

I think that this is wrong in so many ways. Number one, voting Democrat is well beyond just a dumb idea.

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It's not an oopsie. It's not an oopsie. It's like, look, you're trying to put in power a party that is telling you we're going to do all kinds of abject evil with no redeeming qualities.

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It's just evil all the way through. And you're trying to put them into political power, into governmental authority.

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That is well beyond an oopsie. That's not so much a dumb idea. That is actually wickedness in and of itself.

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And so to characterize it like it's just almost like just an oops, you know, like that kind of thing. That's a problem. The second thing though, is that, is that I actually do want to be church disciplined for my dumb ideas.

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I don't know about you, but like, if I'm doing something stupid, I would really, really appreciate it.

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If somebody, a Christian brother came to me and said, Hey, you know, AD, you shouldn't do that. And here's why.

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Like we should be, we should be seeking that kind of confrontation. Like I was saying on Reform Jellicle last night, and I don't know if this came out right because it kind of made it seem like I was like, like not scared of not fearing the

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Lord or something like that. That's not what I'm saying. The thing is like when somebody comes to me and says, Hey, I have a problem with you.

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I want to talk to you about a sin that you've done. Like that conversation, like though I might fear the fact that, you know, maybe

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I'm in sin and again, and against God, like that's a fearful thing to be caught sinning before God. I'm not scared of the confrontation because that confrontation allows me the ability to correct it.

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Right? Like if you don't tell me that I'm sinning, but I am sinning, that should be way more scary than someone telling you that you are sinning and you don't agree because that confrontation is so crucial.

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Like it, I'm not scared to repent. I want to repent. And so if I've got a dumb idea, however you want to characterize that you,

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I want someone to tell me, man, I've got a brother, a biological brother. I talk to him all the time and I love him for many reasons.

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But one thing is I know, I know I can trust him to call me out. If I'm in the wrong,

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I often run things by him and I say, Hey Matt, I'm going to do this and do that. Whatever. What do you think? And he'll tell me he has the guts to, cause he knows

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I'm his brother. I'm going to love him either way. So he'll be like, no, that's stupid. Don't do that. And it's like, that's necessary, man.

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Like you can't be scared of that. Like we should want to repent. We should be a people of repentance. And part of that requires that church discipline happens often.

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Like we should be confronting people for their sin when it's necessary.

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That shouldn't be something we should be averse to. Brother, just think about how many people have been so patient with you as you have held them ideas, right?

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How they didn't just write you off, right? I mean, do you ever have that feeling of thankfulness wash over you when you look back on men and women who are kind to you?

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But do you see that, like how they're, how they're, how they're characterizing this? They're putting this in the category, almost like, look, they're not saying this, but this is, this is the air of what, this is what, this is the impression that you're being given by this.

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Like kindness is over here and church discipline is over here and they're opposed to each other.

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So we've got kindness and that's what we're so grateful for, kindness and church discipline is not kindness. Those are two separate categories.

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Brothers, this thing ought not to be the way it is. Kindness is, what does it say in the

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Bible? Love is kind, right? Love is kind. And, but I would argue that church discipline and these kinds of confrontations, you know, the steps of church discipline,

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Matthew 18, every single step in the way, including excommunication is done in love.

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We should not put these things against each other. Excommunication for a sin is done in love.

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It's done in kindness. It's done in patience. Like we're not talking about jumping from zero to 60.

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We're not talking about skipping all the steps and saying, you shunned. You're like a tax collector to me. That's not, why are they making that, that the impression here?

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Nobody is arguing for that. Nobody. I hate when this happens because when you see the pushback for church discipline for Democrats, you can see that really what it is, it's pushback against excommunication as such.

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It's like excommunication is not kind. Excommunication is not loving. I reject that. In fact,

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I said that in my conversation with Russell, the conversation that he's not putting online. I said,

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Russell, I see what you're saying, but it seems to me like you're trying to pit love against church discipline. I reject that.

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I reject that. I see no reason for that to be the case. And I reject it here as well.

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They obviously haven't learned their lesson. There's no reason to pit kindness against church discipline. You when you didn't deserve it, when really what you deserve is a smack in the mouth.

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You deserve to be cast out, just like in the gospel. That's what we deserve. Right. But older, wiser men and women were very patient and very gentle, very kind with us, and they held our hand and helped us walk in the right direction.

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Do you see how they're characterizing this? It's so ridiculous. It's so ridiculous. No, no.

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This is what I'm talking about. Brother, you're about to vote Democrat, but let me talk to you about this. This is why it's wrong.

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This is why it's a sin. Let me plead with you. Don't do this wicked thing. And obviously I'm just doing a

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YouTube video, so I'm not going to take you through exactly how that conversation goes. It goes differently for every person, right?

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It goes differently for every person. There's likely tears. There's likely give and take. There's likely pushback. There's likely conversations and arguments and undercutting arguments and responding to arguments and stuff like that.

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Like we're not saying you go, I'm not saying every person who votes Democrat is out of the church today.

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My goodness. Like, like, like why? Why would you think that? Why would you think that? I just don't understand that.

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Kurt Kennedy was thinking the same thing. I saw him criticizing my video on disciplining

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Democrats, and he said, what does he think? These people think they have authority over cross boundaries? Church discipline is local.

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Yeah, I know. Church discipline is local. I'm encouraging you to do it in your local church. That's what

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I'm encouraging you to do, but we can't pit patience against church discipline. We should do church discipline with patience.

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Church discipline with kindness. Church discipline with grace. I think it's all a grace.

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It comes from God. That's what the Bible says. Discipline is not hatred. It's grace. And well, you know,

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I think this is the thing, like, like, to be honest, like, like, like I said, Russell, Russell, Russell Berger here has, has claimed that he didn't not put the video up because it didn't go well for him.

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But the thing is, we talked about this in his video and his, and he didn't have a very good response to this. I said, brother,

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I'm not saying not doing this in love. This is love. This is part of love, that love requires this.

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And there really wasn't a good answer for that. But yet here he is enunciating the same thing. Well, it's like, it's like, oh, it's against kindness.

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No, it isn't. No, it isn't. This is very frustrating. This is why you have a conversation instead of doing a little agreement party with your, with your bro on a very contentious issue.

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Like, we can do those two, but like, we got to have conversations about this. I think we should also be willing to err on the side of charity here, as you mentioned, because the

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Republican Party, for example, has its own shortcomings. The Democratic Party in particular is, is remarkably good at rhetorical deception.

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You know, they just think about - He said the same thing to me. We talked about this in the last episode. He said the same thing to me, but these are very different though.

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These are very different. Rhetorical deception or not, you have to look at their actions, right? What they're, what they're advocating for and what they actually do tell you that they're advocating for.

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So yeah, I agree. They're, they're very deceptive. But they actually do tell you what they're for. And all of the things that they tell you that they're for in a straightforward way are wicked.

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It's very different than the Republican Party. Yes, the Republican Party has its problems, granted. Everybody agrees with that, but it's not wickedness top to bottom.

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It's not, here's the wickedness we intend to do, now vote for me so I can do the wickedness. That's not what it is.

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It's a very, it's a different thing. It's so frustrating to keep hearing this moral equivalency argument being made.

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It's so ridiculous. The way they talk about abortion, it's choice, it's women's rights, it's reproductive rights, it's healthcare.

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When you have a party that is so good at obfuscating the truth, they won't call it murder.

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I just want to create a space for Christians who are weaker in their understanding to make errors in judgment.

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Yeah, but Paul didn't, because here's the thing, because Paul didn't, because you're going to tell me that the schismatic party, the circumcision party didn't have slick sounding rhetoric.

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In fact, the scripture says the person who has error always has slick sounding rhetoric.

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It always sounds smooth as butter, but inside it's war. Words are smooth as butter, war in their hearts.

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And so if you're going with them, even though they tricked you into it, even though they deceived you into their wickedness, it's still wicked.

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It's still wicked. So try not to interrupt them.

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I think you get my point. Let's continue. So think about a Christian who grew up liberal their whole lives.

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They just get, and I'm using liberal in the most pejorative sense possible, not like a classic liberalism.

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Right, right. A person who grew up liberal, they get saved. They've been walking with the Lord for two years.

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They haven't been in a healthy church. They haven't been discipled. They don't really know how to read their Bibles. And you sit down with them and you go, who are you going to vote for?

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And they go, oh, Biden, of course, he's going to do the most good for the most amount of people. You know, in that moment, do you think that there's no room for that Christian to be in the church?

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Well, I think there has to be. Sorry, I have to interrupt again. Do you see how they're framing this?

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They're framing this as our position is there's no room in the church. They tell you they're voting for Biden, then you better go tell your pastor and excommunicate them.

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Brothers, this is so wrong. You are wrong. This is not what we're saying.

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What we're saying is that there ought to be room for you as a brother to walk that new

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Christian through why that is wicked. You can make that case, Russell. You can make that case,

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Sean. I'm sure of it. You can make that case. So what we're saying is not to take it from,

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OK, there's a disagreement. Now you've got to cut him off from Christ. Stop characterizing it that way.

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That's wrong, brothers. I'm coming to you as a brother, Russell, Sean.

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Stop it. That's not what we're saying. What we're saying is in that moment, that's how you start step one.

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It's like, brother, let me talk to you about this. And step one might take more than one conversation. I'm not saying it all has to get done right then and there.

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You're on the subway with each other. You find out he's voting Biden. OK, well, that's step one. You talk to him for five minutes. No, that's not what

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I'm saying. But you contend with each other and then you hash it out. See where he's at.

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See where his arguments are. I think I made my point. But you see the way that they're framing this.

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This is so wrong where nobody is saying this. They're burning. They're torching straw men all day long and so that they can look reasonable.

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This is so. Russell, brother. Come on, man. You know better because I told you better.

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In our conversation, I explained what I was what I was meaning. And it wasn't this. So why did you do it this way, man?

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Why'd you do it this way? I'm about to I'm about to start sending people over your way to say release the tapes. You know what I'm saying?

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Don't do it. Guys, I'm not sending you over there to say release the tapes. Let me be clear. I don't know if you were planning on doing this, but I just want to do it.

13:13

OK, maybe we'll cut this out if it doesn't go well. I think the Democratic Party is evil from the root to the fruit.

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I agree. They have it written into their platform every way and they have enumerated their evil positions in their platform.

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They're anti God. They are pro murdering infants even after they are born. They're pro taking away civil liberties and all different kinds of rights that I just don't think

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God permits them to do. Oh, yeah. So we are not defending the Democratic Party. No, no, no.

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So I know. So I recently had a conversation with a sister in the Lord who was a little concerned about our last conversation.

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And one of the things that she said was she says, well, I just felt like those people who said those things needed to be more clear.

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So in an effort to be as clear as I can possibly be, just because I'm making room in the church for people who vote for the

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Democrats does not mean that in any way I think what the Democrats are doing is anything other than pure evil.

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That's right. OK. Yeah. Let me just make sure that you understand what Sean just said here. I know

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I keep promising not to interrupt, but I have to. Let me just make sure that this is clear with you.

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He wants to make room in the church for people who support and after being rebuked and taught and corrected and pleaded with and exhorted and all of that stuff, all the steps of proper

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Christian church discipline and teaching. Right. They continue to support and want to empower a political machine that thinks it's

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OK and wants it to be more widespread to kill babies after they're born.

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So we're not even talking babies in the womb anymore, which is bad enough. Even after they're born, literal infanticide,

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Sean wants to make room for someone who wants to empower that party to continue to be in the church.

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It makes no sense, even though he admitted that top to bottom, there are no redeeming qualities.

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It's wickedness from root to fruit. That's what he said. He's cute. So he's got to use cute language because he's from Big Eva, right?

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I mean, there it is. That's it. That's it. I don't understand that. I don't understand.

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I could understand because Russell, as he said, but they deceive people. They use tricky language.

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OK, great. That's why you have to do the church discipline steps in order, because someone might be deceived. And so you confront them, you talk about them, you hash it out, you have conversations, you plead, you beg, you show them in the

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Bible, you're a good Berean, you're all that stuff. You bring your elders, you do the whole thing. There's a whole process here.

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So now they've been confronted with the truth. They can no longer say they're deceived anymore over a period of time.

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But no, no, no, no, no. None of that. Maybe don't even start that. And definitely don't excommunicate.

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We need room for those people. Infanticide. I'm going to quote a

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Puritan by the name of Jeremiah Burroughs. He wrote a really helpful little article called

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What We Are to Bear With in Others. During the English Reformation, basically he was in a battle between Anglicans and Congregationalists on how the church should be ordered.

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Should it be basically part of the state system, or should a congregation be autonomous? Oh, great. So we're going to talk about church governance instead of what

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Sean just said, which was a party that is rotten from root to fruit. Everything about them is rotten, and they support infanticide.

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So great. Thank you for this very helpful example, Russell. Stuff that American Christians today wouldn't even know about.

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Are you kidding me? But in that debate, he had this piece that was basically arguing for unity on these issues of secondary and tertiary importance.

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And even him writing that would have been a sign of compromise. Yeah. According to many. To many of his comrades on the

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Congregationalist side. This does not make you upset. We just talked about the most insane thing you could possibly—infanticide.

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A political party in the United States that wants infanticide. And Russell Berger thinks it's going to be helpful to give you an example from the

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Puritans who were arguing about church governance. I mean, am

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I out of line here that that's just insane to even go there? I'm sure this is very helpful.

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In its context, he wasn't talking about infanticide. If I must needs err, considering what our condition is here in this world,

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I will rather err by too much gentleness and mildness than by too much rigor and severity.

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So here he is recognizing our sinful, fallible minds, and also recognizing that there are issues in Scripture that are more dim, that we have to reason from principles to circumstances in our present lives.

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And that introduces the possibility of error. And basically what Burroughs argued in this piece, which I highly recommend you go find.

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It's in Ian Murray's Reformation of the Church, if you Google that. He's arguing that the Lord gives us these areas that are less clear, not because the

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Scripture is not sufficient to guide us, but as a useful way of encouraging us to be charitable and to extend love to our brothers in Christ on areas that we don't have a direct word on.

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Yeah, so I've never read that book, or whatever he said it was, a pamphlet, whatever it was.

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That sounds very helpful to me. I've actually made a very similar point. I had talked about the blessing—I wrote an article actually for a

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Big Eva publication that since got thrown down the memory hole because I'm out of favor with Big Eva.

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Imagine that. But it was called The Blessings of Theological Disagreement, and I made a similar point.

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I said it's not good that we disagree theologically, obviously that reveals sin somewhere along the lines, but we can use it as a blessing to show unity.

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I made a very similar point. But guess what, guys? He wasn't talking about empowering a political party that's evil from root to fruit, and also, just a small little thing, infanticide.

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That is not one of the things that Scripture is dim about. I mean, call me crazy.

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I think that is so right, and so good. Unreal. And I just want to encourage us to do the same. And let me tell you, some of the best fruit that I have seen in the life of the local church that I pastor comes when we don't see eye to eye, right?

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It's when it's like, I know that— Let me bring you back into reality. We're talking about infanticide, like a baby comes out of his mother's womb, and then you off it.

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That's what we're talking about here, that they're waxing poetic about Christian unity The people that are in your congregation, that they might be against infanticide, but they certainly do want to empower the people running for political office that are not against infanticide, in fact, want to spread it as a matter of orthodoxy.

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And he runs to a passage about disagreements on how to set up church government. I'm going to teach this thing publicly, or I know that this member holds this belief privately, and there's an opportunity for friction there.

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But we bear with one another. We receive one another. We love one another. You know, Jesus said—

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I'm bearing with you brothers right now, and I love you brothers. You guys are out to lunch on this. I say it in love.

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Out to lunch. And I think you guys might know this because the example you just used,

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I mean, you ought to be pretty embarrassed of yourself to jump from one minute to talking about literal infanticide in our nation, to talking about, well, do we set up a government like this, the

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Anglican way, or do we set it up like this, the Protestant way, or whatever it was. I don't even remember what it was. In love, brothers.

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In love. I'm bearing with you. I'm not casting you out to outer darkness. In fact, I recommend your podcast, and I still do.

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Brothers, this is wrong, dude. You're characterizing the opposition in such a ridiculous way.

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Nobody is pitting kindness against church discipline, except for you guys, for some reason.

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I can't imagine why you would. I corrected Russell already once on this, and apparently it didn't take. If he wants to, he can release the video if he'd like.

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But guys, this is whacked, dude. In love, I say that.

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I'm bearing with you. This is whacked, what you're presenting here. This got pretty bad, man.

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I didn't think it was going to get this heated. By this, the world will know that you belong to me, that you love one another.

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And he did not say that thinking about a church that was going to agree on every primary, secondary, and tertiary matter of doctrine.

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He said that about a church that he knew from its very inception was just going to be shot through with controversy and disagreements.

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And this is why church discipline is necessary, because we are going to disagree.

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We need to be ready to have confrontations, and battles, and fight well, and all these kinds of things.

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We need to be ready to do it, which is why you shouldn't take church discipline off the table. That's the primary means of doing this, guys.

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Confronting your brother, teaching your brother, pleading with your brother. That's the primary way to do this.

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It's especially in the midst of these disagreements that we can really make Jesus look as big and as glorious as he really is.

22:55

Amen. And let me tell you how Jesus doesn't—let me rephrase this.

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Let me tell you how not to do that. This is not something that makes Jesus' name look good.

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When you sweep things under the rug that are real conflicts and pretend you have unity.

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No, no, no. He's after actual unity, not the pretense of unity. And so to sweep this under the rug like trying to empower wacko, psychotic, infanticide -loving politicians is no big deal,

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I don't think that that's actually a good thing. That's actually rather something we ought to be ashamed of.

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Going back to our first point, the supernatural nature of our unity, that it defies these political divisions, is a testament to the power of the gospel.

23:45

Yeah, that's right. And so we need— It's just a political division, you know. The baby comes out, looks up to his mom, that beautiful moment, and then the doctor takes a scalpel and sticks it into its neck and twists.

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You know, the people that want to empower that party, it's just a small political division, and God gets glory when you just sweep it under the rug and pretend like it's not there.

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God gets glory with everything, but he gets glory from destroying people as well. And I don't want to see brothers and sisters in Christ who have been—who have claimed the name of Christ go that way, because that's the path that leads to destruction.

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We see it in the Old Testament, we see it in the New Testament. I want them to—if they're insisting on taking that path, they're going to do it over my body.

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I'm going to have to—over my dead body, I'm going to go to war with them. I'm going to plead with them and beg them and give them the gospel and give them opportunities to repent.

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I'm not just going to comfort them on the way to hell. That's the problem here, because we need to sort out the sheep from the goats, and there's goats in our midst, and we need to figure out who they are.

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And God gives us tools to do that. God gives us tools to do that. So why is it off the table for us?

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God gets glory either way, but I'd prefer him to get glory because of people's repentance that I know, than the people that I know that I didn't confront, but they're on their way to the pit.

25:03

I don't know about you, but that's what I'd prefer. That charity to be given to us, right?

25:09

Yeah, if you're a Democrat -leaning voter listening to this, yes, you heard us say that we think the party you're voting for is evil.

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It's evil, but we're never going to really confront you about it. I mean, we're not going to make you give up your evil. You can continue an evil,

25:23

I guess, if you'd like. It depends on how you justify. Can you justify your evil? If you can justify your evil pretty well, well then, yeah, sure, you can come to the table with me.

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I'm not going to take it too far. I mean, it's not that big a deal, right? We would pray that if you look at us, and we're not -

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These guys sound very loving and very reasonable, but think about what they're saying. Bring it back into context.

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Think about the people that they're talking about. They're real people, man. They're real people.

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And if they're really deceived so much that they can vote for a party that's rotten from root to fruit, and it likes to commit confanticide, and it wants to overturn almost every single one of God's laws, and rejects the foundations of God's universe,

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I got to wonder, do they really love you? Love is an action more than it is sounding nice.

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Not really Republicans either. Not really. Okay. But if you look at us and see that our political leanings and choices are different from what you would judge to be right, and you think we are wrong, great, keep thinking we're wrong, but please, brother or sister, extend the same charity that we're trying to encourage from our end.

26:31

But no, don't do that. Please don't do that with me. Because if you think I'm sinning in my vote, or someone yesterday told me that I had an opinion that was sinful, and you know what

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I did? Take a guess. Take a guess what I did. I reached out to him.

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I said, dude, I don't think you're right, but I'm very interested in hearing what you have to say, because I'm not as sure as I was before you confronted me with this.

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So let's talk about this. No, no, I don't want you to treat me the way these brothers are asking you to treat me, where you don't actually tell me that I'm sinning and how

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I'm sinning, and we can go to the, have a Bible study together and talk about it and hash it out and stuff like that. That's not love, my brothers.

27:10

That's not love. That's fake love, man. That's sweeping things under the rug. We should have unity, but not fake unity.

27:20

Russell, man, I hope you guys listen to this. I really do. This is, this is, this is so weird, man.

27:27

Because it's, because you guys are clearly smarter than this. I really appreciate your show. I appreciate your show. I appreciate your interview style and all that.

27:34

I think you get this. I'm wondering why it's so confused, though, in this presentation, especially considering I talked to you, brother, about this stuff.

27:44

I cleared up all of these misconceptions with you once already, and you decided not to post it and do a video repeating your, the wrong things that you believed before.

27:56

If you're more conservative and you're listening to this and thinking, yeah, but if you vote for Biden, you're voting for abortion.

28:03

Just try and remember this category of people who are firm in their convictions of what's right and wrong.

28:09

And yet in their judgments, they unconsciously contradict those convictions. He can't even help himself. He keeps mischaracterizing people.

28:17

Yes, you're voting for abortion, but also an entire litany of evil, as your friend

28:22

Sean over here admitted already in this thing. He said the whole platform. There's just point by point by point by point, wicked, wicked, wicked, wicked, wicked, no redeeming qualities, root to fruit, all that stuff, abortion and infanticide, everything put together.

28:37

I just, I just don't get it. I don't get this. I guarantee that our conservative listeners already have this category.

28:46

Oh, really? Yeah, they already use it in their reasoning. Let me give you an example. Give it to me. So he's about to use an example.

28:54

I haven't watched this yet. I'm pretty sure he's about to use an example that he used on me. He talked about semi -Pelagianism and theological disagreement.

29:02

Again, completely out of the context of infanticide, for goodness sake. But let's hear him out, because he said this to me, and I corrected him on this.

29:10

And let's hear, let's see if he repeats it. Slavery. Mm. Jonathan Edwards.

29:17

George Whitefield, both heroes of the faith, both owned slaves.

29:23

You will have people on the far left, that you're woke theologians, who will look at these guys and say, they couldn't have been

29:30

Christians. You have to doubt their salvation, because they were engaged in something that was wickedly sinful. Now, they're right that it was sinful.

29:37

Very serious moral failing. And yet, we would say that's wrong. Because we...

29:42

What's that there? We would say it's... Stop right there. Stop right there. So he also used this one on me, when he interviewed me, and I answered him then as well.

29:48

And I'm gonna say the same thing I said to him in our interaction. I just, again, I find it so unbelievable that,

29:55

I bet you he's not gonna give the pushback that I gave. And it's just like, dude, you know that this pushback's out there, because I literally told you to your face, this pushback.

30:04

So it's just so bizarre that you would do it this way. But I told him, when he brought up George Whitefield, or whoever,

30:13

Jonathan Edwards, who owned slaves. So we have this category already in our minds of people that are Christians, that had big moral failings, right?

30:21

Big moral failings. And so we had that category in our minds. And here's what I told him. I said, listen,

30:27

I'm a Calvinist, right? Like, I am as Calvinist as any Calvinist has ever Calvined, right?

30:33

So I am completely sold out to God's sovereignty and his providential placement in time and stuff like that, and things like that, right?

30:41

But I said, if you want to play theoretical, hypothetical games, Russell, I'll play that game with you. Because I'm a

30:47

Calvinist. I wish there were six points of Calvinism. That's how much I'm a Calvinist. But I'll play this theoretical game with you, okay?

30:54

If George Whitefield were to be in my church, and I was either a pastor or his co -congregation person, whatever, and he owned a slave that was stolen from Africa, that was kidnapped from Africa, and he owned the slave,

31:10

I would say, absolutely, he should be confronted for that sin. We should start the steps of church discipline right away.

31:17

That is a sin to be in the possession of someone who has been stolen, okay? It's a sin.

31:24

And so, yes, I would confront him from that sin. And then we could talk it out, and we could hash it out over time and patience and kindness and all of that, humility, the whole thing.

31:32

It's all still applicable. And then if he doesn't repent, we should bring other people. And if he doesn't repent, we should bring the elders. If he doesn't repent, he should be excommunicated from the church.

31:41

In this hypothetical game where George Whitefield is transported to my church, or if I'm transported to their church, that's what should happen.

31:51

But since I'm a Calvinist, I have to recognize the fact that that is not what happened, right?

31:58

George Whitefield, as far as I know, maybe someone who's a historically -minded person knows better, was never excommunicated from the church for his sin, right?

32:07

Never. Providentially, I take that very seriously because I think God gives the keys of the kingdom to his elders, and he puts certain elders in time over certain people in time, and it's all providential, right?

32:19

It's all providential. So I can look back and say, look, he should have been excommunicated, or at least the steps of church discipline should have been started with George Whitefield, at least we can say that much, because I don't know how he would have reacted if he was confronted over the sin.

32:34

I can't put myself there, I don't know, I'm not a Molinist, you know what I mean? That kind of thing. So he should have been, but he wasn't, and I take that very seriously because I'm a

32:45

Calvinist, and I take his baptism very seriously, and so he was a baptized believer, and so clearly I'm going to take that very seriously.

32:51

He belongs to Christ, he was never excommunicated, plus, on top of that, I've got mountains of evidence of his faith in Christ, and so why would

33:00

I question the fact that he was an actual believer, that I'll meet him in heaven one day?

33:05

Why would I question that? There's no reason for me to do that. But if you want to play hypothetical games, I can tell you what should have theoretically happened, but I'm a

33:13

Calvinist, and I have to recognize that he had him with the pastors that he had him under for a reason.

33:18

God had him there for a reason, okay? But here's the thing that I told Russell at the time.

33:24

I'm not worried about people that I have no control over, no impact on. I'm not worried about looking backwards and saying, oh yeah, those people should have been church -disciplined.

33:35

What I'm worried about is today. I'm not LARPing here, I'm not doing role -playing games here.

33:41

I want to focus on what I have control over, my family. I've got a lot of control over my family, so I'm going to try to execute control over that.

33:48

I have a little bit less control over my community and my church, so I'm going to try to execute justice there, or not execute justice there, do the right thing there.

33:56

But I also have a YouTube platform, and so I want to encourage pastors in their local context to also do the right thing in the here and now.

34:03

Not to look backwards in time and say, well, the sins back then and the failures back then somehow justify my failure today.

34:11

That's not how this works. So that's what I told Russell at the time. Look, I'm a Calvinist.

34:16

I get it. I get what you're saying, but if you want to play a hypothetical, sure, I'll tell you what should have happened, but it didn't. So I have that category in hindsight.

34:24

So they're failures then, I could recognize them as failures, and seek to not make the same mistake here, today, with Democrats today.

34:35

That's why I point to the Nazis and the KKK, because everyone, that's in the past.

34:41

We all know that you should excommunicate KKK and Nazis now, in hindsight. But I'm looking at here and now and saying,

34:46

I don't want to just operate in hindsight. I want to operate now. I want to look forward into the future. That's what I want to do.

34:52

That's what I told Russell. But I guess it didn't take. I guess it didn't take. He still wants to play hypothetical games and let the sins of the past and the failures of the past justify failure in the future.

35:05

I refuse to do that, brothers, and I don't understand why you would. Wouldn't. It's wrong to question the salvation.

35:12

To say that they're not Christians. And to say that these brothers weren't Christians. And here's why. It's because we have a category where they could affirm

35:18

Orthodox truth, that all men are created in the image of God. They could affirm those salvific issues and just be completely self -deceived and unconsciously contradict those affirmations in their behavior.

35:30

Yeah, that's right. And we give room for that. And sorry, I know we were going to talk about slave owning and stuff, but we also need to make a category distinction between a man like Jonathan Edwards, who, as he read scripture, saw all the protections for slaves and tried to love them, serve them, care for them as a stewardship, versus like maybe a slave owner in the deep

35:50

South who abused. A man -stealer. A man -stealer, abuser. That's right. Right. And I was just talking about it as if he was a man -stealer, right?

35:58

That's all I'm saying, because that's the point he was trying to make. People on the right already have this category.

36:03

You see how they've made a false choice here. No, we don't have this category the way that you're describing it.

36:10

We can look in hindsight and say, okay, well, Jonathan Edwards, George, they weren't excommunicated. They were

36:15

Christians, so I expect to see them in heaven. But we have a job to do today. We have no control over that.

36:22

That was decades and centuries ago. We can't control that. Why are we operating in hindsight?

36:29

Let's operate in reality, in the here and now. I just don't get it. I just don't get it. When these woke theologians go,

36:36

Jonathan Edwards, he wasn't a Christian, they go, how dare you? How could you say that about Jonathan Edwards, right?

36:41

So you have this category. I'm taking people's profession of faith seriously, and the fact that they haven't been excommunicated, just like I do now with Democrats.

36:51

That's why I want church discipline enacted on them, because I assume that they're part of the church.

36:57

Do you see how this works? You see how the way that they frame this has made it seem, well, you're just saying they're not a believer.

37:03

No, no, no. If they were not a believer, I wouldn't try to have church discipline on them, because you don't discipline your neighbor's kids.

37:09

You discipline your kids, right? You discipline your kids. You don't teach your neighbor's kids.

37:15

You teach your kids. Do you see how they frame this? It's just so inappropriate. Guys, I beg you to stop framing things this way.

37:22

It's so twisted. No, I assume that they're in the church. I assume that they're believers, and so I treat them the way

37:29

I would want to be treated as a believer. Confront me with my sin, plead with me, take me through the steps, do everything the way it's supposed to be done with a believer.

37:38

I assume you're a believer, so I will treat you like a believer, the way Christ does or commands in Matthew 18.

37:46

Why is this so difficult? By saying, oh, you voted for a Democrat? Well, how could you be a

37:51

Christian? They're doing the same thing. The same thing. And really, I would say to a worse degree. Yeah.

37:57

Well, and I do want to say, though, I sympathize with their view insofar that, as you've said, we think the

38:03

Democratic Party platform is full of wicked, evil things. And I'm willing to say that in a few years, this podcast may not really be true anymore.

38:13

It may not, yeah. In some sense. It's already there. This is the thing. So this is why I know that they know that they're wrong here.

38:19

They're wrong. And they're doing the same thing Lehman does. Well, you know, one day we'll have to fight this battle, but not today.

38:26

It's always not today. Not today, not today, not today. What could make it worse? Your bro just said they support infanticide.

38:34

Like, how much worse does it have to get? Right? I just don't get it. What else could they say?

38:40

What else could they attempt to do? What else does it have? What else has to happen for you to be like, they're there now?

38:47

You guys, you give, by the way, you understand that you've given me the argument here. I've won this debate, just like I won the conversation that we had that you refused to put up.

38:57

Because you admit that there could be a situation where these mere political differences are exhumed.

39:03

We're already there. I dare you to make the case that we're not there.

39:09

Maybe he does. Maybe he does. There could be developments. The principles will be true. But we may come to a point where the extreme left wing of the

39:18

Democratic Party has dragged the mainstream so far in their direction that it just becomes an issue that Christians simply can't disagree on anymore.

39:24

Infanticide doesn't make the grade, I guess. So you take the Nazi party in Germany, for example. Remember, the

39:29

Nazi party, there was a development, a progression there. Their original platform wasn't kill all the

39:35

Jews. That's right. There was an ideological evolution and implementation. There's a progress in implementation.

39:42

So there was a point where a line was crossed, right, where you could have been a Christian and voted for the

39:47

Nazis. They are only comfortable operating in hindsight. If you trust guys like this to tell you when it's time to fight, you're in trouble.

39:56

It'll never be time to fight. Never. They only know it's time to fight when they're decades into the future.

40:03

I'm sorry, but that's just how it is. Jonathan Lehman's the same way. They're too careful to lead you into battle.

40:11

Listen, a general should be careful, but they can't be too careful that they're analyzing things until, you know, 10 years after the battle has started.

40:20

It'll never be time. If infanticide doesn't make the cut for these guys, nothing will.

40:27

They will only be comfortable when they're reading it in a history book. I'm sorry, that's harsh, but it's true.

40:34

I can't believe that this brother just said, we're talking about infanticide here. And they're like, yeah, but we haven't met the threshold yet.

40:40

I mean, the Nazi party, that's one thing. The Nazi party, or participate in the Nazi party, and then there was a point where you just couldn't anymore, right?

40:47

Maybe that was the Nuremberg Declaration, I don't know. But there is a lot. You'll know when the history book tells you. We need to pray for wisdom, that God will help us to see if that day comes with the

40:56

Democrats. Brother, let me tell you this. I have no illusions that I'm, delusions rather, that I'm a prophet or I'm speaking the words of God or things like that, but I am trying to look forward.

41:07

I am trying to read this time that we're in right now. And brothers, let me say to you, we are there.

41:14

Wake up. We are there. The Democratic Party has passed the point of no return.

41:19

It passed it a long time ago. We are there. It at the time to stand up and fight and to purify their church of Christ is now.

41:28

You do it in your local assemblies. I have no authority over you, obviously. So before you, that objection comes,

41:34

I don't have any authority. I'm encouraging you. I'm exhorting you. I'm telling you to wake up, open your eyes, and look at what's happening all around the country.

41:42

The time to stand is now. The time to stand was probably a long time ago, but it's time.

41:47

It's definitely time now. It's definitely time now. And let's close with a word from the

41:55

Lord. This is Romans 15, five through seven. May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may, with one voice, glorify the

42:08

God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore, welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you for the glory of God.

42:15

Let's glorify God with one voice. Amen. Also, I lifted my hand for that benediction. I saw that.

42:20

Yeah. Did you feel different? These guys are good guys. I'm not saying that they're bad. I'm not saying that they're evil. I'm not saying that you shouldn't listen to their podcast.

42:26

I actually really enjoy their podcast. So you know, the last time I reviewed them,

42:32

I had not listened to them very much at all, but I've listened to them a little bit more now. These guys are good, right? These guys are good. But they take too many cues from Jonathan Lehman.

42:39

They take too many cues of Jonathan Lehman. These are the type that Doug Wilson was talking about, faithful men versus careful men.

42:47

Listen, we need faithful men. We need to be careful, but we need faithful men, men who will tell you what's what.

42:55

I'm sorry, but if you're telling me in the same podcast that a party that's evil from top to bottom, oh, and by the way, just a small thing, they support infanticide, literal infanticide.

43:05

And then you're telling me, yeah, but you know, eventually, maybe one day they'll get so evil that we shouldn't tolerate any support of them in our midst.

43:14

Maybe one day, but it's not yet. Like I just, I'm sorry, you're too careful to be of any value on the front lines here.

43:21

I'm sorry. Let me encourage you, brothers. Let me encourage you with as much encouragement as I can say, brothers,

43:28

I think you can see the inconsistency with what you're saying. And I urge you to stop worrying about appearances.

43:35

Stop worrying about optics. Stop with that. Say what's right. Do what's right.

43:41

Even if it costs you followers, even if it costs you your, the mantle of being a reasonable guy or whatever it is like this is, this is too much.

43:49

They've gone too far. You don't have to be a Republican, but you cannot be a

43:54

Democrat in 2020. It's beyond the point of no return. You have to, you have to at least see that, at least tell me that we're close.

44:04

We're very close. You'd have to at least grant that. And I would argue that you have to grant a lot more.

44:12

So brothers don't take this as I hate you. Don't take this as I think you're an unbeliever, but it take this as a rebuke.

44:18

Let me earnestly contend with you. This podcast not only misrepresents the opposition so much, and you know it because I've given you the opposition prior to this.

44:28

Not only does it misrepresent it, but it really does make room or space or an allowance for abject evil within the church of Christ.

44:40

And he will not put up with that for long. We should not tolerate people that promote that kind of evil.

44:47

We shouldn't tolerate it, not even for a moment. Anyway, I hope you found this review helpful. God bless.

44:52

If you found this helpful, please share it. I'm Russell. I'd be glad to talk to you any other time. I probably wouldn't do another interview with you because unless you guaranteed, you know, sending me a copy or something like that because of how this first one went.

45:06

But I'd be glad to talk to you on your show again if you were to make certain guarantees. And I'd love to talk to you more about this particular topic because I love you guys.

45:12

I think you guys are on the right side. I think you guys are on the right track. I mean, let me just encourage you to like, you know, take it a step further.