Able or slave? Then the Broke Woke Church

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But at least here at the beginning, even he himself says the usefulness of this is a comparison of the two positions side -by -side, and that's interesting that he says two positions, because in essence, that's what we've been saying all along, the monergism versus synergism.

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But they always complain about that and say, well, that's too simplistic. We have all sorts of different perspectives on our side.

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But he's basically right, monergism and synergism. And to hear the two positions side -by -side, either you're dead in sin and incapable of doing what is pleasing to God, or you are capable of doing what is pleasing to God.

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You have the capacity in and of yourself to be able to do this, and that all you need is a gospel presentation that is grace enough in and of itself.

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It doesn't have to be a supernatural enablement, it doesn't have to be a freeing from sin, it doesn't have to be a raising the spiritual life.

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The rebellious dead sinner has the capacity in and of himself to make, even though a slave to sin, the slave has the capacity in and of himself to end his slavery, to take off his chains.

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Those chains, you just reach over, you just undo them, you're able to just, this is your capacity, this is what you are, this is what the image of God is.

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That's going to come up here. And I thought this very first portion of it would be useful in looking at what is being said.

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So here is the problem, okay. So now

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I'm being told we don't need this. And so, okay, if I do that, problem was on your end.

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Okay, well, we're going to have to have a little discussion about this. Maybe some vacation days, you know, something along those lines, you know.

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Has Leighton been slipping you a little, you know, a little extra on the side? I've been wondering.

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Yeah. Anyway, all right, so we're going to give a shot here. You should be able to hear this better now. I was about to be putting the microphone down in front of a speaker or something like that so you could be able to hear it.

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So here we go. And by the way, when he plays Jeff, his software, when

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I play somebody fast, it doesn't make them sound like the chipmunks. But when he plays someone fast, it does make them sound like the chipmunks.

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I'm not sure why that is. Most software today doesn't automatically raise the tonal quality, but Jeff does sound like one of the chipmunks as he's preaching.

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So just so you're aware of that. So let's listen in here and hope this works.

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Here's Jeff. You can see I'm starting about the 17, 18 -minute mark here in Jeff Durbin's sermon on total depravity.

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So we're not going to watch the whole thing. I think this will be a good introduction for those of you who are wanting to see the two views side -by -side.

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So here it goes. I'm playing it just a little bit fast. We're not saying when we say total depravity that the image of God has been erased.

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That's very important. When people hear total depravity, which was the response of the Calvinists to the Armenian protest in terms of the condition of man, how fallen is man?

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What are his capabilities spiritually outside of God and his regenerating grace? We're not saying that the image of God has been erased.

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So when we say, biblically speaking, total depravity, everyone who's a son and daughter of Adam and Eve, totally depraved.

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We're not saying that the image of God has been erased and that fallen people don't do things that look like image bearers of God.

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We're not saying that the fall has made people into beasts. There's still the image of God. Now, let me just stop before Layton Flowers does.

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This is important to recognize because of how constantly this is misrepresented. I am stunned, honestly, when

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I see scholars, when I see well -read individuals who just don't seem to get this part.

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There is such a deep commitment to the concept of autonomy that when you say we are made in the image of God, the image of God is not erased.

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It is not destroyed. But our capacity to do what is right in God's sight because of our union with Adam, because of our rebellion, because of our slavery to sin, because of our spiritual death.

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We can use all of the different phraseology of Scripture. We are slaves to sin.

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The Scripture says that God has to free us from our sins.

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We have to be set free. This is the biblical teaching. And so we are saying in bondage, spiritually dead, and therefore what is the universal action of man in the presence of the truth of God?

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Suppression. That suppression can take many different forms. That suppression is a spiritual act.

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It doesn't mean you're just a corpse because people say, well, the Bible plainly shows that we do that.

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Yeah, we recognize that. It just seems to me like almost anybody, almost everybody who takes the other side won't take the time to just read something like maybe

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Chosen by God by R .C. Sproul, or I know it's not real easy, but how about we read something like the work of Jonathan Edwards.

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I know the print is super small, but you can get other versions of it. And it's, yeah, it's not short and it's imperative.

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Should have seen how he wrote his notes for preaching. Oh my goodness. I couldn't read them.

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Couldn't read them when I was young. When I was looking at them now, it would just be just super, super tiny.

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It's just amazing. Anyway, they don't read Edwards. And there's extensive discussions of all of these things, all the way through the modern writers of the nature of the will and the issue of the suppression of truth and the interface between the spiritual and the rational in man that you can't just simply separate them out and pretend that they're not connected.

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So you keep all that in mind. And what Jeff is saying is when we say total depravity, we are not saying image of God is

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God. We are not saying that man is not active. We are not saying that man does not make choices. What we are saying is that all of mankind, every aspect of our being has been impacted by sin.

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That's the teaching of Romans chapter one. That's what the whole example of Romans 1, 26, 27 homosexuality is, is that even at the most basic level of how we continue to propagate the species has been impacted by sin.

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You can't get much more basic than the sex drug. You can't get much more basic than what keeps the human being alive on the planet, where you have one generation after another generation.

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That basic has been impacted and can be impacted to such a point to where the natural use of the male or the female is abandoned because of sin, because of the rebellion against the creator.

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That's what homosexuality is. It is a, you made me this way. I'm going to rebel against that.

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I'm going to, I have certain desires and I am going to follow those desires even when they go against the creative order.

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That's what transgenderism is to an even further level and even, even more obvious level is what you have in transgender.

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So there you go. So that's what, that's what Jeff is saying is the

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Imago Dei marred, the Imago Dei enslaved, the

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Imago Dei in mankind, the rebel fallen son and daughter of Adam.

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Yes. And what then does the Bible teach about what the result of that is?

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For example, if you take a coin and you throw it into the mud and you pick up that coin out of the mud, that coin has been muddied and dirty, but the image is still there.

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It's marred, but it hasn't lost its image. And that's what we're talking about when we talk about hope. Okay. So I want,

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I want to highlight this point first because he's about to contradict it in my estimation. You wouldn't believe that, but this is my argument.

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When you say marred, that's like saying sick. Marred is like saying it's hurt.

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It's, it's, it's not complete. It's not full, but it's still there. Okay. And therefore later on, when you hear him say, we're not sick, we're dead, it seems like he's contradicting this concept of us being marred.

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Okay. So what Leighton has to do, what every sinner just has to do is you have to, you have to crack the door open for some mechanism of mankind's activity to cooperate with grace or in his case, not even, not even cooperate with grace.

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You, to have the ability, the capacity in and of itself to be able to autonomously embrace an offer that is made to every person equally.

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Of course, it's never made there, but that's another theoretical problem with that system, but you have to be able to do that.

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And so there are different, there are different terms that are used in scripture to describe this state.

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There are different categories that are used when contrasting the accomplished regeneration of the spirit of God.

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When, when we're looking at where we are as believers who have been changed by the spirit of God with where we were, the scripture speaks of spiritual life and spiritual death.

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And so it's a, it's, it's the, but God of Ephesians chapter two, you were dead in your trespasses and sins, walking in the futile way of life, your enemies of God, but God acted and changed you and changed those circumstances.

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And in the process, the contrast then is between life and death.

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You were walking one direction. You had no relationship with God outside of rebellion.

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Now you have a new nature, a new heart. You've had a heart of stone taken out. You've been given the heart of flesh.

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It's likened to life and death. That is different from asking questions about activity and capacity.

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So when Jeff is talking about the coin, the reflection of God in the center is covered over by the rebellion, is covered over by the sin, is covered over by the pollution of being made in the image of God and then choosing to go their own direction.

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That's the result of idolatry, but that's not saying that there is no recognition.

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No, we still have to deal with the fact that as his pots, he is the potter.

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We're the vessels and right on the bottom of this, it says made by God. We have to deal with that.

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How we deal with that. We deal with that in many different ways, but the universal reality is in light of Romans one and Romans eight and so many other passages is that we suppress that knowledge and we cannot stop suppressing that knowledge in and of ourselves.

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We do not have that capacity. We're going to look at a number of texts that talk about man and the do not.

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He wants to try to say, well, you're contradicting yourself. But when when

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Jeff is talking about spiritual death, he's talking about the category that I mentioned before.

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It's not like you were sort of in relationship with God. It's not like you sort of were indwelt by the

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Holy Spirit. It's not like you were sort of justified. No, you're either in the flesh. These are the categories that the scriptures choose.

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Is Leighton saying that Paul was contradicting himself? When Leighton says, you did not know

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God and then elsewhere, he says, you suppress the knowledge of God. Was he contradicting himself or those different concepts?

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When Leighton says when Paul says you're either what in the flesh or what in the spirit.

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So which one's which? That seems like a real contradiction. He's just chapter two dead, alive, in Christ, outside of Christ, perishing, being saved.

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It seems that these categories, which are so completely black and white, stark, come straight from scripture.

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They come from the apostles argumentation. But you see, in the semi -Pelagian,

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Pelagian world, mankind is not the enemy of God so much so that he can't just decide in and of himself to stop being the enemy of God.

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The whole idea is, well, you know, once you hear the gospel message, then maybe you can you can just make the choice and you can work the system and do the things you're supposed to do.

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And of course, that's Rome's position, too, in the sense that you have the capacity with prevenient grace of working the sacramental system.

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The stronger the emphasis upon autonomy, the less the emphasis upon the concept of grace, prevenient or otherwise.

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There is no biblical concept of grace, but that's that's another issue. Image bearers, that an image bearer still has the ability to respond to the one who bears his image, the one who gave us his image, has the ability to respond freely or the ability to respond in rebellion as a slave.

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What did Jesus say in John chapter eight? Well, let's let's let's let's look at that.

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I just want to since I had already used this member, Mary Jesus' words, he specifically makes the argument.

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And I I'm sorry I got into that and forgot to share the screen.

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And where am

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I? Have I been not sharing the screen the whole time? I don't know. I can't tell. So if our tech is not really

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OK, not sharing our tech is is really in our tech is in a state of rebellion.

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Let's just put it that way. It is it is fighting this bad anyway, as long as you can hear it.

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All you've missed is is seeing Jeff and Layton in two different windows. I'll try to try to make it share next time.

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Maybe it's just refusing to do that, too. I don't know. But that's fine. And in John chapter eight.

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Remember the situation. Very, very important. Men hear

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Jesus speaking. And in chapter eight, verse 30 says, as he spoke these things, many came to believe in him.

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But. John uses the aorist form of belief. Episcopal.

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When John talks about saving faith, he always uses the present tense. Every time he uses the aorist, you're going to see by the end of this chapter, they're picking up stones to stone.

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It's not saving faith that is being referred to. So Jesus was saying those

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Jews who had believed him. If you continue in my word, then you are truly disciples of mine.

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You will know the truth and what the truth will make you free. The truth will free you, set you free.

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Why do they need to be set free? They just they just believed in Jesus about being set free. They don't need anything else.

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Do they? They do. They do. Because they had not truly believed.

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And they need to be set free and they need to be set free by the sun. They answered him. We are Abraham's descendants and have never yet been enslaved to anyone.

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How is it that you say you will become free? These people are self -deceived. They are currently servants of Rome.

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They have been enslaved many times. They were slaves in Egypt. But they say we've never been enslaved to anyone.

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They're self -deceived. They think they have freedom when they don't have freedom. Sounds familiar. Jesus answered him.

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Truly, truth, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin.

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Everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin. How much clearer does that have to be?

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You know, we don't live in a day where all around us we see slavery.

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But if we did, we would be struck with the force of this statement. Everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin.

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The slave does not remain in the house forever. The son does remain forever. So if the son makes you free, you will be free indeed.

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Not if you choose to make yourself free. You have to be freed by the son. And does the son ever fail in his setting someone free is the question.

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So if the son makes you free, you will be free indeed. I know that you are Abraham's descendants, that you seek to kill me because my word has no place in you.

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My word has no place in you. Now, I think Leighton would say because of their choice, they choose to not give place to his word.

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But is that what Jesus said? I speak the things that I have seen with my father.

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Therefore, you also do the things which you heard from your father. So now he contrasts himself, his father over against their father.

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They answered and said to him, Abraham is our father. Jesus said to them, if you are Abraham's children, do the deeds of Abraham.

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But as it is, you are seeking to kill me, a man who has told you the truth, which I heard from God. This Abraham did not do.

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You're doing the deeds of your father. They said to him, we were not born of fornication. We have one father, God.

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Might have some reference to maybe scurrilous accusations and gossip about Jesus' parentage, maybe.

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Jesus said to them, if God were your father, you would love me. Now stop a second. Now think, if God were your father, you would love me.

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So we can just choose to love God? I mean, I've actually heard people in this camp say, yeah, they're the choice meats.

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The choice meats who love the father, they're the ones who hear the son. So that's something they do themselves.

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Jesus says, if God were your father, you would love me. For I proceeded forth and have come from God.

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For I have not even come on my own initiative, but he sent me. Perfect union between father and son. This is John chapter eight.

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This is a continuing theme of John chapter five and John chapter six. Then here's the kicker.

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Why do you not understand what I'm saying? Okay. Let's answer that question from the two sides.

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Why do you not understand what I am saying? From the provisionist, synergist, semi -Pelagian,

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Pelagian, all down the line side. Why do you not understand what

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I am saying? Haven't had sufficient gospel presentation. There might be some cultural issues, maybe some language issues.

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Maybe the preacher's a jerk, but it can't be anything in the person. It can't be anything in the person.

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It can't be anything about their spiritual nature. Because this is Jesus speaking. So you can't really say it was bad preaching either, could you?

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Jesus' answer, it is because you cannot hear my word. But why can't they hear his word?

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Now, it's u -dunastha, from dunatai. You are not able, akuoin, akuo is to hear, akuoin is the infinitival form, to hear my word.

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You can't hear my word. Well, what if they choose to? No, you cannot hear my word.

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No, you cannot hear my word. Well, why? Because you are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father.

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He was a murderer from the beginning. It does not stand the truth, because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature.

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For he is a liar and the father of lies. But because I speak the truth, you do not believe me. Which one of you convicts me of sin?

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If I speak the truth, why do you not believe me? Because they have autonomous free will, says

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Leighton Flowers. They have autonomous free will, and they have chosen not to do so, because they love the praise of men more than the praise of man, and so on and so forth.

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Is that Jesus' answer? He who is of God hears the words of God.

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For this reason, you do not hear them, because you are not of God. You are not of God.

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Now, the Pelagian says, but you can choose to be of God. The Pelagian says you have the capacity in and of yourself, outside of grace, to choose to be of God.

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But you have to be of God to hear the words of God. And so what

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Leighton says is, well, once you hear the gospel, see, that's the extension of grace, is the gospel. Without the gospel, you couldn't save yourself.

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And so that's the extension of grace. But you have the capacity in and of yourself, without prevenient grace, you have the ability to hear the word of God, which is the extension of grace, and to act upon the commands of the word of God, and to bring about your own salvation through the gospel message that is proffered to you.

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You couldn't do it of yourself. But you have the capacity, apart from any external impartation of special grace to your soul.

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Your soul does not need to have anything other than a gospel presentation made to it.

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It doesn't have to be raised from the dead. It doesn't have to be freed from the slavery of sin. But John 8, 47 says, the reason you do not hear the words of God that Jesus is delivering, the

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Son of God is standing in front of these men. Standing in front of these men.

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Why do you not hear the words of God? And he doesn't say, because you don't choose to.

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It doesn't say any of that. It says, because you are not of God. You don't belong to Him.

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You are not of God. Ha -ti -ek -tu -the -yu -uk -este.

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You are not of God. So who are the ones who hear the word of God? Those who are of God.

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Who are they? They're sheep. Who chooses the sheep? The shepherd. Election, plain and clear.

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Brought out in John 8. Brought out in John 10. Brought out in John 17. It had already been in John chapter 6.

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Constant theme all the way through. If you'll allow the text to speak as a whole. But ask someone, why is it that someone does not accept the gospel message?

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And if they say it's because of, and then they start down the line. Their upbringing.

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Their background. Linguistic issues. All these things could explain why someone might not understand the message.

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Someone might continuously think that the message is something other than what it is.

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We have to deal with things like that. But the reason that they do not accept it when it is presented to them by the best preacher that has ever lived.

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Why is it? Because they're not of God. Those who are of God hear the words of God.

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The reason you do not hear is, you're not of God. You're not of the sheep. That's the message.

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That's the issue. So what that means is, is that when

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Paul said what he said in Romans chapter 8. When Paul draws the contrast between flesh and spirit.

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He's not saying something different than what Jesus said. Belonging to God. Being his sheep.

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Same thing as in Christ. In the spirit. Spiritually alive. Over against outside of Christ.

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In the flesh. Spiritually dead. Sheep, non -sheep. Belonging to God, not belonging to the

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Father. It's all the same categories. God by the Father, not God by the Father. Where is the middle categories in any of this?

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Why is it that the Apostle and the Lord, and then the Apostle John, in recording these words, light, darkness, hear, can't hear.

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It's always the same contrast. It's consistent across Scripture. There are no choice meats.

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As long as you think there's choice meats, you will never understand. Ever. Some of you are going, what is this choice meat stuff?

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You got to go back, look up latent flowers of choice meats. But Romans chapter eight, is

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Paul saying something different here? For those who are according to the flesh, set their minds on the things of the flesh.

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If that's where your origin and source of life is. Those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh.

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But those who are according to the spirit, the things of the spirit. Is that not the same contrast? Is that not the contrast between being in Christ and outside of Christ?

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Flesh, not flesh, live, dead. Ephesians two, Romans eight. Consistency, all the way across.

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For the mindset on the flesh is death. But the mindset on the spirit is life and peace. Because the mindset on the flesh is hostile toward God.

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The mindset on the flesh is ekthra aisteon, hostility, warfare.

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That's, that's what the mindset on the flesh is. For it does not subject itself to law of God.

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Now up to this point, maybe the provisionist, the human autonomist, would say, well, you can choose to put your mind on the things of the flesh.

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And that will lead inevitably to death. And when it's set on the flesh, it's hostile toward God.

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And when your mindset on the flesh, it's not subject to the law of God. But they can't say the last phrase of verse seven.

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They can't say it. It's only three words.

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Udegar dunetai. It is not even able to do so.

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That it is, because they can say, for it does not subject itself to the law of God freely, autonomously.

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That's not what it says. It's not even able to submit itself to the law of God. What is the whole point of provisionism?

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Mankind in and of himself, outside of the special expression of divine grace, maintains the capacity in and of himself of autonomous free will, so as to choose to end his own slavery.

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Choose to end his own death. Choose to walk into the light. Or in this case, choose to submit to the law of God, which says to repent and believe.

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Paul says it's not able to do that. It is not able to do that.

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And those who are in the flesh, the ones existing in that realm.

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Again, it's contrast. Flesh, spirit, flesh. How do you get in the realm of spirit? By the work of the spirit of God.

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You have to be born again. You have to be raised from spiritual death spiritually. And those who are in the flesh, they are not able to please

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God. Is it pleasing to God to believe the gospel? Yes.

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So what has to happen is it's a spiritual act.

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Those in the flesh cannot please God. This is the teaching of scripture.

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It is compelling. It is clear. And it is extremely offensive to the natural man.

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Extremely offensive to the natural man. Let's see if I can share this this time.

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Maybe it's just possible that I'm not able to share. Let's see. Shut down.

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This is not good because, am

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I able to share that? No. For some reason,

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Zoom is not allowing me to share anything right now. So I would have to shut down, restart.

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And I bet you it would work if I did that. But it sometimes just,

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I am the host now? No, that's not going to do it.

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We're just going to have to we're just going to have to cripple along here. Sorry, folks. Zoom just sometimes gets a mind of its own and decides

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I'm just going to stop doing everything I'm supposed to be able to do. So, I will just have to read you everything

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I was going to show you today. It's just, the tech ain't working. You live by the tech, you die by the tech.

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And today we're dying by the tech, big time. So hopefully we'll still be able to hear some of this. And then the other stuff

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I'll just have to read for you instead of being able to show it to you. It shouldn't change much. And for people who listen, they're all going to be like, who cares?

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Stop talking about it. Get back to what you're doing. And that's what we're trying to maintain with the doctrine of free will and human responsibility is that yes, we're fallen, but being fallen doesn't mean therefore you can't reply positively to God's own appeals to be reconciled from that fall.

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So there it is. We just saw Romans 8 contradict that. We saw John Chapter 8 contradict that.

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We see Ephesians Chapter 2 contradict that. It is a fundamental anthropological error on the part of the provisionists.

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And it is directly contradictory to Scripture. I know. But they have answers.

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And the, I would invite you to consider the consistency of those answers over against, think about the number of passages that we have just brought up and the consistency they demonstrate with one another.

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The consistency of in the Gospel of John, being able to see, not being able to see, being able to hear, not being able to hear, cannot come to me unless the

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Father who sent me draws him. I will raise him up on the last day. Sovereignty of God in that situation. You have dead in sin, alive to God, in the flesh, in the spirit.

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You have this all, all the way through. It is consistent across New Testament books.

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It's not just, well, there is a special situation in Ephesus. It almost reminds me, honestly.

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Remember, remember one of the craziest lines I ever got in a debate was when I debated

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Hamza Abdel -Malik in 1999. And I pointed out what

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Philippians chapter 2 says. And his only response was Paul was just messing with them, their

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Philippians. Well, that's what you do when you say, well, you know, it was a special situation like in John 6.

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That was just a special group of Jews. And then there was a special situation here. And you have to try to break all of these things up rather than seeing the consistency of all these categories across the

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New Testament teaching. So, very, very clear, very, very compelling. These multi -hour attempts on Leighton Flowers' part, in my opinion, just demonstrate how, well, first of all,

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I think it has been, I think it has been his assigned task for years now by certain people in the

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Southern Baptist Convention to provide the anti -Calvinist response.

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I feel for the man. I really do. I mean, what a life.

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That's all he does. I mean, there will be a two, three -hour response to this one. It will be the same thing over and over again.

36:47

I would not want to get up every day and just do the same thing.

36:54

At least we get to talk about all sorts of other really cool topics, but some people just have to be anti -Calvinists 24 -7.

37:05

And, you know, I am opposed to all sorts of, I'm opposed to provisionalism.

37:12

I am opposed to plagianism. I am opposed to Unitarianism. I am opposed to those who deny the inspiration, authority, the word of God.

37:21

But I deal with all sorts of different topics. And yeah, there are frequently connections between them.

37:28

That's obviously helpful. But, wow, I could not, I could not have as my task just being, you watch these guys and whenever they say anything about this, you just, you just, just go at it.

37:46

That would be, that would be rather sad. Okay. A tweet was posted on August 4th, so two days ago.

37:59

We're changing subjects, by the way. Layton, you can stop now. You're, you're good. You don't have to worry about this part.

38:05

I don't think you deal with this part. You should be dealing with this part, but, yeah, I don't think that's what you do.

38:13

August 4th. It, it has been really sad over the past number of years to see the trajectory.

38:26

There, there was once a time only 10 years ago when there was such a wonderful unity amongst

38:36

Reformed believers. The gospel gave us our unity. We rejoiced in discussions about the hypostatic union.

38:48

We rejoiced in discussing our high view of Scripture.

38:57

So many things like this, and it didn't matter what color we were. there was no,

39:06

I, I remember, I forget where this was. I remember the church I was at, but a whole group of young Black men and their wives had traveled quite a distance just to be with us, and we just had such wonderful fellowship, and it was a fellowship in the gospel.

39:25

It was a fellowship in it was beautiful, and so much that has been lost.

39:33

There used to be RON, the Reformed African American Network, which became the witness,

39:42

DeMar Tisby, and to watch the radicalization of DeMar Tisby over time, to watch how quickly this has happened, relatively speaking, is a sad thing to observe.

39:56

It truly is. We have attempted to warn that the woke church is a broke church.

40:05

It's an imbalanced church, because it, once you embrace the idea of white spaces and Black spaces, remember when

40:15

I put up a meme that said, at the table, that's a Christ space.

40:21

There is no white space there. There is no Black space there. It's a Christ space, and our ethnicity brings nothing into that space.

40:32

And oh, I mean, look at Eric Mason's book. He even makes reference to it.

40:38

There are people calling for an ecumenical council, if you can believe that, to have me proclaim to Heritage.

40:48

We're saying, we have to have our space. Well, DeMar Tisby posted on August 4th, 1130 a .m.,

41:00

given the depth of theological miseducation when it comes to race in white churches, a brief sermon series on race before you get back to your regularly scheduled programming, regularly scheduled programming is a quote, isn't going to cut it.

41:18

We need to consistently address racial justice for months and years at a time.

41:29

Months and years at a time. Do you think

41:36

DeMar Tisby thinks that, well, first of all, he operates in the categories of white and black churches. He has a racialist view of church.

41:44

He has no problem with there being black churches, white churches. Well, he has no problem with there being a black church.

41:50

There should be a black church. Has to be a black church. But white churches are by nature guilty of being white churches.

41:57

Even if that church doesn't view itself as a white church, that doesn't matter. And so many people now bought into that idea.

42:05

We thought that the spirit of God was the one who formed the church. We thought the spirit of God is the one.

42:10

You preach the gospel. He brings his people to the gospel. He forms the local body as he sees fit.

42:17

And we were wrong all along. Or so we're being told. That's not how it's done.

42:23

You have to have quotas. You have to go after a certain percentage. It's not the spirit that builds the local church.

42:30

Unless it's the black church, and then it's the spirit that does that. But I really wonder how he interacts with Asian churches.

42:42

Because there are a lot of Chinese Baptist churches. There are a lot of Asian churches. There really are.

42:48

And there are some Hispanic churches too. But I honestly, I suppose there might be down south someplace, but I don't know of white churches.

42:59

I've never been in a white church. I've never been in a church where people said, we specifically only allow white people or we have a preference for white people or we're in a multi, like I live in a neighborhood that is not majority anything.

43:18

It's Hispanic. It's Asian. It's black. It's white. It's everything. That's the way Phoenix is in many places.

43:24

And if there was a church plopped down in the middle of this area, and you tried to make it representative that would be a really diverse church.

43:40

But you see, when people plant churches, they just, you cast the seed out, you throw the word out and you trust the spirit of the

43:49

Lord. At least that's how we thought it was done. But now we have black churches and white churches.

43:54

And so given the depth of theological miseducation when it comes to race and white churches. So Jamar Tisby has come to us with the truth about race.

44:07

Well, the truth about race is it's a social construct and there's only one race. That's the truth. He might want to change that.

44:15

That's the actual truth. But from his perspective, there is theological miseducation.

44:21

So he's got the right theological education. And in white churches, whatever that means, what is a white church?

44:33

If blacks are 13 % of the population, should they be 51 % of a church?

44:42

None of this works in any functional fashion. It's rhetoric.

44:49

But white churches have been miseducated, theologically miseducated.

44:58

And so it's not enough. So you woke white guys that want to do a sermon series on race.

45:08

You want to read Jamar Tisby's book and you want to read the book on white fragility that Ed Stetzer is helping to get distributed amongst churches and discuss right now, even though it is one of the most inane, inept, absurd books that has ever been pawned upon the

45:25

American populace. It is the Kafka trap. If you respond in any way to what

45:34

I'm saying to you, you're guilty, argumentation. I mean, any debate professor worth his salt would fail to Angelo on the first day and have her expelled from school.

45:50

But Ed Stetzer, former pastor of Moody Church, Wheaton College guy.

45:58

Yeah, great, wonderful. Tells you everything you need to know. You read

46:04

Divided by Race. You read one of these books and all of a sudden you feel all woke and I've never thought of these things before and so I'm going to get our church woke.

46:15

Well, that ain't enough. Not according to Jamar Tisby. You've got to understand there is no end game, folks.

46:22

Go back to January of 2019 and listen to the

46:31

G3 pre -conference we did. What did I say during the Q &A? What did I say during my sermon? There is no end game.

46:37

There is no redemption. You will constantly be in a state of penance because there is no redemption.

46:44

There is no way of achieving unity because the one way of achieving unity is not allowed by the whole church.

46:53

They already refuse to recognize the mechanism by which God creates unity, by which

46:58

God created unity in the early church. That's, there's your problem. There's your issue. So you may want, you may think you are just being so wonderfully woke to do a sermon series and I'm hearing this happening all the time.

47:16

I hear people all the time contacting me going, my pastor just, I've never heard him talking about this stuff before and all of a sudden he's just all about this and this,

47:27

I don't, what am I going to do and what does this mean about the future? And this is, so this is happening everywhere but as Jamar Tisby says, it ain't enough.

47:37

You want to do your sermon series? A brief sermon series on race before you get back to your regularly scheduled program.

47:44

What would that be? Verse by verse exposition of the scriptures maybe? You know, having a

47:52

New Testament sermon in the morning? Old Testament sermon in the evening maybe?

47:59

I don't know, a theological series on the Trinity Man, I wish that would be as regular as I'd like it to be but no, none of these things are, isn't going to cut it, that's not enough.

48:12

That's not enough, no, no, no. What you need is to become woke 24 -7.

48:20

This is penance, folks. We need to consistently address racial justice.

48:27

It's not biblical justice, racial justice. James Cone racial justice, you know it's behind that.

48:35

You know Jamar Tisby's read it and you know he's friendly to it. Oh, he may want to tweak something here.

48:41

I wouldn't put it that way, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Racial justice here is not being defined by anything that anyone in any of Paul's churches would have recognized.

48:51

They wouldn't understand what you're talking about. You wouldn't understand what you're talking about. We need to consistently address racial justice for months and years at a time.

49:04

Atonement, resurrection, no, come on. That's so secondary in white churches because white churches are that bad.

49:13

They are so far behind the curve that they need years of being scolded for being white but you'll notice there's still no end game.

49:26

What's the end game? Okay, let's say for two years you drive your church in the ground because that's exactly what's going to happen.

49:35

There'll be nobody left. But you drive your church in the ground by no longer following the spirit given balance of scripture but you lead them through white fragility and divided by faith and woke church and all of Jamar Tisby's books too.

49:58

You nail them to the ground for years. Then what?

50:06

Then what? There's no forgiveness. There's no redemption. You have to keep going.

50:16

There is no end game. The woke church is a broke church because it never can provide unity.

50:27

It's not really a church, that's the problem. I don't know what happened,

50:34

Jamar. There should have been a time in his life when he would have recognized all that.

50:41

Same thing with Anthony Bradley. Dr. Anthony Bradley. That's Dr. Jamar Tisby too. Dr. Anthony Bradley tweeted the day before.

50:53

I really wish more Asian and Latinx. I was so thankful that a number of Hispanic Christians wrote back and said what is this

51:05

Latinx garbage? We didn't come up with this. This is being forced on us by other people and we are offended.

51:11

Good. Keep pushing back on it. This woke abuse of the language just needs to be rebuked for what it is.

51:19

I really wish more Asian and Latin friends would listen to Eric Mason, author of Woke Church.

51:27

So many blacks have recently decided, recently decided, I would say since, well, started as early as 2008, 2010, really started big time in 2014.

51:45

So many blacks have recently decided not to waste their lives in white spaces.

51:53

Can you imagine if a white person said this in reverse? They don't care.

52:00

They don't care. They can't be racist. And they don't care to listen to what their words say. They don't care.

52:07

It doesn't matter to them. There's no such thing as black supremacy. There's only white supremacy.

52:14

So they can say whatever they want. They can, you can, you, this, here is a Christian who can look at white

52:20

Christians and talk about wasting his life in white spaces and doesn't even recognize how deeply offensive and racist that is.

52:29

Doesn't even recognize it. He would have in 2008. Doesn't anymore. What's happened?

52:35

What's happened to him, to Beatty, all these guys? It was a societal thing.

52:41

It wasn't inside the church. I've recently decided not to waste their lives in white spaces trying to convince white folks, because we're all the same.

52:51

White folks are all the same, right? The racistness of that is just astonishing.

52:59

They've really bought the narrative that they can't be racist. Trying to convince white folks to care about black thriving.

53:15

Black thriving. What's black thriving?

53:22

From a Christian perspective, what is the difference between black thriving and white thriving?

53:28

Is there, is there anything in scripture that would help us to understand the difference between black thriving and white thriving?

53:38

What is thriving in the Christian life? For a person who is indwelt by the spirit of God, is there a consistent mechanism of defining the term thriving?

53:55

That's the question I would ask. Are we given biblical understanding? Yes. Growing in the grace and knowledge of the

54:03

Lord Jesus Christ, which has nothing to do with his color, or yours, or anyone else.

54:16

Waste their lives in white spaces trying to convince white folks to care about black thriving. Why do other minorities crave white acceptance?

54:29

Wokeism is designed to divide the body of Christ. It provides no foundation for you.

54:36

All you gotta do is read Jamar Tisbee. All you gotta do is listen to Anthony Bradley. And you can see these people have no desire for unity any longer at all.

54:47

At all. And they are angry at anyone who would say, your color doesn't matter.

54:54

All that matters is your sin. And the sin bearer, the righteousness that you receive from him, and the unity that comes about as a result of that.

55:04

That's terrible. Where did that come from? It didn't come from scripture. It didn't come from scripture.

55:14

And this has all happened in a relatively short period of time. Amazingly short period of time.

55:22

But I would be remiss. I think this was, yeah, this was today.

55:32

We're on top of it today. We're not on top of our tech today by any stretch of the imagination.

55:39

But we are, we're on top of this one. And so I'm going to read you a little bit from the ever popular

55:52

Beth Moore. Yes, Beth Moore, who blocked me on Twitter years ago.

56:00

I'm not sure that I ever even said anything to her, but I'm amongst many, many people who have been blocked by Beth Moore.

56:09

So you have to do an extra step to get to the tweet. It's no big deal.

56:16

But on August 6th, 519 a .m. this morning,

56:21

I'm not sure what time zone she's in. I was running at 519 this morning.

56:27

I've got to tell you, we've had the hottest summer ever so far here in Phoenix.

56:34

July was the hottest month ever. And this time it's real. We're not faking it.

56:41

Average temperature, 99 degrees, high -low. I think I mentioned that last time. We're still reeling from that.

56:47

But this morning, some of you are going to, just to give you an idea of how hot it gets, this morning, the dew point was super low.

56:55

It's dry. The monsoon has been a complete bust. And it dropped,

57:02

I think, to almost down to 78 degrees. For us, that's like, yes, thank you.

57:10

So I got a seven -mile run in this morning. When she was complaining, I wasn't watching.

57:16

But I got it later on. So here's what she says. If you're going to let a little name -calling keep you from standing up for what you believe according to the word of God, it's gospel truth.

57:28

So gospel truth here, folks. You ain't ready. I know a song. You ain't ready.

57:34

White supremacy has held tight in much of the church for so long because the racists outlasted the anti -racists.

57:46

Outlast them. Them is it all counts. Oh. So it has been interesting to watch

57:56

Mrs. Moore's journey into mega -woke status.

58:03

But she is definitely there. She has definitely reached the mega -woke status level now.

58:12

And so we have this new term, white supremacy.

58:19

What does it mean? Don't ask them. They don't have a clue. They can't identify it.

58:26

Not in any rational way. Not in any way where you could actually point to it. And here it is. It's, oh, no.

58:32

It's white supremacy. It produces these results, you see.

58:40

And no, it's not actually the expression of the intentional, purposeful attitudes of the human heart.

58:48

It's systemic. And it is this nebulous, you're guilty of it.

58:56

We don't have to provide proof of it. And if you say you're not guilty of it, you're saying you're not guilty of it, proves you're guilty.

59:03

It's very similar to the white fragility absurdity. So white supremacy is held tight in much of the church.

59:12

We weren't. The spirit of God wasn't creating that unity we had only 10 years ago.

59:19

No, no, no, no, no, no. Preaching, when R .C.

59:24

Sproul would preach those sermons, and all those white men and black men and Hispanic men and Asian men and every other kind of man are in those meetings, and they're all just glorying in the sovereignty of God.

59:45

That was all white supremacy. It wasn't real. That's absurd.

59:54

So sad to see these people trading in that glorious type of stuff for what?

01:00:03

To fit in with a culture. A culture that's running toward transgenderism and abortion and Marxism, all to its own destruction.

01:00:14

So somehow white supremacy is held tight in much of the church for so long because the racist outlasted the anti -racist.

01:00:21

Now, realize that all these words had meanings once. So those of us who can still continue to honor language, have a

01:00:28

Christian worldview, we keep using these words as if they have meaning. You need to understand that once you become woke, the meaning doesn't mean anything anymore.

01:00:38

So they think that they are anti -racists, and that if you oppose them, that makes you a racist.

01:00:46

So they've redefined the word into something that has no meaning. Because it doesn't matter what your attitudes are.

01:00:53

It doesn't matter what your actions are. It's all identity politics.

01:00:58

It's group politics. You're in this group or you're in the other group. You're either a racist or an anti -racist. So if you're not involved with us and opposing racism, you're a racist.

01:01:07

If you disagree with their definition of racism, you're a racist. If you don't buy the

01:01:12

Marxist identity, you're a racist. So they've absolutely emptied the word of any meaning, but they keep the moral shame associated with it that it used to have when it had a meaning.

01:01:27

They will overrun this. It's already happening right now. There's already a lot of people that are realizing you can only abuse that term for so long before it becomes absolutely empty.

01:01:39

And it already has become absolutely empty. We continue. They're going to call you a

01:01:44

Marxist, mainly because you start using identity politics and fundamental concepts of Marxism, and you equate equity and equality, which are not the same things.

01:01:57

This is more. A liberal, their worst possible derision. Now, the worst possible is the leftist.

01:02:05

Liberalism is now a nice term because it allows for freedom. You folks don't. And a leftist.

01:02:10

There you go. Same thing. They're going to make fun of your wokeness. And they're going to say you've departed all faithfulness to the scriptures.

01:02:19

Yeah. When you when what we have being presented to us is the kind of woke of Jesus.

01:02:28

That is currently being presented. When you know, I had a good conversation.

01:02:34

The guy is a nice conversation with a guy on Twitter. He he said, you're just totally you've lost your balance in what you said about Tim Keller.

01:02:41

And so I said, OK, let's talk about Philippians chapter two. So we started walking through Philippians chapter two. And I kept pointing out to women.

01:02:48

What did you just say? You're assuming these categories here. Where does where's

01:02:53

Paul saying that? Remember, his emphasis is this. This is his purpose in the Karmic Christi. This is a sermon illustration.

01:02:59

He's talking about humility of mind. This is the key to interpreting. I've been dealing with Karmic Christi for for decades, especially in light of those who attempt to twist its meaning into something else.

01:03:09

So I'm pretty sensitive to when people start importing stuff and Tim Keller import all sorts of stuff.

01:03:15

It's woke stuff. And. A lot of folks liked it when 20 years ago,

01:03:24

I'm pointing out how the Jehovah's Witnesses and the Unitarians are wrong to miss that and to bring stuff into the text.

01:03:33

Now they're now now those woke folks are doing it. And I have to do the same thing with them. And they're not quite as happy about that now.

01:03:42

That particular fellow wasn't. I was talking about that point, but I did say to him,

01:03:48

I'm sensing that you've already embraced some of this stuff. We had a good conversation. It ended well, and I appreciated that.

01:03:55

Most Twitter conversations. Don't go that well. But that one. They're going to make fun of your wokeness and they're going to say you've departed all faithfulness to the scriptures.

01:04:06

If you teach or preach, this is Beth Moore speaking. They'll say you're a false teacher or a false prophet.

01:04:12

And they do this because it is effective. Not because they're convinced it's true, but it is effective.

01:04:18

There will be people who believe them. Thankfully. And this is why it has worked for generations.

01:04:25

Oh, yeah. For generations. We've been talking about it, haven't we? I remember generations now we've been talking about this.

01:04:31

Well, not really. We haven't been talking about it for generations. Not in this way.

01:04:38

This is not a part of what the church conversation was. For a long time. Because it's not a biblical world.

01:04:44

It's not derived from scripture. It's coming from another source. The names and the name calling may be different, but the fear it triggers is the same.

01:04:52

No servant of God wants to be seen as unfaithful. So we tone down. Can't say this strongly enough.

01:04:59

Stay in your Bibles. I agree. Yeah, stay in your Bibles. But not with the lens she's going to try to provide you.

01:05:08

Read the Old Testament prophets and watch for verses noting

01:05:14

God's displeasure over injustice. Please do. But don't just look for verses.

01:05:21

Look for the entire themes of books first. Mrs. Moore knows this. She used to teach this.

01:05:28

Look for the entire themes first. What's the injustice about? What's the origin and source of it?

01:05:36

It won't be coming from Marxism. And it's not going to be about oppressor classes. And it's not going to be about bourgeoisie or anything else.

01:05:44

It will be about God's law. It will be about man as the image of God. The prophets do specifically say that God will bring justice and judgment against nations outside of Israel for abusing the widow and the orphan.

01:06:05

Because that's part of God's law that he's written on the heart. You can see he's written that law on the heart of the rich and the poor.

01:06:13

And that same Old Testament says God makes them rich and God makes them poor. And it's God's sovereignty that determines it.

01:06:19

Not equity. Not equality. Not the way it's being used today. Not in the Marxist sense.

01:06:25

Oh, no. You have to read that in. Read the

01:06:32

Old Testament prophets and watch for verses noting God's displeasure over injustice. Note divine judgment. Yeah.

01:06:38

Note divine judgment. Start with Isaiah. Pour over the Gospels and watch what compelled and repelled

01:06:45

Jesus. Please do. Jesus wasn't woke. Jesus wasn't joining in rioters in the streets of Jerusalem.

01:06:57

That wasn't Jesus. Read Acts of Revelation. Read, read, read. Yes, please do.

01:07:04

And keep your woke glasses off. Stop being intimidated.

01:07:10

Don't enter in the name -calling war. Hold on to your heart as you stand firm. Jesus said a tree is known by its fruit.

01:07:16

Oh, that's for sure. What is this wokeism resulting in? Massive division. Listen to Jamar Tisby.

01:07:24

We need to spend years preaching about one thing only in white churches. What do you need to be preaching about in black churches?

01:07:34

Galatians 5, 22 -23 lists the food that Jesus prioritizes. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self -control.

01:07:42

Yes, it does. Cannot say it strongly enough. Stay in your Bibles. Read the Old Testament. I already saw that one. The last one.

01:07:48

All that's true. And then it's finished with this. The white supremacist way.

01:07:55

We had a definition of that. No. Has produced terrible fruit. What specifically?

01:08:04

What specifically? For those people you're calling white supremacists. I'd assume

01:08:09

I'd be one of them if you blocked me years ago. So what specifically is the terrible fruit? Show me what it is.

01:08:19

Is it a perversion of the gospel? What is it? Well, you're not with us in being on the left of the political spectrum.

01:08:29

I didn't see that in Galatians 5 either. Endure and regard the ones who will believe you're on the slippery slope.

01:08:36

Just keep serving Jesus faithfully. They're looking for you to go off the deep end in a few years, so don't.

01:08:42

Say faithful Jesus, time will tell. Oh yes, time will tell. She's right about that.

01:08:49

Unfortunately, she hasn't been watching this disaster happening long enough to see what's going to happen. Because remember, this is the same woman.

01:08:57

And I have her book someplace else. This is the same woman who had an accurate description of the sin of homosexuality in one of her books.

01:09:07

And then she removed it in the Kindle version without so much as a note. Because slippery slope.

01:09:17

And then she says, well, I came to understand that I had not spoken with clarity and I hurt people.

01:09:25

Oh, so what's next after homosexuality?

01:09:31

Transgenderism? Abortion? Polyamory? How steep is that slope,

01:09:39

Mrs. Moore? You were right in what you said about homosexuality. Why did you remove it?

01:09:48

There does seem to be a slope there, doesn't it? Yeah, there is a slope. There is a slope. So here's the question for all of us.

01:09:58

As this perspective becomes more and more prevalent, it's going to become more and more costly to stand on the ground that you thought 20 years ago could never be questioned.

01:10:18

In the year 2000, if you believed in the inspiration of Scripture, you believed it is the inerrant revelation of God, it's consistent from Genesis to Revelation, not in some simplistic fashion, but in a deep, beautiful fashion that demonstrates its spiritual origination, even through the diversity of all the people who speak and the languages and the metaphors they use and all the rest of that stuff.

01:10:44

You believe you had a highest view of Scripture, Trinitarian, deep theology of soteriology,

01:10:54

God's way of glorifying himself and the salvation of a particular people in Christ Jesus, the resurrection of Jesus Christ, the existence of the supernatural.

01:11:05

And as a result, you could not conceive of how there could ever be a day, there could ever be a day when people would apologize for the gospel's definition of sin, apologize for Paul's statements about homosexuality or about the role of women in the church, apologize for the

01:11:37

Bible's teaching that God will punish sin, that there is judgment to come.

01:11:48

You couldn't have imagined that only 20 years later, people that you had benefited from in your life at that point would all of a sudden be emphasizing things that they had never emphasized in their ministries before, ever.

01:12:04

Couldn't have imagined it. But now here we are. So each one of us has to have a firm foundation, a firm foundation to stand upon.

01:12:23

You cannot look to me. You cannot look to anybody else, pastors or anyone else.

01:12:31

God has put people in the body to encourage and to teach. That's all wonderful.

01:12:36

But you as an individual believer, you as the head of a household, you as the husband and the husband and wife, the father and the father and the children, you have to have a foundation that will stand firm even when the people that you've been blessed and learned from do not stay firm.

01:13:00

You can look at me today and go, ah, he'd never collapse. You don't know. Don't look.

01:13:09

Your foundation has to be firm in and of itself. If it is dependent upon others, then it needs to be strengthened.

01:13:19

It needs to be strengthened. A couple of years ago, I started saying, you're going to see a tsunami of apostasy.

01:13:27

Are we not seeing it? Is it not all around us? I'm not just talking about like the liberal

01:13:37

Baptist pastor dude up in, was it Maine or Massachusetts, one of the

01:13:43

New England places up there, who came out as transgender to his church.

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Now he says he's a woman. He's not. Never will be. That's just a biological, mental and physical and spiritual fact.

01:14:03

That will get you bounced off of almost any social media today. Maybe only because it's toward the end of my video might we survive, but that could get, that would be enough today.

01:14:13

We all know that. We all know that even making that statement, you're done. I challenge anyone to meaningfully preach

01:14:25

Matthew chapter 19 in any, any fashion whatsoever that is honoring to Jesus words based upon the original language, the original context, the context of first century

01:14:38

Judaism, the whole nine yards. You can't preach Matthew chapter 19 about saying God created man and woman. And it was good.

01:14:46

You cannot embrace transgenderism as a person. You embrace it. You say it's good.

01:14:51

You say, we just didn't know before the church needed to grow up, blah, blah, blah, blah. You do not believe what

01:14:57

Jesus taught. Stop pretending, stop pretending. We're all going to have to make these decisions and they are going to cost.

01:15:12

There's some sitting in this audience right now, the job you have right now, you will not be able to keep it within a matter of weeks or months, especially if a certain thing happens in November, you won't be able to keep it.

01:15:28

We obviously without making ministries have been talking about what happens when we can't do

01:15:35

YouTube anymore. What happens when you cannot communicate via Facebook? How do we keep in contact?

01:15:43

Obviously people will have to make the effort to find us.

01:15:55

And I can see that happening for a while. But eventually, if God gives us over to a totalitarian government, they will control the horizontal and the vertical.

01:16:12

They will control everything. And they will silence anyone who will not submit. And there will be no place to hide.

01:16:21

You will have to offer your pinch of incense upon the altar. You will have to say,

01:16:29

Kaiser Quiddios, Caesar is Lord. And unlike the early church where you could find ways around that, when you've got

01:16:42

Google and satellites and everything else, it could be a really, really difficult time.

01:16:53

Not going to stop Jesus from reigning over his church, but mankind can go through an incredibly difficult time.

01:17:03

Where is your foundation going to be? And how much, honestly, how much do you really want to be one of those who will stand for him?

01:17:15

Because that's going to be the real question. How much do you love your things?

01:17:23

Your house, your home, your fame, your health, your stuff, your cars, your

01:17:29

RVs, your jet skis, your planes, whatever. The more we love those things, the less likely we're going to stand for them.

01:17:42

The less likely we're going to stand for them. We can't love the things of the world. We love the things of the world, love the

01:17:48

Father's audience. And that's the only power the world has over us, is our love of the things of the world.

01:17:56

I keep telling myself the same thing because I know I need to do it. I know it's true.

01:18:03

Ah, the allure. We all know it, don't we? We do, we do.

01:18:10

So anyway, sorry about all the techie problems on both ends today. I should have reset this unit, should have reset it, would have had to have brought all that stuff back up again, but it might have worked.

01:18:26

So I apologize for that. But we read all of it. We still got to everything. And I think the people who listen on Sermon Audio were probably like, who cares?

01:18:36

This is how we do this all the time, and it probably worked better for them. So maybe there was someone on Sermon Audio that needed some extra clarity, and we provided it via our technical faux pas today.

01:18:49

But anyways, we appreciate your tuning in. We hope to be an encouragement, if sometimes a challenge as well.

01:18:58

But an encouragement that you would grow in the grace and knowledge of the Lord and of Jesus Christ. That's why we're here.

01:19:04

That's why Alpha Omega Ministries exists. We do need your support, as all ministries do at this point in time.

01:19:11

And it's a tough time. It's going to continue being that. Just to let you know that we want to be here to continue to do these types of things.