December 9, 2020 Show with Roger Salter on “The Wonder of the Incarnation”

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Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, Lake City, Florida, and the rest of humanity living on the planet earth who are listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com.

This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Wednesday on this ninth day of December 2020 and I'm always thrilled to have back as a returning guest a very dear friend and someone whom

I absolutely love to interview. His name is Roger Salter. He is rector of St.

Matthew's Anglican Church in Birmingham, Alabama, and today we are addressing a very appropriate and timely theme for this time of year especially, the wonder of the incarnation and it's my honor and privilege to welcome you to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Roger Salter.

It's good to reconnect with you Chris, especially on such a wonderful theme that absolutely no one can do justice to, it's extraordinary, but it's a timely period of, it's a timely period of time just to think about the wonder of the incarnation.

Well, before we go into that theme, once again, explain or describe to our listeners

St. Matthew's Anglican Church in Birmingham, Alabama, especially in light of the fact that the first thought that many have come to their minds that are not

Anglican themselves is, wow, you're having an

Anglican guest on your show, is he very Roman Catholic or is he very liberal, does he even believe the scriptures, and you could go on and on and on with the first thoughts that folks have come to mind because they're thinking typically of either of the extreme wings, the left and right,

I don't know if necessarily Anglo -Catholicism would be right, but they are polar opposites from liberalism anyway, but you have the liberals who are thorough -going apostates and who deny the pillars of the faith and then you also have

Anglo -Catholics, many of whom are involved in superstition, idolatry, and the false gospel, just like their

Roman Catholic cousins, so you have those extremes that seem to be the most prevalent things that most people think of when they hear

Anglican unless they are Anglican, well, they might even think those things if they are

Anglican if they belong to either of those two polar opposite wings of Anglicanism, but if you could tell us about St.

Matthew's Anglican Church in Birmingham, Alabama, to distinguish yourself from those groups. I'll try,

Chris. I mean, Anglicanism is a very diverse movement. It shouldn't be that because our basis is clear.

Scripture, the 39 Articles, the Liturgy of Cranmer as the template or basis for our worship, ensuring that whatever kind of service we use, it should be thoroughly scriptural and that when we approach

God, we describe him in terms of scripture, his own self -description and not with any human invention or notions that originate from our own speculation.

What we try to do at St. Matthew's, and we're a small group, is to adhere to scripture as faithfully as possible, to adhere to scripture according to the understanding that is, when

I say prescribed, I don't mean in any rigid sense, but we endeavor to hold to what scripture says about certain topics that are laid down before us in the 39

Articles, and we in particular use a contemporary form of the book, 1662,

Book of Common Prayer, so that we use contemporary language for the traditional liturgy.

So we are very much identified as a reformed

Anglican Church. We adhere to the ancient creeds and we adhere to the doctrines that were restored to the

Church or presented to the Church with greater clarity at the time of the

Reformation. So we honor very much Anglicanism as it was constituted in the 16th century, which doesn't mean that we cannot develop it, you know, in accordance with those roots, but I believe we should never ever counter or disagree with that basis, but because so many

Anglicans over the years have disagreed with our constitutional documents, that's why we have that mixture that you've outlined, the liberals, the more

Catholic wing, and so on. You get a different definition of Anglicanism depending on whom you're speaking to.

Yes, I've seen that as disagreements interrupt on the

Internet, in particular on even traditionalist Anglican websites.

I saw an argument, although it never got nasty that I recall, but I saw an argument rise up not long ago between Reformed 39 articles,

Anglicans and Anglo -Catholics, over whether or not it is appropriate to pray to saints, and the

Anglo -Catholics involved in the conversation were adamantly defending that practice, whereas the 39 articles men were denouncing that practice as idolatrous and just plain wrong.

Yes, it's, gosh, I've got to be careful, Chris, because I feel in many ways

Anglicanism as a tradition, as a denomination, or a Christian body has been hijacked by so many different influences, and, you know,

I don't want to be ugly or in any way rude or disrespectful in terms of other people who think of themselves quite sincerely as Anglicans, but it bothers me that what is a very clear basis for our faith and our outreach, our worship, and our belief, is just regarded as an historical, you know, museum piece, and that grieves me.

I have a lot of Anglo -Catholic friends, I've worked with them in ecumenical situations,

I've learned from them, but I cannot help but say there is only one stream of genuine

Anglicanism, and that is the Protestant Reformed variety. Praise God.

Well, let me let our listeners know how they can get in touch with the

St. Matthew's Anglican Church of Birmingham, Alabama. First of all, you could go to rogersalter .com,

the name of our guest, Roger Salter, and Salter is spelt S -A -L -T -E -R, and also another website you can go to is stmanglican .weebly

.com, that's S -T -M for St. Matthew's, anglican .weebly,

W -E -E -B as in boy, L -Y, dot com. So hopefully we'll be remembering to repeat that information later on in the program, and I highly recommend that you pay a visit to this fine church, whether you're

Anglican or not. I have a very strong kindred spirit with Roger, and I believe the only thing that I would likely disagree with him over is infant baptism and perhaps some realm of ecclesiology, church polity, or something like that, but even

Roger's congregation is independent, like my Reformed Baptist congregation, where I am a member is.

And I know that you also, you worship in the same facility as a

Reformed Baptist church. We do, Grace Covenant Baptist Church, and we get on very well.

You know, it's like Spurgeon was saying about the Westminster Catechism, there's only half a sentence he couldn't agree with, and so we don't touch on that half a sentence.

There's too much we have in common and rejoice in from Scripture itself. Amen. Well, this is a, obviously, very appropriate and timely theme that we have for the

Christmas season, the wonder of the Incarnation. Now, perhaps for the sake of our non -Christian listeners, and we do have those outside of the

Christian faith occasionally who let their presence be known in my audience, we do have

Muslims who listen, and we have those who are in aberrant groups that we would call cults.

We have those sometimes who are none of those. They are just searching for a religion that perhaps fills a void in their lives, and they are curious about Christianity and maybe listening.

If you could, although the majority of our listeners likely know this very well, this definition, please, if you could define the

Incarnation. Well, I have no great expertise at all,

Chris. You know, my head goes dizzy when I look at the first four centuries of controversy on some of these matters concerning, you know, the

Incarnation and the... I don't mean I struggle with the biblical doctrines or concepts, but with the nature of the discussions, many of which were very philosophical and speculative, all

I want to do is look at what Scripture itself says and understand the

Incarnation in terms of the Gospel. And to my mind, there are passages in Scripture that explain it fully and clearly and without any, how can

I say it, confusion or lack of clarity. They simply state and affirm the great truths of the

Christian revelation, and we as Christians are not in any way adopting some sort of superior attitude or understanding whatever we glean about the

Lord Jesus Christ as his gift to us. But we are simply, as somebody said very well when

I knew them years ago, we are simply beggars telling other people where the bread can be found, and that is

Jesus Christ, the bread of life. And so, the Incarnation to my mind is, and there are so many definitions that are so apt, but it is

God coming to us in the flesh in a mission of revelation and mercy, of compassion and saving power to restore us to himself and to put creation right and to put the human race, human nature back on the right track.

So Jesus is the perfect human, just as our first parent was, Adam. But Adam had the susceptibility to fall.

He had that freedom of agency and will to disobey God, and that is what he did.

Now we have the second Adam, Jesus Christ, who has come, and any disobedience to the will of God is utterly impossible to him because he is the

God -man, fully divine and fully human, two natures in one person, which to my mind is one of the great mysteries to ponder and to think about and to delve into that the human mind could possibly exercise itself with.

But there's a wonderful book that I'm just two -thirds of the way through, Chris, it's called

The True Image, The Origin and Destiny of Man in Christ by Philip Edgecombe Hughes, who was born in Australia, taught in South Africa, Britain, and then more laterally in America and had a church in Philadelphia.

And in his chapter on The Word Became Flesh, there's a paragraph I would like to read.

It's a little longer than I would prefer, but I don't know that I can reduce it very much without losing some of the sense of it.

Yeah, well, I think since we have such a lengthy program, you may feel free to read as much of that as you choose, and of course, unless it exceeds two hours.

It won't take that long, Chris, but I'll read it because I think it's such a vital comment on the reality and truth.

And one thing I'd like to remind you, brother, is make sure that you keep your mouth towards whatever device you're using to speak into because sometimes you get a little distant.

Okay, okay, is that clear? That's much better. Okay, here's what

Philip Hughes says on The Word Becomes Flesh. The uniqueness of the virgin birth in the history of mankind should not be a hindrance to faith.

On the contrary, it should confirm the expectation that when God intervenes in a decisive manner in the affairs of men, the event will be altogether out of the ordinary.

The incarnation as God's unique central act in human history relates back to and interprets the original unique act of creation and relates forward to and interprets the ultimate unique act of the last judgment and the fulfillment in the new heaven and the new earth of all

God's purposes in creation. Creation which had been dragged down by the fall of the first Adam was in need of a new

Adam who by his perfect harmony with the will of the creator would raise him with himself to the glorious heights of its ever intended destiny.

For this to be achieved, it was necessary for Jesus Christ, the last

Adam, to enter this world like the first Adam, innocent, God -centered, unstained by sin, and unburdened by guilt.

God could actually have created a second Adam in the same way as he created the first Adam, but the unique event was not to be repeated because it would have meant an entirely new start and the abandonment of the original creation, whereas it was precisely to redeem and restore the original creation that the incarnation of the son took place.

Disconnection and discontinuity could not have affected this. The problem then, though not for God, was how to do what was necessarily unique without sacrificing vital contact with man and the world, for vital contact was essential for the saving of creation, and one just marvels at the fact that this vital contact has taken in that event of the divine becoming human, not

God -man. Praise God, that wasn't very long at all.

And I want to give our listeners our email address if they would like to join us on the air with a question of their own on the incarnation.

It is chrisarnsen at gmail .com, C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com.

Please give us your first name at least, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence if you live outside of the

USA. And one thing we might want to get out of the way right up front is that I was raised

Roman Catholic, and I actually learned more about Catholicism after I had actually become a born -again

Christian and become a member of a Reformed Baptist church, especially since over the years

I have orchestrated quite a number of debates, primarily with Dr.

James R. White of Alpha and Omega Ministries, a brilliant Reformed Baptist apologist, and Roman Catholic opponents, and I also have involved

Dr. Tony Costa, the professor of apologetics and Islam at Toronto Baptist Seminary on at least one debate with a

Roman Catholic. But it is interesting that many people, even

Catholics, your average lay Catholic as they call them, wrongly believe that the immaculate conception is referring to the incarnation of Jesus Christ, referring to when

God became flesh. But that is not at all what the immaculate conception is referring to.

It is referring to Mary, the mother of Jesus, having been immaculately conceived in her own mother's womb, and am

I not right on that? Absolutely, absolutely, Chris, which is an unnecessary deviation.

And it's actually heretical, in my opinion. And it actually takes away from the humanity of Jesus itself, doesn't it?

It does, to my mind, and it also denies the fact that Mary herself was a sinner in need of redemption that her miraculous son would provide.

She is no exception to the fall and its effects. Yes, well, tell us why this precious, beautiful truth of the incarnation, which actually begins at his conception.

A lot of people may automatically think of the birth of Jesus being the time when he became incarnate, but he actually became incarnate at the conception of having been conceived in the womb of Mary, right?

Yes, yes indeed. I think my first reaction to this fact that scripture reveals with such clarity, and it's a very necessary reality and truth for us to receive, is that God bothers about us so much.

The Lord of the cosmos, the maker of the universe who governs every aspect of reality, visible and invisible, thinks so much in terms of mercy towards mankind that he...

I might be using some unorthodox language, Chris, because of my lack of comprehension of this marvel, but he wraps himself in our nature.

He takes on our nature in order to identify with us and to make amends for our nature and to restore us to God once again, our maker.

I am absolutely staggered at the very concept of the incarnation that God should become flesh, and that Christ has such excellency and loftiness of stature to come among us as God and yet man as well.

And it's a mystery that just fascinates the human mind.

We'll never plummet, we'll never understand it, but it's there, it's revealed, we believe it, and the more we look into scripture, the more it astounds us and gives us a higher conception of the worth and majesty of the

Lord Jesus Christ, both his loftiness as God and his lowliness as man.

It's just a stunning truth. And another thing that amazes me, you know, with Richard Dawkins, the sort of arch -atheistic evangelist of our time,

I remember him saying, when you think of the vastness of the universe, why should

God bother about our little speck, you know, in this infinite universe as we perceive it?

Why should he even bother? And that to me is the colossal impact of the gospel, that God does.

The one who holds the universe in the palm of his hand still cares for our planet and our race and brings himself to us in Jesus Christ, his son, to resolve our issues, to heal our souls, to restore us to his fellowship.

That leaves me, in terms of saying anything sensible, speechless.

It's such a colossal truth to try and wrap our minds around, but it fuels our worship, our wonder, our admiration and adoration of Christ.

So, you know, I say to somebody like Dawkins, and I'm not being daring,

I'm just saying, you know, why would he say, why should God bother? I would say, if our planet is minuscule in his arrangement of things, it proves that God's care is immense and his supervision is beyond measure and that he can care for something like an atom, as well as the universe, because it's all his and all created for his glory.

And there's a universal aspect to the incarnation and the atonement brought by Christ.

Now, why was it necessary for God to perform this miracle through the conceiving by the

Holy Spirit of Jesus Christ in the womb of Mary, so that God could become flesh, the second person of the

Trinity could become flesh? Why was that necessary? Why could not God, the

Trinity, in heaven, have saved his people from their sins without the step of the humiliation of Christ, the whole concept of him becoming flesh and having to not only suffer as all men do in unique ways on this earth, but even in the very special way and exclusive way that he suffered on the cross at Golgotha?

Why was this something that began with the incarnation?

Why was it even necessary? Well, Chris, I honestly feel in the light of these stupendous truths that Scripture presents to us, my answers are just so feeble and my comprehension so limited.

But I think in one specific way that I can think of immediately, the virgin birth and the incarnation of the

Son of God are necessary because of the effects of our fall.

Our fall is universal in the person, the representative of the human race,

Adam. And it means that we inherit from Adam the infection of sin, that inherent hatred of God, that hostility to God that is there at the very heart of human nature, that root within us that produces the rebellious heart, the irreverent attitude towards God, the desire to depart from him and separate ourselves from him and, as it were, direct our own lives by usurping his sovereignty.

I'm not putting this very well, but I feel that, first of all, God made us.

We owe him our obedience and our love and our gratitude and by virtue of his being our maker.

We are so polluted now by sin that we are incapable of in any way reconciling ourselves to God.

We don't want it. We can't perform it. And because we are sinful and so impure, we can't make it acceptable to God.

So someone has to come to represent the human race that is without fault, that is without sin, who can make amends for our rebellion against God and that immense pile of sin that we have, you know, built up between earth and heaven that the human race is accountable for.

Somebody's got to take that away, first of all. Jesus comes to take away the sins of the world, but also our disobedience makes us indebted to God.

We've denied him the worship, the affection, the submission that is his due as God and as our maker.

And so somebody with a pure heart and a harmony with God, as Philip Hughes says, has to come and bear the consequences of our rebellion, the punishment, the ills, the suffering, and to do so on our behalf as a substitute for all those who will eventually, by God's grace, come to believe.

In fact, we're going to pick up right where you left off on the precious doctrine of substitutionary atonement.

And if anybody, we have to go to our first break, and if anybody would like to join us on the air with a question of your own, again, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail dot com.

C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail dot com. And please, as always, give us your first name, at least, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence if you live outside of the

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Rector at St. Matthew's Anglican Church in Birmingham, Alabama, on the wonder of the

Incarnation, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com. chrisarnson at gmail .com.

Always give us your first name at least, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence. And we were just in the midst of you talking about substitutionary atonement when we had to go to our station break.

If you could pick up where you left off, Roger. Yes, I'll try to. Chris, I was wondering, one of the pastoral provisions that we have in the

Anglican tradition is a lectionary that suggests readings for Sundays.

And it's not obligatory, but it's simply a recommendation. And in a way, it probably causes us as ministers to cover more of the

Scripture than our own choices perhaps would achieve. It means that there are passages we have to think about that we may not have been drawn to or feel that we would not feel at home with, but we have to explore the

Word of God diligently and in detail. And I wondered as a sort of exalting our thoughts about Christ and the

Incarnation, I could read a brief series of Scriptures from the recommended readings that we have for Christmas Day.

Would that be all right? Of course. Because I think they present the fact of the

Incarnation to us in such a powerful and convicting way, provided the

Spirit is bringing them home to our hearts and minds, because Scripture is self -authenticating when

God discloses it to us and illuminates our minds. And I think, you know, these passages are so well known, and in many ways too familiar for people of a shallow interest in the

Christian faith. But John chapter 1 and the first five verses, I think, are so powerful and so convicting.

In the beginning was the Word, that is, the Son, the one we know as the second person of the

Trinity. And the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made. Without him nothing was made that has been made.

In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it.

That darkness, of course, is the sinful resistance offered to the Word of God, both by fallen angels, the demonic realm, and also fallen human beings.

That's why we need a God -man to come onto the scene to allure us back to God, somebody who gives us that sense of the empathy of God with us in our dilemma, our deserved condemnation and doom.

But God says, I'm not going to let this situation prevail. I will come and retrieve man myself in human form, in human nature, to make my appeal to those he's calling irresistible.

And so then we come to verse 14 of that same chapter, the Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.

We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

And then we have, as an alternative reading, something that matches it so precisely from Hebrews chapter one, verses one to four.

These things that we're reading in scripture are so staggering, so enticing, so overwhelming in their influence upon our minds and our belief.

Hebrews one, one to four, in the past, God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways.

But in these last days, he has spoken to us by his son, whom he appointed heir of all things and through whom he made the universe.

You know, why in contradicting Richard Dawkins, would not the one who made the universe in some sense or other by government and providence and his rule govern every aspect, every speck, every atom of that universe?

It's his. And the son of radiance of God's glory is the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word.

After he had provided purification for sins, that was the necessary clearing of our debt and our evil record before God, so that first of all in Christ, we could have a new reputation, which is his reputation, and then through the

Holy Spirit, a new nature, a new disposition, so that the way back to God, which is furnished for us by Christ, then moves on to making us compatible with this

God, so that we can fellowship with him. So he provided purifications for sins, shows that the incarnation was for the purpose of atonement.

It wasn't just, as some people suggest, an identification with man and sufficient in itself to reunite us to God.

We had to be reconciled to God. And when Jesus did that, provided the purification, he sat down at the right hand of majesty in heaven.

So he has become as much superior to the angels as the name he has inherited.

And I think this is the extraordinary thing. If I'm going on too long, please tell me, Chris. Oh no, no, not at all.

Moving on to Hebrews chapter 10, verses 5 to 10, where, and this is what is so wonderful about Christ's willingness to come as the incarnate

God, to come as the one who will suffer in our stead and win us back to God and make us commendable to God by his own righteousness, obedience, and virtue.

Therefore, when Christ came into the world, he came willingly. This was his pact with the

Father. His sacrifice and offering you did not desire, that's the human sacrifices and system, but a body he prepared for me.

He came as a sacrificial victim. With burnt offerings and sin offerings, you were not pleased.

Then I said, here I am. It is written about me in the scroll. There it is in the Old Testament prophecies.

I have come to do your will, oh God. There is Jesus saying, I've come as man. I am

God incarnate in the flesh for the purpose of being a sacrifice, an atoning sacrifice, the lamb who takes away the sin of the world on behalf of sinful folk who simply cannot redeem themselves or even care about that fact.

And when we realize that Christ came in human nature and a human body, he came in order to restore us to God.

And that is brought out by Peter in his first letter, chapter 2, verse 24, where he speaks of Christ being incarnate.

He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree.

He came to bear our sins, which is the ultimate purpose of the incarnation.

There are so many varieties of Christianity that think we get right with God through the incarnation, the fact that he became man.

But he became man to take the sinner's place and to make it a possible, it's not a strong word, but make it a certainty that those whom

God calls will come to him with the assurance of his acceptance. By his wounds, you have been healed.

So he came to be wounded, to die and to suffer for those who were going to be heirs of the kingdom, which

Christ would eventually rule and reign over and hand to the Father. This is a spectacular project or assignment on the part of the

Savior. It is, as Peter says, you know, no, can I just go quickly to Colossians?

Because, you know, the Bible is so full of the universal application and appropriation of the incarnation.

1 Colossians 15 to 20, this is for the scientists among us. Once you were alienated and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood shed on the cross.

This is of universal significance. I don't know the dimensions of Christ's atonement and what it has wrought in the history of the universe and other denizens of the universe as such there be.

But, you know, once you were alienated from God, you were enemies in your mind because of your evil behavior.

Now he has reconciled you by Christ's physical body through death to present you wholly in his sight without blemish and free from accusation.

If you continue in your faith established and firm, not moved from the hope of the gospel.

I think this is colossal. I have no expertise to expound the incarnation.

Chris, I just wonder at it. I just wonder at it and its beauty and its ingeniousness and the way

God has put things right in his creation, preparing it for what lies ahead in the kingdom of God.

Well, you are certainly eloquently through a biblically informed mind and a spirit -filled heart doing a beautiful job explaining the incarnation.

Before we go to the midway break, I'll just ask the question and have you answer it when we come back from the break because I don't want to interrupt you in mid -sentence.

But isn't one of the reasons that the incarnation was necessary is because God being not only completely holy and righteous, but he is a

God of justice and he is not a God that sweeps things under the rug as some people might wrongly think of his grace and forgiveness and mercy.

He forgives those whom he loves and has elected because he indeed fully paid the price of justice for our sins through his soul.

And we'll have you pick up on that when we return and we'll also have some of our listener questions and if anybody else wants to join us, it's chrisarnsen at gmail .com

to send in your questions. And remember folks, this is the longer than normal break in the show, so please be patient with us.

Grace Life Radio, 90 .1 FM in Lake City, Florida requires of us a longer break in the middle of the show because they are required by the

FCC to localize this show to Lake City, Florida and they air their own public service announcements and other local things while we air our globally heard commercials.

So use this time wisely, write down the information for as many of our advertisers as you can so that you can more frequently and successfully patronize them, which is necessary for us to remain on the air.

Remember that our advertisers, the funding that comes through their advertising campaigns is the primary way that we remain in existence in addition to the generous donations of our listeners.

So please keep our advertisers happy so that they want to remain our advertisers and try to patronize them as much as you can and also even just reach out to them to thank them for sponsoring the show if indeed you do love the show.

And so use this time to do that, to write down that information and also send in your emails to rogerontheincarnation at chrisarnson at gmail .com.

Don't go away, we'll be right back after these messages with more Roger Salter and the wonder of the incarnation.

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Good to be back, Chris. I always enjoy our time here. I have to tell you, you're one of the better interviewers out there, and I've been doing this for 30, more than 30 years.

Wow, that's some compliment. How much do I owe you for that? You don't have to owe me anything.

We're in good, we're in good shape. I'm glad you said it on the air, so I don't have to brag about myself.

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Charles Haddon Spurgeon once said give yourself unto reading the man who never reads will never be read he who never quotes will never be quoted he will not use the thoughts of other men's brains proves he has no brains of his own you need to read solid ground christian books is a publisher and book distributor who takes these words of the prince of preachers to heart the mission of solid ground christian books is to bring back treasures of the past to minister to christians in the present and future and to publish new titles that address burning issues in the church and the world since its beginning in 2001 solid ground has been committed to publish god -centered christ exalting books for all ages we invite you to go treasure hunting at solid -ground -books .com

that's solid -ground -books .com and see what priceless literary gems from the past or present you can unearth from solid ground solid ground christian books is honored to be a weekly sponsor of iron sharpens iron radio and i know that my anglican guest roger salter rector of st matthews anglican church in birmingham alabama has a very high affection and values greatly solid ground christian books do you not brother i do indeed chris and i have a good number of volumes from solid ground on my bookshelves and i treasure them very much i'm very grateful for chris's work with republishing these great classics from the past you mean you mean like kadosh you said chris's oh chris i'm sorry that's all right um i'd like to take credit for that but i i can't yes i know i didn't even realize i'd done that but um no i i think mike is fulfilling a wonderful ministry in terms of disseminating christian literature well let me just highlight some of the books that will be of particular interest to our anglican listeners although it shouldn't be exclusively of interest to them but it might be particularly uh of interest to them first of all a contemporary writer thomas isham has written a biography of augustus top lady called rock of augustus top lady the little lone the little known man behind the well -known hymn and that is available at solid -ground -books .com

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before i return to our guest today roger salter i just want to provide for you another appeal for help iron trip and zion radio has suffered financially during the hysteria connected with the coronavirus pandemic because business owners who have donated to this program and also advertised on this program have suffered themselves greatly through the quarantine mandates and other things or their customers have suffered and therefore they have subsequently also suffered financially so please if you are financially blessed we could really really use your help in fact we really need your help if you love the show and don't want to disappear please go to iron trip and zion radio .com

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click support then click click to donate now and donate as frequently and as generously as you can as long as you don't violate either of those two commands that i mentioned providing for church and family also if you are not a member of a local bible believing church you need help finding one i have lists of biblically faithful churches all over the planet earth i've helped many people in our audience find churches near where they live sometimes just a few minutes away away from where they live that they didn't even know existed so if you are in that category or if you're asking on behalf of a loved one who doesn't have a church no matter where they live in the world send me an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com

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chrisarnson at gmail .com and roger we were talking about one of the key reasons why god could not forgive sinners on earth without violating a part an aspect of his pure and full holiness and righteousness he would have to violate his the fact that he is a god of justice if he just swept our sins under the rug and overlooked them in that way but he did need to pay that price of justice and he he voluntarily did so by sending his own only begotten son who had to become flesh in order for him to serve as our representative and our substitute is that not right absolutely chris you know the idea of penal substitution is not the most popular doctrine in contemporary christendom by any means and there are so many people who sound biblical biblical who tend to as it were diminish the prominence of this doctrine in scripture or to ridicule it or to try and present it in an inoffensive way i don't feel there's any clash or contradiction in the christian mind of having a desire and delight for and in god but also a dread of god i mean we're born in a situation of of sinfulness and guilt original sin and actual sin and all of us are born on the wrong side of god and until we come to know him in his mercy and favor and compassion we need to dread him because he is a god of justice he is a god of he has to keep his universe pure and it's at the moment it's polluted by sin even beyond the confines of this world in you know the realm of the demonic and the evil spirits he has to vindicate himself by measuring out what is the due consequence of our sinfulness and rebellion against him and this is something that i feel has to be emphasized in the gospel even though i know some very clever scholarly types who ridicule people for holding this doctrine which is so essential so clearly scriptural who you know cast everybody who adheres to it into what is this common square word of fundamentalist um you know fundamentalist is somebody who initially uh recognized and advocated the key doctrines of holy scripture for our redemption through christ and i i just think that you know before god throws you to himself and reveals the beauty of his his mercy and grace and kindness it's right to dread god we ought to and even believers i think should recognize that in his power and holiness he's a he's a fire and um i have a friend who has said you know in in view of this reality of god being a consuming fire which means all the dross and rubbish of the universe is going to be consumed in that fire um we ought to be jolly well aware of it but not to run from the fire not to run from god but to run to him because christ has given us that protection from the wrath of god he's born at forest i don't know how anybody who reads isiah 53 can ever deny the doctrine of penal substitution and you know just looking at the last verses where the father reveals how he's going to reward the son for his obedience in the incarnation and atonement therefore i will give him a portion among the great and he will divide the spoils with the strong because he poured out his life unto death and was numbered with the transgressions transgressors so he bore the sin of many and made intercession for the transgressors isn't that you know just telling us plainly that the cross is the great dumpster on which all our sin and wickedness and evil is into which it is cast and taken away by christ who bears it in his own body i think that is one of the great motives for the adoration of christ what he bore in our stead and in our place so there's no doubt in my mind that we have to take into account the formidable justice of god when he looks at human character and human behavior and our record as sinners you just used a phrase that i have never heard before the cross is a dumpster and even though some may have a knee -jerk reaction to that as being something blasphemous but it is absolutely true because we have to stop thinking sentimentally about the cross and you know these ridiculous images especially those that have been created by roman catholics and quite frankly even anglicans some of them anglo -catholics especially of these beautiful the ornate crosses some even picturing christ in kingly robes and so on on the cross of course some do also have a more accurate depiction of what he likely looked like being tortured there but obviously there is a huge debate amongst christians whether that is appropriate to have any image of jesus but there is a completely sanitized and unbiblical understanding of the cross and the one you just the way you described it is perfect and the cross ought to be to the floor um christ in our celebration of christmas what i dread is the sentimentality in churches over a little doll stuck in a crib which is where people leave him they don't even recognize that the babe was born in order to do away with their sin and uh that alarms me in fact it makes to me a certain aspect of christmas um undesirable i haven't that distasteful is the word i want because in the church of england you have to have crib services everybody comes along and pays tribute to the babe but that's where they jesus in their infantile minds he's still that little infant and they don't have to take notice of him or revere him or trust him i find christmas sometimes is just loaded with blasphemy as well as materialism and uh you know i won't get too carried away by this but i used to somehow uh inwardly um experience great discomfort when i had to take these so -called crib services and i remember likewise with the midnight services you know that you would have what they call the first eucharist of christmas and um i remember once in a particular church we sang you know the christmas hymns uh which shouldn't be sung before christmas day because we celebrate advent and the promise of the redeemer up until then but that's not done anymore but anyway i remember including a hymn that referred to the atonement and as i was saying goodbye to people at the church door at two in the morning somebody said to me how dare you introduce an easter theme into christmas and i was blown away i thought don't you you know blend the two things together your uh perception of christ he was born to die and it just strikes me that there's i won't go on any longer chris i i i have a lot of concern about the way christmas is observed yes unfortunately uh especially for those who are lost uh who enjoy celebrating christmas they really are celebrating a jesus that is very safe and harmless to them jesus that doesn't that doesn't threaten their ways of living their non -repentant uh love of sin they are completely common at ease if they're just focusing on a little harmless fragile baby in a pile of hay are they not yes yes indeed and in a sense even in the most respectable sense it is a season of indulgence rather than of focusing upon the glory of god in his son and why the gift was granted to us in the first place uh i'm sounding like an old moaner and i'm sorry but you know in something like anglicanism that is so mixed in terms of its confused beliefs and confused motives for being in church these things are very troublesome to one's mind when you know that the gospel is eclipsed by all these ancillary or unnecessary things that deprive people of the real joy of christmas yes and it's amazing that uh people would find it more appealing uh to distort and rob the christmas message of the whole concept of the penal substitution and the substitute substitutionary atonement that christ provided on calvary because that is where the absolute beauty and amazing quality of the reason for his incarnation is most vividly seen when you take that away it may be a nice adorable cute story but it has nothing to do with an event that would make you collapse on your knees and sing praises to god no i know i mean i don't like christmas pageants and those little plays that we have because i think they diminish the honor and status of jesus and right from the outset teach people to be patronizing towards him he's harmless you know he's we've tamed him we've got the measure of him and and it just grieves me but i shouldn't be so outspoken about this i'm not i'm not without a christmas mood of you know fellowship and joy and family and friends but the whole point of it is the incarnation and uh that is stupendous well we do have i'm sorry i interrupted you there were you going to say something yes i was chris but i don't want to be too outspoken no go ahead i have a listener as a question but he can wait so continue okay well i was thinking too as part of our liturgy our worship uh we use that wonderful hymn that we recite together as congregations or sometimes in tone the tedium which that wonderful scottish professor of hebrew and theology uh john rabbi duncan described the tedium as perhaps the best christian hymn that was ever written you know in the fifth century and part of it when it's alluding to the coming of the the savior as incarnate and born of the virgin mary um in the modern version uh we have in in our contemporary version of cranmer when you became man to set us free you humbled yourself to be born of a virgin well that's good and true but i i prefer the cranmerian 1662 version that says um when thou tookest upon thee to deliver man as the sin aspect in the alienation from god and need needing to be withdrawn from that uh departure from god thou didst not abhor the virgin's womb and therefore saying that as abhorrent as we were to go as wretched and guilty and rebellious jesus did not abhor our nature our race he was born in a virgin's womb to come to us for our rescue and redemption i love that word abhor i don't think it's lost its relevance uh why shouldn't god abhor us for the effrontery and the the uh great um and the things we commit against him i'm trying to think of the insults that we callously and casually throw in the direction of god and his son when his name is taken in vain and i believe even by christians when they're using the name of jesus in in a superficial way you know a habitual way that doesn't recognize his loftiness and majesty and that we we were to tremble before god as well as have that thrill and that fishing of delight in you know being with the one who redeemed us our elder brother well we do have uh bruce in hoover alabama was a question yes chris and roger thank you so very much for this specific program today i am so blessed to hear this and to apply my mind and heart to this scriptural discourse on the incarnation of jesus my question is this time of year our culture emits an incredible amount of apparent celebration of jesus's incarnation i struggle with elements of this for at least a couple of reasons number one is emmanuel coming to us more to be celebrated than for us to grieve the reason why he had to come and number two isn't it just wrong for our society to not celebrate christmas all year long why is it just for two weeks and then we go dark on this miracle for the next 11 months thank you keep charging bruce from hanover alabama i i can see where he's coming from but i don't know if i fully agree with him but if you could give your own answer to him i can give my own poor perception of things in this area i think chris i i feel that if somebody said you know easter day or resurrection day is every sunday we are bearing in mind the whole scope of christ's assignment on our behalf and that means from the incarnation through his life death resurrection and ascension and ministry for us in heaven we cannot isolate all of these truths with great emphasis every sunday but they're all there they're all the basis of the gospel they're all in mind um i'm not making a plea here for anyone to become an anglican i'm just saying that a church that has the liturgy has a backup in the liturgy for anything that is stated in the word of god that's if it's a scriptural liturgy so it supports what's being said specifically from the exposition of scripture and if there isn't something mentioned specifically in the minister's address it's there backed up constantly by by the liturgy that is stating the whole breadth of the christian faith week after week so that it becomes ingrained in our minds and we see the continuity of christian truth we see it in its completeness and wholeness and so every sunday ought to be something to do as it must be if you're reading scripture with the incarnation with the resurrection and so on all the aspects of christ's experience and ministry on our behalf but um it just worries me that in a sense christmas is robbed by our culture and by the materialism of our world and it dictates the way when we commence celebrating the incarnation way ahead of the season and uh the way in which we actually function throughout it but i'm sounding like a misery guts i know i don't feel that way chris i think christ should not be eclipsed by anything uh the awareness of him ought to be overwhelming and to the fore all the time and we must facilitate that in our private devotions and lives and in our life as a as the people of god in our public worship the reason i said that i uh although i see where our guest or should i say our listener bruce and hoover alabama is is coming from i do have some disagreement um i i don't my cell phone's going off here i um i don't think and you could respond to what i am saying roger perhaps you disagree with me i don't think it is wrong for christians to highlight a specific aspect of christ's existence during a specific time of year like the christmas season to focus on his incarnation and celebrate that i also don't think that we who have been miraculously uh delivered and redeemed from the enslavement to sin and the penalty of our sin i think that we should find plenty of time in our lives to celebrate and focus on the joyful aspect of that rather than uh constantly be contemplating and focused on the misery of sin and and someone not that we should ever forget why uh we needed a savior and where we came from when he uh redeemed us but at the same time i don't think that we need to live lives of drudgery constantly focused on the the sin of mankind and so on i mean obviously in our normal day -to -day lives of angelizing people we have to make them aware of their sin and the fact that they are headed for hell if they do not repent and believe upon the name of christ and trust in his finished work but at the same time i think that there is a lot of room in our lives that should be dedicated towards as the uh westminster shorter catechism as puts it uh enjoying god forever yes and so that's where i am uh i am somewhat i don't let me also give you an example of how this kind of bears uh witness to something that happened in my own life i remember when i was a new christian having been raised roman catholic and i became a born -again believer i was in my cage stage of calvinism as they call it and i could be very prone to immediately erupt in anger uh witnessing the way the lost uh behave and speak and so on and i remember vividly i can still remember to this day sitting in a recliner in my living room when i was still living at home with my parents and i could remember seeing on the television a neil diamond christmas special yeah and my first my first reaction was anger uh and in fact they had a scientology choir backing up neil diamond and i remember thinking to myself how dare this man this man who does not really love christ who does not believe in the true biblical christ how dare he sing these songs and that was my first reaction but then after a while i began to sit there in amazement when he was singing oh holy night and i was saying to myself isn't it utterly amazing that god in his sovereignty at least one time a year he even makes the pagans sing praises to him yes that's right that's right i mean i think the joy of christmas should be exuberant and untrammeled it's the mode of celebration i think that one is more concerned about that you know god is being denied his due gratitude for the greatest gift of all his son but i as i say i i think and i probably alarmed some of my reformed friends that there are many aspects of christmas that that i would be quite happy with you know i'm not averse to a christmas tree or gifts or a christmas dinner those things don't bother me but it's the way in which i think you know christ is overlooked and i just feel a in my heart for that that he's locked away rather than exposed why do i want to make sure that i clarify that i don't necessarily know whether or not i fully captured our listeners questions i didn't want to act as if i was uh dismissing everything he said there are things obviously that grieve me about people who only think about christ one time a year or twice a year when easter comes around but i think that uh as opposed to our dear friends uh who are reformed and who oppose the celebration of christmas as being pagan in origin and romish in origin i don't think that there's anything wrong with christians conquering even a pagan holiday and transforming it into a way to honor and worship christ especially when the world is thinking about him yes it's part of his victory i think chris um you know that he he is intrusive he won't be shut out and even though the world you know is drenched with paganism he does break through as you said about the neil diamond concert uh i didn't want to be overreactive to you know what we might say some of the secular aspects of christmas because we can always deter discern something in them that is related to christ you know i mean luther was supposedly the one who introduced the christmas tree on a night journey home you know crossing the snow and seeing the stars through a tree and said oh that would be wonderful you know to decorate the house with a christmas tree i think there are so many innocent things that are uh and neutral do you know what i mean um yes but but i think it just bothers me that people cannot tie the infant and the redeemer into one entity but it's all part of a saving process in fact we have to go to our final break i'm going to read a question before we go to that break and you can answer it when we come back we have a question from susan margaret in dauphin county pennsylvania who says i was wondering if you know of the origins of something that i find quite bizarre that is practiced within roman catholicism many roman catholics during the christmas season actually worship the infant jesus as if he every year somehow goes back in time and becomes a child again there are even churches called the church of the infant jesus and then so on is this not a very aberrant and bizarre superstitious way of viewing the incarnation and do you know of how it began and we'll have you answer that when we come back from our final break if anybody else wants to join us for the question chris arnson at gmail .com

chris arnson gmail .com is the email address don't go away we'll be right back with roger salter after these messages as host of iron sharpens iron radio i frequently get requests from listeners for church recommendations the church i've been strongly recommending as far back as the 1980s is grace covenant baptist church in flemington new jersey pastored by alan dunn grace covenant baptist church believes it's god's prerogative to determine how he shall be worshiped and how he shall be represented in the world they believe churches need to turn to the bible to discover what to include in worship and how to worship god in spirit and truth grace covenant baptist church endeavors to maintain a god -centered focus reading preaching and hearing the word of god singing psalms hymns and spiritual songs baptism and communion are the scriptural elements of their corporate worship performed with faith joy and sobriety discover more about grace covenant baptist church in flemington new jersey at gcbcnj .squarespace

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that's gracechurchatfranklin .org this is pastor bill sasa wishing you all the richest blessings of our sovereign lord god savior and king jesus christ today and always oh hi i'm buzz taylor frequent co -host with chris irons and on iron sharpens iron radio i would like to introduce you to my good friends todd and patty jennings at cvbbs which stands for cumberland valley bible book service todd and patty specialize in supplying reformed and puritan books and bibles at discount prices that make them affordable to everyone since 1987 the family owned and operated book service has sought to bring you the best available christian books and bibles at the best possible prices unlike other book sites they make no effort to provide every book that is available because frankly much of what is being printed is not worth your time that means you can get to the good stuff faster it also means that you don't have to worry about being assaulted by the pornographic heretical and otherwise faith insulting material promoted by the secular book vendors their website is cvbbs .com

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that's l -e -e -s drugs rx .com don't forget to ask about their discount generic drug program welcome back this is chris arnson and this is our final segment of our discussion today with roger salter rector of saint matthew's anglican church in birmingham alabama on the wonder of the incarnation and roger do you have any idea where this custom this tradition of roman catholics to worship the infant jesus during the christmas season came into existence and would you agree with our listener and even my disdain for such an idea as being superstitious and actually ridiculous yes i agree with you and and your listener too uh chris it seems retrogressive to me because we should have a comprehensive appreciation of the lord jesus in every installment of his redeeming assignment and i don't know how to comment on this particular matter because i wasn't aware of it but i too can only label it as ridiculous and um you know the basic became a man he matured he uh he suffered in our place he rose again and he's ascendant now in heaven and i don't think we in any way worship segments of his life or try to place him in something that is now past and a step in the journey he took for our redemption so it puzzles me and i can't think of any justification for it and i've never heard of it until today yeah well i was raised roman catholic and i definitely remember in catholic school during the christmas season that we would indeed we were instructed by the nuns to worship the infant jesus and bow before the nativity scene in the church when we had to as a class go over to the church building for a service and that was just definitely a tradition that they were involved in but i want you to now have about three minutes to summarize what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners in regard to the wonder of the incarnation well i know when the topic occurred to me uh the first time i've let you know of course what the topic ought to be without letting you know the night before the interview because it just struck me as being such an apt consideration for this time of the year apart from that i was apprehensive because to my mind the incarnation is such a stunning reality i don't know how anybody feels that or definition of it can be uh in any way comprehensive or um what's the word i want all encompassing to me it is just an amazing miraculous act of god that leaves me stupefied amazed full of wonder full of gratitude and one is dizzy with the with the reality of the nativity but um and so desirous to know this god who took our nature upon himself and at the same time to realize that the god man is far greater and to us incomprehensible than we will ever know um it just stuns me that god has done this entered our race entered our little planet uh wrote such a wonder in the redemption of his people i just don't know how to encounter this doctrine and and deal with it it is so amazing you know i think that the best in my estimation of the moment the best christmas hymn and carol is heart the herald angels sing i think that sums up so much about this season and the reality of the incarnation amen my neighboring parish in bristol when i was there a few decades ago was known as holy nativity church but i'm sure they didn't preach on that team every sunday i think that's a bit different than calling your church church of the infant jesus yes indeed indeed well i want to make sure that our listeners have your contact information again uh first of all uh you can go to the website rogerssalter .com

r -o -g -e -r -s -a -l -t -e -r .com and you can also go to s -t -m which stands for saint matthews stmanglican .weebly