January 9, 2024 Show with Jono Sims on “Eight Things God Sovereignly Chose for Pastors of His Local Church”

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Christian scholars, and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

Proverbs chapter 27 verse 17 tells us iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

Matthew Henry said that in this passage, we are cautioned to take heed with whom we converse and directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better.

It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next two hours, and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions.

And now, here's your host, Chris Arnzen. Good afternoon,

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 Tuesday on this ninth day of January 2024.

And I'm absolutely thrilled to have back on the program a returning guest who

I first heard preach about two years ago in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, when he was on the speaking roster at the

True Church Conference, which was held and is always held annually at the

Grace Life Church of the Shoals in Muscle Shoals, Alabama. And I was so blown away by this dear brother's preaching, so edified and so blessed, that I immediately afterward asked him, please, will you come on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio?

And he graciously accepted that invitation, so I've already interviewed him, as I mentioned.

He is a returning guest, and I am delighted to have the privilege of interviewing him today.

I'm speaking of none other than Pastor John O. Sims, and he is the senior pastor of Shelbyville Mills Baptist Church in Shelbyville, Tennessee.

It's my honor and privilege to welcome you back to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Pastor John O. Sims. Hey, Brother Chris.

Thank you. Thank you, brother. It's a joy to be here. Amen. Well, I'm so glad that you accepted my invitation once again to be on the program.

And why don't you tell our listeners something about Shelbyville Mills Baptist Church in Shelbyville, Tennessee.

Absolutely, brother. I came here, matter of fact, January the 30th will be my 24th anniversary.

And when I came here 24 years ago, kind of a typical

Southern Baptist Church, very unhealthy, and somehow by the grace of God, I survived a split about two years in.

Still to this day, don't know how, but survived a split. And since then, by God's grace, brother, the

Lord has done what he said he would do. I will build my church. And it has,

I've said this before, I've gone from pastoring the worst church I've ever pastored to pastoring the best church

I've ever pastored. And I say that humbly, but that's how radical the transformation has been.

And though you never arrive, we have been on the trajectory now for 24 years of being a biblical church that is based upon the word of God and actually attempts to apply it in everyday life of the church.

And I can just say this as a testimony, brother, I'm in the happiest time of my life.

It's such a joy to pastor this church. I love our people. I love them with all my heart. Love to be with them.

Don't like to be away from them. And the high point of my life is stepping into the pulpit here every week and rightly dividing the word of truth.

And unless our audience or anybody in our audience gets the wrong impression that my guest here is broad brushing and bashing the

Southern Baptist Convention, some of the most critical people that I know of the

Southern Baptist Convention's problems are still currently Southern Baptist pastors.

So this is nothing that is a secret to those who, some of whom are still inside of the

Southern Baptist denomination, are fully aware of and also are attempting to protest from the inside.

One dear friend and brother that I'm thinking of immediately is Dr. Tom Askle, the president of Founders Ministries.

But there are those that obviously, such as my guest today, have departed that denomination.

And can you share any of those conflicts that compelled the break? Well, it was probably one of the most difficult decisions for me personally that I've had to make because I'm a fifth generation

Southern Baptist. Wow. And the message that I preached while we departed from the

Southern Baptist Convention kind of lays it all out there. It's been an evolving thing for me.

But honestly, brother, frankly, I just grew weary with,

I guess I would say, orthodoxy on paper that just doesn't make its way down to ever being applied in the local churches.

And, you know, we're not going before the judgment seat of Christ to give an account for the

Southern Baptist Convention. We're going to give an account for our local churches. Christ loved the church and gave himself for her.

And we just kind of reached the point, brother, to where we just didn't feel comfortable any longer sending our cooperative monies for missions to things that we wouldn't tolerate or allow in our own church.

And we were already partnering some with Anchored in Truth, who sponsors the church conference.

And when we would look at Anchored in Truth, everything Anchored in Truth was doing was exactly what we believed in.

And we could support it wholeheartedly without any reservation at all. And so, honestly, the leadership of our church were way out in front of me on this.

And they were there long before I was. And it was unanimously affirmed by our congregation, not one dissenting vote.

And we're a congregation of about between 350 and 400 people. And it was unanimous.

And, you know, like you said at the disclaimer a moment ago, some of my dearest friends are still in the convention, and I love them, and I don't bash the convention or anything like that.

It was just—it was time for us to move on, brother. Amen. Yes, and I know that there are a couple of key issues, especially, that seem to be plaguing the

Southern Baptist Convention, one of which is the lack of discipline in congregations where people have been retained on the membership roles even decades after they have abandoned that church, and some of whom have abandoned church altogether, and perhaps even the

Christian faith entirely, and they're still on membership roles, never having been disciplined. And the other is the doctrines of sovereign grace, even though everyone to the man—to a man who founded the

Southern Baptist Convention in the 19th century were Calvinists, thoroughgoing five -point Calvinists. Today, those who believe in the precious doctrines of sovereign grace are a minority, unfortunately.

And some of the leaders in that denomination are vociferously anti -Calvinist.

So, anything to comment about that? Well, those are two major things for us and always have been.

We regularly and consistently, lovingly, scripturally practice church discipline in our congregation and have almost the entire time

I've been here. We actually practice discipline for forsaking the assembly.

Hebrews 10 clearly teaches not to forsake the assembly, and it's a very serious sin.

And so, it's not possible any longer to be, quote, an inactive member or a non -attending member of Shelbyville Mills Baptist Church.

We just, you know, that's scripturally not allowed.

And I know we're going to talk about this today. Just this past Sunday night,

I preached on the doctrine of election. And so, those are things that are dear to us. And, you know, a comment that I would give,

I was speaking to a brother about this yesterday. In my entire, I'm almost 60 years, and 58 of those were spent being a

Southern Baptist. And, you know, almost without exception, Chris, I'll go to a church, a

Southern Baptist church, go into the pastor's office, the door closes behind us, and he will agree with me point by point by point, almost without any departure on the major doctrines that we hold dear.

But when that office door opens up, a transformation takes place. And, you know, he plays to his base, and there's certain things he won't say.

And I just cannot imagine having deeply held beliefs and having to keep them bottled up and not talk about them and especially not preach them, you know.

And I'm so thankful that I'm at a place where, and it's come at a very high price, that I don't have one private belief, not one, that I will not preach from the pulpit.

And so many brothers that I love are just, they live in fear of doing that because, frankly, it would probably cost them their job if they did.

Wow. Well, if anybody is either traveling through Shelbyville, Tennessee, or perhaps you live in or near Shelbyville, Tennessee, or perhaps you have family, friends, and loved ones who live in or near Shelbyville, Tennessee, the website for Shelbyville Mills Baptist Church is smbconline .com.

smbconline .com, and God willing, we'll be repeating that toward the end of the program. Well, today we are going to be discussing eight things

God sovereignly chose for pastors of his local church. And this will be an exposition of Titus chapter 1, verses 1 through 4.

And I will read those verses right now. Paul, a bondservant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ, for the faith of those chosen of God and the knowledge of the truth, which is according to godliness, in the hope of eternal life, which

God, who cannot lie, promised long ages ago, but at the proper time revealed his word in the proclamation with which

I was entrusted according to the commandment of God our Savior. To Titus, my true son, and a common faith, grace and peace from God the

Father and Christ Jesus our Savior. So tell us about what it is about these

God -breathed verses in the inerrant Holy Scriptures that so compelled you to want to speak on these eight things that you have gleaned from this very short passage.

Well, along with 1 and 2 Timothy, we refer to Titus as a pastoral epistle, a pastoral letter that the apostle

Paul wrote to young Timothy pastoring in Ephesus and Titus here pastoring the churches on the

Isle of Crete. And, you know, the whole thing is this as a pastoral epistle, at least in Titus, I entitled my message here,

The First Pastoral Lesson. And I preach out of the King James Version.

I guess I'm just old school. I'm not a King James Version only guy. I just I got saved under it and love it.

And it's it's just my favorite. And the 17th word in the

King James Version is the word elect. Paul, a servant of God and apostle of Jesus Christ, according to the faith of God's elect.

And my point was the doctrine of election is not something that we sheepishly backdoor retrofit to a pastor after he's been in the ministry for a couple of decades and we figure, well, now he's ready.

No, this this was the very first lesson Paul taught to Titus in shepherding the

Lord's church. And I just it grieves me, brother. You know, I know what comfort and what bedrock foundation, what joy has brought to my heart, what peace of mind, what confidence and boldness even this doctrine has brought to my heart.

And so this is not something we need to withhold from a young pastor out of some fear that it might damage him or hurting.

This is a doctrine that he'll build his ministry upon. And I don't think there's any any way

Titus could have accomplished what he accomplished. I don't think there's any way Timothy could have accomplished what he accomplished without the doctrine of election.

And by the way, about a year, almost a year to the day from when

Paul penned this letter to Titus, he wrote the second

Timothy pastoral epistle. And he said this to Timothy, another young pastor. He said, quote,

I endure all things for the elect's sake that they might obtain the salvation, which is in Jesus Christ with eternal glory.

That's second Timothy 210. And so here are two young pastors, brother Chris, and they're both shepherding in extremely difficult places, being opposed by false teachers,

Judaizers, surrounded by paganism. And Paul undergirds them very, very early in their life and in their ministry with the precious doctrine of election.

And and I and I saw eight things in this text that God chose the word elect.

We could we could we could skew that down to meaning God's prerogative to choose.

And I see eight things in this text that God chose that he sovereignly chose that, you know, apply to all pastors and I think all

Christians. And so the message kind of grew out of that. Well, praise God for that.

I'd like to now, before we continue on having you exegete these passages,

I'd like to ask you about the true church conference where you are once again on the speaking roster.

And if I'm not mistaken, I think you're on the roster every year. But I'm sure that that the folks who gather there will be richly blessed by what you have to say and what all the other speakers have to say.

My friend, Pastor Jeff Knoblet, has great discernment, in my opinion, and the fact that he chooses you so often to be one of the speakers is very telling.

And by the way, I don't know if you are aware of this. Brother Jeff Knoblet recently was a speaker at the

Iron Sherpins Iron Radio Free Pastors Luncheon in Perry County, Pennsylvania. Yes.

And the men there were absolutely blown away by him. And I was so refreshed and blessed, not only for the fact that he came and took took a chunk, a big, big chunk out of his very busy schedule, but he blew me away again by doing so at his own expense.

And the church covered all. Not only did they cover the expenses for his traveling to us, but they actually sent a financial gift to help support the luncheon, which was so very much appreciated beyond my ability to describe.

But I know that this conference, this next conference for the

True Church Conference in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, is going to be held in February.

And the speakers include Ken Ramey, who is scheduled to be on my show on Wednesday, the 31st of January.

If anybody wants to mark that down on your calendars, Richard Caldwell, who

I'm trying to get on the program again. He has been a guest before. I'm trying to get

Jeff Knoblet on again. And Timothy Seal, who I've never interviewed. I'd love to have Timothy on.

And Derek Melton, who I have interviewed once before, would love to get him on again as well.

But tell us about this conference. Are you there?

Yes, sir. I thought you dropped off. Oh, yeah.

The conference, brother, from beginning to end and everything about it and everything we're about has this very simple objective, and that is to raise up biblically qualified pastors who will go out and shepherd biblically healthy churches.

And the bottom line is this. There's a lot of good things we could be involved in. And this is just where we are, brother.

But if it doesn't have as its end and aim, a healthy local

New Testament church, though it may be a good thing, brother, we're out. Amen. You can only you only have so many resources and you only have so much time.

And so we've just decided, brother, we're going to be about what what Christ is about.

He he loved the church and gave himself for her. And our mission is to raise up local pastors to shepherd healthy local churches.

And let me let me tell you this, Chris, I've come to understand rather than being church planters,

I think we're pastor planters. I think that's what Paul was doing with Titus and Timothy.

If we raise up a healthy pastor and send him to an area to start a church, the church will eventually be healthy.

But think about the churches on the island of Crete. Paul said to Titus, for this cause,

I left you in Crete that you would set in order the things that are lacking and ordain elders in every city.

Think about this. They had had some type of a church planting endeavor. Maybe these people were converted at Pentecost and went back to the island and started churches.

But the problem was their church planting endeavors exceeded their eldership and they had a great problem.

And it was creating all kinds of issues in the churches. And Paul had to leave

Titus behind there to get it all together. And the chief thing was to raise up elders and pastors to shepherd these churches.

And so that's just a snapshot of what we're dedicated to.

And that is biblically qualified pastors in the first Timothy three and Titus one sense.

And then seeing those brothers plant biblically healthy churches that will actually apply the word of God and function according to the

New Testament. Well, praise God. And as one who has been at a true church conference in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, it is well worth the trip from wherever you are.

In fact, there are pastors that came there at the conference that I attended.

There are pastors there from all over the world. And I was just so blessed.

I can't even describe in words because of the fact. I think one of the things that made me so blessed is to witness

Pastor Jeff Knoblet's heart for shepherds and the focus on shepherding.

And that makes this conference unique. And some might, when they hear the name of the conference,

True Church Conference, they may bristle and think that that is somehow sectarian or something. It's just basically bringing attention to the fact that there are things that are necessarily required for a church to be a true church.

They're not claiming that there is one true denomination or anything like that. But if you want to comment on that.

Well, absolutely, brother. We throw the term church around way too loosely.

Right. And well, back to what you said in the introduction of church discipline.

I mean, this will be shocking to some people, but I don't think it's possible to be a

New Testament church without the practice of church discipline. I just don't.

The very words of the Lord Jesus Christ himself and the apostles, too, by the way,

Ephesians 2 says the church is built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ being the chief cornerstone.

And, you know, J .L. Dagg was one of the first writing systematic theologians in the

Southern Baptist Convention, and everybody quotes him as saying this. And it's true.

When discipline leaves the church, Jesus goes with it. And there's just no way for a church to be a healthy biblical

New Testament church without that. And that's just one doctrine without the doctrine and practice of church discipline.

And so what we're having to do is kind of swim upstream to regain some things that have been lost.

And any pastor that loves the New Testament and truly seeks to apply truth in his church understands we're always reforming, brother.

It never ends. There's ground that has been lost even since the

Protestant Reformation that has to be regained. And while we certainly don't think we've arrived and we've got so far to go and we see our own deficiencies, at the same time, there are some things our

Lord commanded us to do that must be done. And we can no longer be idle about it, and we can't let fear or politics or, you know, our standing in certain ecclesiastical groups and bodies to keep us from following our head, who is the

Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. And by the way, folks, if anybody wants to find out more information about the

True Church Conference, which is a conference of Anchored in Truth Ministries, a parachurch ministry under the oversight of Grace Life Church of the

Shoals in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, the conference will be held February 15th through the 18th.

It starts a day after my birthday, my 62nd birthday. February 15th through the 18th in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, and the website to get more details is anchoredintruth .org.

And there is a tab at the top that you can click for True Church Conference that gives you all the details on registering.

We're going to our first commercial break right now. If you do have a question for Pastor Jono Sims, please submit it to ChrisArnzen at gmail .com.

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on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. That's royaldiadem .com. We're now back with my guest,

Jono Sims, who is the senior pastor of Shelbyville Mills Baptist Church in Shelbyville, Tennessee.

And today we are addressing eight things God sovereignly chose for pastors of his local church, an exposition of Titus chapter one, verses one through four.

If you could continue on exploring these texts and these eight things that God sovereignly chose for pastors.

Well, the first one, Brother Chris, God chose Paul to be, as it says in verse one, the servant of God and the

King James Version is not as poignant as the

Greek, it's Dulog's slave. And brother, here we learn the purpose of election.

And it's to crush the prideful spirit of man and humble him before the Lord. You know, back to the

Baptist faith and message, which is the doctrinal statement of every

Southern Baptist church and comes out of the New Hampshire Confession of Faith.

Article five of election, it says, and I quote, this doctrine excludes boasting and promotes humility, end of quote.

And how this doctrine is needed today, brother, boasting needs to be excluded and humility needs to be promoted.

And I don't know anything that does that more than the doctrine of election. Paul, when he met

Jesus, he says on the Damascus Road to the Philippians, I was apprehended. Christ apprehended

Saul of Tarsus and crushed his pride and humbled him and broke him.

And these eight things, Chris, they are totally diametrically against contemporary models of pastoring and church planting.

Humility and brokenness and meekness and patience, 2

Timothy 2, 23 through 26. That's the way God chooses men to shepherd his church is not arrogant, prideful, ambitious, you know, narcissistic, you know, dictatorship.

We're slaves, brother. Every Christian, when he, say, becomes the slave of Jesus Christ, how much more a pastor?

And that's something God sovereignly chose in the very opening of this pastoral epistle.

Paul is saying, you know, if you're going to be a if you're going to be a pastor of Jesus Christ in one of his churches, you're going to be

Christ's slave. And a slave, his will is swallowed up in the will of his master.

And he's a man under orders and he obeys. And what I would say, dear brother, pastor listening, you don't have the right to structure your church like you deem it right.

You don't have the right to choose, you know, how your church functions and operates.

Man, that's the prerogative of God. That's the prerogative of Jesus Christ. Your job is to hardwire yourself to the

New Testament and follow the follow the instructions Christ laid down for what it means to shepherd his church.

And that is so radically opposed to the way most models of pastoring today are done.

Now, in your opinion, are many models of pastoring taken out of the workforce where a pastor is supposed to, in more aspects, behave like a

CEO than a shepherd? 100 percent. And sadly, when you don't follow the

Sola Scriptura, when you don't follow the scriptures, you're going to go looking for a model. And sadly, the model is the world more than most.

I remember and I've shared this many times when I came here to Shelby Mills. And this is a fairly standard question that Baptist pulpit committees will ask a pastoral candidate that they're interviewing.

And I wasn't I promise you, brother, I wasn't trying to be a smart aleck. I was just I was just trying to answer the question truthfully to who

I am and what I understand scripture to teach. And one of the person on that committee said, brother,

Jono, share with us your vision for Shelby Mills Baptist Church. And I said,

I don't have one, you know, and I don't get to have one.

I don't have the right to have a vision. This is not my church. I didn't die for it. I'm not the head of it.

Here's my vision. If you if you have to have a vision, here it is. To strictly follow the

New Testament. And all things pertaining to life and godliness and structuring this church.

Amen. And but but for me to say I've got a vision, that's all about me.

That's my intuition, my intellect, my creativity, my juices, my thoughts.

And brother, I'm the slave of Jesus. I don't I don't get to have my own vision for the church.

Jesus has a vision for the church and I'm to be hardwired to that. Amen. And perhaps we should move on to the second thing that God has sovereignly chose for pastors, because we want to make sure we can fit all eight,

God willing, into the program. Well, the second one, obviously,

I do not believe in apostles today. I don't believe that the apostleship, you know, goes to today.

I believe it obviously ended with Paul. But Paul says in verse one, God chose him to be an apostle.

That's the second choice. I'm a servant of God, a slave of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ.

And here's the point I'm getting out of that. I quoted it a minute ago. You know, we think about Paul's conversion on the

Damascus Road in Acts chapter nine. And again, when Paul described that years later to the church at Philippi in Philippians 312, he said,

I was apprehended of Jesus Christ. Listen to this exchange between Paul and Jesus.

Paul, Saul, trembling and astonished, said, Lord, what would you have me do? And the

Lord said, arise and go into the city. It will be told you what you will do. Acts nine, six. Brother, that sounds like a

Lord directing his slave. Amen. And Paul says, what do you want me to do? And Jesus says, oh, hang on.

I'm going to tell you exactly what to do. And so,

Paul, we're not apostles today, but we are sent to bear the gospel of Jesus Christ as pastor brothers.

And, you know, we should have that attitude and that spirit that I've been apprehended.

And Jesus has told me he would tell me in his word, his written word, what he would have me do.

Now, I'm not sitting around, you know, getting words from God mystically, brother. I'm reading the

New Testament. And through reading the New Testament, God tells me what to do and how to structure and order his church.

The Lord told Paul, you will be a chosen vessel to me.

That word again, there's electos, election. You're a chosen vessel to me to bear my name before Gentiles and kings.

And he said to Ananias, I will show Saul how great things he must suffer for my name's sake.

Acts 9, 15 and 16. And so Paul was chosen to this task.

And by the way, that would be very humiliating for a Hebrew of Hebrews taught at the feet of Gamaliel to now be the apostle to the

Gentiles. Right. And so I just state it this way, brother, that if you have visions of grandeur and your name being written in lights and being famous and influential and powerful, you are probably not going to be very much of use to the

Lord Jesus Christ, because here's the thing. He calls you to be a slave and he gives you your marching orders in his word and there to be followed without departure.

You know, that reminded me when you mentioned that the apostle

Paul, Hebrew of Hebrews, was the apostle to the

Gentiles. Doesn't that doesn't that refute a commonly held belief not only amongst

Armenians, but reformed people who are perhaps unconsciously adopting an

Armenian mindset where they think that in order to effectively and successfully evangelize the lost, we have to somehow imitate their culture, their ethnic background.

In other words, if it's a black community, we've got to send a black brother. If it's a community that is upper crust wealthy, we've got to get somebody who's a wealthy business owner, corporate executive out there.

If it's a poor community, you've got to get a poor person. You know, we could go on and on and on with that kind of mindset.

But the apostle Paul was not at all from the culture or mindset of his audience that he was chosen by God to primarily proclaim the good news to.

Am I making sense? Truth is cross cultural, brother. Amen. Now, we understand that sometimes language barriers would would require somebody speaking the same language.

But other than that, we don't need to. Absolutely. You know, get an identical replica of the audience.

That's exactly right, brother. And, you know, truth is truth.

And we say we believe in the inspiration of Scripture.

We say we believe in the inerrancy of Scripture. But what about the sufficiency of Scripture? Do we really believe,

Romans 116, that the gospel is the power of God unto salvation? And if we do, what we believe determines how we behave.

We're not going to have to, you know, market and brand niche ourselves to a certain market.

Brother, we just preach the word in season and out of season. And by the way, if I could, this dovetails with my third point.

Is that OK? Oh, sure. And here's my third thing God chose.

God elected us. God chose us, brother, unto godliness.

Amen. That's the last part of verse 1. He said this. I'm a servant of God, an apostle of Jesus Christ, according to the faith of God's elect, to the acknowledging of the truth, which is after or unto or which brings about godliness.

And this is another thing that deeply troubles me, brother. The evidence of election is justification.

The evidence of justification is sanctification. And the evidence of sanctification, one may dig, be glorification.

Everybody wants to talk about election. But I say this respectfully, brother, but maybe it's an aberrant group.

I don't know. But it seems to be growing to me that this whole error that Paul had to deal with in Rome, it just sticks its ugly head up again and again and again in every generation.

And that is, well, since I'm saved by grace, it doesn't matter how I live. Since I'm saved by grace,

I can be grungy and smutty and I can have foul language and I can be inappropriate and risque and tell dirty jokes and even use foul language.

It's all common practices by preachers in the pulpit nowadays. And Paul said, no, your election is unto godliness.

And brother, everyone whom God justified, that golden chain of redemption in Romans chapter eight, he foreknew us and predestined us to be conformed to the image of Jesus.

And so if whatever you have, whatever you say you believe is not conforming you into the image of Jesus, it's not producing godliness.

Be holy as I am holy, says the Lord. Man, you need to go back and take a hard look at it because election is unto godliness.

God, look, God not only chose us to be saved, brother, he chose us to be godly.

You can't separate those things. Yeah. And there's a serious... How much more for a pastor?

How much more for a pastor, brother Chris? Oh, yeah. That's why we have the qualifications come next in Titus 1, 5 through 9.

And those are not suggestions, those are qualifications. We are to be above reproach.

The pastor should be the holiest man in town. I mean, he should live closer to Christ than anyone.

In fact, could you pick up on being above reproach when we return from our midway break?

Because we've got to enter into our midway commercial break now. And don't forget where we need to pick up where we left off.

And folks, please be patient with us because the midway break is always a bit longer than the other breaks in the show because Grace Life Radio, 90 .1

FM in Lake City, Florida requires of us a longer break in the middle of our show because the FCC requires of them to localize this program geographically to Lake City, Florida where Grace Life Radio is located.

They do so with their own public service announcements. And those announcements are only aired on Grace Life Radio.

We, on the other hand, simultaneously air our globally heard commercials. Please use this time wisely.

Write down as much of the contact information as you can for as many of our advertisers as you can so that you can more frequently and successfully contact our advertisers.

And when you can't use money, when you can't buy what they're selling, when you can't use their services that they're offering, when you can't visit their churches, there's one thing that every single

Iron Trump and Zion Radio listener can do if you really love the show. Simply contact our advertisers and say, thank you so much for sponsoring

Iron Trump and Zion Radio. That in and of itself should go a long way to convince our advertisers that their money is being well spent.

So please, at the very least, say thank you to our advertisers because we absolutely positively depend on our advertisers to exist because of the funding they provide.

And also send in your questions to Pastor Jono Sims, to ChrisArnzen at gmail .com.

That's C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com.

As always, give us your first name at least, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence. We'll be right back.

Please do not go away. Have you noticed the gap that exists between the

Sunday morning sermon and the Sunday school classroom or the small group study? So often we experience great preaching from the pulpit, but when it comes time to study

God's word in those smaller settings, well, let's be honest, it leaves a lot to be desired.

It seems like it is nearly impossible to find good curriculum out there today that is true to the word of God and is built upon sound doctrine.

Much less it's hard to find curriculum that will actually teach people how to study the Bible. Hi there.

My name is Jordan Tew, and I am the executive director of the Baptist Publishing House. Our ministry is dedicated to providing local churches with sound

Bible study resources. Our quarterly curriculum is titled the Baptist Expositor.

And for good reason, we are Baptist and we exegete the scriptures. If you want to have a curriculum that teaches your people how to study the word of God, I invite you go to our website, download a free study, baptistpublishinghouse .com.

May God bless you. Puritan Reformed is a Bible -believing, kingdom -building, devil -fighting church.

We are devoted to upholding the apostolic doctrine and practice preserved in Scripture alone.

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For details on Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming, Georgia, visit heritagepresbyterianchurch .com

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Power of Jesus' Name This is

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Our congregation is one of a growing number of churches who love and support Iron Sharpens Iron Radio financially.

Grace Church at Franklin is an independent, autonomous body of believers which strives to clearly declare the whole counsel of God as revealed in Scripture through the person and work of our

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Charles Haddon Spurgeon once said, Give yourself unto reading. The man who never reads will never be read.

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Iron Sherpa and Zion Radio. Before I return to my guest, Jono Sims, I just have a couple of very important announcements to make.

If you love the show, folks, and you don't want it to disappear from the airwaves, I'm urging you, please go to IronSherpaandZionRadio .com,

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So send me an email to ChrisArnzen at gmail .com and put advertising in the subject line. Always remember, folks, when you are donating to Iron Sherpa and Zion Radio, I never want anybody in my audience cutting into the finances that you have set aside for Lord's Day giving to your own local church where you're a member.

In other words, never give your own church where you're a member less money than you normally give your church in order to bless us with a financial gift.

Never do that. Also, if you're really struggling to survive and make ends meet, please wait until you're back on your feet and more financially stable before you send us a financial gift.

The Bible is very clear that the two most primary ways we are to use the finances with which he has blessed us are to support our church and our family.

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And that may be you, too, if you are without a solid church home. Send me that email to chrisarnson at gmail .com and put

I need a church in the subject line. That's also the email address where you can send in a question to my guest, Jono Sims.

And that is chrisarnson at gmail .com. And we would ask of you to give us your first name, at least your city and state and your country of residence.

We do have a listener question for you, Pastor Jono. Before we go on to what you have to say for us and before we continue where you left off before the break, we have

Frederica in La Verne. I'm hoping I'm pronouncing that right.

V -E -R -G -N -E Tennessee. Frederica says, I have seen

Baptist churches that have on their websites that they adhere to the

Baptist faith and message who do not appear to be theologically reformed, even though there is a section saying that they affirm the doctrine of election.

Am I correct in my assumption that even some non -Calvinistic, non -sovereign grace churches say publicly that they adhere to the

Baptist faith and message? Absolutely. She's correct. Yes.

Yes. That is weird, isn't it? Well, it is, brother.

And it's that and more is part of the reason that, you know, that we made the choice that we made to leave the

SBC. I've always said, you know, we got a great statement of faith.

We just don't believe it. And, you know, Article 5 is and there are the statement in the

Baptist faith and message on regeneration is as good a statement as I've ever read anywhere. People will hold that up and tout that they believe the

Baptist faith and message. They'll always say Baptist faith and message 2000, which is

I agree with. But don't don't do not believe the clear teaching on regeneration and election that it clearly teaches.

And so she is spot on that just because they adhere to the

Baptist faith and message, they could be far, far away from.

As a matter of fact, there's churches that believe the Baptist faith and message that absolutely hate and despise the doctrine of election.

And growing up, that was that was the majority. The churches in the

Southern Baptist Convention that have embraced the doctrines of grace and believe the doctrines of election and predestination and foreknowledge.

In my lifetime, that's fairly recent development. Basically, this this reformed resurgence kind of was spearheaded by Al Mohler and all that God has done at Southern Seminary.

But the majority of our churches, well, I say our churches, I'm no longer there.

But the majority of Southern Baptist churches would not hold to the doctrine of election as we're teaching it here.

Well, thank you, Frederica. And if you are a first time questioner, please let us know, because if so, you have won a free

New American Standard Bible. Compliments of the publishers of the NASB, nasbible .com,

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who will actually be the ones shipping that Bible out to you if you are indeed a first time questioner.

Well, I'd like you to pick up before I go to any more listener questions. I'd like you to pick up where you left off before the break. Well, the thing that you had asked me to remember, and I didn't know specifically how you wanted me to speak to it, you mentioned the word above reproach.

That's right. And the King James Version in First Timothy 3 .2

and Titus 1 .6, though they are different Greek words, they're both translated blameless.

And many translations translate them above reproach, which are both valid translations of that Greek word.

And it basically means, and, you know, we're talking about pastors. These are pastoral qualifications.

This is a pastoral epistle that the pastor should be a man.

And most commentators are going to tell you, you know, this is your reputation in the community.

He should be a man. One author I read said that he's a man that can't be arrested and held because there's no charges that will stick against him.

It's a courtroom scene. It's legal terminology where the charges have to be dropped because there's no validity to them.

So the meaning is that this is a brother, a pastor is a man, as Paul told

Titus, your election is producing godliness. He's a holy brother.

Now, we don't believe in sinless perfection, brother. That's a heresy on the other side.

But we do believe that sanctification is progressing, and we're more and more and more taking on the likeness of Christ, you know.

And so that's a part of our election is we're elected unto godliness.

Amen. And why don't you move on to the next thing that God sovereignly chose for pastors of local churches?

Well, God sovereignly chose number four to give us the hope of eternal life. Amen. Verse two says, in hope of eternal life, which

God that cannot lie promised before the world began. And, you know, this is dear to me, brother, because you can call it the perseverance of the saints.

You can call it eternal security. In Baptist life, we dumbed it down a little bit when

I was growing up. They said once saved, always saved. And that may not be the best way to state it properly understood.

I believe that. But this is the thing that grieves me, especially in Baptist life. And this is probably what

Frederica was talking about. People in Baptist churches don't understand, brother, that the doctrine of eternal security grows out of the doctrine of election.

Without the doctrine of election, there is no hope of eternal life.

Amen. Paul said, I'm persuaded that and this is at the end of that grand section on election.

He said, I'm persuaded that neither death or life or angels or principalities or powers, nothing present, nothing to come, no height or depth or any other creature.

She'll be able to separate us from the love of God in Jesus Christ, our Lord. And that comes after four new predestined, called, justified, glorified.

And so the entire doctrine of preservation, perseverance, eternal security is the doctrine of election.

And so God has chosen that our hope of eternal life be rooted and grounded, brother, in the doctrine of election.

Without the doctrine of election, you have no eternal security. Amen. And when you deny the doctrine of unconditional election and you deny the doctrine of perseverance and preservation of the saints, but yet still believe in eternal security.

All kinds of heresies make themselves manifest, like easy believism and cheap grace, where even in life and likes living a wicked, sinful life and thinking you're going to have heaven when you die.

Exactly. And a hero to many. The late Charles Stanley, in his book on eternal security, made it clear that he believed that a truly regenerate born again person could immediately after their rebirth, abandon the faith and live the rest of their lives apart from God.

And they would still go to heaven, which is amazing that anybody who could know the

Bible as well as he did could come up with that kind of heresy. Well, and you know, the father ate grapes and the children's teeth were set on edge because Andy took that much farther than Charles did.

Yes, you're right. And, you know, what Charles might have done in moderation,

Andy has done in excess. Oh, yeah. And now look at his ministry, brother. It's completely unhinged from the

Bible. And so you're right.

That's the problem that you get. And by the way, this is exactly what

Paul dealt with in Rome. This is what he was dealing with.

And so we need to understand that a brother growing up.

And I know you and I talked about this the last time I was on. And I don't mean to get us off course here, but I heard the king of all

Armenians, Church of Christ, get into debates with Baptists over once saved, always saved.

And the Church of Christ would rip their heads off. And it's because Baptists, when

I was growing up, they tried to argue once saved, always saved. They would state it, but they didn't have any clue what it was based on.

I just believe it. And sadly, a Church of Christ has a better systematic theology than that, and they'll obliterate you if you don't understand where we get this doctrine from.

And it grows exclusively from the doctrine of election.

Amen and hallelujah. I'll take one more question before we move on to the next thing that God sovereignly chose for the pastors of his local church.

We have Bo, B -E -A -U, in West Helena, Arkansas.

And Bo says, I am one who firmly disagrees with the way some denominations make a huge gap with a clergy hierarchy and the average congregant.

But at the same time, are not elders called to a much higher standard, and even deacons for that matter?

100 percent, Bo. And deacons are called to this exact same standard.

The qualifications for elders and deacons are almost identical. And I want to go one step further.

I've always believed this. And brother, you know, when you're I introduced the book of Titus Sunday morning and I'm in one, one through four, and I'll finish those verses this coming

Sunday. You read, read, read, study, study, study. And I've read, though my eyes are blurry, which

I believe is what an expositor does. And brother, of the men that I read, there was concurrence across the board that above reproach means above reproach.

And I would say this. Now, certainly, I believe there's some pastors are sinners and in need of the grace that they preach.

I don't deny that. And certainly there are some sins that a pastor can commit that he could be restored from.

But scandalous sins, brother, sins that bring reproach on the name of Christ and sins to such a degree that it obviously proves he's not above reproach and can't be trusted.

I don't believe that brother can be restored to the gospel ministry again. And I think it's brings shame and reproach on the name of Jesus.

When a pastor is in obvious scandalous scene and obvious the type scene that causes you to lose confidence in his leadership and churches like both said, we'll do some little superficial measures.

But as quick as they can, they get him back in the pulpit. There's no way I would sit under that man. There's no way

I would put my family under his teaching and ministry again. And so I do believe that there are ministry ending sins.

And while that pastor may be able to be forgiven and cleansed of his sin by God and even restored to full, even restored to full membership without being restored to the role.

Absolutely, brother. He can be restored to the membership, but not

I don't believe that he can be restored to above reproach again. And, you know,

I agree with Bo completely on that. And obviously, a man, a fallen pastor who has committed a scandalous sin, who is pushing to be immediately restored into his office.

That's a sign that he doesn't belong there also, because it goes back to our first thing,

Paul, the slave of Jesus Christ. And, brother, that's the thing. If you've been regenerated and humbled and broken by the regenerating power of the

Holy Spirit, you don't demand your rights. You had rather humbly you'd rather humbly step aside than do anything to cause one of these little ones to go astray.

And, brother, we have a saying around here at our church, among our pastors and deacons. And it goes like this.

Each one of us agree that we will voluntarily step aside should we become disqualified.

The church won't have to vote on it. We're not going to have to have trauma brought on the body.

Brother, if you're not qualified, you just get out. You step out of the way and you you go work on your heart before the

Lord, but you don't drag the church through it. Amen. And there is a misconception, a very false and dangerous understanding that God needs certain people.

He like a man, the man who's been in the ministry, who maybe grew a church through his gifts from five people to 5000 people.

And maybe he's even written dozens of books. And maybe he's got over a million followers on YouTube and we could go on and on and on.

But that doesn't mean God needs him. And if he's fallen in an unrepairable way, as far as being qualified for the ministry, that is,

God does not need him. Nobody is bigger than Titus 1 and nobody's bigger than 1

Timothy 3. Those qualifications, let me say two things about them. They must be met in order for a man to be a pastor and they must be maintained.

They have to be met and they have to be maintained in order for a man to be a shepherd in God's church.

Amen. Well, let's move on to the next thing that God sovereignly chose for the pastors of his local church.

Well, verse 2 says God sovereignly chose us. This was a promise before the world began. That's when our election took place.

That's Ephesians chapter 1. You know, Paul makes that very clear to the church at Ephesus that we were chosen in Christ before the world began to be holy and without blame.

There it is again. Our election is unto holiness and blamelessness. You can't separate this grand thread of redemption, brother.

And that promise was before the world began. And I love Paul's illustration.

And I don't know how anybody can. You can't honestly exegete Romans 8, 9, 10, and 11 and not believe in the doctrine of election.

It's not possible. And Paul's illustration of this truth of our election before the world began.

He uses Jacob and Esau. And he says the children not even being born yet.

They've not done any good or evil that the purpose of election might stand. God said the elder will serve the younger.

He goes on to say, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy and I will have compassion upon whom

I will have compassion. That's Romans 9, 11 through 16. And so our

God's sovereign choice of us was before the world began. But I want to say one thing, brother, just so that someone doesn't get into heresy.

Our justification was not before the world began. Our election was before the world began.

Yeah, many of the primitive Baptists fall into that heresy. I think

Timothy George calls it the heresy of what he would call eternal justification. And that would be that they back justification up to before the world began, which guts you must be born again, which guts repentance and belief and faith.

And so anyone out there listening, you need to understand that election is unto salvation and election is unto sanctification.

But there's a birth, there's a birth and a regeneration, a transformation that comes from the

Holy Spirit that where you actually become saved, you become a child of God.

But it's election that is the promise before the world began that is that that is going to be, you know.

Yes, there are serial killers on death row who blaspheme

Christ every day, but they still may be one of the elect who will come to Christ in saving faith and repentance before they die.

And that's why we fall on the cross. Yes. That's why we need to evangelize everyone, whether it is a pious pastor or a perverse prostitute, no matter who they are, we have to proclaim the gospel to them.

And as you know well, one of the great quotes from Charles Sadden Spurgeon was that even if God had painted a yellow stripe on the backs of his elect, he'd still proclaim the gospel to those without the stripe.

And Spurgeon was a champion of helping us all understand that there is an elected means.

And the elected means, the elected means is preaching the gospel, witnessing, evangelizing, doing missions.

The means that God has elected for his elect to come to saving faith in Jesus Christ is the preaching of the gospel.

By the way, that's my next promise, brother. Can I go ahead and get it? Oh, yeah, definitely. The sixth thing

God chose was preaching as the method to save his elect. Verse three says it's manifest through in his word through preaching.

That's what Paul meant when he said to the church at Corinth, I have ordained the foolishness of preaching to save those that believe.

And so, man, what we believe determines how we behave. Our theology has to drive our methodology.

And that's why I said pastors are not polished CEOs that take playbooks out of Wall Street. Brother, their men lashed to the scripture, and they understand that the way the

Holy Spirit awakens the lost is through the preaching of the word. And that's why we're commissioned and commanded preach the word in season and out of season, reprove, rebuke, exhort with long suffering and doctrine.

The thing God has ordained to awaken the dead and give them faith, which is a gift and repentance, which is a gift, is the preaching of the gospel.

This is the God ordained method and means by which

God gathers his people to himself. Amen. And just to make sure we get all eight of these things to fit in the program, why don't you move on to the seventh?

The seventh is that God alone chooses men to be pastors. And I draw that from verse four.

Paul gives a salutation, and then he says in verse four to Titus. And this is what

I love about the doctrine of election, brother. It's not some sterile, old, aloof, arbitrary thing.

Election comes all the way down to a man, an individual man named

Titus. Think about it like this. God chose Christ. God chose to send the Holy Spirit to draw

Paul. God chose to send Paul to Titus. God chose to save Titus.

God chose to send Titus to Crete. That decree of God in eternity past was personal, brother.

It came all the way down to a man named Titus. And I just can't tell you how that thrills my heart.

It made its way down to me, brother. God chose me, and that's a humbling thing.

God chose me to be saved. I'm double chosen. He chose me to be saved, and he chose me to be a preacher of his gospel, a pastor of his church.

And here's what I want to say about that. When your church splits, and you're voted on for termination, and your salary gets cut, and people accost you, and you think you're crazy, and you're losing your mind, brother, that's when you fall on the doctrine of God's sovereign choice of you.

I believe God knew me before the foundation of the world and chose me to be saved.

I believe he knew Kayla before the foundation of the world and chose her to be my wife, so I'm sticking with her.

And I believe he chose Shelbyville Mills Baptist Church as the church I'm to shepherd before the foundation of the world, so I'm not leaving her.

Do you see how this doctrine, brother, is an anchor for your soul, and it keeps you persevering even when difficulty is all around you and suffering?

I mean, this is not just some sterile doctrine we debate on apologetic forums.

Man, this doctrine is—this is what keeps our hand to the plow. Amen. We have a question from Burton in Stonington, Connecticut.

And Burton says, I am not a charismatic nor Pentecostal. I am thoroughly

Reformed in my theological view. But at the same time,

I'm wondering how we can view a calling into the pastoral ministry as not something that may somehow resemble a charismatic event where someone, through their own mind and what they are feeling in their heart, is determining that they are called of God, and of course they are using the qualifications in the

God -breathed Word. But at the same time, it is an opinion and a belief that is extra -biblical.

How do we explain this if we are cessationists? Well, I am a cessationist, as I understand that.

What I would say, brother, is that you don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. Just because charismatics and Pentecostals have latched onto some, quote, scriptural terminology, doesn't mean we have to be overreactionaries and abandon the truth of what the

Gospel teaches. And frankly, there are some mystical things, brother. There are some mystical things that we just can't fully explain.

You want to get right down to it? Regeneration is very mystical. I mean, it's the work of the

Holy Spirit, brother. There's an awakening and a quickening and faith and things going on that we don't even fully grasp, brother.

And so I'm just not intimidated because it seems like the language is the same.

It's not the same. They've hijacked some biblical terminology and twisted it and perverted it, which is always what false teachers do to fit their system.

But just because they've done that, I'm not going to allow them to rob me of the genuine language in the

Bible that talks about effectual calling, awakening. You know,

Paul and Barnabas, they fasted and prayed and said, separate on us, you know,

Paul and Barnas for the ministry. The Holy Spirit's, you know, called them to. So there is a legitimate calling.

And there are some elements of mystical things that God does that we can't completely get our arms all the way around.

My caution would be that reformed people tend to overreact and run in a hundred miles the opposite direction because they're so turned off from Pentecostal and charismatic mysticism that they end up falling into another ditch.

And that is just sterile, cold, stated, you know, just almost.

I'll be honest with you. Other than they give that they give the Holy Spirit an honorable mention in the

Trinity and other than that, he's relegated to nothing. And I don't believe that, brother.

I believe the Holy Spirit is living and vibrant and alive. I am a cessationist. I believe the sign gifts have ceased.

I don't believe in apostles. I believe in Sola Scriptura. But I can tell you this, brother.

I remember the night God awakened me and called me to salvation. It was unsettling.

And I remember the whole season I was in when he called me to preach. And, brother, it was unnerving and unsettling.

It was unnatural. And I've never experienced anything like it since then. But there was a mystical element to it that, frankly,

I'm just not apologetic for. And by the way, folks, if you want to hear Jono's testimony, he provided that in a previous interview.

If you just type in the last name S -I -M as in Michael S. Sims, that will come up if you go to the ironsharpensironradio .com

search engine. We have to go to our final break. And if you have any intention on asking a question, immediately send it to us to chrisarnsen at gmail .com

because we are rapidly running out of time. chrisarnsen at gmail .com. Don't go away. We'll be right back with Jono Sims right after these messages from our sponsors.

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Welcome back, and folks, I want to remind you that a commercial you've been hearing every day for years, the ad for the

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Daniel P. Bottafuoco, attorney at law, and so I'm asking you all, if you are the victim of a serious injury or medical malpractice, call 1 -800 -NOW -HURT, 1 -800 -NOW -HURT, or visit their website, 1 -800 -NOW -HURT .com.

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Also, please, if you are a man in ministry leadership and you desire to attend my next

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to 2 p .m. at Church of the Living Christ in Loisville, Pennsylvania. For the very first time, we have the honor of having my old friend who has been a dear friend of mine since the early 1990s,

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United States and the United Kingdom that I have selected personally. So send me that email to chrisaronson at gmail .com

and put pastor's luncheon in the subject line. We're now back with my guest Jono Sims, and if you could move on to our eighth thing that our

God has sovereignly chose for pastors of local churches. Yes, sir.

Well, the last is that God sovereignly chose the preaching of the gospel to bring grace, mercy, and peace to the church.

And that's what he says to Titus, my own son, after the common faith, grace, mercy, and peace from God our

Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ. And, brother, let me just say, after having been a pastor in the local church for 35 years now, 24 of those here,

I don't know of anything that brings grace, mercy, and peace to the church of the

Lord Jesus Christ, to the people we shepherd, than the preaching of God's sovereign grace.

Amen. I've been at four funerals in the last two weeks.

Two of them I preached. Two I attended. The two I preached were members here.

And, brother, it's such a blessing when your people repeat back to you from their heart, you know, what their hope is.

And both of these families, independent of each other, said to me when their loved one died, brother, we believe

God is sovereign and in full control here. Hallelujah. And, brother, that's the grace, grace, mercy, and peace that Paul is talking to Titus about.

And that's what our churches need, brother. And that doesn't come through clinicians, clever entrepreneurs, niche marketing the church.

Brother, that comes through faithful preaching and the pastor himself being transformed into godliness and then the preaching of the word transforming

God's people into godliness as well. And so I don't know of anything that serves to be more of a foundation in the lives of our people than the preaching of election, preaching of sovereign grace.

Amen. Well, we have time for one last question from a listener.

We have Chastain in Waynescott, Long Island, New York. And Chastain says, what do you say to a young man who seems to have all of the gifts that qualify a man to be a pastor and he is very talented and has the encouragement of many people but is discouraged by an unnamed idea or thought that continues to make him hesitate to pursue this calling that he still believes he may have but at the same time is extremely hesitant to pursue it?

What do you say to such a man? Chastain, I would say this.

You just cannot remove a healthy local church from this equation.

And the thing that breaks my heart, whoever this brother is, if he were here, if he was in our

Anchored in Truth network, there would be numerous mature brothers, you know, helping this brother discern

God's call on his life, helping him battle wrong systems of thinking, helping him discern

God's call on his life. And, you know, when a young man believes the

Lord is calling him here, man, our church springs into action and we try to help the brother and stand behind him and support him if we discern that he's qualified and that God has gifted him.

And I guess I would say if he's in a healthy church, he needs to reach out to the leadership of that church for help and for affirmation.

And if he's not, I would humbly ask Chastain to ask this brother to look up Anchored in Truth.

I believe he can find us at anchoredintruth .org and reach out to us or he can reach out to me and, brother, we'll put him in contact with some brothers that can come alongside him and help him and help him to, you know, not listen to Satan's condemnation, if that's what it is, and false systems of thinking, but to discern this thing through the lens of the

Word of God. Amen. And you are correct. That is the website anchoredintruth .org.

And I extend that invitation to any man who is either already in pastoral ministry or is considering whether or not

God has placed a call upon his life to enter into that solemn and sacred calling.

And once again, let me remind our listeners that the website for Shelbyville Mills Baptist Church in Shelbyville, Tennessee is smbconline .com

s -m -b -c -online .com And once again, the Anchored in Truth website, which also has the information about the

True Church Conference, which is being held February 15th through the 18th, 2024 in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, go to anchoredintruth .org

anchoredintruth .org Well, Jono, just as I knew you would be, you were truly an extraordinary guest as you were the last time.

I look forward to many future visits from you. And I want to remind our listeners that I want you to never forget for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far, far greater