A Reformed Defense of Cultural Transformation: A Response to Theocast Part III

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When the Scribes and Pharisees asked our Lord about the greatest commandment, He replied, You shall love the

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Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.

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So, why do we hear some of today's most prominent pastors saying things like this? It had everything to do with how we talk about the

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Bible. And specifically, or along with that, what we point to as the foundation of faith, which for most

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Christians, unfortunately, is the Bible. We need to do better.

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We need to love God with all our hearts and stand unashamedly on the rock of His Word. We need to love the

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Lord with all of our souls and respond to the worldview issues of our day with the wisdom and discernment that comes only from Him.

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We need to love the Lord with our minds and understand the calling of God's people in every area of life in God's world.

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We need to love the Lord our God with all our strength and face the work of building a life -giving, God -honouring culture.

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Join us for 10 days at the Runner Academy for Cultural Leadership as we consider how the

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Gospel influences all of life and culture and the role that we have to play in applying foundational

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Christian thinking to every area of life. Non -rockabodas must stop.

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I don't want to rock the boat. I want to sink it! Are you gonna bark all day, little doggie, or are you gonna bite?

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You're being delusional. Delusional? Yeah. Delusional is okay in your worldview. I'm an animal.

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You don't chastise chickens for being delusional. You don't chastise pigs for being delusional. So you calling me delusional using your worldview is perfectly okay.

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It doesn't really hurt. Is he hung up on me? Yes! What? What? Desperate times call for faithful men and not for careful men.

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The careful men come later and write the biographies of the faithful men, lauding them for their courage.

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Go into all the world and make disciples. Not go into the world and make buddies. Not to make brosives. Right. Don't go into the world and make homies.

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Right. Disciples. I got a bit of a jiggle neck. That's a joke,

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Pastor. When we have the real message of truth, we cannot let somebody say they're speaking truth when they're not.

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Take an amazing journey so you will never be the same again.

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And he who was seated on the throne said, Behold, I am making all things new.

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Not all new things. Excellent choice. Thank you. Also he said, write this down for these words are trustworthy and true.

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And he said to me, It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega. Omega, not the mega. The beginning and the end.

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To the Thursday I will give from the spring of water of life. Without payment. I didn't do a good job of timing that.

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That's from Revelation. It was like, where'd a beat go? It just cut out. Revelation, singular. Yeah, not

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Revelations. Five through six. Revelations. You can tell where you went to church. You can tell what theological tradition you might have spent some time in in your youth.

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If you say Baptist. Baptist without the P. Baptist or Revelations.

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There's a D in there too. I think you added a D in there. That's it. Baptist. Oh, good times.

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Good times. Oh, man. Yes, we are. Reform Baptist. Yes. Yes. Give me the shirt.

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I need a shirt. Reform of big letters. Baptist. Sorry. What's up, everybody?

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Welcome to another episode of Apologia Radio. This is Luke the Bear hosting once again. Pastor Jeff will be back this week and in the seat again next week.

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In the saddle. For next week's episode. We'll be back in the saddle. Back in the saddle. Baptist saddle.

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But yeah, here we are. Holding it down. We are holding it down. We actually, this is pre -recorded if you're watching this live.

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Oh, way to break that fourth wall. I'm telling people because they were literally in the comment section saying, why aren't they answering my questions?

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He's ignoring me. That's why. So we're actually squeezing this episode in at a different time than normal.

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And I'm feeling silly today. So it's going to be fun. So yes, thank you everyone for tuning in.

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We have been going through several podcasts from our brothers at Theocast, Justin and John.

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Several pods. Several pods as they call them. And so we're going to be doing the third one today.

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So this will probably be the last one in this series unless they drop some more podcast pods that we need to reform to.

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Respond to. See, I use the word respond so many times last week. It's carryover. Responded out like I can't.

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It's not my vocabulary any further. Yeah. So this week they did a show called, forgive me, the misplaced zeal of cultural transformation.

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Yeah. They've had maybe a couple episodes since then. I think. Yeah, they look at their channel. I actually,

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I don't. Yeah, they did do a couple. I haven't seen them though, but I don't think they were related to this, were they?

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No, no, the different topics. So this is kind of, I mean, if people are wondering, you know, you spent a couple of weeks on this addressing some of the concerns of this, what we would identify as more of a novel approach to theology.

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Yeah. Of course of church history. What's the big deal? Well, the deal is big because this has implications for culture, which we'll be using that word a lot today.

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Yes, we will. And how Christians are to interact with the world around us.

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And what the work and the calling and the status and the position and the witness of the

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Christian church entail and what our Christians, you know, really called to be engaging in.

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Because, you know, there is clearly a divergence in perspective that we would have with these brothers.

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But, you know, and they draw necessary conclusions from their perspective.

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And so I'm going to feel free to do the same today in regards to their theology and where we believe it ultimately leads.

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So hopefully we can do that with charity. Amen. Again, they have been very gracious in their show.

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So thank you brothers for that. And hopefully we're doing the same and responding. So, yeah, we'll get into that here in a second.

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I will say that this, this episode of theirs isn't at least

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I feel like they weren't. And like trying to pile onto the conversation, like it addresses more than just our position because, you know, we've done some recent shows with responding to G3 and this whole like Christian nationalism and stuff.

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So I think this is kind of like their response to that. So again, right off the bat, if you didn't see those episodes, we are not ascribing to any cultural or any

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Christian nationalistic. Nationalism. We're not, we're not adopting that position in that term.

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So I think the show, again, is kind of a response to that, but there's plenty to talk about and you won't.

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So we'll, we'll do that. But before I get into that, thank you. I just want to thank everyone again for their support.

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And especially with an abortion now, which Zach is our direct director of communications for.

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And as a reminder, I mentioned this last week, we do have ReformCon 2024 coming soon in 2024.

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Well, at least once more. We'll have a date coming soon. We're working on that. We are partnering with the

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Ezra Institute, which we're very, very excited about. So be watching for that. We're hoping to make that a yearly event.

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That's like a match made in heaven right there. I mean, I mean, I know we're praying thy kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven, but that's a match made in heaven that we're looking to bring the blessings of to earth.

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So, yes. Yeah. When we, I'll give you guys a little insider story here. When I think it was before, it's either right before or right after Joe boot spoke at ReformCon this last year in 22, we were in the green room backstage and he just was like,

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Hey, I'd like to talk to you and Jeff. We'd like to partner with you with ReformCon moving forward.

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And I was like, yes, yes. Yes. And amen. Before you say anything else.

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Yes. Affirmative. Love those guys.

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Anyways. All right. Is there anything, any announcements or anything you have? Like we mentioned, you're kind of in the, in the dole.

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There's a time right now. I mean, there's a work in the event or, you know, an event in the work,

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I should say, that deals with one of those out there. Yeah. A little list of events. When it comes to the movements for, you know, abortion abolition and all of that, that'll be happening in the next month or so.

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And hopefully that will be a gathering of brothers that are dedicated to the same goal, ending abortion, providing equal protection of the law for all human beings from the moment of fertilization.

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That's what we're all fiercely committed to. However, within that, there is a different number of perspectives on the, how we get there and the methods that we employ to reach our goal.

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And so there's a conversation and a conference and a little bit of a rally.

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That's pretty important to our movement coming up next month in July, kind of mid month there that we'll update you guys more about with details as we get them, but pray for that and pray that it would be a moment of clarity for our movement as a whole.

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I think the abolitionist movement has made such tremendous strides since the mid 2000s, the 2010s and such.

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And obviously with bills of equal protection going in all over the country now to 15

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States from where this whole thing started from, from our perspective, it's jarring how much

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God has accomplished in such a short amount of time, you know, reforming the minds and hearts of men with the gospel around this issue and how we actually apply our engagement to the civil sphere and our manner of cultural engagement.

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And while that God has done, we're just so thrilled for, but this is, this is really, I think will be a good moment of clarity and helpfulness for the church at large.

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And for people that are fiercely committed to Christ as Lordship over every area of life.

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And in particular this issue, how do we have consistency and thought and application as to the type of practice and as to the type of, in particular types of laws that we support that will actually do justice for our neighbors.

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So hope that you will be available to tune in for that event. It's going to involve, of course end abortion now and other like -minded groups like us.

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And so it should be a good time and it should be helpful for the church. I pray. Yeah.

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No, I'm glad you mentioned that. We will be announcing that once we have things finalized, hopefully this week.

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But, you know, trying to not get ahead of myself here, but you brought up a good point, just this and cultural involvement.

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And we'll probably get into this when we get into their pod, their podcasts. But, you know,

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I feel like from our perspective, our position, we have an objective standard to do so.

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Yeah. You know what I mean? And we talked a little bit about this last couple of weeks, but I feel like when we get involved in the culture, especially in the legislation and stuff like that, action for life, take action for life .org.

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Shameless plug. We have an objective standard to do so. And we have God, God's direction through his word and how to do so.

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I'm concerned that these brothers don't, cause they they'll say, Hey, you know, we should get involved. But the, the, the question

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I ask is why and by what standard. So anyways,

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I just wanted to throw that out there. And I was thinking about this morning again, I don't want to get too ahead of myself here, but I was thinking about it on the way in.

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And I really feel like it's just a matter of being a good, a good steward, right.

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Of what God's given us so that he's sovereignly placed us in this time, in this point in history, the culture that we have, the civil magistrates that we have, all that, like that's

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God's sovereign orchestration over our lives. And he's given that to us.

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Right. And I believe as good stewards, it's our responsibility to, to take dominion over those things, going back to the garden, you know, which they would disagree with.

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But I feel like if we just say, no, we're just going to win souls to, you know, to heaven and prepare people for the age to come.

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Yeah. I feel like it's the, the steward that just buries his talents, you know, and you know, that, that was a bad story.

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He didn't, he didn't he wasn't blessed with more, you know, because he was, he was doing the opposite of what he was supposed to do.

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So I don't know. I was just thinking about that this morning. I don't know what your, it's a good point. I think that where the battle rages there, the loyalty of the soldiers proved.

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So I think it was Martin Luther that said, unless I focus my attention to where the world and the devil are at that moment, attacking and laying siege to like, what, what is a preeminent issue of our time that God has ordained that we live during this time.

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I mean, child sacrifice, the shedding of innocent blood, living in a nation as evil as ours, under the judgment of God, all the aberrant sexual perversions and all that stuff, of course, but that those are the battlefields.

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Like that's where the loyalty of the soldiers proved is not over here, where that's not even being attacked really.

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And does it have implications for worship? Absolutely. Because culture is all about worship.

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And of course we'll define that. But if you're talking about something that affects, you know, you mentioned

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Stewart, that's what Adam was meant to be. He was meant to be a steward of the throne, right?

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For God, not, not in the sense of ruling for someone that's absent, but a partner with God in this great cosmic work of taking the garden and taking the beauty there in and expanding that glory over all of creation.

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And part of his function was guarding the worship that him.

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He was priestly. He was a priest. He was to rule and to reign and to guard anything that would detract from the proper worship of God.

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And if you don't believe that abortion is an act of false worship with the proposition of a different sacrifice and a rejection of the propitiatory work of Jesus, then you don't understand the issue.

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You don't understand that people are offering up their own children as a way to have atonement as a way to make atonement, as a way to have peace, but it's a false peace that will never come because only the

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Prince of peace and truly innocent blood, not the blood of the innocent child will satisfy the wrath of God and bring hope and forgiveness and deliverance for these sin, six souls for these dead hearts that are in love with death.

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I mean, that that's the answer for the issue of abortion. It's a different son to be sacrificed on the altar than your son.

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You need to receive the son that God has appointed for you and then will your striving cease because this is false worship.

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This is worship of the creature rather than the creator who has appointed for you a once for all sacrifice so that you don't have to shed the blood of your own son or daughter.

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You can receive the forgiveness that's in Jesus and you can be restored to true worship.

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That's what it's about. And so, you know, you mentioned the role of Adam, but where is the culture attacking?

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This is false worship. We need to rush out onto the field of battle to meet them there and to plant the standard in the ground and the banner and say, here's where the, the beacon of Jesse is now let the nations rally to the standard.

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Like come fight with us, come join us because this is where the enemy is laying siege and those that stand on the word of God need to be ready to meet them.

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Amen, bro. You know, I was just thinking you reminded me of, uh, recently I got to go to the

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Ark encounter and, uh, I was, I was a little bit jealous. I know you were. I'm sorry.

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One day. Um, thank you. Lalo. If you're watching for the hookup on that, but, um, my favorite part of the

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Ark encounter was this one section where it's really cool how they do it, but you kind of go like through like, like windy, like almost like a maze.

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But like, there's like, it starts off with like what they think the garden looked like just as beautiful painting, you know, and all of that.

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And then it like takes you through like history through the Bible, like the fall of man.

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And then like, it gets progressively worse and worse and worse. And then they have like these little miniature, they're like little miniature people and like these scenes set up.

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Right. And so like, there's one that's just straight debauchery, like just all kinds of rampant sexual stuff going on.

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and then the next one is, and I sent a picture, I don't remember or not, but it's this miniature model of someone offering up their, their child to this ball.

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Yeah. And, uh, it's powerful, man. I was like, like, yeah, like it hit hard when you actually like see that, you know, um, and it was worse as worship, dude.

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And then like, right after that, it's here's the flood, but it's crazy. Like that was like, it got to that point with, um, with the world, with, with the culture.

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Um, and then God wept it out. So anyways, I was just thinking of that. It was my favorite part, but, um, we, we haven't even started this yet, so I'm going to go ahead.

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Let's do it. We're going to be starting at around three minutes. Um, again, the misplaced seal of cultural transformation.

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And here we go. So last week's pod, we talked about the fact that so much of the conversation around the end of time and the return of Jesus is fear -based and fear -driven and how the new

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Testament actually presents a different perspective on the return of Jesus in particular, that when

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Christ returns, that's going to be the realization of our hope, right? So Christ coming back is a hopeful thing for the believer.

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And in fact, the certainty of his return and the certainty of our salvation in him when he returns motivates us to action now.

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So that was last week's pod and we refer you to it. Today's conversation is related. We're kind of considering eschatology again, the end of all things, the last things, the end times, that whole arena.

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That's right. And in a sense are considering kind of an opposite error. If there is this super fear -driven kind of man, like everything's bad, like any thought of the end times, all that governs that conversation is we should be afraid.

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And that's our motivation. Then today we're talking about an opposite kind of perspective that effectively says that through our faithfulness and through our diligence and our working, we are going to transform this world.

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And there will be a kind of golden age ushered in where the nations more or less are

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Christianized. And the world is just a much, much better place than perhaps it's ever been.

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And that will occur through the ministry and the work of the church and the ministry and the work of Christians. And then at the end of all of that,

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Christ will return. So in one sense, we're talking today about a particular flavor of post -millennial eschatology, meaning

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Jesus will come back at the end of the millennium. But this is a very hyper -optimistic perspective.

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So this is not necessarily the post -millennialism that's existed through history. It's a very popular perspective these days, this hyper -optimistic post -mill view.

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It often comes packaged with Christian reconstructionism, where we're going to reconstruct, rebuild

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Christendom, where we're going to build a Christian society. And sometimes it comes packaged with theonomy, which we've done a couple of pods on recently.

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We would refer you to those. Sometimes it comes packaged even with Christian nationalism, though we want to be fair to people that hold these particular views.

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So I'm not saying that that's always the case or necessarily even the case, but this has a lot of implications.

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Why do we care about this? I'm assuming that they're talking about this fear -based eschatology.

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I'm assuming they're referring to pre -mill dispensationalism. I would say so. And they're saying that we're on the opposite spectrum and that they're somewhere in the middle.

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I'm guessing that's the point they were trying to make. I would say so. I mean, two quick points.

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We believe that this is something God is doing. Yeah. And we believe that his people are the means by which he accomplishes that.

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Yes. The ones indwelt by his spirit, bearing the word of his authority, having his name upon them, are the ones empowered by God to bring all of this about.

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Now that is humbling. It is deep and grand in its scope and comprehensive, such is the nature of what we believe the

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Great Commission to say. But that is, of course, something that God is doing. He's doing it by his power.

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And he has means by which he brings that about to accomplish it. As to the dispensational piece, which they have identified as an alternate error as to how they're defining these things and putting them together, we would say that while the, you know,

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Pop Disbee, Tim LaHaye, Jerry B. Jenkins, fundamentalist error is culturally retreatist and pietistic and escapist, and it's outworking.

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I would also say that the perspective of Two Kingdom theology, the way that it has been articulated by, you know, the

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David Van Drunen, who is said to be the gold standard. For whom they had on. So I'm going to assume that they share his perspective because they speak highly of him.

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If you examine the implications of what this is, essentially it is also inherently escapist and retreatist, and it does leave an escape hatch for the church from engagement with the culture, because the culture is part of this common order that is ultimately going to pass away.

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And so while they would believe that we should do everything that we can as individual Christians to have influence on it, where God has called us to minister, they do not believe or hold that the church in any institutional sense is called to engage this together as the people of God.

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They don't believe that that's the calling of the church in any way to affect that meaningful change.

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And so we talked about this last week, the discrepancy between Christianity and churchy entity, right?

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Life in the institutional church and, and pietism and emphasis on personal holiness and reforming the church, administering the sacraments, employing, you know, performing church discipline.

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That's their focus is the institutional church proper being reformed.

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And so while I would distinguish their theology from dispensationalism, it is a distinction, but that doesn't mean that they are not also a retreatist and an escapist.

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And what this is, this perspective is essentially, you know, David Van Druden was a student at Loyola.

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You know, he was influenced by you know, Roman Catholic scholastic nature, grace, dualism.

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He was influenced by Aquinas, I believe. And that framework produces certain results because the redemptive kingdom never touches the common order.

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They run parallel to each other, but you cannot bring special revelation to bear upon the common order and hold it to the same standard that you hold the people of God to.

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That is their position. And so there are implications to that type of belief.

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And one of them is a lack of cultural engagement in the sense that we mean it. yeah, that's an excellent point.

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And there will probably get, this will probably come up a bunch, but this, this idea of like the church ushering in Christ's kingdom, like we're not even, we're not even starting from the same point as the, like we have a different starting point and they, and I don't remember what points

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I'm going to go ahead and mention. Now we, we may address this, which by the way, we're just going to get as far as we can in this episode.

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But they mentioned like the NAR, the seven mountain mandate, like that's what that is.

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Like that position is, they would say that we have to this, there's seven mountains in the culture that we have to conquer.

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And when those seven mountains are conquered, then we will usher in Christ's kingdom. That's literally the reverse 180 direct opposite of what we're saying.

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We're saying Christ is currently ruling, reigning in heaven. We're in his kingdom as a spiritual kingdom.

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He brought it, he brought it already. We're in it. And like you said, I love how you said it. Like we, as a church are those tools that he uses to expand and grow his kingdom.

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So the idea that like we, as a church, you know, we have to do all these things for Christ's kingdom to come.

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We're saying, no, no, no, no, no, his kingdom is already here. We're just being faithful. That's our job. And our duty as Christians is to be faithful and all of life,

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Christ is Lord over all things. And that encompasses all of life. Like we're to be faithful in everything that we do.

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And when we do that, Christ's kingdom grows and expands, like that's where we're coming from. And so I just want to mention that from the outset because it's going to be mentioned a lot.

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And that's, we would actually reject that thought. Yeah, there's no secular sacred divide in our theology the way that there would be here.

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A more accurate way to put it is, I mean, it's either sacred and profane in scripture.

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Those are the two things that God gives us is that it's all to be restored to God, everything touched by the fall, everything that's been touched by the effects of sin.

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So for these gentlemen, for these brothers, the line of history runs down through history and it poses this separation, this duality in thinking, right?

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It's a philosophical perspective that has the reformed confessionalism kind of scraped over it.

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The language is different, but it's essentially Greek dualism, I believe.

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I agree. Popularized into not just Roman Catholic theology, but now it has the reformed confessional veneer upon it because that's what it produces.

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And so where the Bible draws the line right down through the heart of man, right? Either being in the kingdom of light or the kingdom of darkness, the kingdom of God or the kingdom of Satan.

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Those are the two kingdoms that were given in the Bible. The line for them doesn't run through the heart of man as God's creature in religious relationship to him, either a covenant breaker or a covenant keeper, subject to God's law in terms of its blessings and its curses, they do not share that perspective.

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So that's why I just, I think it's helpful to flesh this out a little bit because they don't share that perspective.

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The line is drawn in a different place. Whereas we would say scripture speaks to the reality of man's heart in relationship to God.

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And he is always responding to God, no matter what, no matter where he is, he can't help but be what

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God has made him to be. He is a creature in relationship to God and he will always act either in obedience to God or in disobedience and defiance and rebellion against his law.

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There's no third option, right? There's no neutral sphere is what we would be saying.

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Yeah, and also real quick, I mean this idea that they kind of claim that our view of post -millennialism is like a new fad.

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I forget how they describe it, but like some kind of like ultra optimistic like position or whatever.

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You know, and they're like, well, that's not the historical. It's like, well, I would argue with that. I would disagree with that.

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I would say that we do hold the historical post -millennial view. Now, I would say through much of history, it was post -mill or a mill kind of a lot of the church.

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The dispensationalism pre -mill, that's the new fad really that we're reaping the benefits of now.

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You know, in the late 18th century, early 19th century, the two great wars didn't help with that.

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But yeah, I would argue with that and say, no, I think that we actually do hold a historical position.

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And I would say that this nation wouldn't exist if it wasn't for Christians that hold to that position.

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And I'll use an example. One of my favorite stories that I like to tell, and I'm gonna talk about beer so I might already offend people, apologies.

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You've been to Ireland. You've been in the Guinness storehouse. Arthur Guinness was a

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Christian. Guess what? He was post -millennial. He invented Guinness for the people so they had something safe to drink because the water was awful.

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And because they were raging, ragingly enslaved to hard liquor and alcohol. Also, no, you're right.

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Yeah, it was to help them not be addicts. And when you go to the

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Guinness storehouse, we have a video of this, Jeff did it. Like you go up and there's a 10 ,000 year lease he signed for the property, 10 ,000 years.

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It's in the floor. You can stand over it and look at it. That's a historical post -millennial view and that was in the 1700s.

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So like, yeah, anyways. That's, it's a good point regarding the type of reformed

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Calvinism that we hold to. I mean, we're talking about Calvin in Geneva.

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We're talking about John Knox in Scotland. We're talking about the Puritans of England and then by extension, the

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Puritans in America, the city on a hill theology that they adopted. There wasn't for them,

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I do not believe, this bifurcation of reality into two kingdoms, the way that it's articulated by these brothers here.

32:44

I don't believe that you can make that case. Agreed. Okay, we'll keep going here. We care about this and we're gonna get into this, especially in the second half of the pod.

32:54

Why do we care so much about this conversation? Well, we're convinced that the mission of the church and the clarity of the gospel are at stake.

33:03

And yeah, these errors can produce a lot of fallout for individual believers and for churches as institutions as well.

33:12

So we think - Just real quick. I'm not new. Like we actually addressed this last week, this idea that we're, you know, obscuring the gospel or not having a clear gospel.

33:23

Like we reject that wholeheartedly. And again, I would challenge these brothers to listen to what we're saying because everything we do starts with the gospel.

33:31

But did you wanna add anything or? I don't think so. Yeah, again, you can watch last week's episode if you want more on that. I think it's a worthwhile conversation.

33:39

So let's begin, John, by talking a little bit more, maybe in depth about this view of a golden age to come and even this hyper -optimism and why for us it doesn't hold biblically because we don't think it does, just laying our cards out on the table.

33:54

Yeah, you know, we've kind of added an element to the theocast. We've been really emphasizing resting in Christ, which is to clarify the gospel part without the clarity of the gospel, it removes the rest of Christ.

34:06

And then after that, I think believers can slip back into a lack of joy and really pietism when we don't understand the purpose of the kingdom, right?

34:17

We're now focusing on the wrong thing. Yeah, I would say some of the issues with this, you know, someone asked me the other day, are you an optimistic all -millennialist?

34:29

And I said, you're gonna have to clarify what you mean by that. Do you wanna explain what all -millennialism is real quick? Not really. It's a different part for a different topic.

34:40

It's that we don't understand. So we are redemptive historical guys. We understand that prophecy works in certain ways in scripture.

34:50

We uphold typology, how, you know, basically the way that revelation works. We do not understand that there is a literal thousand years, but that the millennium, like the age of the

35:02

Messiah is inaugurated with his first coming and he will come back at the end of history and our redemption will be consummated.

35:10

Okay, so. There's some, how would you say it?

35:18

Some needles to thread here, but I don't wanna get lost in the weeds.

35:26

We would be of the perspective, and I'm not jealous for the term post -millennial. I'm not jealous for that.

35:32

If by post -millennial you mean that Jesus brought the kingdom of God on time and as planned and that God's historical process for the world culminates in Jesus and has an effective outworking through the work of the church in partnership co -laboring with Christ as his co -heirs until the redemption, reconciliation, and restoration of all things in him take place gradually, then sure,

35:58

I'm a post -millennialist. I believe that the kingdom is a present reality. I believe that when

36:05

Jesus said, if I cast out demons by the spirit of God, then the kingdom has come upon you.

36:11

I believe that he did bring it when the king came, so did the rule of God. In that ultimate sense, there was a sense in which

36:19

Christ went through, of course, his earthly mission, accomplished his perfect work, and then was declared to be the son of God in power by the spirit of holiness in his resurrection.

36:32

And that resurrection, the subsequent ascension of our Lord, and then the enthronement at the right hand of the father, all of that was to inaugurate this new age that has broken into, it did break into that present moment in history.

36:47

And now all of history is flowing towards this glorious conclusion amidst suffering, tribulation, persecution, hardship, and the pattern that we see all the way back to Genesis of death and resurrection.

37:03

This is the way that these things work. They mentioned typology. You wanna talk about typology, death and resurrection.

37:09

Adam was put to sleep. And then when he woke up, he was reconstituted. He had a help meet that was suitable for him to help him realize the mission.

37:18

And so for the last Adam, the last Adam also has a help meet. It's the Christian church taken from his body, brought to him to partner with him as a help meet in the expansion of the rule of God in all the world.

37:32

So that's what I would mean when I would say I'm a post -millennial is I maintain that conviction.

37:38

Yeah, and so Zach and I were talking about this before we started the show. I would like to ask these brothers, because I'll be honest,

37:45

I'm confused by their understanding of the kingdom and our millennialism. That was a good definition of omnil right there.

37:55

Yeah, I wouldn't dispute even that much with it. I feel like the way they argue for their position, they argue like a dispensational premill.

38:04

It's like, because they're gonna talk a lot about this, like the end of Christ's kingdom is at hand.

38:11

The verses they use too. Yeah, like they use a lot of those same verses, which we're gonna talk about, hopefully we get to it.

38:16

But it's like they argue from that position like Christ is gonna return at any moment.

38:22

But they talk about, or they define omnil traditionally, but then they argue for it differently.

38:29

If that makes any sense. I'm confused. I'd wanna ask them where they're at and their understanding of things. There could be some follow -up questions there to pinpoint where they're coming from exactly.

38:39

Yeah, and so, and just even like this, they're gonna mention this a lot, this idea of ushering in this golden age.

38:47

I don't know, none of our friends talk like that. I understand,

38:53

I get, I understand what they're trying to say but none of us talk like that. This is it, this is us. Christ is ruling and reigning and he will do so until every enemy is put under his feet.

39:03

It's our job then to proclaim his lordship over all things and his kingdom will continue to grow and grow and grow until he's put all enemies under his feet, the last being death.

39:12

That's how we talk, that's what we're trying to do. Yeah, we believe he's got all authority in heaven and on earth now.

39:18

He's presently reigning, right? He's not waiting to receive a kingdom. The timeline of 1 Corinthians 15 is that he must reign until all of his enemies are put underneath his feet as a footstool, made his footstool and then he presents the kingdom, the finished product to God the father.

39:36

Look father, here it is. Here's the kingdom, complete, right, with a bow on it. Yeah, yeah, so I just don't know where this golden era language comes from.

39:46

Maybe that's just how they define our position, but. Well, some people mischaracterize the post -millennial view by saying it's all sunshine and rainbows.

39:55

Therefore, that's the golden era where no trouble is expected and things just get better and better. Yeah, yeah, and that's a great point because I think even in the last, it might've been the last episode, you know, they hadn't even mentioned like,

40:08

Christ said you won't be hated. You know, you're gonna be persecuted. And we're like, yeah, of course, because Christ's enemies are still out there.

40:16

So until his enemies are all put under his feet, yeah, we're gonna experience that and we should expect that.

40:23

But like the process of Christ's kingdom growing by using us to proclaim the gospel isn't gonna be cupcakes and rainbows.

40:33

Right. It's gonna be a challenge and there's gonna be strife. And, you know, and they mentioned this verse as well, but like Christ said that the gates of hell will not prevail against the church.

40:47

And we believe that wholeheartedly. And where our position is like, I use this illustration a lot, but like, you know,

40:56

I'll be honest, like growing up dispensational pre -mill and I hear that verse, I'm picturing like the gates of hell, like trying to knock down the door at church.

41:07

Like that. And I think you probably grew up the same way. Like that's what I'm picturing. It's like, no, no, no, no. Gates are defensive, not offensive.

41:15

Right. The church is offensive. The church is trying to knock down the gates of hell, not the other way around.

41:21

And with all respect and love and grace to these brothers, like that's what they're saying.

41:28

They're preaching this idea of like, we're not going to go knock down the gates of hell, but the church is going to prevail.

41:37

And so anyways, I'm rambling now, but we'll just keep going. Point taken. And already not yet, all those things.

41:44

It's an unfortunate title because all means none. And it's that we don't not believe in a millennium.

41:50

We do believe in a millennium. We do, we think we're living in it right now. That's right. We think it's typographical like a lot of things are.

41:58

It's metaphorical and typological. Metaphorical and typological, yeah. Which is true of like you said, many things in the

42:03

Bible. So, right. We would be historically post mill from its perspective, but a more modern day clarification.

42:11

Right. Excuse me, which is all mill. And this is why this particular individual asked me, are you an optimistic on mill?

42:16

And I said, no, I'm actually not. I'm a pessimistic on mill. I would just say I'm a realistic on mill person. Yeah. And what

42:23

I mean by pessimism is that the world does not give me anything to hope in. Right.

42:28

No, I hope in Christ, but the world, that's why there's pessimism. Or realism is a good way of saying that.

42:34

Well, maybe one thing here. If by the world, you mean the carnal lawless and unregenerate way of life that runs through all the human hearts that are under the dominion of the adversary.

42:46

Yeah, the world doesn't give me much hope either. You know, like if that's what you mean by world, yes, that old order that we were ransomed from in Christ, where we were delivered from the kingdom of darkness and brought into the kingdom of his beloved son.

43:04

So says Colossians. But if by the world doesn't give me any hope, you mean the structures, norms, things that God built into the created order.

43:15

See, here's the thing. It's this confusion between structure and direction. Structure, the good things

43:22

God put into the world, nothing is to be rejected if it is blessed by God and honored, is to be received with thankfulness, the

43:29

Bible says. So we're not to discard it. It's to be renewed and reformed.

43:37

But what dictates that is the orientation of the heart of the person.

43:46

Is the heart oriented towards God? Is the heart alive from the dead? Or is it dead in trespasses and sins?

43:51

So that's what I would say. Yeah, and I won't get into this too far because we, again, discussed this last week, but Colossians one,

44:01

Christ came to reconcile to himself all things. We've gotten to 2 Corinthians. We're given the gift, the ministry of reconciliation of the world.

44:10

I just read Revelation 21. Christ is coming to make all things new, not all new things.

44:20

And so - Which they'll get to Romans eight. Yeah, we'll get to that. And that's a key point on that. But the point of what I was saying, all

44:25

I was saying is the world doesn't give me hope. You're right. But the power of the gospel does. That's what gives me hope.

44:31

Exactly, oh yeah, absolutely. So that's where our hope is too. We agree with that. We just have, I think our output is different.

44:37

Our hope is the same. Input's the same. Output's different. And here's why.

44:43

When you read the New Testament authors, the epistles being given to the churches, not just once and not in just one area where there might have been persecution, but the other churches don't have to experience that.

44:56

You're seeing multiple churches in multiple locations where Paul or Peter or John are giving the concept that the return of Christ is preeminent.

45:07

It's near. It's right on the edge. That's how - Can we say one thing about that? Yes, and yes.

45:13

So here's the thing. The imminent return. Jesus could come back any moment, literally any moment, any second, right?

45:20

I just don't think that when Christ ascends and he tells his followers to go disciple the nations and baptize them and teach them everything that he's commanded,

45:31

I don't think that that teaching, that honestly has been popularized by dispensational premillennialism and fundamentalism, aligns with the scope of the

45:44

Great Commission. The Great Commission is tremendously expansive and global.

45:52

And it's massive in its implications. And so that would have needed to be true 15 minutes after Jesus ascended to heaven, that he could come back at any time.

46:04

And so that I do not see. Yeah, and so, I mean, we're already down to 15 minutes on the show, but they're gonna go through a number of passages here talking about the imminent return of Christ.

46:16

It's at hand within reach. And we say yes and amen. And I would argue that our position actually fits more into that historical timeline than what they're saying.

46:27

So we would say, yes, that's absolutely true. The early church did believe that.

46:33

And that's because it was written prior to AD 70 and was within one generation of Christ, exactly like he said.

46:40

So that time came with his inauguration in AD 70 with the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem.

46:46

So yes, we agree with that wholeheartedly. We would say we are now past that in history.

46:53

How they're supposed to live their life, for it is at hand. Like, I love that illustration, as close as your hand is to you, is as close as Christ's return is.

47:02

That's the - So imagine, I know you're gonna say it. When I think of that, go ahead, I wanna hear what you have. Imagine if that was 2000 plus years.

47:10

That's what they're arguing for. That within reach, within hand is, they were still in that time period and yet we're 2000 years after that, nearly.

47:22

So like, actually dude, like another 10 years and we'll be at the 2000 year mark, crazy, roughly.

47:30

Anyways, I don't know if that's where you're going, but - Similarly, dealing with the subject of imminency and the imminent return of Christ, but I think about the way that they're speaking about this.

47:40

And this is how Jesus and John the Baptist speak of the kingdom. Yeah. Right, the kingdom of heaven is at hand, repent and believe the gospel.

47:48

He went about preaching the good news of the kingdom, repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand, mellow.

47:55

Right, is that the fingertip reach? It's right there. And how could that be true? Well, because the king is coming, he's here.

48:03

The promised one, the one that the prophets foretold in the older Testament scriptures has come.

48:10

And so the kingdom of heaven, the rule of God has broken into history. And even to such an extent that the new

48:16

Testament authors could say in Luke's gospel, the kingdom of heaven, the kingdom of God is within you, which goes back to this issue of the heart.

48:26

Wherever Christ has come to rule, wherever that rule has come to expression, there is the kingdom of God.

48:34

So whether that be in an individual, in a family, in a church, in any local jurisdiction, anywhere that Christ has come to rule, there is the kingdom.

48:46

Because again, we're talking about hearts, hearts made new. And the only way that hearts get made new is by the proclamation of this message in the spirit of God, bringing people from death to life.

48:56

So it always goes back to the gospel. Of course, it's the good news of the kingdom. And what makes the news good is the proclamation of another king.

49:07

There's another king that does not rule like the kings of the earth. He doesn't rule by that coercive external force that Caesar does.

49:18

And that's what got the early church into trouble was that they were proclaiming a different king.

49:24

They were saying that Jesus is Lord. Exactly. He does not rule. And Jesus tells his disciples this very same thing.

49:30

He says that the kingdoms, the rulers of this world lorded over them. Not so in my kingdom. My kingdom is internal and transformational.

49:39

But here's the thing, it doesn't stay there. It doesn't stay in my sweet little heart between my two ears and behind the four walls of my church building.

49:49

It has implications for all of life. And so we have to say that. You know, this reminded me of, this is something

49:55

I learned from our buddy, Mr. Sandlin, we had on last week. The euangelion, that term, the evangeling, right?

50:06

The good news was not a term created by the Christians. That was a term that was already being used by the

50:16

Romans. And literally what would happen is say, the king or Caesar won a battle and victory and he would be returning in victory and they would have -

50:28

Heralds. The heralds, the good news bearers. Not like, hey, his name's Harold, but like heralds of good news.

50:34

They would go before the king. They'd run back or come back on a horse prior to the king returning and saying, the king is coming in victory.

50:44

That was where they got the term euangelion from. And I don't think it's a coincidence that the early, the apostles -

50:52

Oh, no, brother, no, no, no. I do not think so. They used those terms, you know. And we're saying the same thing. I think that this point is so critical.

51:02

It's so critical. This is the language of the New Testament. The apostle Paul, for example, says of the church, thanks be to God and Christ who always leads us in triumphal procession.

51:15

Pastor Luke is exactly right. The verbiage, the terminology that's used to describe this coming king that brings his rule into the world and the subsequent heralding of the message that goes forth from his throne is this.

51:30

Christ is Lord. Repent for the kingdom of God. The rule of God is here.

51:36

It's at the fingertip reach. And he leads his people in a victory parade with the enemies of God in the caboose behind them, leading captives.

51:48

And that's what Jesus has done. He's ascended and he has plundered the enemy and he has divided the spoils of the plundered enemy amongst all the inheritors.

51:58

And who are those people? It's you and me. It's the Christian church. We have received the plunder of the enemy that God has disarmed,

52:09

Satan. And we're now, you know, the spirit has been poured out. We've been apportioned gifts according to his ministry, according to his grace for the work that God has given us.

52:19

I won't say too much more on that because I want to get to Romans eight, but we have got to get there. I know, okay. So I'm going to say this real quick.

52:26

And then we're going to try really hard to get to Romans eight. If we don't get here, we'll get it in the after show, but. And then you really will need to tune in because you get me on Romans eight.

52:35

So I can't, I can't, I can't give you any warning about how long it might go. This is making me, made me think of something else. And they get, they talk about this, but I think it's later in the show, we probably won't get to it.

52:44

But you, you mentioned like Satan and plundering Satan, Satan's house. I mean, last week I mentioned that Christ came to vanquish the works of Satan, right?

52:51

Like this, I love this point right here. So if you guys, if you look through scripture and look through history, you know, there's roughly 400 years between the end of the

53:03

New Testament or the Old Testament to Christ coming as a baby, a wee babe.

53:10

And like Satan just had like his, whatever he wanted, you know, in the earth.

53:17

And if you look like even in the Old Testament, you don't really see a lot of, or if any instances of like demonic stuff, right?

53:28

You don't see any demons being cast in the pigs and stuff like that. Until Jesus. Until Jesus comes because they knew what was up.

53:38

They knew what Christ's coming meant. And this is a battle for ground, right?

53:44

So Satan's had the earth as his playground. Christ comes, establishes his kingdom.

53:51

And now we are in a battle to regain that ground, to reconcile all that ground to Christ.

53:58

That's why he came. And that's why you see all these demons freaking out all of a sudden, because they knew what this meant.

54:06

And that's not a point, I'll be honest, I never heard that growing up in the church. I actually learned that from Joe's dad.

54:15

I heard a message Joe Booth's dad did on spiritual warfare. And I was like, oh my goodness, how did

54:21

I miss that? Well, you gotta hook a brother up. I'll see if I can find that. I have it buried somewhere, but. Yeah, I mean,

54:27

Christ has struck the fatal decisive blow in Satan at the cross. And now what remains is for the heralds of righteousness to go into the land and declare the terms of this

54:38

King's victory, right? We're not looking to get Jesus elected as president. We're not looking to hang those leaflets and say, vote for Jesus.

54:47

We're going to announce that the King rules, the King reigns. So please come quietly.

54:54

These are the terms of surrender. You're surrounded. So please, you know, repent before it's too late.

55:02

That's the church. Okay, we'll see if we can get to those. Expectation, you should live every day with the expectation that it returns today.

55:12

Well, and that makes sense if a world is in a constant decline and slide down, and they're like Romans, when it talks about, in Romans, is it

55:20

Romans eight, that the earth is groaning, waiting for its final consummation and restoration. So the reason we would struggle with some of the views of a transformation of culture or a progression of culture is that one requires time.

55:37

Number two, it's been 2000 years. And if you want to say we've made progress, we've made progress in science.

55:44

Okay, okay, okay, okay. That's a whole nother point. This part is so ironic to me. I know. We have to get to it. I know, I know. It's really important.

55:50

Okay, let's do Romans eight though, because we're running out of time, and then we'll probably get to the other part in the after show. So go ahead, let me hear what you got to say.

55:56

Okay, so the Apostle Paul in Romans chapter eight is talking about creation groaning with eager expectation to obtain the freedom of the children of God.

56:09

Maybe we can just read the verse right here. I have Romans chapter eight pulled up. We'll just read this brief section here so that you can see.

56:17

Romans chapter eight and 19. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God.

56:25

For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.

56:39

So I think, I mean, here's what needs to be said about this. This for Paul is all bound up with the resurrection, right?

56:47

Redemption has implications for all creation, okay?

56:52

Now where the 2K error is, and if you look at the way that Van Junen handles this particular passage with the dualistic perspective, the text really gets mauled and muddied because in his perspective, it refers to a creation that is just meant to pass away and it's meant to give way to the new creation.

57:13

It's not meant to be redeemed. It's not meant to be restored. It's not meant to be reconciled to God.

57:21

It's meant to be euthanized. It's gonna pass away. There's nothing left and guess what?

57:28

There's good news though. Our bodies do make it out, right? So he maintains his

57:34

Orthodox Christianity by allowing for the resurrection to be maintained here.

57:39

But here's the thing. Creation is groaning with eager expectation for the children of God, which means that the calling of the

57:50

Christian and the calling of God's people is to set life free unto the glory of God.

57:59

It's been imprisoned. It's been bound up by sin and the heart of men reaching expression, the actions of man and his thinking and his behavior.

58:09

It's under bondage and the down payment that it will be restored, renewed and reconciled to God for Paul is the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

58:18

And of course, there will be a final consummative element of that in which our bodies are raised in a glorified fashion.

58:25

So that's there, but it's not, Pastor Luke read the verse at the beginning of the show, right?

58:33

Christ is not making all new things, right? There isn't a created order that's going to just dissolve and give way to this greater thing.

58:45

Christ is making all things new. When you talk about the gospel, it's not just about redeeming our bodies.

58:54

It's not just about that, but our souls, our minds, our relationships, our work, right?

59:00

Our vocation, our action in the world. And Paul says elsewhere that that foundation is built upon and the fire tests those works and ultimately our works in some meaningful sense because of the outline of the biblical narrative, creation, fall and redemption, those works follow us into eternity in some meaningful sense.

59:22

Obviously we don't know the details of all that, but there are aspects to our work, our calling, our vocation that God has put in our lives that will follow us and in some way be a part of what we do in the final state.

59:37

And so, why does this matter? It matters because in order to meet this onslaught that's upon us culturally, we need a comprehensive and holistic

59:49

Christian worldview of creation, fall and redemption. Van Druenen and the 2K advocates, they reject that.

59:57

They reject even the concept of a Christian worldview. They don't believe there are Christian answers to the questions facing us.

01:00:02

There are a variety of plausible answers, but there's no Christian answer because there's no

01:00:07

Christian way to make a stir fry or there's no Christian plumber. And once again, that might sound plausible on the surface, but here in the nation that we live in, as we see the decadence of man play out on a full scale and this idea of a common kingdom go up in smoke, because that's what's happening, right?

01:00:31

The more that society descends into moral depravity, we're seeing this illusion of commonality dissipate.

01:00:37

It's disappearing. And what we're left with, they use the word radical, you wanna talk about radical, is a radical antithesis between the kingdom of darkness and the kingdom of light.

01:00:49

That's where we are. And the only thing that's gonna ground our hope moving forward is the hope of the resurrection, of course, of Jesus Christ, the subsequent hope that all of creation will be liberated from its bondage to corruption and will enter the freedom and the glory and the hope of the children of God.

01:01:08

But that happens through us and the proclamation of the good news over all of life.

01:01:16

Amen, look at that, 15 seconds left in an hour, good job. You just pulled a Dr. White. So I'll just end on this thought, just to tag on to what

01:01:24

Zach was saying. So our position in Romans 8 here, where was it?

01:01:31

So verse 21, that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God.

01:01:39

Their argument is that it's just gonna be burned up and then there will be a new creation.

01:01:44

Our position is that when creation set free from bondage, it's made new, it's not being burned up.

01:01:52

And then even verse 25. So a translation, what you do matters. Bingo, verse 25, just as a thought, but if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.

01:02:05

So again, going back to what I said earlier and their position, the church has been waiting patiently for 2 ,000 years and we're still waiting patiently.

01:02:16

So we'll end there. We're gonna carry on into the after show here in a minute. The next,

01:02:22

Zach and I were just chomping at the bit to get to the next point. I'll just say this, brothers, because you're probably not gonna see the after show.

01:02:29

If Justin and John, if you see this, I'll just, I wanna be lovingly honest here. Your next point you make is very schizophrenic and we'll get into this in great detail as much as we can, but the point they try to make essentially is that, you know, they say, well, there's not gonna be a time where things get better.

01:02:50

And then they list a number of things, how things have gotten better. So anyways, this has been a quick hour, dude.

01:02:59

So we're gonna, like I said, go over to the after show. We'll continue in this conversation. But thank you once again to everyone who supports us, everyone that is signed up on all access.

01:03:12

You make this happen. We say that all the time. We mean it. We're not just saying that just to say it.

01:03:19

You make the lights go on. You make everything that we do possible. So thank you. Every time the gospel is preached on the street and you see a video of it, whether it's for an abortion now or Apology of Studios or any of that, you make that happen.

01:03:32

Thank you. Thank you for your support for an abortion now and helping us to try and end the slaughter of our pre -war naders, naders.

01:03:42

Bad dis naders. Ha ha. Ha ha. Now I'm not even gonna try to save that one.

01:03:50

Thank you, thank you, thank you, Zach. Yeah, we're signing off. We're signing off. We will see you next week and or in the after show.