May 4, 2022 Show with Dr. Kevin Clauson on “Reconquering the Academy for Christ”

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May 5, 2022

May 4, 2022 Dr. KEVIN CLAUSON, President & teacher of Principles of Law & Principles of Government @ Christendom Bible College, who will address: “RECONQUERING the ACADEMY for CHRIST!”

00:05: Live from the historic parsonage of the 19th century gospel minister George Norcross in downtown
00:10: Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron. This is a radio platform in which pastors,
00:23: Christian scholars, and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.
00:31: Proverbs 27, verse 17 tells us, Iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.
00:38: Matthew Henry said that in this passage, we are cautioned to take heed with whom we converse and directed to have a view in conversation to make one another wiser and better.
00:51: 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.
00:58: And now, here's your host, Chris Arnzen. Good afternoon,
01:10: 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.
01:20: This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Wednesday on this fourth day of May, 2022.
01:29: And today we have a first -time guest, someone that comes once again with a number of my guests recently, with the enthusiastic recommendation of Dr.
01:44: Joseph C. Moorcraft III, one of my favorite guests to interview on this program, along with his lovely bride,
01:51: Becky. They have both enthusiastically recommended that I interview Dr.
01:57: Clausen. This is Dr. Kevin Clausen, who is president and teacher of principles of law and principles of government at Christendom Bible College.
02:08: And today we are going to be addressing the theme, Reconquering the Academy for Christ. And it's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the very first time ever to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Dr.
02:18: Kevin Clausen. Thank you. It's a pleasure to be here. And although I am interviewing
02:25: Dr. Clausen for the very first time today, I have met him before when
02:31: I was a brand -new Christian in the mid -1980s. I started a long -distance dating relationship with a wonderful Christian woman back then,
02:42: Barbara, who was a graduate of Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia.
02:51: And she was also at the time an elementary school teacher for Jerry Falwell at the
02:58: Christian school associated with Thomas Road Baptist Church in Lynchburg.
03:03: And one year when I was visiting her early on in our relationship, visiting her and her parents out there in the
03:13: Lynchburg, Virginia area, while she was working, she said, You know, I know a professor who's a
03:19: Calvinist just like you are. That was one of the differences we had, Barbara and I.
03:24: She was not a Calvinist. But I know a professor who's a Calvinist, and I think that you'd love to meet him.
03:31: And I believe she somehow arranged a meeting between my guest today and I, Dr.
03:37: Kevin Clausen, and he took me on a tour of a building that was going to become the headquarters for the
03:47: Patrick Henry Institute. And I just remember being very blessed by my meeting with Dr.
03:55: Clausen and very impressed with him. And little did I know then that I would one day be interviewing him on a
04:01: Christian radio program because I had no idea at that time that I would be the host of a Christian radio broadcast.
04:08: But I don't know if you remember that day, but I remember it very well. I remember, yes.
04:15: It was a great privilege to take people on a tour of the old historic building there in Lynchburg, Virginia that we took over for $10.
04:26: The Lord gave it to us for $10. Wow. Well, yeah, I remember
04:31: I was very impressed with the building as well. Well, before we go into the subject at hand, tell our listeners about Christendom Bible College.
04:41: Yes, Christendom Bible College is a very unique institution. It offers a one -year program, a one -year program.
04:50: Most colleges are two -year, four -year. This is a one -year program which offers a program which gives you the biblical foundations of Christianity, of Western civilization, and of America.
05:08: And it builds those foundations across various disciplines and various learning areas, law and government, economics, history, theology, philosophy, the humanities, as it were.
05:23: I'll use that term, the humanities, and so forth. So it gives you a one -year foundation.
05:30: We like to say, give us one year for life. It prepares you for life.
05:37: So after that one year, a student can go on to transfer to another college, a four -year college, or a student can go into a vocation without going on to college at all.
05:51: It gives you a foundation either way. Yes, that is interesting. Who do you find are your most typical student, if there is such a thing, as far as age group and season in their lives?
06:07: Are they usually students right out of high school, or are they more mature adults who are getting an education for a career change?
06:19: What would you have found to be your average student? I cannot answer that question yet, because we have not started yet.
06:28: Oh, okay. We accept our first students in September of this year.
06:34: Oh, wow. The first. Great. Well, I'm glad to be one of the first to be discussing the launching of Christendom Bible College.
06:43: And since we mentioned the Patrick Henry Institute, tell us about that.
06:49: Well, the Patrick Henry Institute was created about 25 years ago in Virginia to act as a vehicle to present the views, the biblical views of law and government, playing off of Patrick Henry, who was a
07:11: Christian statesman in Virginia. The Patrick Henry Institute still exists, and, in fact,
07:18: Christendom Bible College is an offshoot of the Patrick Henry Institute in the corporate sense.
07:24: It's a fictitious name, as they say in corporate law, of the
07:30: Patrick Henry Institute, or a doing business as entity of the
07:35: Patrick Henry Institute. So what we've done is we've just branched out from the original mission of the
07:42: Patrick Henry Institute. And we have done that based on several things, based, one, on Dan Smithwick.
07:51: I don't know if you know Dan Smithwick. The Pierce Test at the EMI Institute, based on Dan Smithwick's results of giving the
08:00: Pierce Test to incoming Christian college students in various institutions for decades and seeing the scores just progressively go down.
08:11: That was one of the strands that caused Dan and I and Max Lyons and Reverend Knoedel, Dick Knoedel, and others to brainchild this thing.
08:22: Another one was the existence of a one -year institution out in Wyoming, of all places,
08:28: Jackson Hole Bible College, which their curriculum is built around creationism. Ours is built around biblical principles of life.
08:38: But it's still a one -year institution, and I learned about that when I served as vice president of academics at Bryan College and drew up a transfer agreement with Jackson Hole Bible College at that time.
08:52: So all these connections, all these strands came together. In addition to that,
08:58: I would say Herb Titus' principle approach that he used in the initial
09:04: Regent University public policy program was an integral part of this.
09:12: And, of course, Greg Bonson and others like him played into all of this too.
09:20: Yeah, I actually had the privilege. This is a both wonderful and painful memory.
09:26: I had the privilege to interview Dr. Greg Bonson before I even had a radio show.
09:33: He was speaking at Messiah's congregation in Brooklyn, New York, pastored by Steve Schlissel, and I was in attendance at that meeting.
09:46: And I remember very well Dr. Bonson's sermon on the ascension, and it perhaps is engraven in my memory not only because it was a powerful sermon, but I don't think
09:57: I had ever heard a whole sermon on the ascension before. And during a break between the morning and evening service,
10:12: Pastor Schlissel said to me, I know that one day you're going to become a
10:17: Christian radio host. I had been working in Christian radio as an account executive selling airtime, and Steve Schlissel had a very accurate instinct.
10:29: I'm not going to call him a prophet, but he was very confident that I would become a talk radio host.
10:37: And he says, I want you to interview Greg Bonson in my study and use that as a part of your portfolio, your resume, for when one day you go searching for a job as a talk show host.
10:52: So I did that. I was so honored with the privilege of interviewing
10:57: Dr. Bonson, sitting right in front of me. And then years later, having moved several times, the tape was lost, which
11:08: I kick myself every time I think about it. So that's why I said it's both a beautiful and horrible memory.
11:18: Yes, the new Bonson Institute would probably love to have that tape. Well, who knows? Maybe by God's providence it will show up one day.
11:26: I seriously doubt it, but God can do anything. Yes. Well, I want to give our listeners the website for Christendom Bible College.
11:38: I'm sure I will be repeating this later, but it's very easy. Christendombiblecollege .org.
11:46: Christendombiblecollege .org. Now, just out of curiosity, what did you call it,
11:52: Christendom? Did you want the name to be broader, perhaps, in its sphere of influence and student body and so on than specifically the
12:07: Christian church? Christendom seems to convey and has conveyed a broader sense of that which even professes to be
12:19: Christian in addition to that which is actually and truly Christian. Oh, yes.
12:25: The term Christendom has a long history, hundreds, it goes back hundreds of years, and came to be understood as a concept that referred to the entire reach of Christianity, the whole impact of Christianity that grows out of Christ's kingdom,
12:46: Christendom, Christ's kingdom. But all the impact that it has on the entire world, on every human endeavor in the world, and that's how the term really came to be understood.
12:59: I think some people today use it more to refer to the church.
13:06: There is a Christendom College in Virginia, which is a Roman Catholic school, and they,
13:11: I believe, they probably used the term in reference to the Roman Catholic church, but it has a much broader pedigree than that.
13:21: And the reason why we're a Bible college, we're a little bit of an unusual Bible college, to be sure.
13:26: Our curriculum is not entirely the books of the Bible, teaching just the books of the
13:33: Bible. That's the thing. We want to teach the Bible and its effect on every human endeavor, every sphere of human thinking and action.
13:46: So we're much broader than a Bible college, a typical Bible college, and we go back to, we hearken back to the older meaning of the term
13:55: Christendom as well. Great. Well, we will return to more about Christendom Bible College and also our broader theme today,
14:08: Reconquering the Academy for Christ. But before we do that, we have a tradition here on Iron Sharp and Zion Radio.
14:18: Yes, Bible -believing Protestants and Reformed Christians do believe in tradition.
14:24: We just do not believe it is inerrant. Only the Scriptures are inerrant, and only the
14:31: Scriptures are our authority for matters of faith and the
14:36: Christian life. But we do have traditions, and one of my traditions on this show is that every time
14:44: I have a first -time guest, if that guest happens to be a Christian, there are rare occasions when
14:50: I have non -Christians as guests for one reason or another. They may have written a book that is of great importance even for the body of Christ, even though the author is not a
15:02: Christian. But my typical guest is a Christian, and I have that guest on the first appearance on this program to give a summary of their salvation testimony, and that would include the kind of religious atmosphere, if any, they were raised in and what kind of providential circumstances our sovereign
15:22: Lord raised up in their lives that drew them to himself and saved them. And I would love to hear your story now.
15:31: Yes, pleasure to do that. I was born and raised in Huntington, West Virginia.
15:38: Some people may know that community. If they saw the movie We Are Marshall, that is the home of Marshall University.
15:47: That's where the infamous plane crash occurred back in 1970 that killed the whole football team.
15:55: That's where I was born and raised. Yeah, I saw that movie. It was a very powerful movie. Yes, yes, yes.
16:01: Part of it was filmed in my hometown. But I was born and raised there. I was born in a Christian home.
16:07: Actually, my twin brother and I were adopted, and we were raised in a
16:12: Christian home, and we were part of an Evangelical United Brethren church at first.
16:21: And we were very faithful to the church. We went to the Sunday morning, Sunday evening,
16:26: Wednesday evening prayer meeting, etc., etc. So I was raised in that kind of an atmosphere where it was important to hear the word, to be taught the word.
16:39: That church eventually merged with the Methodist to become the United Methodist Church. And that's another theological rabbit trail, but nonetheless.
16:49: Which just went through a major split. The conservatives formed a different denomination.
16:56: Well, that's good. We weren't sure back then, in those days, where we were going to go after that merger.
17:07: But it was about, no, it was not about. It was in 1978,
17:13: I was a college student just about to graduate, that I came to know the
17:21: Lord. I trusted, put my trust in the Lord. And through a series of circumstances, some setbacks in my life, not the kind of setbacks that were major, like with some individuals, but I went to dental school,
17:37: I dropped out, and then I was engaged to a girl,
17:42: Barron Huntington, and she dumped me. To be honest. Because I dropped out of dental school.
17:50: Yeah, my first Christian girlfriend dumped me too. But a very, very wonderful girl, and actually,
17:57: I couldn't blame her. No, not in those days. I wasn't the person
18:03: I am. But I also had just discovered the writings of Francis Schaeffer, especially,
18:10: How Should We Then Live? Because my aunt, Barron Huntington, owned a Christian bookstore. And I was doing inventory there, and I discovered this book, and I thought, this looks really interesting.
18:19: This is a book where this guy actually applies Christianity to life. It's not just about how to get saved, which is obviously the most important first step, but he goes well beyond that.
18:33: And so, I took that book, I bought that book, and I read it, and that impacted me too.
18:41: And all those things taken together, the Lord used to bring me to Himself.
18:49: I had gone forward when I was in junior high school. You know how they talk about going forward?
18:55: I had gone forward in a Bob Harrington crusade in Huntington. I don't know if you've ever heard of Bob Harrington.
19:03: He was a big traveling evangelist back in the day. But that was just emotional.
19:12: The real salvation did not occur until those circumstances, negative and positive, in 1978.
19:21: And on top of all that, I was in a Sunday school class at this church that I went to, grew up in, where we were studying the book of Romans.
19:32: We were actually studying the book of Romans at a Methodist church. You know, believe it or not,
19:40: I have met, and I'm not going to identify them by name because I might get them in trouble, but I have met at least two
19:48: United Methodist pastors who are Five Point Talons. Is that right?
19:55: Wow, that's something. So, you know, the study of the book of Romans, reading
20:03: Francis Schaeffer, having these little crises in my life at the time, in the latter part of 1978, all of these the
20:11: Lord used to bring me to Himself. And after that, after that, I was really enthusiastic about my newfound faith.
20:21: I really wanted to apply the faith all of life. And I had never heard of people like Bodson or Rush Dooney or any of those people that were talking about that time.
20:34: I'd never heard of them. I just knew about Francis Schaeffer. That's all I knew. And by the way, R .J. Rush Dooney was a client of mine for a couple of years when
20:43: I worked at WMCA Radio. He joined a program that I created called
20:49: The Voice of Sovereign Grace, which had... it aired every night and had five different speakers.
20:56: And the Chalcedon Foundation sponsored one of those nights, and R .J.
21:03: Rush Dooney was being interviewed that night of the week, every week, by Pastor Steve Schlissel, actually, who
21:13: I mentioned earlier. And so I go way back, a long way, with the late
21:20: Dr. Rush Dooney and his magazine as well, The Chalcedon Report. I don't know if it still exists, but I was a regular subscriber to that.
21:30: He was a pillar. He was definitely a pillar. But back in those days, I wasn't aware of him yet.
21:38: But all of this motivated me. The Lord used these things to motivate me to want to go to law school and also work on a master's degree in political science so that I could teach in a
21:51: Christian college. I really wanted to teach in a Christian college. I didn't know too much about Christian colleges then, but I knew they were out there, and I wanted to do that.
22:01: So he took me to law school. I graduated from law school. I got my master's degree as well from Boston University.
22:09: And I didn't get much of a Christian worldview, obviously, in my master's program or my law degree program, my doctorate in law program.
22:21: I had to learn those things on my own. But at the same time I was doing these things, I was discovering more works by different people who did teach a
22:34: Christian worldview in the areas of law and government and so on and so forth. So here
22:41: I am. I graduated from law school in 1982. I'm looking for a Christian college to teach at.
22:47: I sent out resumes all over the country, and only one called me and gave me an interview.
22:53: That was Grove City College. Oh, yeah. That's where Dr. Carl Truman is currently in the faculty.
23:00: That's right. He wasn't there then. This was a long time ago. Right, right. He was with Westminster and so on.
23:07: Right. But it was a Christian college, and it was trying to be somewhat distinctive, and they were fighting the federal government at this time over student aid, whether students who received grants from the federal government were subjected to all the regulations of the federal government.
23:30: They argued they were not, that this is aid to students, not to college directly, but to the student.
23:37: The student takes the money wherever he or she wants to take it. And, of course, while I was there, eventually they won their case.
23:46: It went all the way through several levels of federal courts. They won their case in the Supreme Court, but then their victory was stripped away by an act of Congress a couple of years later, unfortunately.
23:58: But Grove City did the right thing. They said, okay, we're not going to take any more federal money.
24:04: We're just dropping all that federal money. We will not allow students to bring government money with them to come to school at Grove City College.
24:13: Wow. That's very unusual. There aren't too many schools that do that. Hillsdale does it.
24:18: A few other places do it. Yeah, I just remembered another faculty member I've interviewed from there,
24:25: Dr. T. David Gordon. Oh, yes, yes, yes. He was not there when I was there either.
24:31: I'm kind of an old timer. I go back a little further there at Grove City.
24:37: But I was there when the economics department was a very strongly free market. I think it still is.
24:46: And Christian, a very, very strongly free market. Then I went from Grove City to Liberty University.
24:54: They kind of recruited me to come and head up their new government program. They had not had a separate government program before.
25:01: It was part of history, history and political science. And they were looking for somebody to head it up.
25:08: And my brother had worked there, so he mentioned my name. I think they were kind of happy to get somebody from Grove City College because Grove City College gave them some reputation, so to speak.
25:22: It was a very highly reputable school. But anyway, they hired me to head the new government program there at Liberty, which
25:31: I did for 19 years. I was on the faculty there for 22 years, but I headed the program for 19 years, first 19 years.
25:40: And that was fun because I got to do all kinds of things. I got to create a new program.
25:46: I got to bring in speakers like Greg Monson. I brought Greg Monson to Liberty once for an entire week.
25:55: And he lectured on all kinds of topics when he was there. He gave, I believe, 10 different lectures when he was at Liberty.
26:04: Wow, and it's interesting because Dr. Falwell was a vehement anti -Calvinist, so it's interesting that he would allow that to take place there.
26:14: Well, that's true. But he also, you know, Jerry Falwell was,
26:21: Jerry Falwell Sr., obviously, was a fascinating fellow. There are rumors that when he was in Bible college, he actually defended
26:31: Calvinism. Well, he actually claimed that. I remember him claiming that he used to be a Calvinist.
26:37: Yes, yes. And then he goes on to do things. By the way, he is now.
26:44: He is now. He is now, that's right. But even then, he did a lot of practical things that really
26:51: Calvinists did in the past and should be doing now, like starting a
26:57: Christian school, like starting a Christian university. That was unique. And all kinds of other ministries that he had.
27:06: He was acting like a Calvinist, even though he claimed he wasn't anymore a
27:11: Calvinist. In fact, he prayed like a Calvinist because when the president of Liberty Seminary, Ergin Kainer, gave a really radically anti -Calvinist speech right before what was supposed to be a debate between him and James White that never took place.
27:38: After this really horrendous speech against Calvinism, really horrible because it didn't even involve exegesis or anything.
27:50: Jerry Falwell, immediately after Dr. Kainer finished his speech,
27:56: Dr. Falwell rose up to the pulpit and said, what a wonderful message, let's bow our heads in prayer.
28:04: God, please open up the eyes of the blind today. Please give men new hearts so they can understand the gospel that we are proclaiming.
28:14: He was praying like a Calvinist. Even though he thought, and of course I was paraphrasing,
28:20: I don't remember the exact wording, I just remember sitting there watching him and hearing him saying, he's praying like a
28:26: Calvinist. He was praying things that only a Calvinist could logically pray.
28:33: Because he was asking God to enable lost sinners to hear and understand.
28:39: Jerry Falwell Sr. was a unique and powerful individual. I never, even though I was there for 22 years,
28:46: I obviously never knew it well, but I did run into him on a number of occasions.
28:52: I remember after we started the Patrick Henry Institute and Christ College in Lynchburg, Virginia, which was definitely very
29:02: Calvinistic. After we did all that, I was still on the faculty at Liberty, and I was going through a reception line, and he said,
29:11: I want you to know that you're doing a great thing there, what you're doing there.
29:17: Praise God. And not only that, but at the time, the provost of Liberty called me into his office one day.
29:26: I didn't know what he was going to say. He closed the door and he said, I've heard about what you're doing down there.
29:33: If there's anything I can do to help you, let me know. So there were some good friends of what we were doing in Lynchburg at the time, in the area of higher education on a different level, different type of higher education than what
29:48: Liberty was doing exactly. Jerry and his ministry were instrumental, really, in what we were doing.
29:57: Praise God. We have to go to our first session break right now. If anybody would like to send in a question to Dr.
30:03: Kevin Clausen on the theme that we are addressing today,
30:10: Reconquering the Academy for Christ, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com,
30:15: 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, and your country of residence.
30:23: Don't go away. We'll be right back with Dr. Kevin Clausen after these messages. As a mother,
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38:17: Daniel P. Buttafuoco, serious injury lawyer and Christian apologist.
38:23: Dan is the president and founder of the Historical Bible Society. Their mission?
38:29: To foster belief in the credibility of Scripture as the written Word of God. They go to various churches, schools, and institutions to publicly display a rare collection of biblical texts, along with a fascinating presentation by Mr.
38:44: Buttafuoco demonstrating the reliability of Scripture. To advance the cause of the
38:50: Gospel, they created a beautiful, perfect facsimile of the genealogy of Jesus Christ from the original engravings contained in a first edition 1611
39:01: King James Bible. This 17th century hand -engraved chart shows the family tree of Jesus Christ going back to Adam and Eve.
39:11: This book is complete with gorgeous full -size illustrations of Noah's Ark and the
39:18: Tower of Babel and an explanation of why the genealogy of Jesus is so important for his claims to the throne of the universe.
39:27: Originals of this work are in museums and nobody has ever made it accessible to the public in a large book form before.
39:35: You can have your own copy of this 44 -page genealogy book for a donation of $35 or more.
39:43: Visit historicalbiblesociety .org That's historicalbiblesociety .org
39:50: Thanks for helping to keep Iron Sharpens Iron Radio on the air. And we want to thank
39:56: Daniel P. Buttafuoco of Buttafuoco & Associates for sponsoring, once again, for renewing their advertising contract with Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.
40:06: And if you are involved in a serious accident or medical malpractice case, wherever you live in the 50
40:16: United States, please call Dan Buttafuoco at 1 -800 -NOW -HURT 1 -800 -NOW -HURT and mention that you heard about them from Chris Arnson and Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.
40:28: We really want Dan's law firm and the Historical Bible Society, which he founded, to continue advertising with us and that will definitely be a motivation if more of you seek his legal counsel as well as supporting the
40:42: Historical Bible Society. So once again, that number is 1 -800 -NOW -HURT and no matter where you live in the 50
40:48: United States, call him today. We are now back with our guest today, Dr. Kevin Clausen, who is president of Christendom Bible College and we are addressing the theme
41:03: Reconquering the Academy for Christ. If you have a question, send it to ChrisArnson at gmail .com
41:09: C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com Please give us your first name at least, your city and state, and country of residence.
41:17: The title Reconquering the Academy for Christ insinuates that the academy was once clearly founded in the principles of Jesus Christ.
41:35: And the academy at one time in this nation, especially the academy of higher learning and seminaries, were very well known to be proclaiming the true
41:50: Christ of the true scriptures and that would include even the Ivy League schools that are now basically, with the exception of individual faculty members and student body members, apostate, having long ago abandoned the roots upon which they were founded.
42:10: But tell us about what you believe or how you view reconquering the academy for Christ.
42:20: Well, there are still, thankfully, some institutions in the
42:26: United States which hold to the Bible and the
42:32: Lordship of Jesus Christ and so forth. And I'm thankful for those. But they are a dwindling in number.
42:39: There are many that claim to be. They're in another category. They claim to be, but they've compromised.
42:46: And then there are the ones that used to be, the ones that you refer to, places like Harvard and Yale, and the
42:52: Long College, which, of course, was the forerunner of Princeton, and many, many others in those early years that used to be very clearly and strongly biblical and Christian.
43:07: And, of course, they've gone. They've lost it. They've gone way off the rails.
43:15: The situation today is, I would say, pretty dire. There are a few places that have sprung up to try to deal with the lack of truly
43:28: Christian education. Not a whole lot in recent years. Liberty was one of those that started back in 1970 to try to deal with that.
43:38: One of the more recent ones, Bob Jones University, started way back in the 1930s to try to deal with modernism and so forth.
43:47: And those schools are still good. Places like Cedarville and Bryan College, where I served as the vice president of academics for a while.
43:58: But you know what? That leads me to something. Every institution, even the strongest
44:06: Christian institutions, have to be vigilant. They have to be constantly vigilant.
44:12: When I became vice president of academics here at Bryan College, I stepped into the hornet's nest.
44:18: We had become embroiled in what some people call the creation controversy.
44:25: We had discovered, the president of the college had discovered, that there was teaching going on by some faculty members of what we would call theistic evolution or evolutionary creation, whatever term they wanted to use.
44:43: There was teaching like that going on, especially in the biology area. And when he became aware of that, he took that to the board of trustees.
44:54: The board of trustees decided to add what they called a clarification statement to the statement of faith of the college, which would tighten up the requirement of what a faculty member had to believe and teach about creation.
45:12: Well, there was a big hullabaloo about that. There was a big blowup about that. And at that point, the vice president of academics at that time stepped aside, and the president asked me to step in as vice president of academics.
45:29: And the reason why he did that was because he expected me, and I was enthusiastic about this, he expected me to uphold the college's view, strong view on creation, among the faculty.
45:42: And I did that, and I wanted to do that. That was what I was called to do for such a time as that, so to speak.
45:54: And it wasn't easy, but we had to be vigilant in terms of the faculty who were still here, who were teaching falsehood, and we also had to be very vigilant about who we hired to replace those faculty members.
46:12: And what I'm afraid of is that that's not always the case at many Christian institutions.
46:19: They're not as vigilant as they should be. They're not always intentionally, they're not intending to be careless, but they are sometimes careless at other institutions about who they hired, about maintaining the truth through who they hire.
46:36: And there are also a lot of pressures on a lot of modern -day colleges and universities.
46:45: The pressures of accreditation, the pressures of keeping enrollment up, the budget pressures, the pressures that come from bringing in new people from the outside,
46:59: PhDs, who in their PhD programs may have been infected by false ideas wherever they worked on their
47:08: PhDs. And that's not something to be ignored either. A lot of people tend to just kind of feed on the stuff they get when they're going through their
47:21: PhD program. And you have to be aware of that. You have to be vigilant about that.
47:27: When you're bringing people in, you're thinking about hiring them, you have to ask the right questions, you have to ask penetrating questions.
47:35: Not just, not just. You believe in our doctrinal statements. Well, a lot of people are going to say yes.
47:42: And they may not mean it. You've got to dig down. You're going to find, okay, tell me what that means.
47:48: Talk about this and talk about that. And so on and so forth. At any rate, that's an example of what happened here.
47:56: And we had, well, I hate to put it this way, but we had to clean up a mess here at Bryan College, starting in 2014 and going probably as far as 2016.
48:12: I continued to serve as academic vice president until the summer of 2018.
48:21: But it was a calling from God to do that. And a lot of people didn't see it that way.
48:28: They reacted negatively. You know, you're being too harsh, you're being too strict, you're being too narrow, et cetera.
48:37: And some people, I remember the New York Times picked up this story at one point about Bryan College tightening things up on creation.
48:48: And they quoted somebody who said something about academic freedom. And then they quoted me, and I said, the
48:56: Bible trumps academic freedom. Well, you know, a lot of academics don't like that.
49:03: And that's bad, too. Academic freedom should not come first.
49:09: Biblical truth should come first. And then, within that biblical truth, you can have your academic freedom.
49:18: But surprisingly, a lot of people don't like that. They took that very badly.
49:24: So that was an episode of my life that kind of showed me, up front, right in the face, how these things can happen.
49:35: What if we had said, okay, that's fine. You teach theistic evolution. Go ahead. No problem.
49:42: What if we had done that? The college would have gone downhill from there.
49:50: After we tightened up, after we did what we had to do, we had parents who showed up with their sons and daughters and said, we would have not even thought about Bryan College had we not read about what you did.
50:06: You know, over the years, I have witnessed what appears to be the yearning, the craving of certain academics who are professing
50:22: Christians, even professing Reformed Christians, who have this yearning and craving to be recognized, appreciated, and even celebrated in some degree by leftists in academia who are considered to be the most brilliant minds of any given category.
50:49: And I emphasize the word considered. I'm not saying that they are. But there are leftists and apostates and atheists and agnostics who are brilliant.
51:00: We can't take that away from them. Even if they are unwise, and even if they are clinging to things that are lies, there are many among them that are brilliant.
51:10: But have you witnessed this yourself, how men over the years, sometimes when they have achieved great credentials and respect, become too broad, far too broad in their sphere of those whom they embrace as either brethren, or they far too often acknowledge them as being their colleagues and even those they look up to in academia, rather than being the enemies of the gospel?
51:51: Yes. They want to be accepted and respected by their peers in the profession.
51:59: And that is a hard thing for some people to overcome. They give in.
52:07: In fact, if you could pick up where we left off, because we have to go to our midway break, and pick up right where you left off there.
52:14: And if anybody would like to send in a question of your own, again, our email address is chrisarnson at gmail dot com.
52:21: chrisarnson at gmail dot com. Give us your first name at least, city and state and country of residence. Please be patient with us.
52:27: This is always the longer break in the middle of the show, because Grace Life Radio, 90 .1 FM in Lake City, Florida, requires of us a longer break in the middle of the show, because they are required by the
52:38: FCC to localize this program geographically to Lake City, Florida, through their own public service announcements and other local things.
52:46: While they do that, we simultaneously air our globally heard commercials. So use this time wisely, please.
52:53: Not only send in questions to our guest today, Dr. Kevin Clausen, but also please write down most of the contact information, or should
53:05: I say as much of the contact information for as many of our advertisers as you can, so you can more frequently and successfully patronize our advertisers.
53:16: And when you can't patronize them, if you could at the very least thank them for sponsoring this program, if indeed you love it and don't want it to disappear.
53:23: We absolutely positively depend on our advertisers to exist, so at the very least, if you love this show, thank them for sponsoring it.
53:31: And our email address, once again for questions for Dr. Kevin Clausen, is chrisarnson at gmail .com.
53:37: chrisarnson at gmail .com. Don't go away. When Iron Sharpens Iron Radio first launched in 2005, the publishers of the
53:53: New American Standard Bible were among my very first sponsors. It gives me joy knowing that many scholars and pastors in the
54:01: Iron Sharpens Iron Radio audience have been sticking with or switching to the
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54:11: NASB is my Bible of choice. I'm Pastor Dan LeBennick of West Hills Baptist Church in Huntington Station, New York, and the
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54:25: NASB is my Bible of choice. I'm Reverend Buzz Taylor, author of God's Lawson, and the
54:32: NASB is my Bible of choice. I'm Dr. William Webster, pastor of Grace Bible Church in Battle Ground, Washington, founder of the ministry
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55:01: NASB is my Bible of choice. Here's a great way for your church to help keep
55:07: Iron Trumpet's Iron Radio on the air. Pastors, are your pew bibles tattered and falling apart?
55:13: Consider restocking your pews with the NASB, and tell the publishers you heard about them from Chris Arnzen on Iron Trumpet's Iron Radio.
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55:41: Based in Alabama, it supports missionaries in over 13 countries around the world.
55:49: Anchored in Truth is in partnership with 36 church plants, as well as radio stations, theological seminaries, and various programs for unreached people groups.
56:00: With an aim to glorify God and reach the nations with the gospel. It is a blessing to see how
56:07: God has used Anchored in Truth in so many different contexts globally, as well as locally.
56:15: To find out more about this vital work worldwide, visit anchoredintruth .org.
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56:38: How do you make your savings last? How much should you take out? And when? You're ready for retirement, but are your finances?
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57:03: That's edwardjones .com. Or call 717 -258 -4688.
57:09: 717 -258 -4688. We here at Iron Sharpens Iron Radio are forever grateful for the generous financial support of Art Amundsen, Edward Jones financial advisor in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.
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57:38: Joseph Piper, President Emeritus and Professor of Systematic and Applied Theology at Greenville Presbyterian Theological Seminary.
57:47: Every Christian who's serious about the Deformed Faith and the Westminster Standards should have and use the eight -volume commentary on the theology and ethics of the
57:57: Westminster Larger Catechism titled Authentic Christianity by Dr. Joseph Morecraft.
58:04: It is much more than an exposition of the Larger Catechism. It is a thoroughly researched work that utilizes biblical exegesis as well as historical and systematic theology.
58:15: Dr. Morecraft is pastor of Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming, Georgia, and I urge everyone looking for a biblically faithful church in that area to visit that fine congregation.
58:26: For details on the eight -volume commentary, go to westminstercommentary .com, westminstercommentary .com.
58:34: For details on Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming, Georgia, visit heritagepresbyterianchurch .com,
58:43: heritagepresbyterianchurch .com. Please tell Dr. Morecraft and the saints at Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming, Georgia that Dr.
58:51: Joseph Piper of Greenville Presbyterian Theological Seminary sends you. Why can't we see
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01:00:00: Hello. Hello. My name is Anthony Uvinio and I'm one of the pastors at Hope Reformed Baptist Church in Quorum, New York and also the host of the reformrookie .com
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01:01:28: Again, I'm Pastor Anthony Avino and thanks for listening. Hi, I'm Buzz Taylor.
01:01:38: Chris Arnzen of Iron Sharpens Iron radio has had a long time partnership with our friends at CVBBS, which stands for Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service.
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01:03:07: Do you know what they all have in common? They all require training, assessments, and certifications. But do you know what requires no training at all?
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01:03:24: I've been a biblical family counselor since the early 2000s. And what I've discovered is that the majority of Christian parents have never been biblically equipped to do the work of the ministry in their homes.
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01:03:40: God called and created them to be. We produce free parenting resources, train church leaders, and offer biblical counseling so that the next generation of dads and moms can use the scriptures to parent their children for life and godliness.
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01:04:11: One such faithful advertiser who really believes in what Chris Arnton is doing is
01:04:16: Daniel P. Patafuco, serious injury lawyer and Christian apologist.
01:04:23: Dan is the president and founder of the Historical Bible Society. Their mission?
01:04:28: To foster belief in the credibility of scripture as the written word of God. They go to various churches, schools, and institutions to publicly display a rare collection of biblical texts along with a fascinating presentation by Mr.
01:04:44: Patafuco demonstrating the reliability of scripture. To advance the cause of the gospel, they created a beautiful, perfect facsimile of the genealogy of Jesus Christ from the original engravings contained in a first edition 1611
01:05:01: King James Bible. This 17th century hand -engraved chart shows the family tree of Jesus Christ going back to Adam and Eve.
01:05:12: This book is complete with gorgeous full -size illustrations of Noah's Ark and the
01:05:17: Tower of Babel and an explanation of why the genealogy of Jesus is so important for his claims to the throne of the universe.
01:05:26: Originals of this work are in museums and nobody has ever made it accessible to the public in a large book form before.
01:05:35: You can have your own copy of this 44 -page genealogy book for a donation of $35 or more.
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01:08:51: always mentioning that you heard about them from Chris Hornson on Iron Sharpen's Iron Radio. Before we return to Dr.
01:08:57: Kevin Claussen in our discussion on Reconquering the Academy for Christ, we just have a couple more very important announcements to make.
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01:12:34: That's also the email address where you can send in a question to Dr. Kevin Claussen on our theme,
01:12:40: Reconquering the Academy for Christ. That's chrisarnson at gmail .com, chrisarnson at gmail .com,
01:12:46: and before the break, Dr. Claussen, you were speaking about there are sadly many in academia who profess to be
01:12:56: Christians, and perhaps they really are Christians, but they have been successfully tempted and lured into a compromising of what they believe, maybe even perhaps as far as a denial of what they believe, although we believe that a truly elect person would not do that very long, but they're doing this because of a craving to be respected by their peers in academia who might even be apostates or just pure atheists and agnostics and leftists, if you could continue where you left off.
01:13:35: Yes, academia can be a very tight brotherhood, and when people get in those circles, and they want to be accepted, they want to be part of that brotherhood, so to speak, then they will, in some cases anyway, or in many cases, it will cause them to compromise their views at least on particular things, not necessarily on everything.
01:14:07: You mentioned that many of them may be true believers, and I think that's true, but the pressure is on.
01:14:16: The pressure is on for them to compromise, and they'll do it. It's human nature, and that's why it's up to the institution to keep a tight guard on what it believes and how it applies that to its faculty, to what's taught in the classroom.
01:14:39: As unpopular as that may be in academic circles, academicians generally, they are a kind of different breed.
01:14:49: They tend not to like to be told what to do, what to teach, what not to teach, but it's up to the institution to do that, whether they like it or not, because the institution is normally beholden to other people.
01:15:04: It's beholden to the board of trustees, which is very often more conservative than the faculty.
01:15:12: It's beholden to parents who expect the institution to uphold certain values and certain ideas and certain doctrines, and the students that the parents send here, as it were, in order to not be compromised.
01:15:30: There are a lot of expectations out there, and those expectations don't come from the faculty.
01:15:36: They come from other, you might say, stakeholders, other interested parties in all of this.
01:15:44: That's where, you know, Christendom Bible College actually wants to come alongside of, as it were, a lot of Christian institutions, because one of the ways that a
01:15:56: Christian institution can guard against compromise is to have a very strong core curriculum.
01:16:04: In other words, those courses, those few courses that every student in the college has to take, where they hear the values, doctrines, and the ideas that are based upon Scripture across the various areas of the curriculum.
01:16:23: Many colleges and universities, including a lot of Christian colleges, haven't taken their core curriculum very seriously.
01:16:30: They've adopted what I call a cafeteria approach. Here, just take a science course. Take a psychology course.
01:16:37: Take a... It doesn't matter what you take. Just take something in this area, something in this area, something in that area, and put it all together, and that'll be your, whatever, 40 -hour core curriculum, 40 -credit -hour core curriculum.
01:16:51: Well, see, Christendom Bible College wants to essentially give the student, not for free, but...
01:17:01: but to give the student that foundation in a solid, biblically -based core curriculum that then they can take with them and transfer it right into the two -year college or the four -year college.
01:17:18: Probably mostly four -year colleges because those would be typically the Christian colleges out there, a four -year college.
01:17:24: And so part of the theme of Christendom Bible College is to adopt or sign transfer agreements with various Christian institutions.
01:17:37: I'm not going to name all of them, but the ones that are... certainly the ones that are truly committed to Scripture, committed to Christ, and so on, to get transfer agreements signed with them.
01:17:52: Does this happen? Absolutely it happens. Small, unaccredited institutions enter into transfer agreements with larger
01:18:01: Christian institutions all the time. When I was Vice President of Academics here at Bryan, we did three of them at least that I can remember with very small institutions, and one of them being the one out in Wyoming, Jackson Hole Bible College, which is, you know, one -year program creationism.
01:18:23: I think they might have 30 students, something like that. So it's done.
01:18:29: It's done a lot, and people probably don't realize that. But that means the student who goes to Christendom Bible College can take the curriculum there, which would be about 39 hours of credit, and just transfer it straight in.
01:18:44: No questions asked. No ifs, ands, or buts. You have a transfer agreement, you're good to go.
01:18:50: You're good to bring all that in. So that's part of the plan too.
01:18:56: And we've had one Christian college already approach us about interest in entering into such a transfer agreement with us, and we're very thankful for that, and we're pursuing that.
01:19:12: We'll praise God for that. We have Joseph in South Central Pennsylvania who has a question.
01:19:19: I know that in elementary and high school grades, there is a thing called classical
01:19:27: Christian education that will incorporate different worldviews and ideologies, not being taught as truth, side by side with truth, but just to prepare the students to be able to respond to those other worldviews, no matter how false they may be, in an intelligent way.
01:19:48: They may have a course on creation, but also explain what those that advocate theistic evolution really believe and teach in order so that they will not be caught by surprise in the real world and be able to, in an educated fashion, reply to and refute these other worldviews.
01:20:10: Do you have a concept like that in your school, and do you accept that kind of a concept?
01:20:17: Well, that's not unique to classical Christian education, which I'm very familiar with, but it certainly does exist within the classical
01:20:26: Christian education world. We at Christendom Bible College are what is called a principal approach college.
01:20:35: Now, a principal approach college does incorporate what the questioner was talking about into the curriculum, but it's not particularly classically
01:20:50: Christian in the sense of New St. Andrew's College, for example, out of Idaho, or many other classical
01:20:58: Christian schools. Without getting into too much detail, we begin with the principles that are based on Scripture and go from there, extrapolate from there.
01:21:11: If somebody really wants to get a great idea of what that means very specifically, they can go to the website for the
01:21:19: Foundation for American Christian Education, FACE, the Foundation for American Christian Education.
01:21:26: That's a principal approach institute that's based in Virginia, and they provide the, you might say, the philosophical or pedagogical foundation for what we're doing at Christendom Bible College.
01:21:42: But the principal approach doesn't reject everything in the classical approach either, classical
01:21:48: Christian approach either. Much of it is incorporated into it, but there are some differences, and you can read about those if you go to that website for FACE.
01:21:58: You can read some of it on our website too. We don't get too deep in the woods on our website.
01:22:05: FACE is really the premier organization that stands for the principal approach to education generally.
01:22:15: High school, elementary level. Thank you, Joseph. We have an anonymous listener who says,
01:22:23: I'm remaining anonymous because I have many friends who are graduates of Bob Jones University, and I don't want to unnecessarily offend them by something that I or you say.
01:22:36: But I'm asking if Bob Jones University is as anti -Calvinist as it notoriously was for most of its existence.
01:22:48: I heard you earlier in the program recommending it as being a fine school, but I was wondering if they are still very opposed to the doctrines of Reformed theology.
01:22:58: That's a very interesting question, and I'll let you answer that before I have my own personal experience hearing and seeing
01:23:06: Steve Pettit, the president, at a really excellent Bible conference not long ago in Manhattan, where he was a featured speaker amongst
01:23:16: Reformed men. But if you could comment yourself there. Sure.
01:23:23: I've got to qualify this answer by saying I never worked for Bob Jones University, only Liberty University and Bryan College in Grove City.
01:23:32: But my understanding from dealing with various schools, particularly when
01:23:38: I was VP here at Bryan College, is that Bob Jones University has changed in a lot of ways, and I do not believe that Bob Jones University institutionally is very particularly anti -Calvinistic.
01:24:01: I'm not going to say they're going to advertise themselves as being a premier Calvinist school or something of that sort.
01:24:11: That would lose them a lot of supporters. I was just about to say that. But it's kind of like Liberty University.
01:24:20: Liberty University never said we are anti -Calvinist, and they've attracted a lot of Calvinist students there and a lot of Calvinist faculty.
01:24:32: I was one of them, and there are many others that are still there. Some have retired already, but there are many who are still there.
01:24:40: So it's really very much like the metamorphosis that Liberty went through earlier, before Bob Jones did.
01:24:49: Yeah, well, my own experience was having met for the very first time
01:24:54: Steve Pettit, the president and chief executive officer for Bob Jones University.
01:25:01: I met him and heard him and saw him preach at a conference called the
01:25:07: Foundations Conference that used to be held in Manhattan. I don't know if they're ever going to return to Manhattan, but I think
01:25:15: I went to three or four of those conferences. And one featured Steve Pettit, and he was the only one on the panel, or on the roster,
01:25:26: I should say, that was not openly by name and by title a
01:25:32: Reformed pastor or preacher teacher. And having said that, although Dr.
01:25:41: Pettit never specifically used buzzwords and typically popular
01:25:55: Calvinistic phraseology with labels and titles, his message was clearly a message that only a thoroughgoing
01:26:05: Calvinist could preach, because he even, not by name, but by content, advocated and declared a
01:26:14: Reformed understanding of the Ordo Salutis. So I sat in amazement and with delight hearing an excellent message by him.
01:26:23: Now, I don't know for a fact if he would ever say, yes, I am now a Calvinist or I am now
01:26:28: Reformed. I know people that believe in most or all of the major tenets of Calvinism that never use that phrase to identify themselves.
01:26:39: But I can at least say that, that I think he is too smart of a man to not know what he was saying.
01:26:48: And it was clearly a message, as I said, that only somebody who believed that regeneration precedes conversion.
01:26:57: Conversion being an instant fruit of regeneration, but still that God needs to give or perform heart surgery on a lost dead sinner before he can see, hear, and believe in the truth of the gospel in a trusting and saving way.
01:27:18: And I was very impressed by him. That's all I have to say about that. I didn't have a chance to ask him about that.
01:27:24: I would love to have him on the program. Well, one other thing too, and this goes back to my days at Liberty, all the faculty at Liberty always were impressed with the academic rigor of Bob Jones University.
01:27:42: They took their, now they of course took their theology seriously too, their particular theological positions, but they took their academics very seriously.
01:27:53: And students who came out of Bob Jones University, and we had a few who went on to teach on the faculty of Liberty University too, were top -notch professors.
01:28:06: Not professors, but top -notch professors. In fact, the president I worked under here at Bryan College when
01:28:14: I served as Vice President of Academics, the president I was referring to earlier when we had the creation controversy, he was a
01:28:23: Bob Jones graduate. He did go to Liberty to teach for a while, but he was a Bob Jones University graduate from way back.
01:28:30: And because of Bob Jones, he had a strong view on creation. And because of Bob Jones, he had a strong work ethic.
01:28:38: And so, I mean, there were some, there are some good things that come out of Bob Jones. Yes, and interestingly enough, even though they have a history of vehement anti -Calvinism, they have always had a great love, admiration, respect, and connection with the late
01:28:57: Ian Paisley and the denomination that he founded, the Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster and Free Presbyterian Church of North America, which is thoroughly
01:29:09: Calvinistic. And the Free Presbyterian Church congregations apparently, from what
01:29:16: I understand, used to be the only congregations they would allow students who were
01:29:22: Calvinist to attend or to join. And I happen to love the men of the
01:29:30: Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster and North America. They typically are powerful preachers.
01:29:35: The only thing I'm aware of over which I have a disagreement with them is their exclusive view of the
01:29:43: King James Bible. But every man I've met from that denomination is a fine man that I would love to hear preach again.
01:29:53: Don't forget, too, I don't know about you, but I have a lot of friends and acquaintances over the years who came out of Bob Jones who have become
01:30:01: Calvinists. Oh yeah, my friend Bill Shishko of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church who was pastoring for decades in Franklin Square, New York, and now is pastoring in Comack, Long Island, New York.
01:30:15: The Haven, that congregation is called, still in the OPC. And a number of other men who
01:30:21: I've interviewed on this program who are thoroughly Reformed are graduates of BJU.
01:30:27: And they told me that Bob Jones laid the foundation for them to become
01:30:34: Calvinistic. Because of their Berean attitude and their attempts to be thoroughly biblical.
01:30:41: When people are thoroughly biblical, they tend to fall in love with the Doctrines of Grace eventually. Yeah. Not all.
01:30:49: I understand that there are fine brethren who are Arminian. But it's just amazing how often that happens.
01:30:55: It also happens in or among the Calvary Chapel congregations which
01:31:01: Calvary Chapel is known for being vehemently anti -Calvinist as well. But I have met and known a number of men who, because of the
01:31:09: Bible -focused nature of Calvary Chapel, they've come to embrace the
01:31:14: Doctrines of Grace. And have been disfellowshipped as a result. But it began there.
01:31:23: The seeds were planted there just because of their constant focus on the Bible. Yes, yes.
01:31:29: What else would you like to say must be a major element in a mission to reconquer the
01:31:38: Academy for Christ? Well, I think that Christian colleges that already have a degree of strength.
01:31:51: And I'm, you know, I'll name a few names here. Liberty University and Cedarville University and Bryan College and a few others.
01:32:01: They really have to, first of all, very consciously and intentionally hold the line.
01:32:08: There's always going to be a crisis. There's always going to be some issue that challenges the foundations, the theological foundations of a college.
01:32:21: I mean, now in a lot of places it's CRT, Critical Race Theory, and LGBTQ agenda and things like that.
01:32:31: And some so -called Christian colleges have come to that. Not these places that I mentioned specifically.
01:32:38: But they still have to be very intentional about holding the line.
01:32:45: They've got doctrinal statements. They've got principle statements.
01:32:50: They've got community standards. They've got all these things in writing. Constitutional documents, you might say.
01:32:57: But they have to enforce them. They have to be willing to make the hard decisions to enforce them.
01:33:03: And, I would argue this, they have to communicate a vision to the people who work at the college or university.
01:33:12: That's usually up to the president of a college or university. Have to communicate a vision.
01:33:19: This is who we are. And this is where we stand. And this is where we're going to stand.
01:33:24: If you don't like that, there are other places for you to go teach. But this is where we're going to stand and we're going to enforce it.
01:33:31: We're going to make sure that everybody tows the line, as it were, on these non -negotiable things.
01:33:42: That's the thing. It's one thing to have a statement of faith or a doctrinal statement, which is very good.
01:33:50: You have to start with that. But you have to have people who are willing to enforce it and to communicate the reason for it, the vision behind it.
01:34:02: Why this institution exists. If this college doesn't want to stand for things that are scriptural anymore, then why bother?
01:34:12: Why should it exist at all? I think that's a good question.
01:34:20: I agree. And we have another question from Grady in Asheboro, North Carolina, a very faithful listener to this program and actually also a very faithful financial supporter.
01:34:32: Grady says, Greetings, brothers. Recently I read that Harvard, Yale and other early
01:34:38: Christian universities were doing well upholding the truths of the Holy Scripture until the ministers that started them stepped down and they were turned over to academia.
01:34:50: Have you noticed this in other Christian schools? Well, Grady, I don't know if you've been listening, but that's about the entirety of what we've been discussing today already.
01:35:00: Yeah. Perhaps you could be more detailed about that. Right. It happens whether the school was founded by a single individual or a group of individuals.
01:35:13: Liberty University was founded by Jerry Falwell. And when
01:35:18: Jerry Falwell died suddenly, humanly speaking, suddenly, unexpectedly,
01:35:25: I remember I left Liberty at the same time Jerry Falwell left Liberty. He went up and I went out, so to speak.
01:35:34: But Jerry was the glue, really, that held the place together.
01:35:40: And a lot of people I know were very concerned. What's going to happen to Liberty with Jerry Falwell Sr.
01:35:47: gone? And certainly we've seen the news, we've seen the headlines.
01:35:53: Liberty University has had its ups and downs for a few years. Not financially.
01:35:58: It's been doing great financially. But there have been some other controversies at Liberty.
01:36:06: I would say it's still an open question, for example, as to which direction
01:36:13: Liberty University is going in, because they just lost their previous president, Jerry Falwell Jr.
01:36:19: He was not his father, to be sure. But now they're looking for a president.
01:36:26: And who are they going to get? And which direction are they going to go in? How is that choice going to indicate which direction they're going to go in?
01:36:35: They have to stick to the mission. They can't focus on individuals as important as individuals are.
01:36:42: They have to focus on the mission and the purpose of the school. And the Board of Trustees, whoever they are at Liberty, or any other school where this might apply, they have to focus on the mission and the purpose of the school.
01:36:56: And they have to hire based on that. Not hire somebody who's going to come in just because they can raise more money, or they can attract more students, or something of that sort.
01:37:07: Well, every institution would like to have more money. Every institution would like to have more students. But that's not the purpose.
01:37:15: That's not the mission. The mission is glorifying God and building up the kingdom of Christ. And they have to focus on that.
01:37:24: And then, to paraphrase scripture, all these things will be added unto them.
01:37:32: But the mission and the purpose have to come first before all these other things. I think there's a danger.
01:37:41: There's a danger when the first generation, the founding generation is gone, that things kind of slip away.
01:37:47: And that certainly did happen a long time ago. Some of these places like Harvard and Yale, a little bit later,
01:37:56: Princeton, but it happened. And they just were not vigilant.
01:38:02: They didn't stick to the mission and the purpose. They didn't... Somebody wasn't willing to actually enforce it and to communicate the vision for it based on biblical truth.
01:38:16: They have to do that. They have to do that. And enforcing it is important too. As hard as it is, and as much as people don't like it, somebody has to be the enforcer.
01:38:30: Amen. Yeah, and that has happened to churches of renown. The church once pastored by Jonathan Edwards is now what they call an open and affirming congregation, whelping unrepentant homosexuals in their midst.
01:38:47: Not only to become members, but to become leaders and to be celebrated, not just tolerated, to be celebrated.
01:38:55: This is a travesty. And it's interesting. Most of the churches in one of the most liberal or beyond liberal leftist and apostate denominations, the
01:39:10: United Church of Christ, also known as the Congregationalists, most of those churches have historically been able to trace themselves back to the
01:39:22: Puritans. And I found it quite humorous when a friend of mine was pastoring an independent
01:39:33: Baptist church, very conservative with Reformed leanings in eastern
01:39:42: Suffolk County, Long Island, and they were renting a building from the
01:39:47: United Church of Christ denomination, and when they expressed interest in buying the building, which is a historic building going back centuries, the thing that was quite humorous is this leftist congregation with a woman minister.
01:40:08: They found out that according to the deed, one of the things required in selling the building was that the church who bought the building had to be confessionally
01:40:22: Reformed. Because that was a part of the deed of the original owners, who were thoroughgoing
01:40:32: Calvinists. And the irony is that they were insisting that a church buying that building be
01:40:38: Reformed, even though they themselves were not. Oh, I bet they didn't like that when they discovered it.
01:40:45: I'm assuming they didn't. Or maybe they didn't even know what it meant. That's possible, too.
01:40:53: Well, we have to go to our final break right now, and if you have a question, please send it in immediately, because we're rapidly running out of time.
01:41:00: Our email address is chrisarnson at gmail dot com. chrisarnson at gmail dot com. Give us your first name at least, city and state, and country of residence.
01:41:08: Don't go away. We'll be right back. Hi, this is John Sampson, pastor of King's Church in Peoria, Arizona.
01:41:16: Taking a moment of your day to talk about Chris Arnson and the Iron Sharpens Iron podcast. I consider
01:41:22: Chris a true friend and a man of high integrity. He's a skilled interviewer who's not afraid to ask the big penetrating questions.
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01:41:41: I believe this podcast needs to be heard far and wide. This is a day of great spiritual compromise, and yet God has raised
01:41:48: Chris up for just such a time. And knowing this, it's up to us as members of the body of Christ to stand with such a ministry in prayer and in finances.
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01:42:28: Gary DeMar, President of American Vision, had to say about Iron Sharpens Iron Radio recently.
01:42:34: Good to be back. Chris, I always enjoy our time. I have to tell you, you're one of the better interviewers out there, and I've been doing this for more than 30 years.
01:42:44: Wow, that's some compliment. How much joy are you for that? You don't have to owe me anything.
01:42:51: We're in good shape. I'm glad you said it on the air so I don't have to brag about myself.
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01:52:25: That's 908 -996 -7654 Tell Pastor Dunn that you heard about Grace Covenant Baptist Church on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio And I want to thank
01:52:43: Grace Covenant Baptist Church of Flemington, New Jersey for renewing their advertising contract with Iron Sharpens Iron Radio just last night.
01:52:52: We got the good news. Thank you so much Pastor Alan Dunn and Deacon Frank Sevilla and all of the saints at Grace Covenant Baptist Church of Flemington, New Jersey for considering Iron Sharpens Iron Radio worthy of sharing some of the money that God has blessed you with, with us.
01:53:13: We have about seven minutes left. Brother, if you could, in about five of those minutes, summarize what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners before we leave today.
01:53:28: Well, one thing is that no human institution is necessarily impervious to being compromised.
01:53:37: And so, a lot of formerly Christian institutions have been compromised, and they've become liberal. And one of the answers to that, certainly is for those that remain strong to strengthen the foundation, to reinforce the foundation.
01:53:54: But another aspect is for new entities to rise up. And that's, an example of that is
01:54:01: Christendom Bible College. There could be other examples, too. Of course, I'd like to see new entities rise up all over the country, all over the world, if possible, to give a place, at least, at least, where students who are going on to an established institution can get the foundation, the strong biblical foundation, first.
01:54:29: Even if it's just a one -year program or maybe a two -year program. Get the foundations first and then go on and do something, you know, in engineering or business or nursing or something of that sort.
01:54:43: And so, yes, the ones that still remain, and there are few of them, there really are very few of them, need to strengthen their own foundation.
01:54:52: I've talked about that. But then new competition, if you want to put it in a human sense, new competition is always good because it really draws attention to the fact that so many of the formerly
01:55:08: Christian institutions are not really Christian anymore. And these new institutions rise up and take up the slack to offer an alternative to the compromises of so many formerly
01:55:23: Christian colleges and universities. And it's, you know, it's dark.
01:55:28: These are dark and dangerous times in higher education, I think. There are a lot of things working against most of the established institutions out there.
01:55:39: I've mentioned a few of them before. Government money is certainly one of them that I didn't spend a lot of time on.
01:55:47: The lure of government money can create temptations for compromises.
01:55:53: Accreditation can create temptations for a compromise. Budget concerns, recruitment, keeping a certain number of students, and so on and so on.
01:56:05: But you've got to strengthen your own foundation. But other people and other groups have to start new institutions.
01:56:15: Give Christian students an alternative or at least a foundation.
01:56:23: Well, why don't you whet the appetites of our listeners tomorrow by telling our listeners something about your son -in -law,
01:56:31: Chris Doerr, who will be our guest tomorrow. I believe the association where he serves as director is the
01:56:40: Pennsylvania Firearms Association. If you could give us some details about your son -in -law. Well, he also, in addition to that, runs
01:56:49: Ohio Gun Oaths as well. So he runs the organization in Pennsylvania and runs the organization in Ohio.
01:56:57: Chris is, well, he's my son -in -law. What can I say? He's the father of eight of my grandchildren.
01:57:05: But he really is a dynamic guy. He really loves the Lord. He really wants to apply the faith to, certainly to the
01:57:15: Second Amendment, but also to issues like abortion, for example, and other issues that are significant today, that are hot -button issues today.
01:57:26: He really is quite dynamic. And obviously, anybody listening should think twice about ever trying to invade the home of Chris Doerr, because there are likely at least ten people in that home who are very skilled at using firearms.
01:57:47: Yes. If they can find it. Well, so mark down your calendars, folks, that tomorrow,
01:57:58: Chris Doerr will be on our program, director of the Pennsylvania Firearms Association, and also
01:58:05: Ohio Gun Owners. And I want to also remind our listeners of the website for Christendom College that we have been discussing today.
01:58:15: The website is ChristendomBibleCollege .org ChristendomBibleCollege .org
01:58:22: And any final words before we go off the air? No, just remember put the
01:58:28: Bible in there. Christendom Bible College. Yes, I'm sorry I misspoke there. That's all right.
01:58:33: If you don't, you'll go to Christendom College, a Roman Catholic school, four -year school in Virginia.
01:58:40: Yes, and we don't want you to apostatize, so make sure you go to ChristendomBibleCollege .org
01:58:48: In Ohio. New Richmond, Ohio. In Richmond, Ohio. ChristendomBibleCollege .org New Richmond, Ohio.
01:58:56: Well, thanks so much for being such an excellent guest, Dr. Clausen.
01:59:02: I look forward to your return to the program. And please send my warm greetings in Christ to Dr.
01:59:09: Joe Moorcraft and his lovely wife, Becky, and thank them again for recommending that I interview you today.
01:59:18: Thank you for having me. I want to also thank all of our listeners today, especially those who took the time to write in questions.
01:59:27: And I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far, far greater