The NXR Podcast - THEOLOGY APPLIED - 3 Heresies In Eastern Orthodoxy (Part 1) with Joshua Schooping

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00:00:40 Hi, welcome back to Theology Applied.

00:00:42 I'm your host, Pastor Joel Webbin with Right Response Ministries.

00:00:46 Now, starting this week, we're doing something a little bit different.

00:00:49 For the next three weeks, we are going to be on a three-part journey, a three-part series

00:00:54 focusing on Eastern Orthodoxy.

00:00:58 There are many Protestants who have recently converted to Eastern Orthodoxy, and there

00:01:03 are some great dangers that each of us need to be aware of.

00:01:07 What I've done is I've invited Joshua Shooping, who is currently a Protestant Reformed Minister

00:01:12 of the Gospel, but who previously for five years served as an Eastern Orthodox priest.

00:01:19 I've invited him to join me for all three parts of this mini-series within our Theology Applied

00:01:25 show that focuses on Eastern Orthodoxy.

00:01:29 This is part one.

00:01:30 In part one, we're going to focus on three deadly heresies, not just on biblical doctrine,

00:01:37 but actually denying primary theological issues, gospel issues, three deadly heresies committed

00:01:46 my Eastern Orthodoxy.

00:01:48 If you join us in this three-part journey, you'll find that next week we're going to

00:01:53 focus on the primary distinctions between Eastern Orthodoxy on the one hand and Roman

00:01:59 Catholicism on the other.

00:02:01 There are certainly similarities, but there are distinctions, and as Reformed Protestants,

00:02:07 we need to be aware of what is Eastern Orthodoxy versus what is Roman Catholicism.

00:02:13 They are not exactly the same.

00:02:14 Then the third part in this three-part series is going to be three of the primary reasons

00:02:21 why certain Reformed Protestants are leaving the Protestant faith and joining Eastern Orthodoxy.

00:02:30 I think that there are three primary appeals or attractions of Eastern Orthodoxy. 0.96

00:02:36 I think it's wrong. 1.00

00:02:38 I think it's dangerous, but I do see the appeal. 1.00

00:02:41 So Joshua Shooping and myself, we highlight three of the primary reasons why certain Protestants 1.00

00:02:47 in just the last recent years, and it seems to be there's a bit of an increase, a ramping

00:02:53 up of certain Protestants switching teams, for lack of a better phrase, from Reformed

00:02:59 Protestant tradition and doctrine to Eastern Orthodoxy.

00:03:04 So this is part one. 0.96

00:03:05 We're focusing on three deadly heresies of Eastern Orthodoxy. 0.96

00:03:09 Next episode, part two, the difference between Eastern Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism. 0.99

00:03:16 And then the final episode, part three, we'll focus on three of the primary attractions

00:03:22 or appeals, the reasons why Protestant guys are switching teams and going EO.

00:03:29 If Eastern Orthodoxy and these things concern you, which they do, if they interest you,

00:03:34 which they might you're in the right place tune in now to theology applied whoa whoa whoa you're

00:03:41 not going to want to miss this two announcements about our upcoming next two conferences first

00:03:46 the fall november 11th and 12th that's a saturday holdover for the lord's day on sunday 2023 this

00:03:54 year what's the title of the conference the household and the war for the cosmos joel you

00:04:00 can't use that title that's the title of chris wiley's book well i can use it because i asked

00:04:05 his permission which he gladly gave to me because he's one of our speakers coming to the conference

00:04:11 that's right we've got cr wiley we also have jared longshore and of course yours truly pastor

00:04:17 joel webin doing an entire conference full day on saturday november 11th hold over on the lord's

00:04:24 November 12th, all about biblical patriarchy, all about righteous households with hopeful

00:04:31 post-millennial eschatology working to push back the kingdom of darkness. That's our fall

00:04:36 conference. Go to rightresponseconference.com to register right now. Now, we also have our

00:04:44 spring conference. This is March 1st, 2nd, and 3rd, 2024. Less than a year away, it's going to

00:04:52 sell out quick. Listen, our Theonomy and Postmillennialism Conference, I warned you guys,

00:04:58 a lot of you emailed me saying, I want to come. And I had to say, guys, it's too late. We sold

00:05:03 out six months in advance. So it may seem like March 1st, 2nd and 3rd is a long way away, but

00:05:09 it will sell out quickly. In fact, we're just now making it publicly known and we've already sold

00:05:16 300 tickets. Why? Why do people want to come? What's the title of the conference, Joel?

00:05:21 The King and His Kingdom. Subtitle, Seven Doctrines for Ruling the World. Reformed Theology,

00:05:29 Covenant Theology, Biblical Patriarchy, Presuppositionalism, Kyperianism, General

00:05:35 Equity Theonomy, and Post-Millennialism. Well, who's going to teach those things, Joel?

00:05:41 He Who Must Not Be Named, Voldemort himself, Pastor Douglas Wilson, will be there. Officially

00:05:47 confirmed and we're honored to have him also pastor brian sauve from the haunted cosmos

00:05:52 the king's hall perhaps you've heard of bright hearth he'll be there also dr joseph boot das

00:05:59 boot he will be there and of course myself yours truly pastor joel webin the four of us with other

00:06:06 speakers that'll be joining us as well we'll roll out some of that information as we settle it but

00:06:11 The four of us are already confirmed, Doug Wilson, Joe Boot, Brian Sauve, and Pastor

00:06:17 Joel Webben talking about post-mill, talking about theonomy, talking about patriarchy,

00:06:22 talking about presuppositionalism, reformed theology, covenant theology, all for Christ

00:06:29 and his kingdom, the king and his kingdom.

00:06:32 So you're not going to want to miss this one.

00:06:34 It will sell out incredibly fast.

00:06:38 Please take my word for it this time.

00:06:40 don't delay go to right response conference.com right response conference.com 300 tickets already

00:06:49 sold and we're just now publicly announcing it so don't waste any time register today fight by

00:06:56 flight why leaving godless places is loving godless places i've had a lot of people tell

00:07:02 me recently pastor joel you're post-millennial you claim to believe that jesus is king of every

00:07:09 square inch but apparently you don't think he's king of california because i've heard your personal

00:07:14 story that you used to be a pastor there and that you left for the state of texas notice the title

00:07:20 not fight or flight but fight by flight think of the prodigal son he comes to the end of his rope

00:07:28 he's longing to be fed with the pods given to the pigs and the parable says no one gave him anything

00:07:37 No member of the father's house tracked him down to give him a handout.

00:07:41 He was hurting. 0.99

00:07:43 He had to lie in the bed that he had made for himself by his foolish choices. 0.98

00:07:49 You know what the next words in that parable are? 0.90

00:07:51 No one gave him anything, and he came to his senses.

00:07:55 He began to repent.

00:07:58 There are 10 million professing Christians currently living in the state of California.

00:08:02 what if they're fighting but at the same time while well-intentioned they're also funding

00:08:09 what if california could be brought to its knees simply by the faithful not fighting there but

00:08:16 leaving there and forcing gavin newsom and other tyrants like him to actually have to take a

00:08:23 spoonful of their own medicine the book has been forwarded by douglas wilson it's been endorsed by

00:08:30 Michael Foster. It's good to be a man. Also, Meg Basham, The Daily Wire, and Steve Days from the

00:08:37 Blaze Network. It's available on Amazon, as well as a cheaper copy that can be purchased right from

00:08:44 our website, which is rightresponseministries.com. Check it out today. Applying God's Word to every

00:08:51 aspect of life. This is Theology Applied. Hi, welcome again to another episode of Theology

00:09:01 Applied. I am your host, Pastor Joel Webin with Right Response Ministries. And in this particular

00:09:07 episode, I'm privileged to have for a first time guest, Joshua Shooping. Joshua, is that how I say

00:09:13 your last name? Did I get it right? Yes, Joshua Shooping. You got it. Okay, welcome to the show.

00:09:18 Go ahead and tell our listeners just a little bit about yourself and particularly your background and the reason and purpose for having you on the show today in regards to your previous past with Eastern Orthodoxy.

00:09:30 Oh, sure. Happy to.

00:09:31 Thanks, by the way, for having me on the show, Joel.

00:09:34 I really appreciate it and I really appreciate what you've been up to.

00:09:37 I think you're making a great stand and a great mark in defense of right belief, you know, standing on the gospel.

00:09:43 I also appreciate your work in theonomy.

00:09:47 I think that there's some important work to be done there, and you're doing it, and I just want to commend you for that.

00:09:54 Thank you.

00:09:54 A little bit of my background, I was born and raised in Florida, but long story short, I ended up in the Orthodox Church.

00:10:01 That's a pretty good fast forward there.

00:10:04 Yeah, that was good.

00:10:05 So I spent about 12 years in the Orthodox Church.

00:10:09 I spent about five years as an Orthodox priest, ordained in Rokor, the Russian Orthodox Church outside of Russia.

00:10:18 I ended up serving for a couple of years also in the OCA.

00:10:24 Through COVID, I was trying to provide some educational catechetical materials for my people.

00:10:32 And as I started digging into some of the finer print of some of the canons, whether that's a major ecumenical council like the Seventh Ecumenical Council or into another major council like that of Decythius in Jerusalem in 1672,

00:10:52 I started digging into some of that and kind of uncovering what I believe are deep and profound violations of the gospel.

00:11:02 that were justified and ultimately, according to a reformed soteriology, by faith alone, through grace alone, by Christ alone, for God's glory alone,

00:11:13 and that we stand on Scripture as our highest authority and our only infallible authority.

00:11:19 And so as those doctrines became clear and as some of the sectarianism of the Eastern Orthodox Church made itself very clear to me,

00:11:29 I realized that I had to leave. And so I left and entered into a pastorship in the Christian

00:11:37 and Missionary Alliance. And I'm currently in Russellville, Arkansas. So yeah, I went from

00:11:45 Florida to Arkansas by way of the Orthodox Church. Wow. That is really interesting. Well,

00:11:53 thanks so much for coming on the show. What I want to do to kind of frame it for our listeners

00:11:57 is I'd like to treat this as almost like two interviews,

00:12:01 a first half and a second half.

00:12:02 And maybe we even break it up

00:12:03 and we do it to be continued.

00:12:06 We'd record it all right here and now,

00:12:08 but we may release it in two parts, we'll see.

00:12:10 But what I wanna focus in the first half

00:12:12 is I want to see you compare and contrast

00:12:16 Eastern Orthodoxy with the Protestant Reformed tradition.

00:12:21 What you would now hold to in the church

00:12:24 where you pastor your personal convictions

00:12:26 and beliefs about the gospel of Jesus Christ, what you preach in your public preaching ministry,

00:12:31 pastorally, what you hold to now, and what you were previously a part of as an Eastern Orthodox

00:12:38 priest. So first I want to compare EO with Protestant faith. And then in the second half,

00:12:44 what I'd love to do is to the best of our ability, by the grace of God, try to compare and contrast

00:12:50 for our listeners, EO, Eastern Orthodoxy with Roman Catholicism, because I think a lot of

00:12:56 our listeners, myself included, I think a lot of people think in terms of, hey, whether it's

00:13:01 Eastern Orthodoxy or Roman Catholicism, they both wear funny hats. They both have robes and tassels.

00:13:08 They both really love their idols. It's the, you know, tomato, tomato is the same thing. And so I

00:13:13 think it just would be helpful for our listeners to see, okay, they may have some similar errors,

00:13:19 theological errors, but there is a distinction between somebody who prescribes to Eastern

00:13:24 orthodoxy and somebody who prescribes to roman catholicism so second half of this episode will

00:13:29 focus on eo versus rome but for now let's look at eo versus the protestant faith can you could

00:13:36 you highlight for us what are some of the biggest you said that in your own personal testimony what

00:13:42 drove you out of eastern orthodoxy was that you were reading some of these historic documents and

00:13:48 you know, things, councils and creeds and synods and coming to see that there were not just little

00:13:55 minute theological differences, but there were what you would consider to be serious

00:14:00 compromises with the gospel itself. What are some of those? Yeah, that's a really good question.

00:14:07 And I would have to, I guess, by way of introduction, mention about how prior to

00:14:12 entering into the Eastern Orthodox Church, I spent a few months at a Reformed Baptist church.

00:14:18 And I heard some excellent gospel preaching there. 0.94

00:14:23 But one of the things that was stressed, and rightfully so, would have been penal substitutionary atonement.

00:14:30 And that was an incredibly harsh doctrine to me at the time.

00:14:37 I couldn't square that circle.

00:14:39 I had come out of Far Eastern philosophical theological studies.

00:14:44 I'm entering into a Christian faith.

00:14:47 I grew up in evangelical churches where there wasn't a whole lot of serious theological education happening around me.

00:14:56 So my more serious theological exposure was more with like Far Eastern sorts of things.

00:15:03 And so as I'm starting to engage with serious Christian theology, I'm being presented with penal substitutionary atonement.

00:15:10 And it sounded abstract. It sounded legalistic. It sounded very weird.

00:15:16 And so I thought, oh, this is really just so frustrating because I love like the like the love of Jesus was just just burning in my heart, I have to say.

00:15:26 And I love Jesus and I wanted to join the church.

00:15:29 I wanted to join a church and I didn't know which church to join.

00:15:33 And so my wife and I, we spent a few months at a Reformed Baptist Church.

00:15:38 We visited R.C. Sproul's church because this is in Florida where we were visited over there.

00:15:44 A friend of mine, his older brother was a Calvary Chapel pastor, visited there for a little while and also visited an Eastern Orthodox church.

00:15:56 And so I'm starting to do this kind of like historical study.

00:16:00 And so I'm asking myself the question, well, who do I believe?

00:16:03 Do I believe what this Eastern Orthodox is saying? 0.57

00:16:06 because he's saying that they've always believed the same thing all the time,

00:16:10 all the way from the church fathers, which is their common false rhetoric.

00:16:15 But there's enough there in the scholarship that if you want to paint that picture

00:16:19 and draw the line between those dots, you can create that impression and run with it.

00:16:27 Or you could go by scripture alone.

00:16:29 But if a person misunderstands sola scriptura, they can understand it as solo scriptura.

00:16:35 Just a guy standing alone in his room with his Bible, and he comes out with whatever doctrine he wants.

00:16:41 So between those two options, I said, well, I'm going to go into Eastern Orthodoxy.

00:16:46 And guess what?

00:16:46 They don't teach penal substitutionary atonement in the Eastern Orthodox Church.

00:16:50 It's one of the famous—

00:16:51 Is it like a Christus Victor, or what do they teach?

00:16:54 More of a Christus Victor, a heavy emphasis on the incarnation, the incarnational aspect of soteriology, Christ becoming man, and that kind of like renewing all of creation, so to speak, defeating death.

00:17:11 But the problem was that when I went into seminary, I'm reading some of these church fathers, and I'm finding penal substitutionary atonement there.

00:17:21 hmm like in john chrysostom he'll he'll give a an excellent summary of you know the the concept

00:17:28 of penal substitutionary atonement in his commentary on second corinthians i believe

00:17:33 chapter five and it's kind of blowing me away a little bit and then i'm finding it in some of

00:17:39 these like mystical writers like simeon the new theologian and i'm asking priests about it they're

00:17:46 saying oh no we don't go by what any one father says and you have to find it in our hymns which

00:17:51 isn't the official part of the official teaching arm of the orthodox church is their hymns their

00:17:56 hymn book doesn't change so it has like a binding dogmatic element to it and then i'm so i'm finding

00:18:02 penal we have that within protestantism it's uh it's called the book of psalms it's in the bible

00:18:07 amen oh man uh and so the orthodox you know um have their their uh very rich hymn tradition

00:18:17 and I'm finding penal substitutionary atonement in there.

00:18:22 And so now I'm starting to kind of ask myself,

00:18:24 well, I kind of left this Reformed Baptist church,

00:18:28 and this was part of the motive of it,

00:18:30 but now I'm finding it in the church fathers.

00:18:32 So I'm kind of compelled to actually agree

00:18:37 that this is a right teaching from the Bible.

00:18:41 And so that began some of my deeper doubt

00:18:45 about the nature of the Orthodox Church in its modern expression.

00:18:52 And so if we're going to ask ourselves,

00:18:54 how does the Protestant Church differ in Orthodox Protestantism, right,

00:18:59 a confessional Protestantism, you know, part of the magisterial Protestant tradition,

00:19:04 how does that differ from the Orthodox Church?

00:19:06 Well, one of the answers is penal substitutionary atonement.

00:19:09 But the Eastern Orthodox Church technically shouldn't reject it.

00:19:13 They just think that they're in continuity with the fathers.

00:19:17 So it's one of the exposures of their modern rhetoric where I would kind of divide off modern orthodoxy with the kind of orthodoxy that we might find all the way back in Cyril of Alexandria, John Chrysostom, Augustine, even though he's a Latin Western father, Gregory of Nazianzus, going back through to Athanasius, to Irenaeus, all the way back to the scriptures themselves.

00:19:43 selves. I would say that the Protestant church, and especially if we read the early Protestant

00:19:48 reformers, whether that's Luther, Calvin, William Perkins, or get into the Puritans like Thomas

00:19:55 Boston, Thomas Goodwin, these sorts of guys, they're reading the church fathers up and down,

00:20:01 left and right, backwards and forwards, and they were true patristic scholars.

00:20:05 So they're quoting Gregory of Nazianzus, they're quoting Cyril of Alexandria, they're looking at

00:20:10 Cyril of Alexandria's commentary on the Gospel of John, their work.

00:20:15 So it's like a conversation with the fathers. 0.79

00:20:17 So even that's another difference then that I would say is that where the Eastern Orthodox like to claim a continuity with the church fathers, I actually don't think they have it. 0.95

00:20:28 They do like a nice big skip and jump and become this kind of sectarian ritualistic post Byzantine hang on. 0.85

00:20:38 that's really interesting uh so that's that's primary that's first and foremost in terms of

00:20:46 the gospel of jesus christ i you know i i think there are multiple modes or models of the atonement

00:20:52 that i think can be true um simultaneously christus victor there's truth in christus

00:20:57 victor there's also even truth in the moral example model in the sense that greater love

00:21:01 has none none other than this that a man would lay down his life for his friends it is true

00:21:06 that in the crucifixion of Jesus,

00:21:08 we see a moral example of sacrificial love

00:21:11 that we should display

00:21:13 in fulfilling the second commandment,

00:21:15 second greatest commandment

00:21:16 to love our neighbor as ourself.

00:21:18 Absolutely.

00:21:18 But if that's all it is,

00:21:20 if Jesus' death is merely a moral example,

00:21:22 then number one, we don't need Jesus.

00:21:24 We have Joan of Arc.

00:21:24 We have William Wallace.

00:21:26 We have plenty of people

00:21:27 who've given their lives

00:21:28 to die for their friends

00:21:31 in a sacrificial feat of love

00:21:33 that we could look at that example

00:21:34 and follow it

00:21:35 and do well to follow it. But none of them died as the lamb of God to take away the sins of the

00:21:40 world. They didn't die on our behalf. That's right. They did not die as a substitute,

00:21:46 a propitiation, a pleasing, satiating sacrifice put forward by God to God in order to absolve

00:21:54 his wrath towards our sin. And so in that sense, it must be, I would, you know, I would say it is

00:22:00 not, it can be more than penal substitutionary atonement, it cannot be less. And anytime that

00:22:06 we make it less than Christ as substitute, then we're talking about denying the very gospel of

00:22:13 Jesus Christ itself. And so that's a great example. And that's very integral to the gospel.

00:22:19 But there are other examples that you and I, we've talked a little bit as we were preparing for the

00:22:24 show that are maybe not so much hitting penal substitutionary atonement, but they're high

00:22:30 up.

00:22:30 I mean, these are not secondary tertiary issues, but primary theological issues, namely

00:22:35 idolatry.

00:22:37 Let's talk about idolatry.

00:22:39 Yeah, well, I would preface that by talking about introducing the concept of what I call

00:22:44 the canonical argument in trying to do apologetics in relation to the Eastern Orthodox Church.

00:22:51 because how I mentioned in penal substitutionary atonement, technically that's taught in the

00:22:56 father. So it should be affirmed by the Eastern Orthodox. So they could go through a trend of

00:23:01 teaching it, or they could go through a trend of denying it. So if you're trying to do apologetics

00:23:06 with them, it's trying, it's like trying to get a jello to stick to the wall. So how do you get

00:23:12 beyond the opinions of this local priest or that local priest or this generation's buzzwords or

00:23:18 whatever um and you go to their canons you go to their their canon law you go to their formal

00:23:23 declarations their formal documents and so one of those documents is in the seventh ecumenical

00:23:29 council which they consider to have equal authority to the scriptures um that's where

00:23:35 they see the voice of the church being equal to that of of the word of god so in that real quick

00:23:42 just to pause in that sense eastern orthodoxy would be similar to roman catholicism in the

00:23:47 sense of saying two equal streams authority of authority namely scripture and tradition yeah in

00:23:53 the council of desithius or the council of jerusalem chaired by patriarch desithius in 1672

00:23:59 uh they affirm that it is the same it's not any different to be taught by the church or by the

00:24:04 word of god or by the bible they're both equally inerrant wow um it's crazy uh actually i think

00:24:13 okay so so just to keep count here we've got number one penal substitutionary atonement

00:24:19 and saying that the fathers actually did hold to this but the modern kind of expression of

00:24:25 eo that we find today that's just that's absent from a lot of the rhetoric uh it's more focused

00:24:30 on christus victor yeah okay so so not even just uh neglecting but outright rejection in many cases

00:24:36 of penal substitutionary atonement that's uh failure number one number two we're kind of

00:24:41 skipping over to get to idolatry and images and icons but uh but on our way there we already hit

00:24:47 another big one which is um solo scriptura yeah that scripture we're not so low script we believe

00:24:53 that there are scripture itself testifies to other authorities um but but in solo scriptura i always

00:24:58 remind our listeners what we're saying is not that scripture is the only authority we're saying it's

00:25:01 the highest authority and it's the only infallible authority and anytime any other authority outside

00:25:08 of scripture is deemed to be infallible or inerrant, we have a problem. So that's two now,

00:25:14 penal substitutionary atonement, and then also elevating traditions of men as being inerrant.

00:25:20 They don't err. And then go on. Yeah. And so that's where I would stress that canonical

00:25:26 argument, because that's where the Orthodox can be pressed, because they formally affirm that

00:25:32 scripture and tradition are of equal weight and equally inerrant, uh, in that council of

00:25:38 Decythius. And, and, uh, I forget which decree it is. I don't know if it's three or four. Um,

00:25:44 but it's in one of those particular, uh, decrees where, where they make that affirmation. Um, but

00:25:50 so this canonical argument is just trying to say, well, I need to find where they actually have

00:25:56 pinned themselves down. And that's this one of veneration of icons is another one in the

00:26:03 Seventh Ecumenical Council, where they define anathema as the church's ability to separate a

00:26:11 person from God. They pronounce the anathema. They don't just say a person has anathematized

00:26:16 themselves they they anathematize uh the person a modern um uh canonical canon law reference work

00:26:25 uh compares an anathema with uh to being equivalent to the death penalty in a secular sphere

00:26:31 so when the church applies uh when the eastern orthodox church says that they apply an anathema

00:26:37 it's the it's the spiritual death sentence the spiritual death penalty and they don't think

00:26:42 Within Protestantism, again, within the Reformed tradition, we uphold biblical church discipline.

00:26:48 It has been my immense misfortune as a minister of the gospel to have to oversee.

00:26:54 Now, we're congregational.

00:26:55 We hold to the 1689 Second London Baptist Confession of Faith.

00:26:59 And so it's through the common suffrage when it comes to removing someone from the membership

00:27:03 of the church.

00:27:04 That's a congregational vote.

00:27:05 There you go, 1689.

00:27:06 That's a congregational vote.

00:27:08 The elders would oversee and guide that discussion.

00:27:11 but we'd actually take a formal vote

00:27:12 from the membership of the church.

00:27:14 And it's been my extreme misfortune

00:27:15 to oversee that process a few times by God's grace,

00:27:20 not dozens of times, but I can count them on two hands

00:27:23 over the course of about 10 years of ministry.

00:27:26 But when that happens, it is never our position

00:27:29 to say that that's definitive.

00:27:33 This person that we have just, right,

00:27:35 the keys of the kingdom, binding and loosing,

00:27:37 whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.

00:27:39 Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven.

00:27:41 We recognize that when we lose someone, when we remove someone from the membership of the church and begin to treat them per Matthew 18 as a tax collector or a Gentile, hand them over to Satan, as the apostle Paul says, in the sense that it's almost to be removed from the church is in a sense to be handed over to Satan because there is protection among the people of God versus being isolated on your own. 0.71

00:28:04 But when that happens, my point is that we're never making a definitive declaration that

00:28:09 we actually know the state of this individual soul.

00:28:12 What we're saying instead is there is simply no signs or evidence at this time for us to

00:28:20 be able to continue to affirm this person's salvation.

00:28:24 But we're recognizing that in handing them over, removing them, it is possible that God

00:28:29 uses us to save them for the first time, that they actually weren't saved, but they come

00:28:33 to salvation, it's also quite possible that we would hand someone over, remove someone who is

00:28:39 genuinely regenerate, but in underneath a season of fatherly displeasure, walking away from the

00:28:47 Lord, but that the Lord would use us not to save them for the first time, but they're actually

00:28:51 already saved. We handed over someone who is regenerate, but the Lord uses that tough love

00:28:56 in church discipline to actually bring them conviction and bring them back in. But my point

00:29:01 is the reformed Protestant church is not making a definitive claim one way or the other and saying,

00:29:05 we handed this person over. And so therefore this person is a reprobate and definitively going to

00:29:12 hell. They have lost their salvation or never had their salvation. We're just saying, no, 0.61

00:29:16 we cannot continue to affirm their salvation. And therefore it would be, it would be a hateful

00:29:22 and spiteful thing for us to do to continue to offer to this individual, a false sense of

00:29:27 assurance when they should have little to no assurance right now and that that fear of the

00:29:32 lord would be a loving thing that would drive them to christ that's very different than we pronounce

00:29:39 definitively and you're saying correct me if i'm wrong but you're saying within eastern orthodoxy

00:29:44 that the church rules and and they believe that definitively if they anathematize someone

00:29:49 that person guaranteed 100 going to hell yeah and they would even distinguish between

00:29:54 excommunication and anathema okay those are two different things yeah so they go and uh you know

00:30:02 so we're in a protestant church you know where we're trying to apply church discipline uh we

00:30:07 might apply uh the the medicine so to speak of excommunication uh right we might separate them

00:30:14 from the body we might shun them uh for a time either as you said to lead them to repentance

00:30:19 or to to lead them to conversion uh you know so to speak so uh the orthodox church go eastern

00:30:27 orthodox church goes another mile in applying an anathema which is assigning a person to hell

00:30:34 and uh so it's not just that they you know like say okay we we have to kick like here's the the 0.81

00:30:43 jurisdiction is the church and we're going to we're going to kick you out we're going to you

00:30:48 know banish you from the kingdom so to speak and hopefully you'll find your way back the other one 0.76

00:30:53 is actually no we're assigning you a place uh in hell is what they and and if you look at their

00:30:58 canonical documents again you'll find that that's how they define it uh if you talk to your local

00:31:04 orthodox priest they're going to say oh no it's just medicinal and they'll try to explain it

00:31:08 how we might try to explain excommunication but there are two different concepts anathema and

00:31:14 excommunication. And so in the Seventh Ecumenical Council, for example, they'll anathematize someone

00:31:20 who refuses to bow down and kiss painted images, not only of Jesus, but also painted images of

00:31:28 Mary and also painted images of saints or painted images of angels. And they even define in their

00:31:36 canonical language in the Ecumenical Council, which they say has equal authority to scripture,

00:31:41 that you have to have affection for these things.

00:31:45 They define it as you need, like we're using this word

00:31:48 because it also means affection for the thing.

00:31:52 And to play the devil's advocate, do they say affection for these things,

00:31:56 namely the images themselves, or do they say the image simply functions

00:32:01 as a conduit, a window to the actual, and you don't have to have affection

00:32:05 for the image, but you just need to have affection for Jesus himself,

00:32:09 himself and and you demonstrate that affection for christ himself by kissing the image of christ

00:32:15 i would say technically no because the language that they use to distinguish between veneration

00:32:21 and adoration it would be almost like a a blasphemy of going too low to merely venerate jesus

00:32:28 like you would we adore jesus you know in that distinction between veneration and adoration so

00:32:35 when they say venerate the icon it's not just you don't adore the icon you adore jesus so when they

00:32:42 say venerate the icon they say affection for the icon that that notion of veneration implies that

00:32:47 so their whole sort of uh semiotic theory their iconological theory that you know my veneration

00:32:53 of the image actually translates into veneration of of the person imaged but it actually there's

00:33:01 a little bit of a wrinkle, in my opinion, in the logic where it's like, well, I'm actually supposed

00:33:05 to worship and adore Jesus. So how does my veneration of an image, if veneration isn't

00:33:10 adoration, how does my veneration of an image become an adoration of God?

00:33:17 That's a great point. And even, and going back to, you know, other saints like Mary,

00:33:22 that even if an argument could be made, which I don't believe it can, I think it's a clear

00:33:27 violation of the second commandment um jesus is god um and that you know we don't have images of

00:33:34 god the father we don't have images of god the holy spirit and both the westminster and the 1689

00:33:38 confession you know god is the most pure spirit without body parts and passions he dwells in

00:33:42 unapproachable light you know and um and so we don't try to to make these things physical but

00:33:47 even with christ the second member of the trinity who is the god man who took on flesh still the

00:33:52 reality is, number one, when we make an image of Christ, the God-man, number one, we don't know

00:33:59 what Jesus looked like. And so whoever we are depicting is not Jesus. And you might say, well,

00:34:06 what if somebody had a camera back then with technology? Well, they didn't. And I think in

00:34:10 the province of God, that's, he didn't come when we had cameras. And I think there's something

00:34:15 there. Number two, you might say, well, what if we found an old painting? Well, we haven't found

00:34:20 a first century painting of Jesus. You know why? Because the apostles knew not to paint Jesus.

00:34:27 They didn't do it. You don't find something like, you don't find that until a few hundred years

00:34:31 afterwards, once I think they were getting a little wishy-washy on the second commandment.

00:34:34 Then number three, even if we had a painting or a picture that was, this is not just what we think

00:34:40 Jesus looked like, but this is the spitting image. It would still not be Jesus in the sense that you

00:34:45 could only physically portray in a painting or an image, um, half of Jesus, so to speak,

00:34:52 in the sense of, um, his, his flesh, um, the man, Jesus Christ, a full, you know, I mean,

00:34:58 he's not half man and half God, fully God, fully man, but, uh, you could only show one

00:35:03 of his two natures, uh, what you could not paint and portray, um, is the deity of Christ.

00:35:09 And therefore you, it would be as a sense, divorcing the deity of Christ from, this is

00:35:14 the argument that J.R. Packer makes essentially in his knowing God when he talks about the second

00:35:19 commandment, violations of the second commandment, and that that applies even to the second member

00:35:23 of the Trinity, namely Christ. So all those things being as they are, I think it's wrong to image

00:35:29 Christ. It's certainly wrong to demand veneration towards an image of Christ. But even if you could

00:35:34 argue your way, nuance your way out of that as an Eastern Orthodox priest, what are you going to say

00:35:41 about um veneration towards images of mary someone who is not god what you know what i mean like

00:35:48 what do they say about that or a right exactly saint right uh in the catholic church they reject

00:35:53 gregory palomas and in the eastern orthodox church they affirm gregory palomas you know or

00:35:58 but we also have the example in revelation where you know uh the angel says don't venerate me you

00:36:05 You know, you know, and so we I would approach the the question of of the second commandment by like kind of like a biblical theology of idolatry,

00:36:17 where some of the principal repeated arguments in scripture against the use of images is that they're not alive.

00:36:26 So they have the appearance of they have a nose, but they don't breathe.

00:36:30 They have eyes, but they don't see. They have mouths, but they don't talk.

00:36:33 They have ears, but they don't hear. And those who venerate or worship them because they're they because they're doing that, that somehow initiates a process where they become like them, lifeless, like them.

00:36:46 And so I would see that it's inescapable, you know, to even if we had a photograph of Jesus, even if we wanted to say the Shroud of Turin was proven to be, you know, an accurate image of Jesus or something like that, we still shouldn't venerate the Shroud of Turin, you know, just for sake of argument.

00:37:04 Because the Shroud of Turin, a photograph, a Polaroid picture, a time machine that goes back and does a digital film of Jesus or something like that, that digital film still isn't Jesus.

00:37:18 And we did have, you know, and I think John of Damascus uses a kind of a bait and switch argument, kind of a non sequitur, because he says that, well, God hadn't appeared, you know, at that time.

00:37:31 But God had appeared to Abraham, and he ate with Abraham.

00:37:35 He wrestled with Jacob.

00:37:37 So we have instances in the Old Testament, even prior, and that's why I mentioned them, prior to the giving of the Ten Commandments, of God appearing to people.

00:37:49 Totally, walking with Adam and Eve in the cool of the day.

00:37:51 You could argue maybe Noah caught a glimpse as the door was closing that the Lord actually closed the door of the ark, and I think it's arguable.

00:38:00 I would hold this position that that was a theophany.

00:38:02 It was the second member of the Trinity who had not yet been, you know, the incarnation

00:38:08 had not yet taken.

00:38:09 So he had not yet been enfleshed, but still taking on a physical manifestation, appearing

00:38:13 and physically closing the door.

00:38:14 It wasn't just an angel, but the Lord himself, Noah, his family likely could have seen him

00:38:18 very possible.

00:38:20 So yeah, so we have, I mean, we have multiple, you know, the angel, the Lord with Joshua,

00:38:23 you have, you know, again and again and again.

00:38:24 um but yeah it you know people saw um the lord but why it doesn't seem like anybody was like and

00:38:33 so we should now take take this image and and and paint it and and it's holy and special and a relic

00:38:41 that's going to be in this temple and going like that just you don't see that with any any of the

00:38:47 biblical authors and you don't see that within the first couple at least two or three centuries

00:38:51 correct me if I'm wrong, but within church history as well. Well, the early arguments of the

00:38:56 Christians against idols and pagan images were the very same arguments, the pagan arguments for

00:39:04 their use of imagery, were the same arguments that the later Christians like John of Damascus

00:39:09 picked up. Even the famous Julian the Apostate, he made a famous defense of the use of images and

00:39:17 idols. But that argument that the apostate used for images was the argument that John of Damascus

00:39:24 later picked up a few centuries later. So they just picked up these pagan arguments that the

00:39:29 early church was arguing against. They knew the whole iconological theory. They knew the semiotic

00:39:36 theory of sign and reference and stuff like sign and reference or whatever. They knew all about

00:39:42 that. Augustine even has a famous treatise on teaching Christianity where he talks about

00:39:47 semiotics and sign and referent and stuff like that. And yet they were arguing against imagery

00:39:54 and the use of imagery in worship. So I would say if a person could even argue to the permissibility

00:40:01 of images of trying to paint a picture of Jesus, like an action Bible or something like that,

00:40:07 Even if a person could argue to that degree, that still would never go that next level of actually using it in worship or using it in devotions or something like that.

00:40:20 Right, right. 0.61

00:40:21 R.C. Sproul in his children's books, you know, I've said this before in past podcasts, but he was really careful, and I appreciate this.

00:40:27 We have all of his children's books that we read to our kids, and Jesus is never seen.

00:40:31 You might catch, you know, maybe a kneecap of Jesus riding in on the donkey, you know, with a Passover or Palm Sunday, but his face is not shown.

00:40:44 Now, you know, to be fair, he actually does have stained glass windows in the church where he pastored, co-pastored with Burke Parsons in the foyer, but it's not in the sanctuary.

00:40:54 um and you know so so you're right so i mean there's an argument to be made against images

00:40:59 entirely um but there's certainly i i mean it's just it's impossible biblically not to make the

00:41:06 argument against images in worship and i think it enslaves us to matter i think that's what god's

00:41:11 trying to protect us from either being enslaved to worshiping the sun worshiping a created object

00:41:18 or a God-created object like the sun, moon, and stars,

00:41:23 or for us to become enslaved to our own creations when we paint stuff

00:41:27 or mold stuff or carve things.

00:41:29 I think God wants us to steward creation, not worship it.

00:41:34 Amen. Amen.

00:41:36 All right, so we've got penal substitutionary atonement.

00:41:38 We've got sola scriptura, you know,

00:41:41 scripture being the highest authority and the only infallible authority.

00:41:45 and now we have images and idolatry um what what are are there any other ones that you can think

00:41:52 of that were you know big in terms of again right now comparing and contrasting protestantism with

00:41:58 eastern orthodoxy uh i think there's also a um a myth within orthodoxy about their the centrality

00:42:06 of theosis or sanctification uh with them where they kind of i think uh inject a salvation by

00:42:14 works sort of model, a salvation by asceticism sort of model. If a person will go back and read,

00:42:23 I think it's a 6th century, maybe 7th century document that's famously read during Lent by

00:42:29 a man named John of the Ladder or John Clemicus, where he gives all of these steps that a person

00:42:35 has to take. Some of them are just good, pious advice, like about how to be humble. But when

00:42:42 you start reading some of these things you find like the total absence of assurance they don't

00:42:47 really have any assurance of of salvation uh and it's really very tragic so they'll live in a

00:42:54 monastery uh they'll fast you know 364 days a year um you know they'll sleep on the ground

00:43:02 uh they'll they'll beat their legs with sticks uh on the shins if they have a thought of lust 0.89

00:43:07 come up. They'll sleep on boards when it's cold, but they'll separate the boards so that a little 0.80

00:43:14 bit of cool air can go in between the boards, so that way they don't have any warmth. And yet they

00:43:19 won't have any assurance that they're saved. They're never sure if it's enough. And you find

00:43:25 their rejection of the gospel being enshrined, again canonically, in that council of Jerusalem

00:43:33 in 1672, where they affirm the necessity of justification by faith and works. And so they

00:43:42 have like this sort of like genetic inability to understand the doctrine of justification by faith

00:43:47 alone, as if we're just a bunch of antinomians, like that's literally what we're affirming.

00:43:52 But really, we're preserving the supernatural nature of regeneration and conversion, and that

00:43:59 we actually participate in the life of God because he gives us his eternal life. He doesn't

00:44:04 give us a thing called eternal life. He gives us himself and he is our life. But that comes together

00:44:11 with faith and trust alone. So it's not dependent on our transformation, whether we're saved. It's

00:44:17 dependent on him saving us and us trusting in him alone. Amen. Yeah, it's not faith plus works

00:44:24 equals salvation, but rather it is faith alone equals salvation plus works. That if someone has

00:44:32 true saving faith, they will have salvation and that faith will also manifest itself not only in

00:44:39 eternal life, but in good works here on earth. But the order is vital and the mistake is the

00:44:49 difference between heaven and hell. Faith plus works equals salvation versus faith equals

00:44:54 salvation plus works. Can I be frank with you for just a second right here at the end? Look,

00:45:00 some of you guys, you're financially supporting this ministry. And from the bottom of my heart,

00:45:05 I say, thank you. I cannot thank you enough. However, some of you, you just, you can't afford

00:45:12 it. In fact, some of you, you shouldn't afford it. Let's be honest. I mean, we're living in Joe

00:45:18 Biden's ridiculous economy. Our nation and our totalitarian political elites lost their minds 0.99

00:45:27 over the last three years due to COVID. We have written checks that we simply cannot cash. It

00:45:34 doesn't matter if people change the definition of a recession. We are living in a recession right

00:45:41 now regardless. Some of you are struggling to afford a carton of eggs at the grocery store.

00:45:47 You cannot support financially this ministry at this time, nor should you, but you could still

00:45:54 help us tremendously. I am asking you, please, if you're willing to do so, take one minute of your

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00:46:23 And the Word of God and courageous theology applied in practical ways to every realm of life

00:46:30 gets out there. Help us get it out there. Thanks for tuning in.

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The NXR Podcast - May 16, 2023

THEOLOGY APPLIED - 3 Heresies In Eastern Orthodoxy (Part 1) with Joshua Schooping

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