The NXR Podcast - THEOLOGY APPLIED - 5 Doctrines Stunting The Church’s Maturity

00:00:00.000 Hey guys, real quick, before we get started,

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00:00:17.560 Thanks.

00:00:18.040 All right, you're listening to another episode

00:00:19.560 of Theology Applied.

00:00:20.540 I'm your host, Pastor Joel Webbin

00:00:21.780 with Right Response Ministries.

00:00:23.160 I was privileged in this episode

00:00:24.820 to have some of the guys who,

00:00:27.100 a lot of people may not know these names, right?

00:00:29.320 so they're not the biggest, you know, name guys in the world. But I have personally been benefiting

00:00:35.260 by listening to these guys and their podcast, The King's Hall. I've been benefiting by listening to

00:00:40.640 them over these last couple months recently, almost more than any other content that I follow.

00:00:46.860 And so I'm pleased and privileged to have Brian Sauvé and Dan, I forget his last name, so he's

00:00:54.540 going to introduce himself. And then Eric Kahn. Eric Kahn, some of you guys know him. I've had

00:00:58.480 them before. He also is a part of a podcast called the Hard Man Podcast, but the three of these guys

00:01:02.980 combined, they're all a part of the same church in Utah, and they all co-host, the three of them,

00:01:08.440 the King's Hall Podcast. If you have not listened to the King's Hall Podcast, you've got to listen

00:01:14.020 to it. We talk about their mission, what they're trying to do, and specifically what we get to in

00:01:18.540 this episode is five key doctrines that are not full-blown heresy. They fall under the banner of

00:01:25.040 christian orthodoxy but five key doctrines that are orthodox but yet wrong unbiblical and that

00:01:31.320 we think are most dangerous most responsible for stunting the the maturity of the church

00:01:37.660 today in america all right thanks for tuning in applying god's word to every aspect of life

00:01:43.480 this is theology applied

00:01:46.300 All right, welcome to another episode of Theology Applied.

00:01:53.640 I am your host, Pastor Joel Webman with Right Response Ministries, and today I'm very privileged

00:01:57.980 to have a special guest, three guests.

00:02:01.200 They are the host, the co-host of the King's Hall podcast.

00:02:05.220 We've got Brian Sauvé.

00:02:06.800 You want to say Sauvé or Suave, or just Suave, but I've been told that it is Sauvé.

00:02:12.260 So we've got Brian Sauvé.

00:02:13.640 We've got Dan.

00:02:15.120 give me your last name dan how do you say it burkholder burkholder dan burkholder and then

00:02:20.700 we have eric khan who is also um the host of the hard man podcast and so me and eric have

00:02:26.460 uh we've kind of you know combined forces a few times now and so i'm glad to have you back on the

00:02:32.080 show so you guys tell us a little bit about yourselves and especially the king's hall podcast

00:02:35.660 wow this is the brian sovay moment i know this is this is a test of who who thinks they're the

00:02:45.840 alpha of the king's hall no no no no it's just that you do most of the talking so we just defer

00:02:50.800 to you well my name is brian sovay as joel said and thank you nailed the pronunciation by the way

00:02:56.560 i pastor refuge church uh in ogden utah where uh we we all serve together uh here in in mormon land

00:03:04.680 i've got five kids and my wife lexi we are uh working hard and staying up late with all of

00:03:12.220 those wonderful duties the lord's given us but um yeah we we have a good time with the king's hall

00:03:17.520 this season we're primarily addressing the question of what would it take to build a new christendom

00:03:24.040 what would need to go and what would need to be established if we were to build a durable

00:03:28.600 uh, reformed Protestant, robustly Christian, uh, Christendom that could last for a thousand years

00:03:35.900 or more. And so it sounds like we're thinking about a lot of the same things, uh, as you think

00:03:40.520 about here on this show. And we do appreciate you having us. Thanks for the invite. Absolutely. So

00:03:45.980 Christendom is bad, right? The Spanish crusades. How would you respond? What do you think about 0.91

00:03:52.220 that? Well, well, you know, we're probably, we're not necessarily telling people that we're going

00:03:58.100 to go retake constantinople is that what it is i think so so so surely certainly there are some

00:04:06.020 errors in the in the old christendom but we would say that the the current thing that we have now

00:04:11.640 is even worse than that so yeah yeah we're we're not necessarily just uncritically trying to

00:04:18.700 replicate the old christendom but even reform and and understand some of the ways that um failure

00:04:25.760 might have been built into the foundation stones of aspects of the first Christendom and build one

00:04:31.300 that would continually improve and be reformed according to the scriptures and, you know, bear

00:04:37.620 fruit. Amen. It might even be better. Yep. Amen. Some of the things that I've really benefited

00:04:42.920 from Kings Hall podcast in terms of Christendom, rebuilding Christendom and those kinds of things

00:04:47.100 is just, you know, thinking in terms of, you know, culture, cultus is a Latin word. It means worship.

00:04:51.780 It's not so the rush to do any kind of thing.

00:04:53.340 It's not whether, but which, um, everybody's worshiping.

00:04:56.160 Secularism is not science.

00:04:57.500 It's a religion, um, modernity, secularism and all it's nasty, you know, um, offspring

00:05:03.080 of feminism and all these androgyny, everything that's come out of it.

00:05:06.840 Um, it is worship.

00:05:07.860 It has therefore an orthodoxy and has convictions and has beliefs, dogma, everything outside

00:05:13.260 of that is blasphemy.

00:05:14.560 And so there are blasphemy laws, right?

00:05:16.040 That's cancel culture, things that you can't say.

00:05:18.180 There are sacraments that go along with their worship.

00:05:21.340 I think it was Gahardus Voss that talks about the Asherah poles and compares them.

00:05:25.820 It reminds me of the two towers and tearing down the trees of Isengard because they represent life and fruitfulness.

00:05:32.500 And an Asherah pole is a tree that's been stripped of all its limbs, all its branches.

00:05:36.980 It's unable to bear fruit. 0.99

00:05:38.780 And you think of, you know, chopping off a boy's manhood, you know, and transgenderism. 1.00

00:05:44.980 And especially as that pertains to transing children and making them fruitless. 1.00

00:05:49.000 And so there you have the Asherah pole. 1.00

00:05:50.400 And then, of course, you have the sacrament of abortion, you know, and, you know, the false god of Molech and these kinds of things. 0.93

00:05:56.480 So it is a religion. It's not whether but which. And you guys do a really good job pointing that out. 0.58

00:06:01.560 And in terms of Christendom, it's the same as the founding of America, at least in principle, that, you know, that, you know, there are bugs and there are features. 0.54

00:06:09.580 We would say that, you know, race-based slavery was a bug and the founding and our constitution and our ideals as we lived up to them is precisely why that bug was worked out.

00:06:21.900 So the solution is not anti-Christendom.

00:06:23.880 The solution is, as Doug Wilson would say, Christendom 2.0.

00:06:27.440 And let's see if we can do it better.

00:06:29.400 So, all right.

00:06:30.580 We'll go ahead and dive in.

00:06:32.320 Any response on my little Christendom spill?

00:06:36.500 Did I get it right?

00:06:38.920 Nailed it.

00:06:39.580 Yeah, that was great. Okay, great. All right. So this is what we want to do in the show. We want

00:06:43.720 to talk about as we're trying to restore and rebuild, build back better, but actually,

00:06:49.680 actually better, not build back worse. But as we want to usher in Christodom, we, you know,

00:07:00.280 re-usher that back in and do it and do it better and do it out of one of the reasons we can do it

00:07:04.660 better is not because we're better men, but we're standing on the shoulders of giants and those

00:07:08.440 wonderful men who came before us. And, and so, you know, one of the ways that God, you know,

00:07:14.520 whether it be a nation and empires or Christodom or whatever it might be, is that God uses those

00:07:20.400 failed empires, all that was good in it, right? You know, removing the sin, but all that was good

00:07:26.460 in it, it functions as the manure, Toby Sumter talks about this, you know, that makes the ground

00:07:31.040 more fertile in order to produce something better the next time. And so as we're seeking to do that,

00:07:36.120 we want to look at things that went wrong and we want to look at things that need to be revised.

00:07:40.340 How can we do this better? And so my thesis, I want to frame up the show like this. My thesis

00:07:45.920 is I feel like over the past 20 to 30 years in the evangelical world, there's been a reformed

00:07:53.180 resurgence, right? You know, a lot of guys became Calvinists. Now, a lot of them never really became

00:07:57.800 Calvinists. Like, you know, R.C. Sproul says, what do you call a four-point Calvinist? An

00:08:01.860 arminian you know and so uh so guys like mark driscoll never really became uh reformed you

00:08:06.480 know but but some guys actually did and then you know god has just over the last few years taken

00:08:11.540 his winnowing fork and and just separating the wheat and the chaff and so some guys went from

00:08:16.140 you know young reformed restless to full-blown apostasy and then other guys have gone to a four

00:08:22.060 full-orbed confessional reformed position not just calvinistic you know baptist you know but

00:08:28.280 But actually really embracing, you know, whether it be Sabbatarianism or patriarchy or like a general equity theonomy, you know, or post-millennialism, like more of a full or mature Reformed theology.

00:08:41.460 So God took this Calvinistic resurgence and half of it went apostate and the other half of it is maturing and growing up and not just, you know, boys, but men.

00:08:52.660 And so we thank God for that.

00:08:53.840 And I think that what the Lord has done,

00:08:55.500 I'm thinking of not just the young reformed and restless,

00:08:57.620 but thinking of just the reformed movement

00:08:59.780 over the last 30 years combined.

00:09:01.460 Ligonier, grace to you.

00:09:02.620 Think of like Paul Washer,

00:09:04.380 all these different guys, Voddie Bauckham.

00:09:06.740 It seems like what the Lord used these men to do

00:09:09.480 in our own lives,

00:09:10.380 and we're exceedingly grateful for it,

00:09:12.480 is really expose heresy.

00:09:14.960 So you can have a false doctrine

00:09:16.780 that's unbiblical, but orthodox,

00:09:20.160 that meaning it's wrong.

00:09:21.140 We're not relativists, right?

00:09:22.120 so it's like, all right, it's not heresy, but it's still wrong. It's still unbiblical. And then

00:09:25.120 you can have doctrines that they're not merely unbiblical, but they're outside of the realm of

00:09:29.260 orthodoxy. And it seems like the last 20, 30 years, the Lord has used reformed guys primarily,

00:09:34.080 but other guys as well, to expose some of these things that are straight up heresy, that will

00:09:39.420 damn you to hell. Things like the prosperity gospel, things like Roman Catholicism, things

00:09:44.760 that would deny the gospel. And so all these different things, prosperity gospel, I feel like

00:09:50.340 every conference for the last 30 years was, um, you know, it's like half of the speakers would

00:09:55.320 say, this is why Catholicism is bad. This is why charismatics are bad. This is why Catholicism is 0.68

00:10:00.940 bad. And this is why charismatics are bad. And so it's like, great. We appreciate that. Um, 0.99

00:10:05.320 you know, American gospel, the documentary they put out, I appreciate it. Thank you.

00:10:09.100 Um, but, but we want, uh, to press on to maturity. And so, um, basically for this episode, what I

00:10:15.120 want to do is list, um, some doctrines that, that aren't necessarily prosperity gospel.

00:10:19.780 they're not necessarily heresy, but I think they're still unbiblical. I'm going to give my

00:10:23.280 list in order of what I think is most dangerous, stunting the maturity of the church to least

00:10:29.080 dangerous, but all five being what I would consider orthodox. But again, wrong, unbiblical, 0.84

00:10:38.220 and unhelpful, stunting the church's growth. And then I want to see if you guys agree with my list,

00:10:43.320 if you want to add something to the list, take something off the list, what would be your list

00:10:47.280 of the top five. And then at minimum, I think you guys would disagree maybe with the order of my

00:10:52.080 list. So here's my list, without further ado. Number one, radical two kingdom theology. And

00:10:57.880 in parentheses, I'm putting there pietism, an idea that it's just the home of the church, 0.55

00:11:03.040 the home of the church, the home of the church. And so, you know, there's not a single square

00:11:08.380 inch of all of creation that Christ doesn't cry out mind. This would be, you know, anti-Kyper, 1.00

00:11:13.860 the all of Christ for all of life. They want some of Christ for some of life. 1.00

00:11:19.100 So a radical two kingdom theology, I think is number one. I think it's the worst second

00:11:23.520 dispensationalism, anti-covenant theology. I think dispensationalism that's second on my list of

00:11:29.920 most dangerous. Then I put complementarianism in that. Yeah, sure. You know, egalitarianism,

00:11:35.880 you know, but complementarianism, it seeks to make roles, God assigning roles to men and women

00:11:41.820 arbitrary in my assessment. And so it lends towards sexual androgyny, that men and women

00:11:47.720 are really the same. But for whatever reason, God's just determined that we have different

00:11:51.360 roles. And I think that's led to a lot of sexual chaos. Number four, all millennialism.

00:11:57.840 I think that that's worse in my assessment in terms of stunting the growth of the church

00:12:02.740 than premillennialism. And so premillennialism is number five. My last one, the reason why I'm

00:12:07.580 putting all millennialism as more dangerous than pre-millennialism is I found, I don't know if it's 1.00

00:12:12.460 your experience, but I found that there are more dispensational pre-millennial guys, especially

00:12:18.100 the historic guys, but even dispensational pre-mill guys who are willing to actually fight

00:12:22.980 in the culture war, that actually want to see all of Christ for all of life, that actually think,

00:12:28.840 you know, basic things like Christians should vote. And whereas all millennials, I always say,

00:12:33.740 You know, all millennialism and post-millennialism, we agree on the timing of the millennium,

00:12:41.320 but pre-mill and post-mill agree on the nature.

00:12:45.020 And I feel like the timing is important, but the nature seems to be more important.

00:12:48.860 Pre-mill guys actually think that Jesus reigning has an effect on earth, even if he's not reigning

00:12:54.580 yet, whereas it seems like some of the all-mill guys, not all of them, but a decent amount. 0.69

00:13:00.060 The reign of Christ is, in terms of earthly, tangible, physical effects, is inconsequential. 0.97

00:13:06.620 And I think that that's a bigger problem.

00:13:07.960 So, number one, radical two kingdom theology.

00:13:10.520 Number two, dispensationalism.

00:13:11.820 Number three, complementarianism.

00:13:14.320 Add androgyny, egalitarianism in there. 0.87

00:13:16.640 Number four, all-millennialism, which I think can be another form of pietism.

00:13:21.240 And then number five, premillennialism, which is just the eschatological pessimism.

00:13:26.860 What do you guys think?

00:13:29.560 yeah well i was gonna say joel it's overall i think a good list like any good presbyterian

00:13:35.060 you know we always take our exceptions um it's uh what struck me is first of all there should

00:13:41.980 be a picture somewhere on here of tim keller um you know he's been in the news lately uh been on

00:13:48.100 twitter um what i would say about his stuff is sort of i don't know what exactly you call it

00:13:53.380 but sort of the middle way ism um i would definitely put that on this list that's a good

00:13:58.500 Um, it's interesting too, because sort of in my mind, the two flavors that run through

00:14:03.320 everything on the list are sort of like Gnosticism and Pietism.

00:14:07.540 And so like, maybe it shows up in eschatology, maybe it shows up in, you know, your sexual

00:14:13.240 theology, complementarianism, for example.

00:14:16.140 But fundamentally, it's kind of these two undergirding things of Pietism and Gnosticism

00:14:20.720 that sort of plague everything.

00:14:22.760 You know, we don't think that physical bodies and physical realities really matter.

00:14:26.620 and so these two things tend to downplay all of them um i don't really have a disagreement i think

00:14:33.600 on any of these um you know we recently did a podcast on our top books and uh we had about 50

00:14:40.800 picks for the top five so that was my fault i'm very indecisive as these other men yeah eric all

00:14:47.460 of a sudden is like in my number four cluster is and we're like number four cluster they're not

00:14:53.020 even like connected they're not even connected it was so sneaky but then we all were like okay

00:14:59.120 if that's what we're doing that's funny yeah okay so what do you guys think brian dan

00:15:03.960 you know i would i would agree with your list in uh everything that's on there i would find

00:15:10.060 similar issues and i think that the way that you framed uh the ones that i think people might have

00:15:15.400 the most issue with who are closer to us would be amillennialism and complementarianism where

00:15:21.400 They might agree with a lot of the other stuff, but maybe not see what's happening in the

00:15:26.560 amillennial instinct that we would object to and say, from the foundations, you are

00:15:32.280 making yourself impotent. 0.68

00:15:33.960 And it is pietism. 0.68

00:15:35.580 It's this instinct where I agree, the premillennialist actually takes these texts more seriously. 0.81

00:15:42.980 And they just say, well, we don't think that's happening now, but we do think it's going

00:15:46.880 to happen.

00:15:47.340 You know, like Christ reigning from sea to sea, from the river to the ends of the earth. Well, that's the spiritual kingdom, the amillennialist would say. And so I do have a lot of respect for those who are, you know, I'm a premillennialist, historic premillennialist, they might say, but it's because I take these texts so seriously.

00:16:06.700 Right. So I agree with that. I think complementarianism on the list. Again, what we're talking about and the reason that we need to object to it is because we're basically removing we're making it arbitrary by removing the reason for which men ought to rule in the home in the church.

00:16:28.340 and we're just saying it was a coin flip instead of, no, God actually made something in the nature

00:16:35.800 of maleness and in the nature of femaleness that will show up everywhere in every sphere of the

00:16:43.320 world. And when you lose that principle, you've lost, you've really lost, I mean, everything in

00:16:50.300 principle and you're going to end up egalitarian eventually. I always tell people, I always tell

00:16:55.040 people with a home in the church you know because it limits it to the home in the church i always

00:16:58.040 tell people you know an amazing thing happened the other day it was the lord's day and my wife

00:17:02.160 and i were leaving church and we you know we pulled out of the parking lot and she still had

00:17:06.700 breast it blew my mind it was unbelievable and i for one you know when i looked over at my wife

00:17:14.180 in the seat i was happy yeah yeah yeah praise god uh praise i praise i sang the doxology again

00:17:20.360 you weren't even in the sanctuary one thing for your other podcast bro i think you're welcome

00:17:25.780 one thing i would add to the list um and and i i don't think you actually missed it i think you

00:17:32.720 included it in your things we've dealt with in like the prosperity gospel and charismania

00:17:38.200 but i i would still add some kind of um instinct of revivalism where where the church is conflating

00:17:48.080 emotional response to spiritual things with spiritual maturity.

00:17:53.880 And you would add to that like the decisionism, right?

00:17:56.100 Yeah, revivalism, decisionism. And I think that while we've probably in a lot of reform circles

00:18:02.300 dealt with the formal issues of prosperity gospel and hyper charismania, I don't think that we've

00:18:09.140 properly or adequately dealt with the instinct that would say, well, how's your quiet time?

00:18:15.580 And what they mean is like, how are your emotions rather than where a more mature Christian instinct, which would be to say, my faith is in the objectivity of God's work and his promises to me.

00:18:30.900 I'm going to believe them and do my duties before God with as cheerful a heart as I can muster today by the grace of God.

00:18:37.640 And I'm going to tell my emotions, kneel to King Jesus.

00:18:42.120 So I still think that's part of – it's all wrapped up in effeminacy, this kind of like designing of the church service around emotionalistic responses.

00:18:50.840 So there's a lot of these that the threads are interwoven.

00:18:55.660 Yeah.

00:18:56.220 I would definitely add that.

00:18:57.800 And with that, I always think of federal vision and Doug Wilson, so I don't prescribe to federal vision.

00:19:03.100 But I think that was the heart behind it.

00:19:05.980 And Doug Wilson, in his defense, I think good intentions, and I think he's backed off.

00:19:10.940 And I think there's also a spectrum within the federal vision camp.

00:19:14.700 And there are guys who are much more hardcore than Doug would be.

00:19:17.920 So all that being said, all the disclaimers, you know, out there, I think the heart behind

00:19:22.620 it, the intent was working against the revivalism and decisionism of all these, all these people

00:19:28.420 wrestling with assurance of salvation, myself for several years being one of them, like,

00:19:32.640 well, I'm probably not saved.

00:19:33.500 I'm probably not saved.

00:19:34.240 I'm probably like every day having to re-decide to be a Christian, you know, having to, you

00:19:39.140 know feel something and work something up and i think doug was just a lot of different aspects

00:19:43.820 but i really think that that was like the core intention of the federal vision movement was just

00:19:48.140 to try to provide some kind of clear uh tangible you know um fruits evidence proof of like this is

00:19:57.260 in this is out yeah this is living faith yeah objectivity of the covenant right um and and you

00:20:03.380 know joel after you said that i'm wondering maybe you should get baptized again sounds like you've

00:20:07.660 maybe sin since we were baptized. So I don't know, maybe you should consider that.

00:20:11.440 I don't think it's by accident that we see, we saw a rise in dispensationalism and denying the

00:20:19.960 covenants, you know, along with revivalism. And so that, that emotionalism and the denying of

00:20:26.640 the objectivity of the covenant, like Brian said, have gone hand in hand. And so you're positionally

00:20:32.600 always unsure because you're, you don't have this framework of God's covenants working.

00:20:37.380 but God has actually declared over you because you are responsible then for

00:20:41.660 your standing essentially in, you know, apart from these covenants. Right.

00:20:46.800 And so I, you know, that's not really a surprise. Right.

00:20:49.480 And that becomes a motivation.

00:20:50.860 The motivation is a fear-based rather than a confidence in Christ.

00:20:55.660 And, and, and it makes sense that pre-mill, you know, would,

00:20:58.520 would go right, right there with dispensationalism. It's like,

00:21:01.060 every day I got, I need to make, you know, so it's,

00:21:02.840 It's a diluting of the covenantal promises and a removal of the objective reality of being in Christ.

00:21:10.840 And it becomes more of a subjective, personal, individual feeling and a decision that needs to be made and remade and remade.

00:21:18.420 And so there's the fear there, fear incentive.

00:21:21.360 And then on top of it, Jesus, you know, could come back tomorrow, you know, and things are going to get worse and worse until he does.

00:21:29.700 So you better be resolute.

00:21:30.860 You better be standing strong.

00:21:31.900 So it really feels like fear, fear based.

00:21:35.460 Yeah. And I think I think another thing that could be on the list would be denying legacy, which is a fruit.

00:21:41.700 It's not exactly a category in itself, but it's definitely a fruit of all of these because Brian said this is, you know, impotent theology.

00:21:49.840 And this morning I was I was thinking through this list and I was like, this is really castrated Christianity.

00:21:55.280 This is fruitless Christianity. If it was a house, it would be like issues with the foundation, with the roof and the HVAC. That's what all of these are. And you're not thinking like, oh, man, I better attend this so that I can pass it on to the next generation. You're like, man, I hope this thing doesn't fall apart in the next 15 minutes. 0.94

00:22:13.060 Right. Yeah. And that's kind of so. So all of these theologies are not looking past themselves in in a lot of ways.

00:22:22.140 You're not going to be passing this on to the next generation like a robust covenant theology, post mill, you know, Calvinistic theology, you know, passing it on to the next generations.

00:22:34.060 It really does deny your legacy. And so just looking through your list, I was I was ready to disagree with you.

00:22:41.000 I really wanted to pick a fight somewhere. And I was talking to Brian. I'm like, I think

00:22:45.660 complementarianism should be number one. It's not necessarily like my least favorite. Like if I,

00:22:51.500 R2K theology, radical two kingdoms, man, I loathe that theology. I absolutely loathe it.

00:22:57.860 And I was making an argument to Brian about complementarianism being so dangerous because

00:23:02.500 there's so much gravity in our culture towards sexual androgyny, you know, towards this like

00:23:10.000 grayness of gray blob humanity, you know, denying, uh, the image bearingness of God into self

00:23:18.780 definition of the person, you know? Uh, and he, he said, well, that's really kind of the same thing

00:23:24.860 that R2K theology does. It's just another category of it. They're so connected, but this, uh, you 0.96

00:23:30.980 know, and tying it all together within pietism, you know, the roots of pietism. Another reason

00:23:36.960 why i would say it's castrated is because pietism in its essence was this pietist movement was

00:23:43.260 founded because of uh how tired they were of fighting this lutheran pietistic movement they

00:23:49.420 didn't want to fight anymore and a christianity that does not fight will ultimately lose they

00:23:55.540 will be swallowed up it won't produce fruit right um i mean the bible the the scriptures are just

00:24:01.320 chock full of language of fighting you know in this in this cosmic battle uh and so uh it really

00:24:08.880 does this list i i think i would put it in the same order you did even all mill over pre-mill

00:24:15.220 because we've found the same thing is that we we will gladly link arms with pre-mill brothers

00:24:22.100 because they're willing even if even if our eschatologies are radically different our

00:24:27.880 motivations you know you say like hey we should go fight we should go take that hill and they're

00:24:31.300 like, okay, yeah, let's do it. You know, whereas the all-mill guy is like, well, that's a spiritual

00:24:36.080 hill. It's like, no, actually the hill's right there. It's real. We should go take it. We can

00:24:40.000 take it. We should go take it. No, we should have taken it. You're like, Jesus is ruling spiritually

00:24:44.900 over the spiritual hills. He owns the spiritual cattle. No, they spiritualize Jesus right out of

00:24:52.020 his lordship for sure. And Jesus becomes sequestered. His kingship becomes sequestered

00:24:58.340 in quarantine to the heart, right?

00:25:00.160 We used to say Jesus is Lord of all.

00:25:01.740 Now we say Jesus is Lord of my sweet little heart.

00:25:04.020 And so it's a confinement of his Lordship.

00:25:07.280 So I think that's great, Dan.

00:25:08.540 So real quick, can you do this, Dan?

00:25:10.200 I think we need to define some of our terms

00:25:12.180 because otherwise people are going to just think

00:25:14.680 that we're egotistical.

00:25:16.360 You're going to just spout in all these things

00:25:17.520 and we don't actually know what they mean.

00:25:19.020 And for me, the guiding force of ministry

00:25:21.060 is always what people think.

00:25:22.160 So I want everybody to like me.

00:25:27.800 So let's define our terms and, uh, and try not to be, uh, try not to be presumptuous.

00:25:32.560 So, uh, Dan, can you take pietism?

00:25:34.680 What would is pietism? 0.65

00:25:36.940 Yeah, sure.

00:25:37.940 I can give you, uh, some of the historic roots of pietism and then, uh, you know, kind of

00:25:42.360 define it.

00:25:42.880 So really the roots of pietism came out of the 17th century.

00:25:47.260 Um, there were folks that were sick of this in this infighting within Protestantism and

00:25:53.200 with, uh, the Catholics, you know, so the Protestant Catholic fighting.

00:25:57.800 uh, was pretty intense. I mean, like, you know, there's a reason that bloody Mary got her name 0.95

00:26:03.140 that way because she killed Protestants. I mean, so within this, uh, debating doctrine and, 0.99

00:26:09.000 and, um, desire to hammer out truth and to figure out like, you know, what is this reformation?

00:26:15.000 What are we reforming? What did the past say? They, this pietistic movement, the roots of the

00:26:20.340 pietists, they grew sick of this, this fighting. And so this led to some movements, um, that is

00:26:26.300 distinct from lutheranism it came out of lutheranism but it's not necessarily the doctrines

00:26:31.240 of lutheran you know conservative uh reformed lutheran theology today but it's really a

00:26:37.760 distinction between uh the head and the heart and so it became um they have this really strong

00:26:44.340 distinction between head and heart uh of emotion how you feel and this um this somewhat disdain for

00:26:53.700 theology proper. And so this led to, for example, in Bible studies became very introspective

00:27:03.300 instead of what is true. The question is asked, how does this make you feel or what does this

00:27:07.700 mean to you? And so that's how I would describe some of the roots of pietism. And so you can see

00:27:14.840 that, you know, the mega church Ted talk sermon is all about how to, how does this make you feel?

00:27:23.880 That is really one of the root questions. So even you, you joke, like you care what people think

00:27:28.780 that's, that's a pietistic impulse, you know, as far as emotions being very important in that

00:27:36.660 movement. Right. Yeah, no, I completely agree. I would add to that. Like I, you know, if I could

00:27:41.340 you just do a two-word definition. I say pietism is privatized lordship, right? Jesus is just,

00:27:47.060 it's just this personal. And so it's this emphasis on quiet time, right? So how do I know I'm doing

00:27:51.720 well in the Christian faith? Well, I have a quiet time every single day. I've been doing it for 40

00:27:56.320 years. It's great, great, awesome. So what's the fruit of your quiet time? Well, my children have

00:28:02.260 gone apostate and, you know, and this and that, you know, and so it's like, yeah, okay, well,

00:28:08.160 faith without works is dead like what there should be there should be some fruit of this 40 year

00:28:13.140 quiet time um yeah so thank you it ends up being like christianity is a cesspool instead of as a 0.96

00:28:19.200 stream yeah you know and so everything gets damned up and it becomes rotten instead of having an

00:28:24.920 outflow i like your definition better than mine no no no yeah it's short it's short but um okay

00:28:30.320 so brian and then i'll go to you eric i want you to do uh complementarianism like what like

00:28:34.520 you know, because people are like complimenting it. Why is that bad? But Brian first, can you do

00:28:38.420 radical two kingdom theology? Explain a little bit of that. Yeah. Radical two kingdom theology

00:28:44.840 very briefly would at the heart, it's making a division between the common kingdom and the

00:28:51.160 spiritual kingdom. So that's really the sine qua non of radical two kingdom theology. It's saying

00:28:56.560 there's this kingdom that Christ rules over. It's his spiritual kingdom. It's his church.

00:29:00.820 and so whenever they look at passages of scripture about the spread of the kingdom

00:29:05.960 you know like the mustard seed daniel and the stone in the mountain they're saying yes we

00:29:11.980 believe that the church is going to spread through the whole world we absolutely believe that but

00:29:16.960 then they divorce that from the effect of leaven being present everywhere in the world right and

00:29:23.280 they say well there's this other kingdom it's called the common kingdom it's rule it was

00:29:27.460 established in the Noahic covenant, Genesis nine. And it basically is just ruled through natural law

00:29:33.420 and, uh, you know, human reason. So what, what, what, it sounds pretty straightforward. You're

00:29:39.320 like, Oh, that doesn't sound too bad. As long as you believe Christ is going to rule over the church,

00:29:42.620 the spiritual kingdom through the whole world. The problem is that as soon as you take that

00:29:47.540 common kingdom and say, it's not ruled by scripture and Christians aren't necessarily

00:29:52.400 therefore going to have a leavening effect on any of it. You've actually just divorced

00:29:56.720 the the transformational effect of christianity from everything outside of the four walls of the

00:30:03.900 church and that's why what you describe in complementarianism with your wife still having

00:30:08.960 breasts when she drove out of the church parking lot really you can see that it's the same instinct

00:30:14.420 yeah that's what dan was talking about it's the reason that uh i would agree to put radical two

00:30:20.960 kingdom at the top is because what's bad about complementarianism is just an outworking of the

00:30:26.660 principles of radical two kingdom theology. So, you know, you'll hear people say like

00:30:31.780 those, there's this neutral politics is this neutral common kingdom sort of issue.

00:30:37.520 You can read, I think Brian Mattson and another guy wrote a book on this where they were talking

00:30:43.040 about how, you know, two kingdoms guys will say, yeah, so how does the Bible affect how you'd make

00:30:49.400 a stir fry? And that's like their point of trying to say, see, there are all these neutral things

00:30:54.160 the Bible has nothing to do with. And their rejoinder was like, really? Have you tried making

00:30:58.780 dinner in India where they worship cows? Does your Christianity affect the food there? 0.86

00:31:05.580 Food is deeply religious. Islam. Yeah. All of Christ for all of life, rather than what you 1.00

00:31:12.340 said earlier. Again, great pithy summary, some of Christ for some of life. That's how I would

00:31:17.440 describe radical two kingdom theology. I completely agree. And it's everything. I think

00:31:21.900 of art so like um i think it's pollock is his name the guy who just splatters paint you know

00:31:26.120 and yeah jackson jackson pollock right exactly yeah jackson pollock and it's kind of you know

00:31:30.560 you think of like the you know uh the emperor has no clothes right the little boy is like the only

00:31:35.440 one who actually has the audacity to say he's naked you know and uh and and and i feel like

00:31:40.140 that happens like you know you you go into an art museum and it's the little kids who actually have 0.98

00:31:44.980 like the gravity to be able to say um i could do this painting this is stupid you know and i think 0.90

00:31:50.400 your favorite painting the storm on the sea of galilee like little bits look at all the colors 0.51

00:31:54.160 and the people in the boat and they look at this like reader response splattering and they're like

00:31:58.620 but that but that came from that secular sacred divide um and and everything in the secular realm

00:32:04.540 became subjective and so art was was was secular and and then it became subjective and then you

00:32:09.980 have you know we get expressions like beauty is in the eye of the beholder right and then you see

00:32:13.840 that even with you know uh pertaining to complementarianism and sexual ethics you know

00:32:18.760 so now it's like we got to get the fattest chick we can find on the cover of a beauty magazine to

00:32:23.420 say this is right because there is no objective standards of physical beauty and so like i think

00:32:29.140 you know from a post-millennial framework i think that we're going to have jason pollock paintings

00:32:33.580 in museums uh hundreds of years from now maybe it'll be a couple thousand years from now um but

00:32:38.120 but they'll be there so that that society can go and kids will go on field trips and stuff like

00:32:42.380 that from their classical christian schools and they'll go and and and they'll go and the point

00:32:46.180 will be to go and laugh and make fun of jason like and it'll be this glorious god glorifying 0.99

00:32:51.660 thing like we'll go and we'll laugh and say isn't that stupid like this is what happens when we 0.97

00:32:55.680 reject christ um that you know that like we actually there were people who actually thought 0.97

00:33:00.400 that this was a good painting and the kids will laugh and pat each other on the backs we'll all

00:33:04.080 have a good time you know eat a hot dog and go home and laugh at jason pollock and it'll be a 0.78

00:33:07.640 beautiful thing and you know and we'll laugh at you know uh the fat girls on the covers of beauty

00:33:12.000 magazines and all those kind of things and not saying that we're making fun of people who are 1.00

00:33:15.380 fat. But what we're doing is we're saying, we're making fun of the culture that tried to force us

00:33:21.100 to say that this is beautiful. That said beauty is completely subjective. No, it's not. Yes,

00:33:26.600 there are. There's some measure of personal preference, but there is a guiding universal

00:33:30.960 transcendent standard of what is beautiful. In the same way that, you know, so it's like

00:33:36.920 engineering, right? It's not like a free for all. Well, I think that, you know, that the foundation

00:33:41.060 should be built like no it's like there are things at work right there are standards and rules for

00:33:45.960 building a suspension bridge and likewise with art there is a universal standard to be able to

00:33:52.120 say yeah that this guy is artistic this guy is talented this guy music right you that guy can't

00:33:58.620 sing that guy can sing you know and so and and we continue as a culture to gravitate away from that

00:34:04.740 because ultimately we're gravitating away from transcendent standards what i would say with the

00:34:08.760 two kingdom thing. So that was super helpful, Brian. I like to say, maybe you guys will disagree

00:34:13.920 with that. I think you'll agree. But I like to say, just to make it real short, three spheres,

00:34:18.640 two kingdoms, one king. Three spheres, two kingdoms, one king. And because what's been

00:34:24.000 helped, so the Lutheran perspective, like Martin Luther himself, kind of made the kingdoms,

00:34:29.600 relegated them to the church and the state. And then you have a long time before him,

00:34:34.340 augustine right you know the city of god and city of man um but but it seems as though that you know

00:34:39.760 joe boot i think is really helpful on this his mission of god and the work that he's done but

00:34:43.460 we do all four of us just for the record for the listener we believe that there are two kingdoms

00:34:48.760 the question is what's the dividing line what's the distinction um and so we would say it's not

00:34:53.940 two kingdoms as church and state i i would use sovereign sphere language uh for that and say

00:34:59.680 okay there's the home the church and the state these are spheres uh the kingdoms is not church

00:35:04.100 and state, and it's not secular and sacred or sacred and common. So, it's not a secular-sacred

00:35:10.840 divide. It's not church and state divide. That's a sphere thing, not a kingdom thing. It's light

00:35:16.220 and dark. And the thing that blows people's minds that really blew my mind in the last couple of

00:35:21.520 years as I've been studying these things is that there is the kingdom of light within the civil

00:35:28.260 magistrate. And there's most certainly the kingdom of darkness within the church. What do you call

00:35:33.580 false teachers will arise from among you right like what do you call apostates uh what do you

00:35:39.800 call you know that's the kingdom of darkness in in the church and and what do you call constantine

00:35:45.840 right or what do you call a christian governor or or mayor or uh what do you call the overturning

00:35:51.500 of row and there's obviously a lot more work to be done um we should have been functioning as row

00:35:56.100 never existed in the first place right why are they desperately trying to codify it and not

00:36:00.640 just codified Roe, but way beyond that, all the way to the moment of birth, blah, blah, blah. But

00:36:04.540 it was never law. But the point is, if Roe is overturned, and I think it will be, that is a

00:36:10.260 win. There's a lot more wins that we need, but that is a win in terms of outside of the church, 0.65

00:36:16.880 in the civil sphere, the kingdom of light breaking through. If we cure cancer, right?

00:36:23.420 All these things is pushing back the kingdom of darkness, but it's not just because someone got

00:36:29.840 saved. And so Joe Boots says it like the church and the kingdom are not synonymous. There's

00:36:34.540 massive overlap, but they're not a one-to-one ratio synonymous. The church only numerically

00:36:39.740 grows one way, conversion. But the kingdom of God grows every time the good, the true,

00:36:46.100 and the beautiful, those things which align with the law of God and the gospel of God

00:36:50.640 are furthered and pressed forward in any sphere of human society. And so nobody could get saved

00:36:59.220 and now i believe it would lend towards salvation but initially no one could actually get saved so

00:37:04.140 the church did not numerically grow um but but a good law was passed the kingdom is advancing

00:37:10.900 and and and the kingdom advancing in these other spheres in all of life it lends towards um the

00:37:18.640 advancement of the church and to be fair to play the devil's advocate you know the blood of the

00:37:22.940 martyrs is also the seedbed of the church so the church grows under persecution but but we act as

00:37:27.840 though that's the only way. And so then we do these self-fulfilling prophecies where we rig

00:37:31.800 the game to make us lose because we think that that's going to be what's, the church grows when

00:37:36.880 it's persecuted. But the church also does really great, really great when you have Christian

00:37:43.980 rulers put in place. It explodes that way too. So any thoughts on that? Briefly, look at the 0.98

00:37:50.080 growth of the Christian church through the Roman Empire. And I think we were under 5% at about 300,

00:37:56.860 under 10% for sure, within a century of Constantine, that number had grown to over 50%.

00:38:04.540 So the results of Christian governance, or you could argue about Constantine's genuineness or

00:38:11.540 whatever, but the fact remains, objectively, Constantine was claiming Christ and giving

00:38:19.160 freedom and decriminalizing Christianity. And the result was explosive growth. So I mean,

00:38:24.660 you can't a lot of the time people want to universalize that like you said that principle

00:38:29.140 of winning by losing well yeah death barrel and resurrection is true but on the other side of

00:38:34.860 resurrection there's 30 60 hundred fold growth and and that's from the seed going into the ground

00:38:40.740 and dying which is going to happen in families and nations although in god's story it's going

00:38:45.780 to happen over and over but the result they want to they want to take away the actual results of

00:38:50.940 the seed being planted, dying and coming up. You're like, well, what about the 30, 60 and

00:38:54.840 hundredfold? Right. They want to, they want to die a million times between now and the return of

00:38:58.860 Christ, but only resurrect once. And we see it as, no, we're going to die and resurrect and die and

00:39:04.260 resurrect. Like they want to, they want to die over and over again, but only resurrect once.

00:39:07.940 And we want to die and resurrect again and again and again as individuals, as families,

00:39:12.360 as households, as nations, all those kinds of things. So yeah, I 100% agree with you. And I

00:39:16.740 think, you know, I forgot what, oh, I was going to say, you know, one of the things with the

00:39:23.960 civil magistrate operating by divine law, moral law, and personally, this might be another thing

00:39:29.040 that we might disagree on, but I see natural law and divine law as synonymous. So I think

00:39:35.160 that the combination of natural revelation in Romans 1 and natural law in Romans 2,

00:39:40.180 A plus B equals the Ten Commandments. I think we can get all Ten Commandments,

00:39:44.540 including the Sabbath from natural revelation, right?

00:39:46.780 That people who are pagans with agriculture really,

00:39:49.440 oh, well, if we break the land, you know,

00:39:51.140 in a one in seven year pattern,

00:39:52.600 then you can grow crops better, you know, these guys.

00:39:55.620 And, you know, natural revelation,

00:39:57.540 you know, you know, there's a God in heaven.

00:39:58.940 Therefore, I think you can naturally

00:40:00.220 and logically conclude that he alone is worthy of worship.

00:40:02.900 There's the first commandment that he's the invisible God.

00:40:05.680 So we shouldn't worship the creature,

00:40:07.300 make his image, you know, engraven.

00:40:08.980 So there's the second commandment.

00:40:10.200 Obviously we should worship him with sincerity and truth

00:40:12.400 and not make it vain and trivial and trite.

00:40:15.280 There's a third commandment,

00:40:16.300 the Sabbath have already talked about that, 0.94

00:40:18.040 just seasons and patterns and day and night

00:40:20.040 and these kinds of things.

00:40:20.920 And then certainly the second table of the law,

00:40:23.220 how we love our neighbor, commandment five through 10,

00:40:25.900 I think certainly comes from a natural law

00:40:28.360 written on the hearts of men, 1.00

00:40:29.360 the Gentiles without any special revelation. 0.97

00:40:31.680 You know, Paul says you're a law unto yourself. 1.00

00:40:33.260 Your consciences bear witness against you. 0.85

00:40:35.240 You're guilty of murder

00:40:36.080 because you know that you shouldn't have murdered

00:40:38.180 even though you've never had a preacher.

00:40:39.820 So I would, you know, personally,

00:40:40.680 I would say moral law and natural law, divine law are synonymous. And that's why every single

00:40:47.440 pagan, every unbeliever is held accountable. They are without an excuse, not just without an excuse 1.00

00:40:52.640 to know that the mere existence of God, but without an excuse to know that this God who

00:40:57.860 exists is also a holy God and that he's written his law on tablets of human hearts and therefore

00:41:02.960 they're accountable to obey these things. But all that being said, when the civil magistrate does a

00:41:07.360 good job, when it's influenced and discipled, when the church is discipling the civil magistrate,

00:41:11.640 the state, and then the state begins to actually produce justice and make good laws,

00:41:17.580 that flows back into the church. One of the reasons why the state is antinomian is because

00:41:25.000 the church is antinomian. And one of the reasons that the church is antinomian is because the

00:41:29.580 state is antinomian. If you live in a society with a state that is actually upholding justice

00:41:36.860 according to God's justice, God's law, theonomy, then it makes the church's job easier in a sense

00:41:43.560 to preach the gospel, right? Because people instinctively, so people are like, you don't

00:41:47.460 need to tell people that they're sinners. They already know. I would say, no, they did know.

00:41:51.920 They did know. I think there was a time in America where, you know, if somebody was a drunk,

00:41:56.480 you didn't need to tell them that it was bad. I think you still should have, but there was less

00:42:00.720 of a need to tell them this is bad. But today, one of the unique things, right, is when you call

00:42:05.960 evil good and good evil. I think one of the unique things as we've pulled back the blessing of God,

00:42:12.700 as it's been pulled back on our nation and we've leant towards this antinomianism,

00:42:16.980 now it's not just preaching what God says about sin and the free grace that's found in Christ

00:42:24.260 alone, but we actually have to make arguments for sin being sin because people do instinctively know,

00:42:30.440 but there is a progressive um denial a progressive deception that comes by suppressing the truth and

00:42:37.140 deeds of unrighteousness and i think culturally where we're at as a society as a whole is um

00:42:42.040 with there there are people who are legitimately saying like no abortion is not sin and and i don't

00:42:47.640 think they these at an individual level i don't think they actually believe that um but but that's

00:42:52.540 that's where as like i would say the church has to preach sin more than ever before because in part

00:42:57.440 My point is because the civil magistrate has not been doing its job because the church has failed to disciple the civil magistrate.

00:43:03.200 So as the state becomes more and more lawless, the church has to pick up the slack and preach more and more law.

00:43:09.440 And my point is there is overlap and they function in tandem in some sense.

00:43:14.220 The state does matter.

00:43:15.620 It should be Christian and it has a benefit to the church when it is. 0.82

00:43:19.300 You know, Joel, that's a really good point.

00:43:20.840 And I, we saw a microcosm of that example of the state passing a righteous law or threatening

00:43:27.340 to pass a righteous law and overturning Roe versus Wade.

00:43:30.760 And then the reaction to it producing actually righteousness on social media, where there 0.92

00:43:35.060 were a bunch of women that are like, fine, if I can't kill my baby, then I'm going on 1.00

00:43:38.580 a sex strike. 1.00

00:43:39.560 Right. 1.00

00:43:40.220 Right.

00:43:40.440 You're right. 0.60

00:43:41.340 No more fornication. 0.66

00:43:43.100 Great.

00:43:43.760 So righteous laws actually produce righteousness, even, even in amongst the unrighteous, you

00:43:49.560 You know, but that's what righteous laws are supposed to do, is to produce righteousness, to restrain evil.

00:43:55.860 And so we even saw that just recently.

00:43:58.240 You're right. You're right.

00:43:59.400 Eric, complementarianism, what do you think?

00:44:01.480 You like it? You love it?

00:44:03.360 Love it. Let's do it.

00:44:04.940 Let's just have it everywhere.

00:44:06.520 Yeah, I know.

00:44:07.360 I think, you know, what's interesting is you guys were breaking these down.

00:44:11.340 I think whether you're talking radical two kingdoms, whatever it is, to your point, Joel, what Joe Boot has said,

00:44:18.340 it's really about churchianity, right?

00:44:20.060 We want to keep the churchy things in the church,

00:44:22.180 and we want to keep, you know,

00:44:23.920 the so-called secular pagan things out there.

00:44:26.880 I think really what complementarianism is,

00:44:32.260 first of all, is really hard to pronounce,

00:44:34.180 which is why it's a terrible theology.

00:44:36.860 It's also hard to spell.

00:44:38.740 It is. It is.

00:44:40.680 So it really comes out of the late 1980s,

00:44:43.120 and you're getting a response to feminism and egalitarianism.

00:44:48.340 So really just feminism. And so you get a lot of evangelical thinkers, Wayne Grudem and John Piper, Mary Cassian, some people like this, they get together.

00:44:58.060 They say, how do we combat the feminism that's going on?

00:45:04.040 And really what they do is they say, well, let's really what we want to stress is that men and women complement each other.

00:45:11.780 So this is a couple of things.

00:45:14.320 Number one, it's a downplaying of hierarchical order as found in like Ephesians 5 and 6.

00:45:19.820 They're trying to stress, hey, look, you guys are, you know, you're different, but you complement each other. 0.61

00:45:25.700 And they really typically are going to want to downplay the fact that there's, you know, a wife has to submit.

00:45:32.360 A husband is Lord.

00:45:33.520 He is the authority.

00:45:35.560 And so even Mary Cassian has written on the Gospel Coalition.

00:45:39.880 She's explained this.

00:45:40.860 she said, we intentionally chose anti-hierarchical language. And really, she comes out and says it.

00:45:49.320 It was a lot of the Marxist thought that was influencing that decision. John Piper will say

00:45:54.980 the same thing. Him and Grudem will say the same thing in their book, Recovering Biblical

00:45:59.800 Womanhood and Manhood. So how does it play out today? Generally, you have a few camps of

00:46:04.740 complementarianism, you've got soft and harder. And, you know, typically, though, what you're

00:46:11.940 going to end up with is men and women, yeah, they kind of have some roles. But it's mostly

00:46:17.700 relegated to family and the church. Some, they've been kind of picked on. But the John Pipers of the

00:46:25.400 world, he would be harder in this camp where he's saying, look, I and he won't even honestly, he

00:46:31.580 won't even really be that hard in my view he won't just come out and say look absolutely not

00:46:36.320 women should not be serving in law enforcement women should not be um serving in these like

00:46:42.040 combat roles police officers john will say yeah that's probably maybe not the best idea let's talk 0.98

00:46:47.920 and then you get you know the amy bird carl truman camp and they were actually ridiculing

00:46:53.400 john piper for this so i think fundamentally what's happening here it's a war on biblical

00:46:58.040 sexuality. And I think this one is particularly dangerous. I've gone after it a lot because it

00:47:05.480 is such a Trojan horse. It looks like, and many times is, faithful, reformed-ish guys who are

00:47:13.260 saying, yeah, I'm complementarianism. You know, I'm complementarian. And for a long time, I would

00:47:18.260 have said that too. I thought, well, I thought that was the conservative position because really

00:47:24.160 nobody at the time so like late 90s early 2000s nobody was really defending patriarchy right it

00:47:30.440 was like well this is horrible except for russell moore obviously yeah except for russell moore

00:47:35.200 god bless him yeah that's right so i think really it's a war on all of sexuality we have to

00:47:44.880 recognize it as such um it's a war against women as well it's not doing women any favors and we

00:47:51.500 can also look at the fruit of complementarianism it's been really bad for the church most of the

00:47:56.540 people who've defended it uh have given ground pretty quickly to the left and to false sexual

00:48:03.520 ideology yeah i completely agree what would you say to somebody who says but we find complementarian

00:48:08.820 principles within the trinity right there's a there's a hierarchy in the trinity you know um

00:48:13.760 so like i think of like eternal subordination of the sun you know so i'm you know you know

00:48:18.560 spoiler alert, I would adhere to classical theism. But for those who would say, all right, well,

00:48:23.680 you know, the Father and the Son are equal in terms of the divine essence, nature, that the

00:48:30.560 Son is fully God, not partly God of the same substance, not just a similar substance, but the

00:48:35.520 same substance. So their essence and nature is equally worthy of worship and honor. And yet the

00:48:43.140 Son plays a role of submission to the Father. And then they would argue, and this continues beyond

00:48:48.220 just his earthly ministry, but that he is still subjected to the Father in terms of role, but equal

00:48:54.220 to the Father in terms of nature. And if we can see that within the Trinity, then we can do that

00:48:58.220 within gender roles with men and women. Yeah, I would say part of the issue here,

00:49:05.340 so, you know, like Bruce Ware, I've had him as a professor, you know, friends with Owen Strand,

00:49:11.620 a lot of the ESS debate. The way that I look at it is like, why do we even have to go there?

00:49:17.240 god said there's authority structures there's hierarchy it's very plain and very clear from

00:49:23.280 scripture let's base our arguments on the things that we know and are clear and not on the things

00:49:29.480 that are like conjecture about some hypothetical you know it's it's a it's a tough area when you're

00:49:34.940 like well how exactly does the um you know certain structure and i think that's typically what's

00:49:40.920 going to happen when you spend most of your time studying and researching doctrine of god not that

00:49:45.840 it's not important but i think sometimes you can you can miss the obvious like just read ephesians

00:49:51.300 5 and it is hyper crystal clear you can read genesis 1 and 2 and you see that i mean any it

00:49:58.020 pretty much any honest old testament scholar will tell you the act of naming which god delegates to

00:50:03.980 adam is de facto authority and who does he name the woman he clearly has authority over her you

00:50:13.920 know submission and obedience i mean these so that's what i would say just go to what's clear

00:50:18.240 and it is crystal clear and let's deal with that no that's super helpful just saying you don't have

00:50:23.500 to be a master on the trinity to um to be obedient in your marriage yes the trinity matters but uh

00:50:29.520 but yeah that's i i didn't even i mean that's super simple but i never thought of it that way

00:50:33.560 in the sense that like the the subliminal statement that's being made is um you you have to you have

00:50:38.880 to master one of the most difficult doctrines, you know, that we have, doctrine of God, theology

00:50:43.540 proper in order to have a position on the nature of men and women. When it's like, well, the secret

00:50:51.280 things belong to God. Let's do, you know, Trinitarian work, but some of these things are

00:50:55.920 secret things, but the things he's revealed to us belong to us and our children forever. And yeah,

00:51:01.620 that's really good. Any thoughts from Dan, Brian on complementarianism or two kingdom or any of

00:51:08.120 these things? I do think the urge in the complementarian world to eliminate the

00:51:17.000 language of hierarchy is just another example of that egalitarian spirit that runs through

00:51:24.380 everything. We're an atomistic, individualistic society where we really want to make every man

00:51:31.540 his own pope, every man his own god. And what that means is that nobody can be an authority

00:51:37.060 external to me so then you're stealing from the woman what makes her a person if you put her under

00:51:45.220 any kind of hierarchical authority in this if if you buy that presupposition where scripture says

00:51:51.060 no everybody is in hierarchical relationships with superiors and inferiors and that doesn't

00:51:56.960 that language itself we would object to but historically that's just normal language of

00:52:01.980 if you're in a military unit you have a superior it we're not talking about your ontology we're

00:52:09.620 not talking about your you know that you're less of an image bearer of god we're saying you're in

00:52:15.340 authority and that authority is real and therefore it's a hierarchy like this just terror at the

00:52:21.200 language of hierarchy is completely the result of rationalistic individualistic modernism not

00:52:29.980 biblical covenantal thinking so another grounds that i would just say interrogate your presuppositions

00:52:36.780 modern man and understand that your framework is already from the beginning flawed in the

00:52:44.080 foundations so your instincts as you build doctrines on top of it are going to be flawed

00:52:48.880 you need to go back to a covenantal hierarchical type of thinking yeah i think the other thing

00:52:55.980 there Brian it's a fantastic point but the other thing is when you create a theology because you

00:53:02.900 want to soften the word of God or appease the culture even if it's just an instinct like well

00:53:08.560 how do we make this this thing that's been around forever hierarchy and marriage we how do we make

00:53:12.580 that more palatable I think whenever you start there you've already lost it may take 20 years

00:53:17.960 to get to the full fruit of it but you already lost the game yep yep yeah what I would say so

00:53:24.080 you're right it's this um this obsession with uh egalitarianism and when egal i would say it like

00:53:29.080 this when egalitarianism is the goal uh androgyny is the the result um because the only way that

00:53:35.540 you can really say that we're equal is um is it's not enough to say we're equal it has to be sameness

00:53:41.580 we have to be the same right so that's like for women to actually be equal with men well men can't 1.00

00:53:45.720 get pregnant you know so i mean that's a part of egalitarianism feminism was you know women allegedly 1.00

00:53:51.540 right right right birthing persons yeah exactly but but that's when you think like where does 1.00

00:53:58.300 this come from it comes from feminism and it comes from you know feminism wanting to be equal 1.00

00:54:02.840 um but realizing we will never be equal unless we're the same but the reality is like god created

00:54:08.020 the world uh with divisions and distinctions and he did so um on purpose so we live in a world that

00:54:13.860 that is designed, um, with a hierarchical structure. And, and so it's, it's this, um,

00:54:19.460 the desire for, for egalitarianism, uh, leads to the fruit of androgyny and, and what it is,

00:54:26.180 what it's opposing is hierarchy. You're absolutely right. And the, the opposition of hierarchy really

00:54:31.080 is an opposition of authority. So it's a hatred of authority, a desire for anarchy. Um, and,

00:54:36.560 and that can be applied to a million different things. So we're just applying it right now to

00:54:39.760 the the sexual ethic but that can be applied to economics right so so what do you see happening

00:54:43.940 you see um a hatred of patriarchy oh but you also see a hatred of capitalism right you want socialism

00:54:48.680 which is you know and that so so the goal of egalitarianism produces the fruit of androgyny

00:54:53.000 well the goal of socialism produces the fruit of communism you know so like um you know and so in

00:54:57.460 all these different levels and and and then you see that like in the church i would argue that

00:55:01.320 this hatred of hierarchy and these kinds of things um i think that's even been applied to sin right

00:55:05.900 all sin is equal nope oh right no it's not no it's not right all sin is equal in the sense that

00:55:11.900 all sin even the smallest sin whatever small sin would be um is is uh fully capable of separating

00:55:17.600 you from god and placing you under his eternal wrath forever so all sin is equal in that sense

00:55:22.340 but but jesus pronounces woes on certain cities saying it will be worse for you yeah than it was 0.58

00:55:29.820 for sodom and gomorrah woe to you this israelite city you know and this is and why well i would

00:55:36.720 say there's two things um one um so jesus says so talk about hierarchy there's a hierarchy on earth 0.53

00:55:41.800 and the world that god made but there's also a hierarchy in hell according to jesus and i would

00:55:45.680 argue uh along with jonathan edwards and guys for a hierarchy in heaven um i think it would be

00:55:50.080 unlike any earthly hierarchy that we're well aware of um but but i do think that in heaven

00:55:54.740 there are seats of honor right like when when uh the sons of zebedee you know who granted to us

00:55:59.440 lord that to sit at your right jesus doesn't say well that's not a thing that's not his response

00:56:03.880 he's like can you can you drink the cup that so he's like that is a thing is what he's implying

00:56:09.400 that is a thing um but i don't know if you'll make the cut because i don't know if you're good

00:56:13.620 enough right yeah and yeah which which is a profound thing so so with with hell you know

00:56:18.440 jesus even says uh but you know to one will be given a light beating uh to the other will be

00:56:22.800 given a severe beating and that's based on in my exegesis it's based on two things um him

00:56:28.080 pronouncing greater woes on the Israelite cities is in one sense because they were given greater

00:56:34.520 revelation. I think he says that explicitly, right? If the signs, if the miracles performed

00:56:38.980 by me in these towns were performed in Sodom and Gomorrah, they would have repented a long time

00:56:44.260 ago. So one thing that makes their sin worse is their sin in the midst of a higher degree of God's

00:56:50.000 grace. If there's more grace and revelation from God and sin persists versus another scenario where

00:56:57.280 there's less grace and sin persists. Well, the sin that persists in the greater context of grace

00:57:03.100 is a greater sin. And then I think you can talk about, so one is degrees of revelation,

00:57:08.120 and then the other is just degrees of sin. There are some, and we know this from just the law of

00:57:12.840 God, and there being varying penalties, varying penalties on earth for different sins. I, I,

00:57:19.700 like God has proportional justice, right? Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth, life for a life.

00:57:24.920 So, you know, so my point is different degrees of sin, also different degrees of grace, particularly in the form of revelation, creates a hierarchy of sin.

00:57:33.340 All sin, again, capable apart from of saving salvation by grace alone, through faith alone and Christ alone.

00:57:39.980 Apart from that, all sin is equal in the sense that it'll get you to hell.

00:57:44.140 But but even in hell, it seems as though there are worse, worse torments in hell than than others, according to Jesus.

00:57:52.900 So there's a hierarchy of sin, hierarchy of hell, hierarchy of heaven, heavenly rewards,

00:57:56.980 right?

00:57:57.160 That's another thing that you notice in the last 30 years, guys pushing back on, like

00:58:00.260 there are no heavenly rewards, you know, because we got to all be the same.

00:58:04.440 We all got to be equal.

00:58:05.780 And I just, I would disagree with that.

00:58:08.580 Like we're not saved by our works.

00:58:10.460 We are saved by works, but the works of Christ.

00:58:13.420 But it does seem as though our works do receive varying degrees of reward.

00:58:18.560 So it's faith alone that gets us eternity with God.

00:58:22.900 But it seems like they're based off of the fruit in our lives, that there will be varying degrees of reward in heaven.

00:58:31.400 And so, anyway, but we're just anti-hierarchy, and I think it's because we're anti-authority.

00:58:36.800 And so, it can be applied to the sexual ethic.

00:58:38.900 It can be applied to heaven, your view of heaven, your view of hell, your view of sin, your view of economics.

00:58:43.540 At every single level, part of why we're falling apart is because we're so committed to have egalitarianism across the board, which seeks to do androgyny across the board, which always works against God's design because God's design contains distinctions.

00:58:58.400 Yeah, that's right, Joel.

00:58:59.480 And I think when you look at creation, creation, what is God doing?

00:59:04.080 He's creating order by division.

00:59:07.240 And then that division is crowned with the hierarchy of man.

00:59:10.200 And then that's the crowning glory where God says that is the hierarchical glory.

00:59:16.160 And then I think you look at androgyny, as you're saying, it's bringing about through uncreation, this great act of uncreation, tearing down the divisions.

00:59:24.860 And now we're bringing chaos back into the world.

00:59:27.620 So I think that's actually, you know, you might put this as one of the top ones on the list, just that this is where the two kingdoms are colliding.

00:59:36.160 Yeah.

00:59:36.560 You know, one saying division is good and beautiful and glorious.

00:59:39.760 This is the way God made the world versus, you know, what's our culture trying to do?

00:59:43.820 Tear down every division.

00:59:46.020 And what you get is this chaotic hellhole, this hellscape.

00:59:50.400 Right.

00:59:50.520 Because all it can ever do is bring it down to the lowest common denominator.

00:59:53.680 Like socialism can succeed in making everybody have the same amount of

00:59:57.060 wealth by making everybody dirt poor, but that's, that's all it can do.

01:00:03.040 Because against all of that, God made a world where there is, you know,

01:00:09.160 Tom Brady and you, and God made a world where there is.

01:00:13.020 What are you trying to say?

01:00:14.640 When you said you, are you talking about me?

01:00:17.600 I mean, I'm talking to a Chinese man named you over here. 0.77

01:00:21.000 Oh, gotcha. 1.00

01:00:21.500 Particularly not you guys.

01:00:23.680 Yeah, I know you. He's a great guy.

01:00:26.200 God made a world where he gives...

01:00:27.560 No Tom Brady.

01:00:29.400 Tom and I are close.

01:00:30.860 He made a world where he gives one talent and five talents and ten talents.

01:00:35.040 He made a world where he made some people with 180 IQ and some people with 75 IQ.

01:00:42.300 And he calls them all to faithfulness with the measure of faith and gifting he's given them.

01:00:47.840 Egalitarianism hates that because it rejects the authority of God in giving his gifts.

01:00:51.380 It wants a world that's fair, meaning equal.

01:00:55.260 And the thing is, God did not make a fair world.

01:00:58.020 Jesus even said that to those who have little, even what little they have will be taken and

01:01:02.800 given to the one who has much.

01:01:04.460 And he's talking specifically about this issue that we're describing.

01:01:09.160 I would say Arminianism has a very similar error where it wants to say that God can't

01:01:15.200 make from one lump vessels for honorable use and dishonorable use, but that everyone has

01:01:20.080 have equal opportunity to respond, that prevenient grace must go out and make everybody equally able

01:01:26.740 to respond and have the same opportunity. And it's like, no, God judges, as you demonstrated,

01:01:32.760 God judges individuals differently based on the light of revelation that they had. I think that's

01:01:39.700 beyond dispute in scripture. Which that right there assumes that God doesn't reveal himself

01:01:44.540 equally to everyone exactly that doesn't sound fair you can't say that my son had the exact same

01:01:51.120 opportunity to bend the knee to christ as lord as the son of some muslim kid right in you know

01:01:58.420 some muslim guy in saudi arabia they didn't yeah and christians that try to argue and like come up 0.85

01:02:04.820 with elaborate gymnastics to make it seem as if that's the case through natural revelation or

01:02:09.540 whatnot we're all responsible because of that absolutely but it's just not the world god made

01:02:14.720 god made a world that wherein one of the glories would be this massive differentiation and and it's

01:02:22.800 like it is what it is far more glorious that tom brady exists this sounds really gay now that i 0.78

01:02:28.780 but it is should i call you mr why are you gay no it's true though i mean the fact that there 0.60

01:02:40.620 are people that can sit down and can intuitively understand engineering and design and and build 0.92

01:02:48.980 things like you know guys working on quantum computing right now i don't even understand

01:02:54.560 the terms that you need to understand to get even the concept. And there are people that God made

01:03:01.660 and he gave them minds that they do what is the glory of Kings, which is to search out the

01:03:06.940 mysteries that God has hidden in the world. And so it's like egalitarianism just wants to make

01:03:12.240 this big gray homogenous lump out of everything. And the one argument against it isn't just

01:03:18.860 theological it's just well that's boring it's the argument from boringness and and god didn't make

01:03:25.380 a boring world god made it because god himself is interesting god made an interesting world yeah

01:03:30.440 and he the the creator maintains the rights like the master of the house the owner he maintains

01:03:36.220 the rights um to to be generous with what he has and to give to one and i always you know that the

01:03:42.480 parable like you said that you know the one one talent two talents five you know and the two talent

01:03:46.660 guy doubles to four and the five doubles to 10. And, you know, but the one, he buries it, you

01:03:51.880 know, in the sand, he hides it. And, you know, I always thought, I think a lot of Christians think

01:03:56.660 that that's, you know, an expression of what's coming across as he's fearful. He was driven by 0.86

01:04:02.560 fear and that's why he buried it. Whereas I would say that he was driven by hatred of the master

01:04:06.940 because he didn't think the master was fair. So, because ultimately, so when he says the master

01:04:11.720 returns and he's like, you know, what have you done? What fruit have you produced? And he says,

01:04:16.660 why I hid, uh, the talent that you gave me because, um, and, and what he's, what he's

01:04:21.960 ultimately saying, what he's implying is because you gave me so little, uh, you gave me such a

01:04:26.520 small investment that if I was to try to, you know, invest this in the markets and do this

01:04:31.460 and that, it was so little that, um, I probably would have lost it. Right. That's, that's what

01:04:35.360 he's saying. And, um, and, but beyond that, he says, I knew you to be a hard master reaping where

01:04:40.960 you did not sow, right? And, and, and the master, you know, responds by saying, if you knew me to

01:04:47.320 be like that, this is what you would have done. You would have at least, right? So you're saying

01:04:52.960 it's not, it's not hatred. It's just fear. And it's really my fault because I gave you too little.

01:04:57.420 And I'm also not, not only was I stingy and gave you too little, but I'm also unjust. I try to reap

01:05:03.020 where I don't sow. And, and so what, the way he's responding is he's saying, okay, I'll, I'll accept

01:05:08.820 your premise. And I'm going to prove that you're a liar. If your premise was true, 0.99

01:05:16.300 this is how somebody who actually believes that would have behaved. You would have at least

01:05:21.540 invested with the bankers so that I might receive interest. So you buried my talent,

01:05:27.160 not because you were afraid, because I gave you too little. You buried my talent because you

01:05:31.380 didn't want me to get a single dime of return because you hate me. And you hate me because

01:05:36.960 your two peers over here, I gave them more and I, and you didn't like that. You know? And so I think

01:05:43.100 that that's what, cause it's like, you knew me to be, you know, we, we look at the master's

01:05:47.160 response. Well, if you knew me to be a man like this, then this is what, and we look at it almost

01:05:50.580 like if we don't read carefully, we look at it as like, like Jesus is actually affirming his view

01:05:55.860 of the master. And that's not what's happening because his view is you reap where you do not

01:06:00.540 sow. And we know that God doesn't affirm that view because where has God not sown? God never

01:06:05.800 reaps where he doesn't sow god sowed everything he created everything that exists is his doing

01:06:10.780 you know and so so he he has rights he has king rights to reap from anywhere and anyone at any

01:06:19.620 time because it's all his doing it all came from him every good and perfect gift comes from him

01:06:25.480 he created ex nihilo so even when all we ever do is we cultivate we steward you know we and we

01:06:30.420 multiply resources. And in that sense, we are creators in the lowercase C kind of, but God's

01:06:35.960 the one who, who provides all the materials. God's the one who created the cosmos and the,

01:06:40.680 and the world that we live in. And so in that sense, he is the original investor. He's the,

01:06:46.300 you know, he has rights to reap from, from everyone. And, and so anyway, so I, you know,

01:06:52.760 even with that, and the last thing I'll say on that, a talent, you know, part of it is we don't

01:06:56.880 understand the culture and how much a talent was. It doesn't say if it was a talent of silver,

01:07:00.160 or bronze or gold but um but if it was a talent of gold it would be in our dollars i think the

01:07:05.400 equivalent of of about two uh two plus billion dollars um is you know if it was a talent of

01:07:11.180 gold and even if it was even if it was silver it still would be it would be you know like 50

01:07:16.020 million dollars um and so you know the the point is like he gave him it it was it was massive it

01:07:22.080 was a lot of resources and so that that reading of the text saying oh he was just he was given so

01:07:28.120 little, you know, and he was fearful. He didn't want to make a bad, like, it's just not, not an

01:07:32.520 accurate reading of the text. So, all right. Um, any, any other thoughts you guys got? If not,

01:07:37.500 um, can, can somebody, I think the last one that I'd really like to do is can one of you guys

01:07:41.360 just, uh, describe, define dispensationalism? Uh, I hate to interrupt. I've got to jump off

01:07:47.920 for the next meeting. That's fine. You guys are more than good. We'll take it. We'll take it.

01:07:52.820 Yeah. Thank you much. Thanks. See Eric. Yep. Yeah. But Brian or Dan, you want to just

01:07:57.640 knock out dispensationalism. We'll talk about that and then call it a day.

01:08:01.560 You know, I think I'll let Brian define dispensationalism. I mean, he taught a college

01:08:05.780 class on dispensationalism. So I think he's the preeminent expert on this subject.

01:08:11.980 That was when I was a dispensationalist as well. When I, you know, obviously like many of us,

01:08:17.800 I grew up in a dispensationalist assumed environment. You know, I read all the Walvoord

01:08:24.360 commentaries on Daniel and Revelation and, you know, the whole nine yards. So, dispensationalism,

01:08:30.920 some of the core tenets, or I guess the first thing to understand about dispensationalism

01:08:36.200 is it's a whole Bible theology. It's a way of attempting to understand how the whole story of

01:08:42.960 the scriptures fits together. How do Israel, the promises, the land relate to Christ, relate to

01:08:49.200 the church it's like covenant theology or new covenant theology or you know some of these other

01:08:54.880 systems it's trying to establish this meta narrative or this great grand uh coherent

01:09:00.840 understanding of all of scripture and so it basically uh answers that question first it's

01:09:06.660 very recent uh it's you know finds its roots in the 19th century so very very recent uh but it

01:09:12.480 it essentially tries to answer that question by dividing god's story that he's telling into

01:09:17.840 different dispensations. And there's no real agreement on how many or what the delineations

01:09:24.420 are. But the way that I heard, like, for example, David Guzik of Calvary Chapel describe it is that

01:09:31.140 each of these dispensations was essentially God governing his household in a certain way.

01:09:38.500 And that those, you know, each dispensation was governed differently. So you have the age of

01:09:42.720 innocence. You have different ages that go through. And then what that gives you is a story

01:09:49.240 of a lot of discontinuity. So dispensationalism is marked by discontinuity, where God changes how

01:09:55.280 he's governing his household at different steps. He has different rules for different people.

01:10:00.160 Israel are his special people that he's made special promises to, that he's given them the

01:10:06.140 land. A lot of dispensational premillennialism is founded on the idea that those promises were

01:10:11.740 not fulfilled in the Old Testament period. The land promises even weren't fulfilled. And so those

01:10:19.020 are waiting for a future fulfillment because when Christ came, the idea is that Israel rejected

01:10:25.780 their king. And so what God did is he hit pause on the fulfillment of all of his promises. And he

01:10:31.900 turned aside for a time to a different people and a different plan. And that's the Gentiles and the 1.00

01:10:37.460 church. So the church are different people from Israel. They have different promises. They have, 0.94

01:10:44.060 you know, a whole lot of different managing of the household. And that this, that's the age we live

01:10:48.800 in. But that at the end, God is going to restart his plan for Israel. He's going to return to his

01:10:56.520 plan for Israel. There'll be a great tribulation, a rapture of the church, remove the church from 1.00

01:11:01.720 the world before that so that he can turn back to Israel. He'll save a lot of Israel through this 0.98

01:11:06.560 tribulation period, then Christ will return physically to the earth and he will establish

01:11:12.160 the Davidic kingdom again. And he will physically rule from Israel, from Mount Zion for a thousand, 0.79

01:11:17.860 literally a thousand years. And that's when he will fulfill all of these great Old Testament 0.96

01:11:22.280 promises before there's a final rebellion and an end period in which Christ will make a final end

01:11:29.760 of evil, cast Satan into hell. He'd been bound during this thousand year period and he'll return.

01:11:35.500 He'll then usher in the new heavens and the new earth, the eternal state, and the great

01:11:40.740 white throne judgment.

01:11:42.140 The dead will be raised. 0.96

01:11:43.320 That's when death will die.

01:11:45.080 So a lot of the differences between that reading of scripture and, for example, a covenant

01:11:51.760 theological reading of scripture, whether baptistic or paedo-baptistic, would really come down

01:11:57.960 to that difference of continuity, discontinuity.

01:12:01.880 And, you know, so a lot of the differences that you'll find when you're talking to dispensationalists will be things like, you know, do you believe that the promises to Israel are given to the church in some meaningful way?

01:12:15.200 The promises and patterns of blessing and cursing and a lot of these things.

01:12:18.500 Dispensationalist has to say no.

01:12:20.820 Those aren't for you in the same way. 0.89

01:12:22.960 Those are for Israel because they're expecting at any time for this cataclysmic great tribulation to happen. 0.61

01:12:31.680 They don't really believe that the church age is the age where we're going to see the fulfillment of these promises in any sense. 0.61

01:12:39.660 Christ reigning from sea to sea, the rivers, the end of the earth.

01:12:42.460 They don't see that as being about this time in history.

01:12:45.660 So if you go to a dispensationalist and you say Christ is reigning as king over all of the earth, they'll say not yet.

01:12:52.960 Not yet. He will. And he's reigning in heaven right now. And they might even say something similar to the Amillennial. He has spiritual authority, but he's not aiming to fulfill those promises right now. That's happening in the future. So that discontinuity does introduce quite a few problems.

01:13:09.300 I'm trying to be charitable to the dispensationalists and not just dunk on them, but it does lead to a lot of issues with legacy, with, you know, building, expecting long future still to happen.

01:13:20.720 There's a lot of expectation of the rapture of the church at any moment.

01:13:24.640 So you have a lot of newspaper exegesis associated over the last 50 years with dispensationalism.

01:13:30.240 There's a handbasket of problems that really come back to that discontinuity idea, I think.

01:13:35.220 Yep, that was super helpful.

01:13:36.540 Thank you.

01:13:36.780 I completely agree.

01:13:37.460 um it seems like the like the pre you know a dispensational pre-millennial would say like

01:13:42.680 uh so so we would say already not yet we would we would agree with that um something is happening

01:13:48.380 the leaven is actually in the dough it's doing something it's you know um the the mustard seed

01:13:52.900 is planted and it's growing um something is happening and so the mountain is growing you

01:13:57.560 know all the all these different things and and we would look at you know part of what i would

01:14:01.440 reject uh kenneth gentry talks about this but you know with the dispensational pre-millennial you

01:14:05.420 secret rapture, right? There's nothing that talks about a secret rapture. But the secret

01:14:10.260 rapture, the world, the whole world somehow misses, but all the Christians see it. It's 1.00

01:14:15.760 cataclysmic. I think he uses the word, it's catastrophic and sudden, sudden and catastrophic

01:14:21.740 rather than what we see as kind of a common theme and pattern throughout scripture is

01:14:27.200 gradualistic. So when you think of even creation, right? I would hold to six literal

01:14:35.160 days um you know because i'm not a heretic but you know so i would hold to you know young earth

01:14:39.420 and six literal days but still like god could have done it uh all at once but he does it he

01:14:44.620 does it gradually over six days so creation sanctification right god is it's a process

01:14:49.760 right and so like it's it's gradual um revelation i mean we have we have this you know this um

01:14:55.900 progression of revealing the messiah adam and eve knew him as the snake crusher you know abraham

01:15:00.540 knows him as the seed you know and just further and further you know david knows him as a king

01:15:04.960 you know of the increase of his government there'll be no end so now we see that you know the

01:15:08.040 and then you know but then we know him with greater clarity and god has only saved a people

01:15:13.080 for himself in one way old testament saints and new testament saints the new covenant being

01:15:16.560 you know well we might disagree there but you know whether it be one covenant of grace one

01:15:20.660 substance with two administrations you know or whether it be the new covenant you know being

01:15:23.960 the only saving covenant covenant synonymous with the covenant of grace is where i would be at

01:15:27.460 retroactively applied but the point is that god has only ever saved people one way but there is

01:15:32.120 the distinction since that we have greater revelation us on this side of the cross we know

01:15:36.940 christ to a much uh fuller degree than than david um knew new christ um but but we were both saved

01:15:43.940 by faith in the same person in christ and so all that is gradual right but the the pre-mill

01:15:49.760 dispensation it's it's sudden and catastrophic you know whereas post-millennialism it's it's

01:15:55.580 it's keeping in the pattern of what what god did in the old testament what god did in creation what

01:16:00.340 god does individually in sanctification it's keeping with this this gradualistic um it's it's

01:16:06.680 small it starts small it grows slowly but it becomes significant it's dominant yeah yeah you

01:16:12.500 can see this in in daniel with uh nebuchadnezzar's statue representing kingdoms that will be destroyed

01:16:18.340 by a small stone that then grows into a mountain that swallows a whole earth yeah he's those

01:16:23.700 kingdom parables you know yeast is not exactly like a speedster you know and a mustard seed that

01:16:30.180 as a small seed and it grows to be the biggest tree where birds nest in it and it overshadows

01:16:34.820 everything so that's even a theme throughout these pictures that god gives us of the dominion of

01:16:40.020 christ over the whole world so i would i would agree with that yeah and and i think some of the

01:16:45.400 the because a dispensationalist they hear us talking about this and they say but there is

01:16:50.260 cataclysmic immediate huge judgment language and and we would say look the error that's being made

01:16:55.860 that was fundamentally made in Darby's writings and, you know, expanded in the 19th and 20th

01:17:01.380 century with some of these ideas of the future seven-year Great Tribulation, that Daniel's 70th

01:17:07.900 week is, you know, we're still waiting for it, a lot of these ideas. Really, it comes from a failure

01:17:13.860 to read the text literally, which is funny when you think about it, because that's the essence

01:17:20.620 of the dispensationalist hermeneutic is a literalistic historical grammatical approach

01:17:26.480 is what they're saying. But the problem is, take the Olivet Discourse, or take the book of

01:17:32.480 Revelation. Both of those sections that deal with this great tribulation coming language

01:17:38.200 are emphatically clear that it is coming upon this generation of Israel that is living at the time

01:17:44.760 that those works were given i mean emphatically clear it is the most clearly literal part of all

01:17:50.820 of those passages right jesus don't see you kayak this high you will see right on you and and you

01:17:56.800 will see the son of man coming on the clouds and clouds being judged judgment yeah and when you see

01:18:01.520 daniel and you understand that the son of man being presented to the ancient of days in the

01:18:05.300 heavens as a sign of his judgment coming judgment upon israel when you see that um the the book of

01:18:12.460 revelation was not sealed up because these things were soon to take place. And yet the prophecies of

01:18:19.120 Daniel and Daniel 12 were sealed up because they weren't going to happen for 700 years. Well,

01:18:24.660 why would Daniel be sealed up because the time wasn't near in 700 years? And then revelation

01:18:29.840 not sealed up because they're near. If we've already had 2000 years of church history after

01:18:34.480 that, well, it's because they were near. God was going to judge apostate Israel for her covenant 0.86

01:18:42.020 breaking, which happened in 70 AD, just as Christ said it would, that not one stone would be left

01:18:47.840 standing on the temple, that the end would come with a flood in Daniel, that, you know, essentially

01:18:53.280 God would come and he would judge his house. He would knock it down because he was building a

01:18:58.880 house no longer of stone. He was building a house of living stones and no longer would he call the

01:19:04.200 nations to worship at this physical temple. He would send his temple to the nations, the living

01:19:09.940 stones and he would build a temple that swallows the world out of those living stones right so i

01:19:15.220 mean you just have a lot of um a failure to read the bible biblically to read it apostolically to

01:19:22.540 read it in its types and shadows and its language and its prophetic imagery you have a failure to

01:19:28.080 take literally what ought to be taken literally in those passages and then take and and the errors

01:19:33.440 compound on top of that. So, you know, dispensationalism, I love dispensationalist

01:19:39.400 brothers. Again, pre-millennialists, um, we've found to be great partners in a lot of work and

01:19:45.060 not all pre-mill are dispensationalists, but, um, it is an error and it's, it's an error with

01:19:49.960 compounding implications. Agreed. Yeah. It's a serious error, but I same, same with me. I've,

01:19:55.180 I found my pre-mill brothers, um, are more willing to, to fight together and link arms than the

01:20:01.160 all mill so i would say like this you know the already not yet that you were mentioning i would

01:20:04.640 say um the the pre-mill especially the dispensational pre-mill um is um they they would

01:20:09.660 be uh not yet but not yet no really not yet yeah so they're like not yet not yet um we're already

01:20:15.800 not yet and then the all mill um and especially the two kingdom radical two kingdom all mill guys

01:20:21.100 would be um already but not really so so it's like so you have not yet not yet um already and

01:20:27.340 not really. And then we are already and not yet. And that was eye-opening for me. And I want my

01:20:33.700 listeners to hear that post-millennialism, ironically, I think the covenantal rather

01:20:39.040 than dispensational, post-millennial rather than pre-millennial, that position is, and this is

01:20:43.740 kind of out of character for me because I usually take the quote-unquote extreme position, also

01:20:50.000 known as the biblically faithful position. But in the case of post-millennialism, it's funny that

01:20:55.100 I would say it's, it's the middle position. It's, we think like pre-mill, all-mill, post-mill,

01:21:00.320 but I think more accurately it's pre-mill, all-mill, post-mill. Post-mill is actually,

01:21:05.040 I think the moderate position. What I mean by that is post-mill, a pre-mill and all-mill have

01:21:10.100 nothing in common. So the pre-mill and the all-mill disagree about the nature of Christ's reign,

01:21:15.340 right? One says it's ethereal, all-mill just ethereal, it's just, you know, magical, mystical,

01:21:19.980 you know, whatever. You know, it's all the pietism kind of stuff. And then the pre-mill is like, 1.00

01:21:24.060 no no no this is a kingdom it's real it's gonna happen jesus is actually king right so they they

01:21:28.380 disagree over the nature of the kingdom um and they disagree over the timing right so the the

01:21:33.480 the um the all mill is like uh it's happening right now and it's uh and don't you worry it is

01:21:37.920 absolutely impotent um and then you know and then do absolutely nothing yeah it does absolutely

01:21:43.760 nothing it is it is in full force right now doing nothing um so it's already but not really and then

01:21:50.000 And then the pre-mill is, it is serious, but we're in this parenthetical moment of dispensationalism with the church age.

01:21:58.260 And so it's completely on pause.

01:22:00.280 But as soon as God hits play, and it'll probably be, you know, before we finish this episode, it could be any second.

01:22:05.880 Any second.

01:22:06.560 Boom, it's going to be serious.

01:22:08.040 And stuff will happen.

01:22:09.140 Exactly.

01:22:09.560 So they disagree on the nature of the kingdom and the timing of the kingdom.

01:22:12.380 Nature and timing.

01:22:13.360 Post-mill is the moderate middle position.

01:22:15.280 We agree with the pre-mill in terms of the nature of the kingdom.

01:22:17.680 We're like, yeah, it's real.

01:22:19.000 It's physical.

01:22:19.420 it has practical implications

01:22:21.140 Jesus is actually king

01:22:22.660 it's not just a spiritual kingship

01:22:24.140 it's real

01:22:24.980 and we agree with the all mill

01:22:26.780 on the timing of the kingdom

01:22:28.460 post mill if you want to be a moderate

01:22:30.820 be a post mill

01:22:32.240 it's a reasonable position

01:22:33.860 middle of the road

01:22:36.000 join us in our

01:22:38.440 post millennial moderatism

01:22:40.920 the post mill folks are really known

01:22:42.700 for being like a moderate gentile

01:22:44.580 winsome nuanced

01:22:46.540 I think we're winsome they've won me

01:22:48.760 yeah i think it's the most attractive position it should be called win win none instead of win none

01:22:55.460 you know we want to win all so all right anyway so yeah so i i think that that's you know so

01:23:00.300 the covenants and you know versus dispensationalism and post-millennial millennialism versus all mill

01:23:06.520 and pre-mill um it matters in the sense of of the pietism thing that we were talking about earlier

01:23:11.480 but but what i found it sounds like you guys have found the same that the pre-mill guys even though

01:23:15.640 they're like, okay, we're waiting on God to push play again. They, what I've noticed is even though

01:23:21.360 they're like, we're not in the kingdom, maybe it's because of that grammatical, historical,

01:23:26.640 literal hermeneutic. They just, they take the Bible seriously. So they're like, yeah, the Bible

01:23:30.760 affects how I should vote. The Bible affects, you know, how, you know, so they actually,

01:23:36.280 the pre-mill guy, even though they think that in the big picture, we're on pause,

01:23:39.780 in their individual lives, they actually believe in practical obedience, practical obedience,

01:23:46.620 beyond just the home of the church, but that the Bible actually speaks to other aspects of life

01:23:50.760 with real, tangible, practical obedience. And they just don't think that obedience will be

01:23:55.760 effective. They don't think that it'll be successful, but they still do think that we

01:24:00.040 should obey and Christ calls us to do things. And then the all mill is like, we're in the kingdom,

01:24:05.800 um but the all-mill is i think the bigger problem not all of them i know this there's a spectrum of

01:24:11.540 differences in pre-mill all-mill post-mill but um but you know i i was in san diego for a long time

01:24:16.280 and so i'm right next to escondido you know westminster and stuff and and that that all

01:24:20.300 millennial two kingdom radical two kingdom um kind of mindset is is just um i think that's the

01:24:26.480 one that's more dangerous that's the one that lends more towards pietism than like john macarthur

01:24:30.420 john macarthur will do something now i mean i you know he'll especially do something when it

01:24:35.100 affects him personally right so like 52 years on record that america shouldn't exist because it

01:24:39.740 wasn't submitting to the civil magistrates in england um you know but then uh as soon as his

01:24:44.360 church got closed down boom he became a theonomist so um you know so if i had the gif of the the black

01:24:51.720 kids running across the camera like so that's what i'd play but my but my point is like john

01:24:57.960 MacArthur, you know, um, if it, when it came, when it came to his front doorstep, this, this insane

01:25:04.340 tyranny, um, John MacArthur fought and, and to be fair, and he's fought other things for 50 years

01:25:10.860 to be fair, um, because of that little, and, and in his defense, just like I said, you know, tried

01:25:15.220 to say, I think this is the intention behind Doug Wilson's federal vision. Well, here's the intention

01:25:19.640 I think behind John MacArthur's leaky dispensational premillennialism, uh, give him the

01:25:24.760 benefit of the doubt i think his intention is 50 years of watching liberal theology ravage the 0.54

01:25:29.540 church with sexual ethic and and gay mirage and all these kind of things and he's like

01:25:33.980 no analytical typological hermeneutic whatsoever we just can't open the door and that i you know

01:25:41.320 so to give him the benefit of the doubt i think that's where his heart is is just give me the

01:25:45.020 bible and so but that guy who's just give me the bible and let's practically obey and do what it

01:25:49.380 says i got way more in common with him than the other guy who has the analogical typological

01:25:54.100 christological piece in their hermeneutic and can read certain portions of isaiah actually speaking

01:25:58.980 of christ without an apostolic new testament author explicitly saying so um but doesn't want

01:26:04.660 to do anything that's so true so anyways all right any final thoughts i i hear my kids are

01:26:11.140 about to come in as a like a wrecking ball but any final thoughts thanks for having us on yeah

01:26:16.360 i learned a lot i learned me too guys i've i've learned a lot of what i'm doing is repeating back

01:26:22.500 to you, um, things that I've learned by listening to, I've listened to some of the episodes. I

01:26:26.840 rarely do this, but I've listened to some of the episodes twice on the King's Hall podcast.

01:26:30.940 Cause it just, thank you. It's fantastic. What you guys are doing is awesome. So one of these

01:26:35.060 days I'd love to get you guys to come out here and maybe we could do a conference together or

01:26:38.200 something like that. So, oh man, what a, what a weekend that would be. That'd be fun. All right.

01:26:43.360 Thank you guys so much. And I hope you guys listening. We're blessed. Uh, tune in next week

01:26:47.920 for another episode of Theology Apply. Thanks so much for listening, but real quick before you go,

01:26:52.500 do us a small favor, take a moment, and leave us a five-star review if you enjoyed the show.

01:26:57.980 This is undoubtedly the best way that you can help us get this biblically faithful content

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The NXR Podcast - May 31, 2022

THEOLOGY APPLIED - 5 Doctrines Stunting The Church’s Maturity

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