The NXR Podcast - THEOLOGY APPLIED - Postmillennialism ｜ Rejecting Dispensationalism

00:00:00.000 Hey guys, real quick before we get started, I have a small request.

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00:00:18.180 Hi, this is Pastor Joel Webin with Right Response Ministries,

00:00:20.900 and you're listening to another episode of Theology Applied.

00:00:24.000 In this episode, I was privileged to have as a special guest, Gary DeMar.

00:00:27.840 He is the president of American Vision, and the topic for our discussion was all things

00:00:33.440 post-millennial.

00:00:34.520 We were kind of scattered in our discussion, so we really covered the bases, but we talked

00:00:38.520 about the danger of two-kingdom theology.

00:00:40.660 We talked about the danger of dispensationalism.

00:00:43.680 We talked about the danger of premillennialism, and a lot of the post-millennial conversation

00:00:49.320 was where to root it in biblical texts, but then also how to be a post-millennial Christian

00:00:55.840 in practice? How to practically apply that eschatology today? How do we win? And how

00:01:03.300 do we get here as a nation and the world at large? And what's the solution? How do we get

00:01:08.940 out of the hole? So if that's what you're looking for, you're going to love this episode.

00:01:14.140 Applying God's word to every aspect of life. This is Theology Applied.

00:01:19.620 All right, so welcome to another episode of Theology Applied.

00:01:26.300 As I've already mentioned, my guest is Gary.

00:01:29.500 We have Uncle Gary is what you typically go by, but Gary DeMar with American Vision.

00:01:34.840 Are you the founder of that, Gary?

00:01:36.780 No, American Vision was founded by a fellow named Steve Schiffman back in the late 1970s.

00:01:43.640 I came on in 1980 as a researcher, and just through a number of different things, the board decided to let Steve go, and I became the president probably mid-1980s.

00:02:03.520 Okay, cool.

00:02:04.580 Could you tell us a little bit about American Vision?

00:02:06.580 What is the mission or the purpose of this ministry?

00:02:09.180 Is it fair to call it a ministry?

00:02:10.420 American Vision, if you're familiar with wall builders, David Barton, it's a kind of restoring, learning more about America's Christian heritage and making people aware of that.

00:02:25.180 That's how American Vision got started. And the founder, when I came on, I said, look, this isn't what I want to do for the rest of my life is just talk about America's Christian history.

00:02:37.520 what we as Christians need to do is to talk about a comprehensive biblical worldview and the

00:02:44.480 application of that and he he agreed with that he didn't know much really he he kind of glommed

00:02:50.380 onto onto that topic he was uh he partnered with Marshall Foster I don't know if you know who

00:02:56.100 Marshall Foster is they see that's the thing a lot of you young guys really the history of all

00:03:01.620 this stuff um one of these days I'm just going to have to sit down and go through go through all of

00:03:07.240 So Marshall Foster is still in the realm of America's Christian heritage.

00:03:14.060 He's good friends with Kirk Cameron.

00:03:16.120 It was Marshall Foster who introduced Kirk Cameron to the preterist perspective.

00:03:23.260 Kirk watched a video series that I did.

00:03:26.260 Then they did a documentary called Unstoppable.

00:03:31.360 I think it was Unstoppable.

00:03:33.480 Was that the one?

00:03:35.040 That's the one it was.

00:03:36.940 I don't know if that was the one, but it was on America's Christian history.

00:03:43.420 And so American Vision moved into the biblical worldview realm.

00:03:50.740 And I wrote, the first book I wrote was the first volume of God and Government.

00:03:58.700 And it was just, and remember, this is the Reagan, this is the Reagan decade.

00:04:04.320 Ronald Reagan was elected as president, beat Jimmy Carter by a landslide in 1980.

00:04:12.480 Ronald Reagan became president, and it was really the first time that Christians became a voting bloc.

00:04:18.780 It was the born-again voting bloc.

00:04:22.380 And this is when Jerry Falwell, who was a Baptist, dispensationalist, got involved in politics and started an organization called the Moral Majority.

00:04:34.320 And he got Christians involved. And there was a national affairs briefing in 1980 that Ronald Reagan showed up for, but Jimmy Carter and John Anderson, who was a third party candidate, did not.

00:04:48.060 And it was at that particular meeting where Ronald Reagan kind of endeared himself to Christians.

00:04:56.700 And this became then a Christian voting bloc.

00:05:00.840 And what I knew needed to be done was that Christians need to understand that in terms of the Bible, government isn't synonymous with politics.

00:05:11.780 That there's God is a governor of all things.

00:05:14.120 There's self-government under God, which is kind of self-control, governing your own lives according to God's standards for the individual.

00:05:22.560 And there's family government, church government, and civil government.

00:05:26.700 And so it ended up being a three-volume set, God and Government, which is now in a hardback, one-volume set.

00:05:33.740 And that kind of became foundational for American Vision.

00:05:38.000 But as I went out and started teaching on this particular topic, inevitably someone would say, well, you know, why?

00:05:44.820 Remember, this is early 1980.

00:05:48.020 My first volume came out in 82.

00:05:49.880 The second volume came out in 84.

00:05:51.520 The third volume came out in 1986.

00:05:53.920 And what was popular in the 1970s was Hal Lindsey's The Late Great Planet Earth, which was published in 1970.

00:06:03.080 And Hal Lindsey kind of made this prediction that Israel becoming a nation again in 1948 was prophetically significant.

00:06:10.520 Generation was 40 years. You add 40 to 1948, you get 1988. 0.77

00:06:15.020 So there was a lot of buzz in the 1980s about the rapture was right around the corner.

00:06:21.300 And inevitably, people would say, why are we bothering with this?

00:06:25.020 Jesus is coming soon, and all the signs are pointing to that.

00:06:31.380 And so that's when I added kind of the eschatological side of all of this.

00:06:36.980 And then we expanded into economics, education, creation, evolution, and the apologetic side,

00:06:42.940 because I studied under Dr. Greg Bonson at Reformed Theological Seminary.

00:06:47.800 So this was essentially it was a package deal that the founder of American Vision knew nothing about.

00:06:55.680 And so in essence, he needed me to kind of keep this ball rolling.

00:07:01.520 So I've been with American Vision for, I guess, 40, 41 years.

00:07:06.720 Wow. Wow. That's really cool.

00:07:10.260 Yeah, these days, man, if I had a dollar every time I hear a Christian say that, you know, that Christianity is not supposed to be political. 0.62

00:07:17.800 or Christians shouldn't be involved in government or this or that.

00:07:21.440 It sounds like the work that you're doing is what I wish a lot of Christians would read and study and understand.

00:07:28.200 Why do you think it is that when do you think that really became a significant dominant position with American Christians,

00:07:36.640 that Christianity and politics have nothing to do with one another?

00:07:39.340 um I don't know if there's a I don't know if there's a an exact point in time where that

00:07:48.440 where you could say this is this is it I just I think there was kind of a convergence of of of

00:07:56.040 ideas um where I think eschatology had a lot a lot to do with it I mean you Schofield reference

00:08:02.960 Bible, you know, came out in the early, you know, early 1900s. And it kind of put the kibosh on,

00:08:12.620 we're living in this parenthesis. You know, the kingdom of God is yet future. We're living,

00:08:19.580 we really don't have anything to say about the things of this world. I mean, even the

00:08:24.240 Sermon on the Mount isn't applicable, you know, today.

00:08:28.120 um explain that real quick the sermon on the mount isn't applicable today they would say

00:08:34.020 it's applicable but they would just say it's private the privatized application well remember

00:08:39.020 the dispensationalist says we're living in a a parenthesis explain the parentheses well the

00:08:45.240 parenthesis well that's this might take a little little time i'm trying to be as quick as possible

00:08:49.200 with this. Dispensationalism teaches that there is a salvific distinction between Israel and

00:09:00.460 the church. The dispensationalists claim that the church arose because Israel rejected Jesus as the

00:09:08.440 promised Messiah, and that stopped the prophecy clock of Daniel's 70th week, which was supposedly

00:09:15.580 a seven-year period, that prophecy clock stopped. And so God quit dealing with Israel, and he started 0.61

00:09:23.520 dealing with this new entity called the church. And according to dispensationalism, at Pentecost 0.54

00:09:29.020 or sometime after that, the church age began. So right now, according to dispensationalism,

00:09:35.300 we're living within the church age. And so the Sermon on the Mount was supposed to be for kingdom

00:09:41.380 living. Well, according to the dispensationalists, the kingdom doesn't come until after this

00:09:47.600 parenthesis is over, and that's the rapture where God takes the church off the earth.

00:09:52.040 And then there's a seven-year period. There's the rise of Antichrist. Antichrist makes a covenant

00:09:56.780 with Israel. Antichrist breaks the covenant, rebuilt temple, animal sacrifices, Armageddon, 0.75

00:10:02.180 all hell breaks loose, on and on and on. And then there's a bloodbath. Two-thirds of the Jews living

00:10:07.580 in Israel are going to be slaughtered. Billions of people around the world will be killed. 1.00

00:10:11.160 That's the dispensational system in a nutshell. Right. Real quick, do most dispensational,

00:10:16.160 so that's super helpful. Thank you. Do most dispensational individuals, would they hold

00:10:21.340 that the earth, like a literal interpretation of, you know, Peter, when he said the earth will

00:10:25.560 dissolve like snow, when they say new heavens, new earth, do they think God is restoring this earth

00:10:29.680 or God's just going to completely wipe it out and replace it? Like Jesus is going to rapture

00:10:34.580 his own take us to heaven which is some separate place from earth and then we're going to eventually

00:10:39.240 return back to a whole separate planet that he's going to create to replace this earth is that

00:10:44.060 right the dispensationalists teach that you know this rapture of the church takes place and then

00:10:50.060 there's a seven seven year period where antichrist kind of reigns jesus returns so there's this

00:10:56.720 rapture is secret you don't see jesus this all the christians are taken off the earth right then

00:11:01.380 after that seven-year period, when Jesus returns, he then returns and sets up his kingdom on earth,

00:11:09.420 and that's Revelation chapter 20, although Revelation chapter 20 doesn't say any of that,

00:11:15.740 and there's nothing to Revelation 20 that says Jesus is going to reign on the earth

00:11:19.160 and rule from Jerusalem, and they have to have a rebuilt temple and all that. Now, at the end of

00:11:25.120 that thousand years uh that's when the the um the new heavens and the new earth start so second

00:11:32.120 peter three according to the dispensationalists does not happen until after the thousand years

00:11:39.120 gotcha um the now most all mills post mills uh who don't have that thousand year literal jesus

00:11:50.880 raining on the earth, they believe 2 Peter 3 is a literal fire-breathing catastrophe on the earth

00:12:00.700 and a renovated earth. Personally, I don't hold that position. John Owen didn't hold that position.

00:12:07.560 John Brown didn't hold that position. John Lightfoot didn't hold that position. Others

00:12:12.060 didn't either the second peter three is really talking about the um the the elements of the old

00:12:20.340 covenants are tested by fire and and and burned up not that the earth itself is burned up but that

00:12:29.820 old covenant order is burned up right so different different views based on based upon your

00:12:37.900 eschatological position that's helpful because i i was i was telling you before we started

00:12:42.180 recording i was in san diego well i didn't tell you san diego but i was in san diego california

00:12:46.120 i told you california and uh san diego is close proximity to um westminster escondido and

00:12:52.040 westminster escondido you know even john frame you know wrote kind of his his critique of the

00:12:57.060 escondido theology he named the book the escondido theology and primarily critiquing their two kingdom

00:13:02.520 I think I even wrote a, I think I wrote a foreword or an introduction.

00:13:07.180 Oh, did you?

00:13:08.080 Okay.

00:13:08.460 And so anyway, Van Drudem would be, for a lot of guys, the gold standard there.

00:13:12.900 But Horton, you know, Michael Horton and multiple other guys would adhere to that strict two-kingdom theology

00:13:18.600 where basically Drudem, from what I've understood, and so I, anyways, I had interaction with, you know,

00:13:24.580 a lot of my pastor friends were Presbyterian, but a lot of them came out of Escondido, Westminster Escondido. 0.82

00:13:29.940 And so they, you know, were pretty staunchly two-kingdom.

00:13:32.520 And from what I heard from them, basically what was taught at the school was that the

00:13:39.020 only thing that is going to enter into the new heavens and new earth is, you know, the

00:13:43.260 only physical thing is our physical resurrected bodies, because you have to hold to that

00:13:47.520 without being just a full-blown heretic.

00:13:49.640 So you've got to say that, you know, you've got to believe in the resurrection and the

00:13:53.360 literal bodily resurrection, but everything else, they really believed everything would

00:13:58.680 be burnt up, would be complete.

00:14:01.240 It wasn't going to be restored.

00:14:02.340 So like text where it says, you know, that even creation itself is groaning with eager expectations for the sons of God to be revealed.

00:14:09.060 Druden and those guys would say that, you know, that the creation is groaning with eager expectations to give way to the sons of God, to basically like a mercy killing.

00:14:18.080 It wants to die so that this new thing can happen.

00:14:21.800 And that's a pretty, look, that's a pretty popular position among a lot of, even some post-mill guys.

00:14:29.180 Okay.

00:14:29.460 I personally believe we need a almost a complete reassessment of eschatology, because if you look at the, you look at the creeds, you look at, you know, the Nicene Creed and you look at the Apostles Creed, one of them says the resurrection of the body, the other one says the resurrection of the dead.

00:14:47.980 One says he descended into hell.

00:14:53.520 Nicene Creed says baptism for the remission of sins.

00:14:57.960 And so there are a number of things even in those confessional statements.

00:15:01.420 And we don't even know those creedal statements.

00:15:04.620 We don't even know who wrote the Apostles' Creed.

00:15:07.160 But throughout all these creedal statements and even confessional statements, Baptist confessions, Westminster confession, whatever the case might be,

00:15:16.200 there's very little on eschatology uh everything most of the stuff on eschatology the westminster

00:15:23.320 confession of faith of course made a direct statement in its original version that um

00:15:29.600 the pope was the antichrist that was that was a popular view in the you know among the reformers

00:15:36.720 and yeah the 1689 says that too which i'm just happy to read that is the pope is an antichrist

00:15:43.240 To which I would say yes and amen.

00:15:45.840 See, that to me is, in biblical terms, that doesn't fit.

00:15:50.860 So you would say that there's a singular Antichrist?

00:15:53.460 Is that what you're hinting at?

00:15:54.600 I was raised Roman Catholic, and I memorized, we had to memorize the Apostles' Creed.

00:16:00.440 So if you look at the Apostles' Creed, a Protestant who believes in the Apostles' Creed,

00:16:06.700 Roman Catholics believe in the Apostles' Creed.

00:16:09.580 Yes.

00:16:09.840 You know, Jesus is the Son of God. God is triune. All of that was within the Roman Catholic Church. The difference is that in biblical terms, an Antichrist is someone who denies that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh. 0.85

00:16:29.060 that is an antichrist is someone who denies the father and the son well roman catholics don't

00:16:35.200 deny the father and the son right they don't they so the biblical definition of an antichrist i'm

00:16:41.980 talking about biblical definition first john yes most likely and again first john chapter 2 verse

00:16:50.220 18 john says look there there's not just one in it there's many antichrist we're living in the

00:16:57.060 last hour, and this is evidence, the evidence for that is there are many antichrists. So who are

00:17:01.640 these antichrists who denied that Jesus Christ had come in the flesh and denied the Father and the

00:17:07.040 Son? So that would be apostate Judaism. It's not Roman Catholicism. Here I think the reformers 0.84

00:17:14.780 got this wrong. That's why I think there are a lot of guys who are historicists, you know, they

00:17:19.880 believe the Roman Catholic Church is the end-time antichrist, not in terms of what the Bible has

00:17:27.020 to say and define it i've seen guys write books on the antichrist and just skip over first john

00:17:34.820 chapter 2 verse 18 first john 2 22 first john 4 1 and 2 second john 7 and that they never actually

00:17:42.260 define the antichrist right and that there were many there were many of them so that's that's a

00:17:47.160 fair i appreciate that that's a that's a really fair assessment and i've never thought that you

00:17:51.480 know the roman catholic church or the pope is the antichrist or the final antichrist but i have

00:17:56.500 categorize the pope as an antichrist which is what reformed baptist guys did what a lot of

00:18:01.920 presbyterian guys did but the point you're making in saying that you know if we want to have a

00:18:07.020 biblical definition of the antichrist the antichrist is because you're right john absolutely

00:18:12.220 he explicitly says that in chapter two the one who is the antichrist but the one who denies that

00:18:17.420 jesus has come in the flesh which is and you know i even wrote a book on first john and i remember

00:18:22.200 when I was dealing with that text saying that, you know, because saying that Jesus came in the

00:18:26.200 flesh includes a lot. If we flesh out that statement, it says that for one, it says that

00:18:30.240 Christ is eternal. He came in the flesh. He came from somewhere, right? That he was somewhere else.

00:18:35.440 And so he, you know, it says that he, you know, he didn't always have flesh. So what did he have

00:18:40.080 before that? He was a most pure spirit with God, the father, eternal, eternally begotten, not made.

00:18:46.480 And he comes in the flesh. And so you're right by that standard. And that is what, uh, John

00:18:52.080 clearly says by that standard catholics would not fall into the category so now this does not

00:18:57.700 i appreciate that solve the roman catholic church of all of its many many of course yeah yeah yeah

00:19:02.720 they may be anti-christ in but in terms of the bible they you can't really make that statement

00:19:10.140 but yeah papacy the idea of speaking excedra virgin mary and perpetual virginity the assumption

00:19:19.680 of mary praying to mary all that kind of stuff i mean roman catholic church has enough doctrinal

00:19:26.280 problems we don't have to make we don't have to create extra ones yeah no that's fair thanks i

00:19:31.040 appreciate that so okay so all that means it's not kirk cameron the movie isn't unstoppable he did

00:19:38.140 another one it's called monumental okay that's the one that he did on america's christian heritage

00:19:43.320 based upon this monument that is up in Massachusetts which overlooks the harbor a gigantic if you

00:19:50.520 haven't if you haven't seen it it's really worth watching it's called monumental Kirk Cameron and

00:19:54.360 Marshall Foster are involved in that and Darren Doan Darren Doan actually was the one who kind

00:20:00.640 of fixed that particular that particular film he's not giving any credit for it in in the film

00:20:07.680 itself but Darren Doan was the one that actually put that all together really make it made it

00:20:11.640 viewable but anyway that's a little side a little sidetrack that's great all right well so let's i

00:20:17.480 know that a lot of our listeners are very interested in eschatology and a lot of them

00:20:20.980 very interested in post-millennial eschatology which is where i'm at but this is a recent a lot

00:20:27.180 of our listeners know this because i've shared it in prior episodes but this is a recent development

00:20:31.620 for me just in the last couple of years really coming into post-millennialism and i think what

00:20:38.460 I hear from a lot of our audience is, well, I like it. I don't know anybody who doesn't like it.

00:20:43.760 Everyone's like, I like it. I want it to be true. But wanting sufficient biblical evidence. We've

00:20:49.840 done some stuff on our show with Matthew 24 and the Olivet Discourse, which that for me seems to

00:20:55.680 be one of, as I've learned and listened to guys like you and guys like Doug Wilson, I feel like

00:21:01.420 Matthew 24 seems to be one of the easiest ones now to explain. In fact, it's one of those things

00:21:06.680 It's like once you see it, you know, you can't unsee it.

00:21:08.700 And so now it's hard for me to look at Matthew 24 and explain it in the framework of any other eschatology but a post-mill, preterist, you know, theology.

00:21:17.520 But what are some other maybe key biblical texts that really convinced you of the post-millennial persuasion?

00:21:25.500 Well, typically when someone becomes a post-millennialist, they're stuck in the definitions, the tensional definitions among amillennialism, premillennialism, and then post-millennialism.

00:21:42.880 And they're battling a paradigm that isn't in and of itself clear of how you get there.

00:21:53.300 Premillennialists have it very easy.

00:21:55.500 Jesus is going to reign on the earth for a thousand years.

00:21:57.780 Simple.

00:21:58.320 Go to Revelation 20.

00:22:00.600 You reign with Christ for a thousand years, although it doesn't say on the earth and the ones who do reign with him are dead.

00:22:05.460 So that's that's another issue.

00:22:06.720 But there's a real simple.

00:22:07.660 Hey, interpret the Bible literally, although it seems like it's the only place in the in the book of Revelation that they interpret literally is that one thousand years.

00:22:17.840 You're right.

00:22:18.220 And they don't talk about all the other things in there that you can not interpret literally.

00:22:22.340 So they got the easiest job to do.

00:22:24.520 The amillennialist has the second easiest job based on Revelation chapter 20, and that's simply because if you read Revelation chapter 20, it does not describe a millennium as we know it. 0.82

00:22:39.900 We say it's 1,000 years. Well, 1,000 years is a millennium. True in the sense that that's the definition of 1,000 years, but a millennium has a broader definition to it in the sense it's typically a time of peace, prosperity, goodwill towards men, all that sort of thing.

00:23:01.700 But you don't find that in Revelation chapter 20 either. None of it is in there. So I'm of the opinion that you cannot build a millennial perspective based upon Revelation 20. The pre-mill can't do it because it doesn't say Jesus is going to reign on the earth for a thousand years.

00:23:20.620 It says nothing about rebuilding a temple. It says nothing about animal sacrifices. It says none of those types of things. The amillennialist has a better case in the sense, hey, Revelation 20 doesn't describe what we would think of a millennium.

00:23:36.360 In fact, if you go to the early church fathers and you read their discussions of the millennium and premillennialists like to say, oh, all the early church fathers, almost all the early church fathers were premillennial.

00:23:51.140 Well, a dispensationalist wrote his master's thesis on that, and he said, nah, that's not the case.

00:23:56.780 What you really find is, is the beginnings of all millennialism.

00:24:00.060 And if you look back and you study, if you study the early church and those who described the millennium, they didn't quote Revelation chapter 20.

00:24:10.140 They quoted Jewish sources, which is kind of interesting and which has nothing to do with Revelation chapter 20.

00:24:18.480 So how does the post-millennialist make his case?

00:24:23.660 I always tell people you can't go to Revelation 20 to do that.

00:24:27.400 I don't think it has anything to do with what we think of as a millennium.

00:24:32.940 So that's my first breakaway point.

00:24:36.280 The second thing is what you brought up, and that is things like the Olivet Discourse,

00:24:42.700 2 Thessalonians 2, the man of lawlessness, the Antichrist issue, the Book of Revelation,

00:24:49.540 the dating of the Book of Revelation, what are all those symbols all about?

00:24:52.760 But mostly it's the it's the sign indicators that stop people from becoming postmillennial plus experiential experiential exegesis.

00:25:06.160 That is, look at the world around us today. I hear that.

00:25:09.300 So the first the first thing you have to do is get out of Revelation chapter 20 to build your case.

00:25:14.760 Number two, you've got to clear the deck by going looking at these passages like the Olivet Discourse and Matthew, Mark and Luke.

00:25:22.760 And say, hey, this deals with these, the events leading up to the destruction of Jerusalem in AD 70.

00:25:29.580 So that takes some of the criticism away from those who oppose postmillennialism because, say, you know, we have wars and rumors of wars.

00:25:39.720 You've got famines in various places. You've got a false Christ and so forth.

00:25:42.760 You say, well, wait a minute. Yeah, we do have those things.

00:25:45.760 They were in the first century, too. And Jesus was talking about that particular generation. 0.80

00:25:52.780 And so one of the places that I, and there are a number of ways to do this.

00:25:56.400 One of the places that I go to, this would be my third attempt, you know, after you say, get out of Revelation 20, that's number one, clear the deck with eschatological passages.

00:26:07.860 And that is the consistent application of an unbelieving worldview.

00:26:15.120 Where does unbelieving thought go?

00:26:17.580 where does it what does it lead to when it is consistent with itself because it's always

00:26:25.900 pitting one worldview over against another worldview and i think what we've got going on

00:26:31.340 right now and we've had for a very long time christians are inconsistent we mentioned very

00:26:35.980 early on christians don't want to get involved in the things of this world right and the other

00:26:41.640 side takes advantage of that because we've left a cultural and moral vacuum. And so one of the

00:26:47.860 reasons we see the ascendancy of so much evil in the world is because Christians sat back and do 0.99

00:26:52.520 nothing. They did nothing. Go through history, who were the educators? Who developed science? 1.00

00:27:00.740 Hospitals. 1.00

00:27:01.100 In all these cases, for the majority of cases, they were Christians who did this. The great 1.00

00:27:07.360 cathedrals. I mean, they, those cathedrals were built to last millennia. I mean, they're still

00:27:12.820 standing today. I mean, you couldn't even burn down the Cathedral of Notre Dame. They had a very,

00:27:17.160 they had a very futuristic perspective. So we gave all that up eschatologically, and I think

00:27:24.620 culturally. We took kind of a pietistic approach to life, which seemed to be more spiritual. So

00:27:32.060 we want to be we want to be spiritual let's you know jesus didn't get mixed up in politics

00:27:37.640 politics is dirty um there's a separation between you know church and state uh satan is the god of

00:27:45.440 this world you just go down the list with these things is that you can't impose your morality on

00:27:50.860 other people we're just supposed to preach the gospel so you've got all this stuff this kind of

00:27:56.200 mix, a witch's brew of a worldview that essentially says to the Christian, we're on a holding pattern

00:28:05.300 until some eschatological event takes place. So I go to 2 Timothy chapter 3. I think 2 Timothy

00:28:13.520 chapter 3 in the New Testament is the place to begin. And most people say, well, how can you,

00:28:20.880 Why do you say that? Because 2 Timothy chapter 3 is truly significant in the way the Apostle Paul outlines the implications of an unbelieving worldview, where it goes, and then the other part is what we as Christians should be doing when we see the faltering implications of the consistency of an unbelieving worldview.

00:28:48.440 And once you go there, you begin to understand, and remember now, this is written, 2 Timothy chapter 3, this is written to a young pastor, a guy like you, living at the time where you had apostate Judaism, you had the advance of the Roman Empire, and you had a prediction that the temple and everything associated with it was going to be destroyed.

00:29:14.980 real quick so what where where would you date the writing of second timothy because right there you

00:29:20.340 just said you know on the dates of these books it's probably i'm going to guess maybe in the 50s

00:29:25.340 may have been in the early 60s i'm not sure because that's another thing i think for a lot

00:29:29.760 of people i remember you know with jeff durbin um you know like dating the the authorship the

00:29:37.500 writing of of revelation um at i think i think he said like 80 67 like just just a few earlier i

00:29:44.600 would say about 80 60 64 maybe 65 right because a lot of people i think that's part of it also is

00:29:50.360 the dating of certain new testament books because people you know would say well this was 80 90

00:29:54.540 they do the late yeah they do the late date thing james jordan has a he has 204 lectures

00:30:01.720 on the book of revelation and one of the things he i was listening to one of them yesterday

00:30:07.840 one of the points he makes is he says you can go you can go through the in the internal

00:30:13.180 um evidence that you know the time texts uh the fact that the temple is still standing in

00:30:19.040 revelation chapter 11 right the sixth king is mentioned which was probably nero the number

00:30:24.480 666 is referring to uh the nero caesar you you would say that the the six six because i know

00:30:31.500 that's what sprawl said and that's to me that seems to make sense that that was a reference to

00:30:35.360 nero is that jim jordan has a more interesting jim's perspective and i'm trying to get people

00:30:43.020 to understand this uh when when jim teaches through the book of revelation and you don't

00:30:50.480 have to agree with everything he says i mean he he'll tell you look i'm speculating here speculating

00:30:54.860 there and i'm working on a series in the book of revelation it's not going to be an in-depth thing

00:31:00.200 but it's going to begin with this premise. How would the first hearers and readers

00:31:08.040 of the book of Revelation understood it, and what tools would they have had at their disposal

00:31:15.320 to understand it? They wouldn't have any commentaries. They would have never, no helps at

00:31:22.100 all. All they would have is, for the most part, the Old Testament and some parts of the New

00:31:29.180 testament that's all they would have to do this um and so and yet they're to understand it and if

00:31:36.940 they're to understand it and that's all the tools they had then we need to pay attention to that

00:31:42.080 and jim makes this this is a fascinating statement he said that the book of revelation

00:31:47.300 is mediated through angels and those symbols animals and so forth and so on babylon mentions

00:31:57.680 Babylon that mentions the city where Jesus was crucified is called Egypt and Sodom. You have

00:32:05.960 the candles, you know, this is candlesticks. You got all these Old Testament allusions. Some people

00:32:11.440 say like 200 to 400 different allusions to the Old Testament. And he said the book of Revelation,

00:32:19.660 because it was mediated through angels this is old testament language this is this is the uh

00:32:29.760 it's kind of like you know zachariah joseph in dreams they were angels uh old testament

00:32:35.740 angels all the way through angels brought this angels brought this and so forth but when you

00:32:41.020 read the when you read the gospels and you read the letters you don't see any of that type of

00:32:47.680 language because that language is new covenant stuff you do see it early in the in the gospels

00:32:54.520 because that's still part kind of the old old covenant and so you know jim is saying here look

00:33:00.320 this is a you got to understand the old testament if you're going to understand the book of

00:33:06.440 revelation and it makes no sense to have the book of revelation done in the in the 90s it it doesn't

00:33:14.340 fit the new covenant scenario it's it's completely different approach to to the way it's you know to

00:33:22.180 the way it's done um so uh so let's go back real quick that that's helpful i appreciate it but uh

00:33:28.860 second timothy chapter three what i've got it here do you remember what verses you're referencing

00:33:33.120 you got it's the whole chapter the whole chapter not to go and it's just it's real quick okay

00:33:39.600 In 2 Timothy 3, Timothy is a young pastor, and Paul's giving him advice.

00:33:46.540 Just basically saying, in the last days, because that's what people are going to reference.

00:33:50.060 So starting in verse 1, but understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty.

00:33:54.560 People will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit.

00:34:07.780 lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of god having the appearance of godliness but denying

00:34:12.760 its power avoid such people for among them are those who creep into households and capture weak

00:34:18.780 women burdened with sins and led astray by various passions always learning stop stop right there

00:34:25.580 okay this is this is this is where people go they they stay and i've seen it quoted so many times

00:34:33.820 that this is where they stop

00:34:36.200 in order to try to make the case

00:34:38.020 that this is describing our time.

00:34:40.560 So what you firstly have to do

00:34:41.800 is study the last days

00:34:44.500 and go through the New Testament,

00:34:45.660 find out what last days are all about.

00:34:47.020 We won't do all that,

00:34:47.820 but I guarantee you

00:34:48.720 the last days refers to

00:34:50.300 the last days of the old covenant.

00:34:56.280 Right, the acts being at the root, right?

00:34:58.400 Like John the Baptist.

00:35:00.160 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:35:01.120 Yeah, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?

00:35:04.740 He's not talking about something in the distant future, but okay.

00:35:07.880 So you get to the end of verse 6, and people say, see, this is talking about our day.

00:35:12.180 But now look at verse 7.

00:35:14.700 And this is what I say about the people who express and live out these characteristics in verses 1 through 6.

00:35:24.060 What will happen to them as they become more and more consistent with them over time?

00:35:30.060 And then the next question is, what should we as Christians be doing while their collapsing worldview takes place?

00:35:38.160 So verse 7, they're always learning, but they're never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. 0.83

00:35:44.920 Wow, wait a minute.

00:35:46.980 Why are we putting so much stock in the power of these people when they're always learning, never able to come to the knowledge of the truth?

00:35:53.140 Now look at verse 8. And just as Janus and Jambres opposed Moses, so these men also opposed the truth, men of depraved mind rejected as regards to faith. Now who were Janus and Jambres? Janus and Jambres were the two sorcerer high priests who stood behind the throne of Pharaoh when Moses and Aaron came in.

00:36:17.860 Now, you've got to picture this. Moses and Aaron come in from the desert, and all they have, besides God's word and God's command, is a dead tree branch. That's it. 0.68

00:36:33.460 and that and so you know they throw down the the the rod it becomes a serpent uh pharaoh's

00:36:42.520 janice and jambres throw down theirs and what ends up happening there is of course

00:36:47.080 aaron's rod consumes those of the janice and jambres and what happens next 10 plagues

00:36:53.800 are are are issued against egypt israel escapes it goes into the land of canaan and goes into a

00:37:02.060 a new garden, so to speak. Now, it's a land flowing with milk and honey. In Numbers 13 and 14,

00:37:11.100 you know, 12 spies are sent out. Everything God said about this land is absolutely true. They 1.00

00:37:17.040 brought back some of the fruit from the land. They say, oh, they're giants in the land. So here

00:37:20.900 we see what happens when God's people are confronted with these types of people in verses

00:37:28.160 one through six. They took a vote. Ten of them says you can't go into the land because they're

00:37:33.640 giants. Joshua and Caleb said, God gave us the promise in Numbers 13, one, that we're going to

00:37:41.180 take the land. They wasted 40 years in the wilderness because they didn't believe. So

00:37:46.640 that's what you, they got to picture all this. Then look what comes up next. Verse nine, but they

00:37:52.840 will not make further progress for their folly will be obvious to all as also that of those 1.00

00:37:59.840 two came to be so briefly what are we finding today unbelievers are becoming more and more 0.95

00:38:07.160 consistent with themselves with their worldview they're killing their future through abortion 0.98

00:38:11.540 they're mutilating their their their their future with transgenderism uh they're they're 0.98

00:38:19.260 bankrupting all of us, and unfortunately, a lot of Christians are kind of going along with 0.99

00:38:24.460 this, and it happened in the wilderness as well, but it says here, but they will not make further 0.96

00:38:30.620 progress, for their folly will be obvious to all, as also that of those two came to be. Now,

00:38:35.500 then the next line, verse 10, but, but you, Timothy, you followed my teaching, conduct, purpose, faith,

00:38:43.780 patience, love, perseverance, and you balance that or contrast that with everything up in verse

00:38:50.500 one through six, and he gives on here, that you even followed my persecutions, my suffering,

00:38:56.400 such as happened to me at Antioch, at Iconium, and at Lystra, what persecutions I endured,

00:39:01.500 and out of them all the Lord delivered me, and indeed all who desire to live godly in Christ

00:39:06.600 jesus will be persecuted but evil men and imposters will proceed from bad to worse deceiving and being

00:39:14.380 deceived the other side is weak the only reason the other side exists in any time frame is number

00:39:25.060 one they're inconsistent with their worldview and number two they borrow moral capital from

00:39:30.580 our worldview but over time they abandon that borrowed capital and has become more consistent

00:39:36.360 with themselves, they destroy themselves. Then it goes on, you, however, you, Timothy, continue the

00:39:42.080 things you have learned and become convinced of, knowing from whom you have learned them, and that

00:39:46.560 from childhood you have known the sacred writings, which are able to give you the wisdom that bleeds

00:39:51.920 to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is God-breathed and profitable

00:39:57.640 for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness, that the man of God

00:40:02.040 may be equipped for adequate, equipped for every good work. That is post-millennialism in a

00:40:08.060 nutshell. It deals with the real world. It deals with real sin in the world, but it also deals

00:40:14.440 with the implications of sin as people become more and more consistent with it. The second phase of

00:40:19.400 that is, or the parallel phase of that is, what should Christians be doing in the interim? And

00:40:24.720 Paul gives the instructions. You followed my teachings. Now do them. Go out there and do them

00:40:29.720 and replace what is disintegrating around you now we're seeing a little bit of this

00:40:35.120 not necessarily by by christians but here we have this cancel culture going on right a cancel

00:40:41.660 culture with with you know twitter and all the other social media platforms as they become more

00:40:47.280 and more consistent with themselves they're losing their they're losing their their grip

00:40:54.140 they got rid of trump well trump was a big big deal on twitter right he's gone you got cnn right

00:40:59.480 now that they're down to like 645,000 people watching them uh you know daily you got all

00:41:06.320 these alternatives out there that are coming that are coming up and people are abandoning

00:41:10.000 these these sites they've all that's what happens to unbelieving thought has become

00:41:15.920 as it becomes consistent with itself christians need to develop a christian worldview and get

00:41:22.060 back to basics and notice the basic here is you learn this stuff from your grandmother and your

00:41:28.420 mother. You need these basic, these fundamental principles you need to learn, and you need to

00:41:34.560 apply, so you build from the bottom up, and that was why that my God in Government books begin with

00:41:40.520 God is a governor of all things, self-government, family government, church government, and then

00:41:44.780 finally civil government, and now you go back to God. This is 2 Timothy chapter 3, so now you go

00:41:50.180 back to 1 Timothy chapter 3, and it talks about leadership, and that is the person who can't

00:41:54.800 govern his own household shouldn't be governing the church right so to me that's how you defend

00:42:01.320 post-millennialism you can bring there are a whole bunch of other verses you can bring in about

00:42:04.860 the word of the lord will cover the earth as the as the waters cover the sea there are all of those

00:42:11.060 verses but this is a practical application not of post-millennialism because to me post-millennialism

00:42:18.660 was built on uh revelation chapter 20 uh and the post what post the the year 1000 i mean just it

00:42:27.320 doesn't fit uh so that that's where i've become convinced on a post-millennialism it hasn't been

00:42:34.780 on a bunch of these kind of proof texts for it and you can make a case for that um that you know

00:42:40.320 mustard seed and the and the 11th tree in the trees i mean all all those types of things but

00:42:45.900 this is a practical application of post-millennialism. The book of Acts is a practical

00:42:52.460 application of post-millennialism because even with all the persecution from the Jews and 0.87

00:42:58.080 eventually from the Romans, they're gone. The temple is gone. Roman empire is gone. Christians 0.86

00:43:05.260 transformed the world from this. They didn't do it perfectly, but we should be getting better at 1.00

00:43:09.880 it with practice. Major universities in the United States were started by Christians, Harvard and

00:43:14.700 Yeah, you've gone down on the list with this, you know, Dartmouth, Columbia, and we give them up because we compromise and that we just got to quit. 0.99

00:43:26.040 We have to quit compromising. This is one of the nice things about what's going on in Moscow. 0.69

00:43:31.660 and the reason someone like Doug Wilson gets slammed so much

00:43:37.060 is because he has drawn a line in the sand

00:43:41.300 and he says we're on this side of this

00:43:44.640 and we're going ahead

00:43:46.060 and we're not just criticizing culture

00:43:51.680 we're transforming it from the bottom up here

00:43:56.880 and we're trying to create a model

00:43:58.400 and I know a lot of people are moving to Moscow

00:44:00.440 But that's not going to work long term.

00:44:03.200 We should be taking that and going other places and doing, you know, go thou and do likewise.

00:44:08.500 Right.

00:44:09.220 No, I completely agree.

00:44:10.580 No, that was really helpful.

00:44:11.660 I mean, that's part of what appeals to me is, you know, the name of our podcast is Theology Applied. 0.99

00:44:15.820 And I think that's one of the big problems is you have Christians saluting the inerrancy of Scripture, 0.96

00:44:19.780 but not actually believing in the sufficiency of Scripture, 0.95

00:44:22.960 not actually willing to take the sword off of the mantle.

00:44:25.720 And, you know, if somebody's trying to bust down the door and come into your house,

00:44:29.360 the enemies at the gate, like grab the sword, use the sword, apply your theology. And, and

00:44:35.320 theology, applying your theology beyond just our private lives and our homes, our marriages,

00:44:42.660 you know, I mean, Christians have, we've never been shy to do conferences on marriage and family

00:44:47.960 and conferences on the church. And we, so it's like, we think that the scripture applies in

00:44:53.180 these two realms of the home of the church, but that somehow, you know, I was preaching just the

00:44:58.140 other day in my church and saying you know like the simba you know mufasa illustration of you know

00:45:03.040 pride rock and mufasa the king is showing simba all of his kingdom that will one day be his and

00:45:08.120 you know simba said what's that dark shadowy place over there and you could almost hear like

00:45:12.280 the evangelicals saying that's the realm of politics you must never go there we don't have

00:45:16.200 any authority there you know but christ is is king of all and and so for me i mean to me i for my

00:45:23.440 listeners i don't know if i've ever shared this but the starting place for me so that was super

00:45:26.680 helpful. Second Timothy 3. For me, it was very similar. It was a practical starting place. So

00:45:30.880 the text for me was just the Great Commission that we're called to go and make disciples of

00:45:35.260 all nations, baptizing them into the name of the triune God, and then teaching them to obey all

00:45:39.940 of Christ's commands. And for me, this is what I took that, and then I cross-referenced with what 0.54

00:45:45.180 Jesus says in Matthew 16, that the gates of hell, he's going to build his church. The increase of

00:45:51.660 his government, like it's not just going to sustain, but it's going to grow. He's going to

00:45:55.800 build his church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.

00:45:59.080 And the gates are actually the defensive, you know, and the church is on the offense.

00:46:05.640 It's being built.

00:46:06.340 It's expanding and increasing.

00:46:08.320 And hell is actually on the defense, and hell won't be able to hold back the growth of Christ's church.

00:46:13.420 So Matthew 16 made me think, all right, the church is going to win because Christ is going to ensure that that is so.

00:46:20.640 and then and then you take that with Matthew 28 and the Great Commission which includes not just

00:46:26.240 making converts but teaching them to obey all of Christ's commands and then you ask the question

00:46:29.860 well what are all of Christ's commands and and you start that well every command in scripture

00:46:34.580 ultimately can be tracked back to Christ and you know but even with the greatest commandment the

00:46:38.940 second greatest to love the Lord and love our neighbor and that being two tables of the law of

00:46:42.480 the Old Testament the Old Testament the Mosaic law the Ten Commandments being you know the the

00:46:47.160 moral law being the bedrock for where we got all these civil laws in the Old Testament.

00:46:52.120 And then all of a sudden, it's like, oh my goodness.

00:46:54.640 So fulfilling the Great Commission is talking about how to start a school

00:46:58.880 and how to have a God-fearing government and how to do this and how to do that.

00:47:05.100 And so then the only question left is, and I think a lot of my pre-mill friends would be here,

00:47:09.160 I could convince them of theology needing to be applied to all of life.

00:47:13.940 I can convince them of that sooner.

00:47:15.760 but the reason they're able to still hold it onto their pre-meal theology is

00:47:19.660 because I can't convince them that we'll ever be successful, right?

00:47:23.560 So they're like, theology applies to everything.

00:47:25.800 So that's why I think you need Matthew 28 and Matthew 16.

00:47:28.720 You need both of them.

00:47:29.440 Matthew 28 says, this is the job.

00:47:31.740 Matthew 16 says, and it's going to work.

00:47:34.400 And once I had those two pieces, it was like,

00:47:37.540 well, then of course we should have Christian nations and Christian governments.

00:47:40.380 I always tell tell people is that if you if you make postmillennialism so grandiose and then people look as to where they are right now, they'll say there's no way we can get from here to there.

00:47:59.160 And I sit back and I think the number of multi, multi, multi, multi billion dollar companies that got started in garages.

00:48:14.560 Right. Jeff Bezos, you know, Apple, Walt Disney, the the the guy who started eBay.

00:48:24.920 They they start they think how small they started. Right. And then people and people will criticize Bezos.

00:48:32.840 He built this all this. He did all this and all this and all this. I said, look, you could have done that.

00:48:38.700 He did it. You could do something like that. It's so.

00:48:42.660 But if you make that if you make the task so grandiose at the beginning, people say there is no way we can get from here to there.

00:48:49.540 right and i i've i've told this this story is i i started i started lifting weights when i was

00:48:56.280 probably i don't know 11 or 12 years old and when you buy a weight set if you buy an olympic weight

00:49:03.240 set you get they're in kilos but basically they're basically the you go the american

00:49:08.700 what weights and measures you get 45 pound plates 35 25s 10s two and a halves and one and a quarters

00:49:16.460 and you know you buy a set you know 300 315 pounds very very few i don't know any 11 year

00:49:26.900 old 12 year old is going to be able to lift three you know do a bench press with 315 pounds do a

00:49:30.900 cleanup press with 315 pounds that's not going to happen those weights those smaller weights are on

00:49:36.680 there you start at a lower weight you and you incrementally to get stronger you add the one

00:49:44.260 and a quarters or two and a halves and after a while you look after four years or so he said look

00:49:49.300 what I I had a big chart big chart that I had I filled it all out all my workouts and my record

00:49:55.400 the records that I did and so forth and I said you go back and you look what I was doing when I

00:50:00.560 was 14 years old and what I ended up doing when I was 18 years old and if someone had said this is

00:50:06.020 what you're going to have to do in order to do what you want to do I probably would have said

00:50:10.660 there's no way I can do that I can only lift 110 pound barbell over my head so what we have got to

00:50:16.800 do is be careful of how we present our the case for post-millennialism you can make it so grandiose

00:50:26.480 it gets people so excited about it that when they go out there and start working on it they get

00:50:32.480 discouraged because it isn't moving as quickly as they want but remember what Paul writes in

00:50:37.340 in second timothy chapter three you followed my persecutions right and all who follow 0.77

00:50:45.180 jesus christ are are going to be persecuted and so there is this here's what the unbelievers

00:50:52.880 believe this is the how what's going to happen they're consistent it doesn't mean that things

00:50:56.740 are going to be a bed of roses they get there here's what you're supposed to do while this is

00:50:59.980 taking place etc so you have to be careful on how you present the case uh and because we're far we're

00:51:09.820 very very you know far behind i mean the princeton princeton started in what was called the log

00:51:16.240 college and it started in a log basically a log cabin well you go up and look at princeton today

00:51:22.940 it's no longer a log cabin and you know we as christians have to start thinking of the

00:51:29.980 possibilities out there but not not be discouraged if we don't reach those things immediately and

00:51:37.340 give up that's good yeah i appreciate that um so what do you think in terms of this was one of my 0.88

00:51:45.880 questions it seems like you know so unbelievers at first they're borrowing capital moral capital

00:51:51.900 from Christians and the Christian worldview.

00:51:54.800 And they're also borrowing, and we're being charitable there

00:51:57.700 because the actual word would be stealing, right?

00:51:59.500 We're stealing it, yeah.

00:52:00.080 They're stealing from Christ. 1.00

00:52:02.120 But they're stealing from Christians and moral capital, 0.95

00:52:04.800 but they're stealing from Christ his principles, right? 0.87

00:52:07.580 They want the principles of Christ without the person of Christ.

00:52:10.920 But they're using these principles because they work.

00:52:12.900 We live in God's world.

00:52:14.120 God has rules for his world, and God will not be mocked.

00:52:17.160 A man reaps what he sows. 1.00

00:52:18.020 And so non-Christians do that, but then eventually you said, 0.99

00:52:20.540 you know, they become more and more consistent with their actual worldview, which, of course, 0.61

00:52:25.760 when you become consistent with a worldview that is antithetical to Christ, then the result is

00:52:31.340 chaos. My question is, within the post-mill framework, things, you know, yes, I understand

00:52:37.200 your point. It's going to be slow, right? It could be a few thousand years. It could be 20,

00:52:41.220 30, 40,000 years. Who knows? But it seems like, on one hand, I feel like, you know, Christ is

00:52:47.100 defeating his enemies one by one that that's another thing that was convincing for me because

00:52:50.680 premill it seems like um the first enemy for christ to defeat his death whereas the bible

00:52:55.700 says that you know the last enemy is death um and so so i i i see christ defeating his enemies

00:53:02.240 now um but then there's certain enemies where i'm like i felt like i felt like that one was defeated

00:53:09.020 like how many times do we have to try socialism until that enemy is defeated you know what i mean

00:53:14.780 So my question is, throughout the last 2,000 years, since the life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Christ and the fall of the ending of the Old Covenant, the fall of Jerusalem in AD 70, would you say that there are some big worldviews, just demonic, horrible worldviews that really have been laid to rest that aren't going to resurrect and come back and we have to learn that lesson again?

00:53:39.720 Are we progressing?

00:53:40.560 well uh you know again i think when you think about you got the majority of christians send

00:53:50.320 their children to government schools right what what do you what do you expect i mean be like oh

00:53:55.900 let's let's send our children to the roman schools or let's send our children to you know you know

00:54:01.560 daniel and his three friends they were captives they they had to be there and adults as an example

00:54:08.800 And I know there are some schools that are better than others and so forth and so on, but there is no school out there. There's no public school out there that's teaching biblical world and life view Christianity. And there are lots of Christian schools that aren't teaching biblical world and life view Christianity.

00:54:24.240 so there just needs to be a and i don't know i don't know if it's going to be come by way we

00:54:30.540 got we finally get we kicked get kicked in the head and we gary north has this this uh analogy

00:54:37.520 that ray sutton said that there are there are all these medicines in the medicine cabinet and for

00:54:43.360 every every time there's an illness they go and they pick one of these remedies and it doesn't

00:54:49.120 work and the next time they get ill they pick another it doesn't work they pick another and

00:54:53.940 it doesn't work. And finally, the last one in there is a Christian worldview, because they've

00:55:02.060 exhausted all the other ones. Now, I don't, you know, I don't want that, you know, to be, 0.99

00:55:09.180 it doesn't have to be that way. I'm beginning to see a lot of change out there. There are lots of

00:55:14.900 Christians out there who are catching on to this. I mean, when I was in, you know, I was a Christian,

00:55:19.940 No one was talking, I mean, Francis Schaeffer was talking Christian worldview, but his was more of a kind of a philosophical, historical dynamic of that worldview.

00:55:37.800 But, you know, you could have talked to a lot of Christians today, they have no idea who Francis Schaeffer is.

00:55:44.020 They just don't, because I think one of the reasons is that Francis Schaeffer didn't offer an alternative.

00:55:52.220 He didn't offer specifics about here's what we need to do.

00:55:55.560 He was premillennial, so his eschatology held him back.

00:56:00.520 He was somewhat Vantilian in his view. 0.79

00:56:03.360 That's why he mentions presuppositions and so forth.

00:56:06.740 But he just couldn't.

00:56:08.100 And his son apostatized.

00:56:09.740 his sons. I mean, he's just going way, way off at the deep end, Frank Schaefer, Frankie Schaefer.

00:56:15.480 So, but things we didn't have, we didn't have, we have very few Christian defense foundations out

00:56:22.260 there. You got Liberty Council, you have Alliance Defending Freedom, there are about six of them

00:56:26.520 out there that are defending Christians in court, winning lots of cases. Christian school movement

00:56:33.180 is growing, it's been, and it's been because of COVID, it's growing even more. COVID helped, yeah.

00:56:37.620 There's a lot of good curriculum out there on this, podcasts like yours, podcasts like mine, what Jeff Durbin and those guys are doing, cross-politic guys and what they're doing.

00:56:49.580 There's good discussion on Facebook on all of these different topics.

00:56:55.040 I mean, somebody posts something, and I'll see these comments, and I think, wow, I have no idea who this guy is, but this guy's right on the money.

00:57:03.800 and my wife and I went to a it's called a pregnancy center it's north north of here in

00:57:10.700 Jasper Georgia and a good friend of ours runs it and not only does it talk about abortion but

00:57:15.840 it's it's just not it's not a it's not just a negative approach like don't get an abortion

00:57:20.980 it's we will help you with your child you decide to keep your child we will help you they have

00:57:27.840 a place for them to come in with clothes they can take take courses they work with them and

00:57:33.560 so forth and so on and it was their last banquet my wife and I were sitting down and there was this

00:57:39.720 young couple and I forgot what they asked me what I did and I told them what I did and they said oh

00:57:44.600 I we we really like uh we like George Grant and Greg Bonson now they didn't know who I was

00:57:51.600 and I didn't know who they were but they knew George Grant and and and Greg Bonson uh I'm

00:57:59.260 thinking, where did they find out about this? So it's going to take time. There's a new day.

00:58:08.740 Eschatology is big right now. Amillennialists, historicists, amillennialists, and premillennialists

00:58:15.480 don't have any real answers. They're still debating their position against preterists

00:58:22.100 who essentially wiped the floor with their exegesis. 0.62

00:58:28.220 I mean, somebody sent a video of a guy who used to be a Christian,

00:58:33.060 and one of the reasons he left Christianity was he said,

00:58:36.520 oh, Jesus predicted that the end, that the world was going to end.

00:58:40.600 This generation will not pass like that.

00:58:42.140 And I'm thinking, this is a seemingly intelligent guy.

00:58:46.700 He doesn't have a clue.

00:58:48.140 When, when Doug Wilson debated Christopher Hitchens, Christopher Hitchens brought up Matthew 24. And in, I don't know, 90 seconds, Doug Wilson shut him down. And so there, when, when I started in this, in this, when I used to do radio shows, oh, the attacks I got, which didn't, didn't bother me.

00:59:08.980 now if i do a radio show you know 80 of the people say yeah gary i believe the way you do i did this

00:59:14.980 study on my own or i read your book and so forth there's been a whole there's been a sea change of

00:59:19.580 this the guy on gab i don't know if you if you're on gab at all no uh but this guy which is kind of

00:59:26.640 an alternative to youtube or twitter i think it's yeah i'm very familiar with gab i'm not on it but

00:59:32.260 Yeah. Yeah. He loves David Chilton. He pushed my book, Wars and Rumors of Wars, gave us a $500 credit to advertise on Gab.

00:59:43.100 Wow. So there's a lot going on out there that we just don't, a lot of us don't know about.

00:59:48.960 The Internet's made it possible to, I can, you know, send PDFs all around the world. I don't have to, you know, a lot of people can't buy books because it's too expensive.

00:59:58.240 of tramp people are translating stuff all the time uh so we are just at the we're just at the 0.88

01:00:05.580 beginning i think of a of a paradigm shift and christians who don't get on the train are going

01:00:13.540 to be their their view is going to be left behind which is okay by me left behind but um yeah their

01:00:20.740 view will truly be left behind um yeah no i i agree i've you know it just in the last 10 years

01:00:26.880 or so I it does seem like there's just a major shift that people are thinking differently people

01:00:31.720 want to apply their theology people want to see Christian schools Christian government Christian

01:00:38.180 this Christian that and people want to fight and I think I don't know in God's providence I think 0.90

01:00:43.400 that's sometimes what it takes I think we just we had just a I don't know a bunch of spoiled 0.99

01:00:47.700 children it seems like we just had like like the some generation I don't know what generation but

01:00:52.620 some generation the sin of eli we just had these these spoiled sons that just were lethargic because

01:00:58.700 they had all these provisions that america oh yeah gave to us you know and now all of a sudden

01:01:04.700 like coven made a bunch of people think right we you know doug wilson said like this we all had to

01:01:08.960 learn in you know 15 minutes what we should have been studying over the past 15 years you know

01:01:12.640 about god and government and all this you know and but it made a lot of guys myself included like oh

01:01:17.540 my goodness i don't have i don't have a a christian worldview that encompasses these kinds of

01:01:23.880 situations and it was all ethereal and all theoretical you know and not a big deal until

01:01:28.240 the last couple years especially now everyone's like yeah i want to think about um what vaccine

01:01:34.520 i get i want to think about who i vote for i want to think about this think about that and you know

01:01:39.000 and so now everybody is like the bible actually does have an answer to these things and the guys

01:01:44.640 who still want to insist because some guys they are going to get left behind because they refuse

01:01:48.780 to budge but the guys who still want to insist that this you know pietism this you know privatized

01:01:54.380 lordship of christ he's not lord of all he's just lord of your your sweet little heart and it's you

01:01:59.300 know and it's private and you know he's going to return soon and he doesn't really christ doesn't

01:02:03.640 really have any desire to get involved in worldly affairs um i really do think like that that brand

01:02:09.420 of Christianity is is quickly becoming obsolete people just not interested there are there have

01:02:15.420 always been gatekeepers these uh you know seminaries are gatekeepers uh you can't you

01:02:21.780 can't minister unless you've uh you've gone to you know you've gone you've gone to seminary and

01:02:27.040 uh and there there really aren't that many gatekeepers anymore right if you want to know

01:02:33.140 something today, you can go online and find an answer to it or find a group that years ago you

01:02:44.180 couldn't do. Look, when I was in high school, I graduated from high school in 1968. I never,

01:02:51.040 never heard the gospel. No one ever talked about any of that. When Jimmy Carter ran for president

01:02:59.380 and he used the phrase born again, the media didn't have any idea what the word, what that

01:03:04.740 meant. Billy Graham had to write a book called How to Be Born Again, in order to try to explain

01:03:11.980 all this stuff. So we are so far behind, and we capitulated, look, public schools when I was

01:03:21.140 growing up, they were okay at prayer, and they had, you know, a Bible verse, you know, here and there,

01:03:26.300 but nothing was taught from a biblical worldview but a lot of i remember sitting down with a high

01:03:30.780 school friend i hadn't seen in i don't know 40 years back went back to pittsburgh and and uh i

01:03:37.040 told him we gave him my testimony said okay we were all christians back then we were all we were

01:03:41.420 all christians that's because you went to church although two doors down there was a jewish fellow

01:03:46.680 who you know we forgot about him but his his worldview was our worldview had the same moral

01:03:53.600 you know everybody in the neighborhood pretty much believed in the same way and for the most

01:03:59.800 part raised their kids in the same way because there was a spillover effect there was kind of a

01:04:05.580 christian civil religion that still existed but that that changed that changed rapidly

01:04:13.360 changed rapidly world war ii changed the moral center uh of of the united states it changed

01:04:23.760 everything we didn't see it right away but it it did um can you explain that a little bit

01:04:30.660 yeah flesh that out world war ii well here you know here we fight fight world war one it didn't

01:04:37.940 last time before we're fighting World War II again, and what people saw, what people saw over

01:04:43.280 there, these soldiers came back. My father was in the, he was in World War II, he was at

01:04:47.640 Pearl Harbor when it was, it was bombed. He was in the, in the Pacific in World War II. He was in

01:04:54.460 the Korean War, his right leg blown off in the Korean War, and these men came back, and they saw

01:05:01.880 horror, and the question was, where was God in all this? Same thing happened in Europe, where the

01:05:07.560 Jews, you know, six million Jews killed. Where was God in all this? People began to question the very

01:05:13.320 core of their existence by what they had seen and what they had experienced, and it was slow. 0.61

01:05:19.640 There was still the Christian remnant there a bit, but people began to, I think, move on with

01:05:25.380 their lives because they had lost the moral center of things, and the Christian churches were weak.

01:05:32.400 they didn't talk about these things i mean billy graham you know billy graham because out in the

01:05:36.920 1950s and uh and there was fulton fulton j sheen it was roman catholic who was who was on tv but

01:05:45.020 they weren't really dealing with the you know with the issues of the day in a transformational

01:05:52.320 way we were sending all our kids to public schools we just thought they were great you

01:05:56.360 know we were growing up you know we played football cheerleading da da da da all that kind

01:06:00.800 of thing. And secularism creeped up on us to the point where it grabbed a hold of us. And then,

01:06:08.660 of course, pastors weren't preaching the whole counsel of God. And so politically, what happened

01:06:14.320 was that, you know, there wasn't that much of a difference between the Democrats and the

01:06:17.320 Republicans. A Democrat, a Kennedy Democrat would be considered a fairly conservative Republican

01:06:25.600 today the republicans today are are almost worthless uh in the in you know christian

01:06:33.860 christians give up you know or they not when 1980 we won the election in 1984 christians just thought

01:06:40.380 boy we just changed the world well we didn't we just won a couple of wars and then it was like

01:06:45.400 it's they they gave up they just went right back to where they were before it's like 9-11

01:06:49.860 all that happened and you know it's it's amazing how we've we've forgotten you know we didn't see

01:06:59.200 that as as maybe a warning from god that we better get our better get our act together with all of

01:07:05.300 this so god has given us enough warnings here uh i hope it's i hope more and more christians take

01:07:11.620 heed maybe they are maybe they're getting a little more fed up uh maybe they need to understand

01:07:17.040 And that government, we just don't switch sides and we take the same money that they're taking and spend it for our pet projects.

01:07:25.660 So a lot of teaching has to take place.

01:07:27.680 And unfortunately, a lot of pastors aren't prepared for it.

01:07:31.080 I completely agree.

01:07:32.440 It seems like each generation always has to learn why.

01:07:35.720 You know, you can pass down the what.

01:07:37.320 This is what we do, you know, but they need to learn the why.

01:07:39.800 They need to have the worldview.

01:07:40.840 They can't just hang certain virtues in midair.

01:07:43.260 There has to be a foundation for that, understanding the underpinnings.

01:07:47.660 And it seems like, I don't know, one generation, I forget who said this,

01:07:52.920 it might have been D.A. Carson back in the day,

01:07:54.560 but one generation believes the gospel and the next generation assumes the gospel.

01:07:58.800 The next generation neglects the gospel and the next generation rejects the gospel.

01:08:04.600 And I think that illustration can apply beyond just the gospel.

01:08:09.320 But for me, you know, I can't look back at Reagan and I can't, you know, that's, I'm just not, I wasn't, providentially wasn't born at that time.

01:08:16.120 But what I can see, you know, I was a part of Acts 29 network for a while and then left and wanted to be confessionally reformed.

01:08:22.460 I kind of got, you know, I got sick of Acts 29 for a number of reasons.

01:08:25.240 But the biggest one was Acts 29, in my assessment, just always wanted to be cool.

01:08:29.460 They wanted to be cool in one way with Driscoll.

01:08:31.500 And then they said, hey, you know, we repent of wanting to be cool and we don't want to be cool anymore.

01:08:35.460 but really they just tried to start that that just driscoll that thing wasn't cool in the

01:08:41.080 culture's eyes anymore so it's not that they they actually repented of the approval of man and the

01:08:45.700 desire to be cool they just they recognized that society was condemning driscoll driscoll was cool

01:08:51.360 for a while he was cool in seattle and but then when that started being condemned as chauvinistic

01:08:55.980 and all those kind of things uh then all of a sudden you know with greater and greater emphasis

01:09:00.840 on uh feminism and all these then it was like oh yeah holiness and gentleness and you know these

01:09:07.040 kind and you know but then quickly out of that came racial reconciliation racial and i remember

01:09:12.180 like six years in a row every conference that you know racial reconciliation racial and they'd have

01:09:15.860 a panel you know and everybody get up there and and it was all anecdotal uh anecdotal you know

01:09:20.600 and just stories of being pulled over by a police officer and mistreated these kinds of things and

01:09:25.820 so eventually you know i i was like you know i didn't even have the language for it at the time

01:09:29.380 I didn't know about critical race theory.

01:09:30.840 I didn't know, you know, any of these things.

01:09:32.140 But I was like, I'm just, I'm tired of, like, how many times do I have to repent of a sin

01:09:36.420 that I'm not even aware that I'm committing, you know, the sin of corporate racism.

01:09:41.200 See, that's your problem.

01:09:42.680 See, you're not aware of it, so it makes you racist by definition.

01:09:48.340 It's all mixed up in this. 0.84

01:09:50.160 But see, what ends up happening is what Christians don't, a lot of these guys who have these 0.80

01:09:56.440 ministries and so forth, they don't like the particulars. They don't want to have to make the 0.87

01:10:05.840 hard choices. They don't want to have to tell people, you know, you don't, why are you sending

01:10:10.720 your children to new government schools? Why are you doing that? Well, we, you know, our school's

01:10:17.320 different. And I remember talking to some Christian leader, this was a number of years ago, and he

01:10:21.820 He said, well, our school's different.

01:10:23.740 And I said, Tim, do you know that the other people are saying that about their schools?

01:10:29.540 Their schools are different, but you're saying their schools are terrible, and they're saying your schools are terrible.

01:10:34.880 He eventually, you know, changed.

01:10:36.580 He said, I don't know because of what I said, but look what's happened to, you know, government schools.

01:10:43.300 Right.

01:10:43.740 I mean, they think we took prayer and Bible reading out of the schools in the 1960s, 1962 and 63.

01:10:51.820 We took that out, and that's what changed.

01:10:53.520 Now, it changed a long time before that.

01:10:56.500 If you're just sprinkling a little bit of pixie dust Bible stuff in the school, and you're not teaching everything from a Christian perspective, you're not teaching a Christian worldview. 0.92

01:11:08.340 And you're turning your children over to the people who are trying to destroy you. 0.91

01:11:12.280 Right. No, you're absolutely right.

01:11:13.120 We have a lot of Christians who don't have a Christian worldview.

01:11:15.480 and then all of a sudden

01:11:17.240 as secularism took over

01:11:19.560 then the world just started calling it

01:11:21.220 started calling a spade a spade

01:11:22.940 so it's like you know

01:11:24.220 secularism had already gotten its fangs in

01:11:27.040 and the actual 0.98

01:11:28.960 meat of Christianity and the Christian

01:11:31.180 worldview was

01:11:32.980 moved out

01:11:35.080 but then there's still the remnants of 1.00

01:11:37.000 the Christian pixie dust like you're saying

01:11:39.560 to allow 1.00

01:11:41.260 to sedate the Christians 0.95

01:11:43.260 to let the actual meat of it 0.68

01:11:45.220 the actual worldview get taken, the teeth of Christianity get taken.

01:11:48.940 But here's some pixie dust.

01:11:50.200 So we're not actually really taking this thing and say, oh, okay, well, yeah,

01:11:52.740 they prayed before the football game.

01:11:54.120 You know, oh, okay, it's not that.

01:11:55.400 That's a victory.

01:11:56.480 Right, exactly.

01:11:57.480 And then.

01:11:57.840 We have a moment of silence.

01:11:59.380 And then.

01:11:59.780 They give us a moment of silence.

01:12:01.320 Right, exactly.

01:12:02.120 A moment of silence.

01:12:02.440 Yeah.

01:12:02.560 A victory.

01:12:03.160 But then once it's all gone, then eventually, you know,

01:12:06.480 you don't do the pixie dust anymore because you don't have to.

01:12:08.800 You can just call it what it is.

01:12:09.940 Yeah, this is a public school. 0.67

01:12:12.160 What makes you think it's Christian?

01:12:13.280 Whoever would have thought that Eastern Europe is more Christian than the United States, the fact that Eastern Europe would come out of communism, I mean, Hungary, the president of, I don't know if he's prime minister or president of Hungary, is a staunch reformed Christian.

01:12:33.180 and you're beginning to see the eastern europe eastern europe who you know they've learned

01:12:40.620 they've learned about the past and they don't want to go back there right you've got sub-saharan

01:12:46.240 africa where the gospel is spreading and we think america is kind of the the bread basket of

01:12:52.000 evangelicalism but no in central south america now it's the types of the types of christianity

01:12:59.040 that are going on down there are pretty weak.

01:13:01.600 But there are people down there trying to transform it.

01:13:03.640 I have a good friend in Guatemala that's trying to transform it.

01:13:06.420 I've got someone in Chile that's trying to transform it as well.

01:13:11.520 All over the world, these types of little things are being raised up. 1.00

01:13:18.600 And you've got Eastern Europe countries resisting the flow of Muslims 1.00

01:13:24.060 into their country. 0.91

01:13:25.440 right in union is you're trying to punish them for that but this you know he's you know they're

01:13:31.600 not giving they're not giving up so yep so anyway hey i've got to it's it's yeah no that's fine

01:13:36.760 yeah let's let's go ahead and wrap it up um okay the last thing i was going to say just with the

01:13:42.400 actually nine thing is you know it became it was cool here and then it was cool here but

01:13:46.260 my point is you know going into the woke thing my point is just whether it be timothy keller

01:13:50.640 whether it be x19 or a lot of guys it just became um gospel gospel gospel centrality right that's

01:13:56.760 what i always you know is you got to be gospel center gospel center anything outside of that

01:14:00.560 is peripheral you're wasting your time but then what i noticed is you know you anytime i talk

01:14:05.520 about something that's conservative you say no no just focus on the gospel but then anything left

01:14:10.720 left leaning right engaging like you are engaging the culture and pushing for things in the culture

01:14:15.240 to happen they're just all leftist ideas so you're allowed to do that while being gospel centered

01:14:19.220 But if you do anything conservative, then you're not being gospel-centered.

01:14:22.980 So I think that was a big thing, too.

01:14:24.660 But any last words?

01:14:27.180 Or if nothing else, just let our listeners know how they can follow you.

01:14:30.660 Well, they can go to AmericanVision.org.

01:14:33.820 And the podcasts are there.

01:14:35.280 There are articles, books.

01:14:38.020 We have a good, good selection of books on apologetics, America's Christian History,

01:14:43.580 eschatology, and a whole bunch of other projects as well that we're working on.

01:14:48.460 Of course, I'm on Facebook.

01:14:52.560 So, you know, look, people shouldn't be discouraged.

01:14:57.440 People shouldn't be overwhelmed with what's to do.

01:15:01.060 You know, I talk about circles of responsibility.

01:15:04.980 You are responsible for yourself first.

01:15:09.140 You're married, you know, children, their families, you know, second.

01:15:13.860 You have friendships next.

01:15:15.160 You have your job after that.

01:15:16.780 You've got, you know, the circles just keep going out.

01:15:21.520 And so these are, you know, the priorities within those circles.

01:15:24.920 You keep, you know, do what is called responsibility within those.

01:15:30.940 Don't bite off more than you can chew.

01:15:32.900 You know, take on something.

01:15:34.060 Don't feel guilty if you're not changing the world within a week.

01:15:37.300 Right.

01:15:37.660 It just takes, you know, it takes time.

01:15:39.820 You know, fix your own, you know, judgment begins with the house of God.

01:15:43.420 Judgment begins with us first, but we should be doing transformative in the way that we can.

01:15:49.780 Support ministries that are doing some of this work and maybe encourage your pastor to address some of these topics.

01:15:59.360 You might have to do some research for him on that.

01:16:01.800 You've got to remember, a lot of pastors, they have a mortgage on the church.

01:16:06.500 They start preaching on some controversial topics.

01:16:10.140 They may lose a third of their congregation.

01:16:12.280 They don't want to do that.

01:16:13.220 There's lots of reasons why they won't preach on these topics.

01:16:16.340 So there's an elder whose daughter got an abortion.

01:16:19.960 So there's just, you know, there are people on maybe some form of welfare.

01:16:24.060 You can't talk about economics that much.

01:16:26.740 Right.

01:16:26.880 A lot going on that has to, you know, that has to change.

01:16:30.200 Yep.

01:16:30.520 You're right.

01:16:31.560 You're right.

01:16:31.960 Well, thanks for coming on the show, Gary.

01:16:33.600 We really appreciate it.

01:16:35.060 All right.

01:16:35.380 Thank you.

01:16:36.020 Thanks so much for listening.

01:16:36.900 But real quick, before you go, do us a small favor, take a moment, and leave us a five-star

01:16:42.400 review if you enjoyed the show. This is undoubtedly the best way that you can help us get this

01:16:48.220 biblically faithful content to as many people as possible. Thanks so much.

The NXR Podcast - March 08, 2022

THEOLOGY APPLIED - Postmillennialism ｜ Rejecting Dispensationalism

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