The NXR Podcast - THEOLOGY APPLIED - The Gospel Coalition & Westminster Seminary CA： Two Ways To Get Politics Wrong

00:00:00.000 Hi, this is Pastor Joel with Right Response Ministries, and you're listening to another

00:00:03.580 episode of Theology Applied.

00:00:05.880 And this episode I was privileged to have as a special guest, Dr. Joseph Boot.

00:00:10.440 He is the founder and president of the Ezra Institute in Toronto, just outside of Toronto,

00:00:15.680 Canada.

00:00:16.300 And our conversation was incredibly helpful.

00:00:18.900 We talked about the kingdom of God, the distinction between the kingdom of God and the church,

00:00:23.580 the distinction between the mission of the church and the mission of individual Christians.

00:00:28.540 we talked about all of Christ for all of life, the inerrancy of scripture versus the sufficiency

00:00:33.200 of scripture. And we got into two primary ways that the church can air today, that we can be

00:00:39.460 embrace this two kingdom theology that we would see with Escondido, Westminster, guys like Michael

00:00:44.860 Horton, but also on the other hand, we can embrace a statism, this neo-Kyperian kind of idea that is

00:00:53.400 not what the scripture advocates for that we've seen expressed by the Gospel Coalition and guys

00:00:58.640 like Tim Keller. So how do we avoid Michael Horton on the one hand and Tim Keller on the other is

00:01:03.080 kind of what the conversation was about. And so I think you'll find it very helpful. Real quick,

00:01:07.780 before we get started, I've got some exciting news to announce. I've got A.D. Robles and John

00:01:13.680 Harris from Conversations That Matter coming out for a whole weekend in the month of March to join

00:01:19.840 up on a Friday, we're going to come in our studio right here and all three of us are going to record

00:01:25.680 a multiple part series on some of the subject matter that you guys have requested that the

00:01:31.500 three of us address through our YouTube comments. Some of you have emailed, we're taking that into

00:01:36.060 consideration as well, but we're definitely looking at the YouTube comments. We've asked

00:01:40.300 you guys, hey, what are topics you want us to address? And so the three of us are going to

00:01:44.600 record for several hours, a multiple-part series in our studio right here in the great state of

00:01:50.000 Texas in March, and we're going to be releasing that content over the coming weeks. Now, here's

00:01:55.060 the other thing. That's on the Friday that they're going to be in town, but on the Saturday, we're

00:01:59.380 going to hold a one-day conference. Now, that's going to be March 12th, Saturday, March 12th.

00:02:05.740 It's going to be a one-day conference where AD is going to do a session on practical, obedient

00:02:11.520 defiance, how to resist civil tyranny, how to resist medical tyranny, and how to do this in

00:02:16.680 practical on the ground ways as households, as head of households, husbands, fathers, how do we

00:02:23.200 resist as a family against the cancel culture and the tyranny and persecution that's coming to

00:02:29.720 America? That's going to be AD session. I'm going to do a session called debunking the boogeyman of

00:02:35.760 Christian nationalism. I'm going to kind of reveal the fallacies of the gospel coalition and all 1.00

00:02:40.780 these kinds of things. Oh, Christian nationalists, the greatest threat to America. I'm going to show 1.00

00:02:44.800 why that's not biblical and how that's not actually happening. And the irony that if anything,

00:02:50.020 Russell Moore, he's the type who is actually the Christian nationalist in a negative sense.

00:02:54.940 And then John Harris is going to do a session on social justice versus biblical justice. Again,

00:03:00.160 that's social justice and how it's completely opposed, completely opposite to biblical justice.

00:03:07.080 And lastly, the three of us are gonna come up all together

00:03:09.780 and spend a whole hour doing Q&A.

00:03:12.200 We're gonna take live questions from the audience

00:03:14.780 and address those questions.

00:03:17.000 It's gonna be a great time.

00:03:18.180 You'll get to meet John Harris.

00:03:19.320 You'll get to meet A.D. Robles.

00:03:20.560 You'll get to meet myself.

00:03:21.700 So if you're anywhere in the area, in Williamson County,

00:03:24.880 or if you're in Austin, Texas,

00:03:26.660 or you're north of Williamson County,

00:03:28.520 or to the west or to the east,

00:03:29.860 and you wanna come out and join us

00:03:31.240 for that one-day conference, Saturday, March 12th,

00:03:35.220 come on out.

00:03:35.780 It's free registration.

00:03:37.800 We're gonna have some refreshments free.

00:03:39.560 Everything's free.

00:03:40.580 So we're paying out of pocket as a ministry

00:03:42.520 to make this happen.

00:03:43.780 We're covering the cost to fly out John and AD

00:03:46.040 to put them up in a hotel

00:03:47.360 so you don't have to pay a dime to show up and attend this.

00:03:51.160 However, for anybody who wants to be generous

00:03:53.760 and help us offset these costs,

00:03:56.140 you can do so donating towards this conference

00:03:58.560 by simply going to rightresponseministries.com

00:04:01.980 slash donate.

00:04:02.980 Again, that's rightresponseministries.com slash donate.

00:04:07.040 Now to find the address, physical location for the conference and exact times for each of the sessions for that Saturday, March 12th,

00:04:14.580 again, go to our website, rightresponseministries.com, click on the menu button at the top and scroll down and you'll find conference.

00:04:22.740 Click on conference. You'll find all the details that you need.

00:04:25.720 And one of the details there that we need is, although registration is free, there's

00:04:30.720 a form at the bottom that says RSVP.

00:04:33.720 We would really appreciate if you could let us know whether or not you're coming and how

00:04:38.940 many people you plan on bringing with you, right?

00:04:41.160 If you've got 10 kids, God bless you for having 10 kids, but we would like to know that you're

00:04:45.580 bringing yourself, your wife, and your 10 kids.

00:04:48.140 Please come, but please let us know so that we can adequately prepare for this.

00:04:52.720 The last thing that I'll say is that that Sunday, which would be March 13th, for anybody who wants to join our church, Covenant Bible Church, John Harris will stay in town.

00:05:03.160 He's going to linger and he's going to preach that Sunday morning at our Lord's Day worship service.

00:05:07.580 That's 9.30 a.m. on Sunday, March 13th at my church that I pastor.

00:05:13.560 Again, that's Covenant Bible Church.

00:05:15.340 We're in Georgetown, Texas.

00:05:17.060 That's the Williamson County area.

00:05:18.760 So if you're in Williamson County or you're in North Austin or you're somewhere nearby and you don't have a church home, if you've got a church home, go there.

00:05:26.600 But if you don't have a church home, you're looking for a church that has courage, that has biblical fidelity, and you want to hear John Harris preach a dynamite sermon from the word of God, then come and join us again Sunday, March 13th.

00:05:39.340 You can find details or directions to join our church that Sunday morning at covenantbible.org.

00:05:46.660 Our website for Covenant Bible Church is covenantbible.org.

00:05:51.500 Without further ado, let's go ahead and jump into our episode.

00:05:55.200 Applying God's word to every aspect of life.

00:05:58.380 This is Theology Applied.

00:06:05.260 Hi, this is Pastor Joel with Right Response.

00:06:07.540 We're diving into another episode of Theology Applied,

00:06:10.120 and I am very privileged to have as a special guest, Dr. Joseph Boot.

00:06:14.280 he is in canada i believe toronto is that correct dr boot just outside of toronto yeah just outside

00:06:20.300 of toronto you are the i believe both founder and president of the ezra institute is that correct

00:06:25.560 that's correct so founder and president of the ezra institute and you've got teaching fellows

00:06:30.460 with the ezra institute that some of our listeners would probably recognize guys like dr james white

00:06:35.680 is jeff durbin is he one of the teaching fellows he is yeah i i think jeff was added uh last year

00:06:42.660 great what what about uh doug wilson in moscow idaho uh we don't have doug yet um uh we uh we

00:06:51.400 haven't uh actually approached doug about that but it's certainly on our minds great yeah a lot of

00:06:57.400 our listeners and myself personally have benefited um greatly from from him from apology you guys

00:07:03.720 yeah go ahead we actually did have him we did have him lecturing uh at a couple of recent programs

00:07:09.100 here in canada we've had him up actually before and uh last year we had doug we were blessed to

00:07:14.580 have doug remotely lecturing to our students so great great we're it's a good it's a great

00:07:19.360 connection so go ahead yeah i totally agree so go ahead and explain for our listeners just a little

00:07:24.080 bit of the uh the mission of the ezra institute so the ezra institute was uh founded in 2009

00:07:31.500 so 13 years ago now and uh our purpose uh fundamentally well we are a we're a christian

00:07:39.500 world and life view think tank um and our concern is with christian philosophy and cultural

00:07:44.820 apologetics and how we apply the the biblical world and life view to every aspect of society

00:07:51.180 and culture uh so our our aim is to to be able to resort not just speak uh hopefully

00:07:58.680 prophetically really to culture I think that's what cultural apologetics actually is it's about

00:08:03.800 bringing the the fullness of the word of God to bear on the challenges that face Christians in

00:08:10.100 the context of creation so we seek to speak to the issues of our of our of our time from a

00:08:17.800 distinctly Christian perspective and then we try and resource Christians as well through

00:08:23.480 print and digital resources, as well as in-person short-term residential training programs in

00:08:31.720 biblical worldview and cultural apologetics. So that's what the Ezra Institute is about. And we

00:08:37.680 have a journal called Jubilee that's published tri-annually. We have a podcast for cultural

00:08:44.480 reformation and our fellows, you just mentioned some of them, are located in Europe, the United

00:08:50.720 States and Canada. We have 18 teaching fellows who are engaged with our programming. Praise God.

00:08:57.900 Yeah, we, you know, we were trying to do something similar. I would never, you know, say that we're

00:09:04.640 doing as robust of a job as you guys are, but that's kind of the vision for this podcast,

00:09:09.680 Theology Applied, that, you know, we don't want to just salute the inerrancy of scripture. We want

00:09:13.440 to hold to the sufficiency of scripture. And we want to hold for the sufficiency of scripture for

00:09:18.440 every realm of life from all spheres. And so we want to teach people to actually apply

00:09:24.720 their theology and not just have that privatized lordship. At some point, it seems like

00:09:29.860 in Western culture, Jesus went from being Lord of all to being Lord of our sweet little heart.

00:09:35.220 And we want Christ to be Lord of all. And he is Lord of all, whether we want it or not. But we

00:09:40.560 want people to embrace that as a wonderful thing and to practically begin to actually apply

00:09:46.200 theology to all of life, wield the sword, not just look at it and admire the sword from the mantle,

00:09:51.580 but actually wield the sword. So with that being said, one of the questions that I had for you,

00:09:56.640 I was telling you as we were getting started and right before we started recording, I just

00:10:00.560 listened twice. It was so good. And I wanted to make sure, you know, when you're listening to

00:10:04.660 something, you don't always retain quite as much as you do when you read. So I listened twice

00:10:08.240 to your short little book called For Mission. It seems like that's probably where a lot of those

00:10:14.880 principles are fleshed out further in your mission for God is what I'm assuming. And so I would

00:10:20.520 listen to that. It was fantastic. So one of the first questions that I had that you addressed in

00:10:24.200 that book sounds simple enough, but I think a lot of Christians, including myself, would have

00:10:29.060 difficulty answering this question. What is the kingdom of God? And to flesh that question out

00:10:34.780 just a little bit more, what's the difference between the kingdom of God and the church,

00:10:39.380 the church growing and the kingdom of God growing, or another way to put it, what's also the distinction

00:10:45.540 between the mission of the church and the mission of individual Christians? Your thoughts on that

00:10:51.200 from four mission was just so insightful. So could you explain that to our listeners?

00:10:56.900 Yeah, well, you've just drawn a very interesting point there just to begin with when you talk

00:11:03.620 about the difference between just affirming the infallibility of scripture and the the

00:11:09.780 sufficiency of scripture or what we might call the material authority of scripture so evangelicals

00:11:17.320 historically have been pretty good at talking about the infallibility of scripture or its

00:11:23.060 inerrancy and arguing in a certain sense in the abstract for that where we've I think fallen down

00:11:31.180 is in the area of the sufficiency or the material authority of scripture.

00:11:35.040 And so for mission, what I'm trying to do in there is identify the biblical understanding

00:11:42.060 of the kingdom of God and the role of the Christian and Christian in the context of

00:11:50.240 the family and their workplace and the specific calling and role of the church.

00:11:54.520 And I think this is where one of the key problems, one of the critical issues actually is found

00:11:59.840 now of confusion in the modern church the the um the biblical word for church in the bible is

00:12:07.400 ecclesia and it literally means as you know called out a called out people a called out

00:12:13.580 congregation uh and of course that calling is for a purpose um and i think you you mentioned there

00:12:22.540 you know how sometimes it's as though we've reduced the the christian life to what's going

00:12:28.000 on in our sweet little heart but actually just the very word ecclesia uh a called out people

00:12:33.820 um is is a church that is is a people a gathered people that are on mission so um ecclesia literally

00:12:41.780 means a called out congregation um but what are they called out in terms of what what what's the

00:12:48.060 what's the purpose of their calling how does their calling fit is the church an end in itself

00:12:52.740 And that's where we encounter the other word, basileia, which is the word for kingdom, which is so critically important, which, by the way, Jesus uses many, many more times than he ever does the word church.

00:13:08.540 And so perhaps a place to start would be to draw the important distinction between the kingdom of God and the church or even the body of Christ.

00:13:22.740 So first of all, let's just mention that even when we talk about church, church is used in a multiplicity of different ways.

00:13:32.400 Are we talking about the universal, invisible church of Christ?

00:13:40.940 Are we talking about the visible church of Christ in all of history?

00:13:45.100 Are we talking about the church as it exists today across the world in this moment in time?

00:13:53.600 Are we talking about the church as a local gathered congregation?

00:13:58.580 Or are we talking about the church in Texas or the church in Ontario?

00:14:03.620 So the way we use the word church even, certainly we're not simply talking about, are we talking about church as a building, that structure down the end of the street?

00:14:11.400 So the way in which the word church is used is often equivocal or ambiguous, and that often doesn't help us because it's important that we define church properly, or at least qualify the way in which we're talking about it.

00:14:27.140 But from certainly within the evangelical reform tradition, the church is an institute.

00:14:36.260 It's a it's a it's a it's a gathered people under certain offices or authorities.

00:14:42.140 So the church is a form of government and it has a particular role, has a particular calling, which historically has been understood,

00:14:51.860 certainly by the reformed churches following the reformation as the preaching of god's word

00:14:57.420 the administration of the sacraments and the exercise of church discipline and some would add

00:15:03.580 a certain amount of diaconal care responsibility and those are the uh the sort of three four

00:15:10.780 core marks of the church institute now um the fact that we can make a distinction between

00:15:18.780 the the church institute and the body of christ uh is actually important in the sense that uh

00:15:26.920 not every church institute because we have all kinds of apostate churches right can be called

00:15:33.600 parts of the body of christ uh so so the body of christ cannot be identified simplistically

00:15:40.660 with the church institute uh and neither can the church institute be identified

00:15:48.020 simplistically with the kingdom of God. And I think the big challenge we're facing is that

00:15:52.400 what the Bible understands by the kingdom of God is the rule and reign in particular of the Lord

00:16:01.100 Jesus Christ, who is king. And he is the king of a kingdom. He's sovereign over that kingdom. He

00:16:06.800 gives law within the context of his kingdom. And that kingdom is, biblically speaking, cosmic.

00:16:16.400 it's overall of creation everything is being brought into subjection that's what paul makes

00:16:21.500 clear in ephesians 1 in colossians 1 the book of hebrews makes crystal clear that all things are

00:16:26.580 being brought into subjection to king jesus first corinthians 15 uh and so the the in fact revelation

00:16:34.580 1 5 tells us that christ is the ruler of the kings of the earth present tense so the kingdom

00:16:41.140 of God is wherever Christ is ruling and reigning. And so we might say that oftentimes if you

00:16:47.920 compared, say, a faithful family, a faithful Christian family to a rebellious and apostate

00:16:56.300 church, well, that faithful Christian family is a more real and better expression of the kingdom of

00:17:02.640 God than that disobedient or apostate church. So the kingdom of God is wherever Christ is ruling

00:17:10.480 and reigning first in the individual of course in our families in our workplaces dare i say even in

00:17:16.680 the state uh where christ is ruling and reigning in the hearts of magistrates or politicians

00:17:21.860 there you see however imperfect an expression of the kingdom of god and of course we see the

00:17:27.280 kingdom of god expressed also in the church but it's there equally uh a imperfect expression

00:17:35.380 of the fullness of the meaning of the kingdom of god now we would acknowledge and we must

00:17:40.480 acknowledge biblically that the church has a peculiar and unique role in the unfolding of

00:17:44.980 the kingdom of god uh in so far as it's the place where christians are gathered to hear the word

00:17:51.140 and where uh authority is exercised a particular kind of ecclesiastical authority is exercised

00:17:57.520 around the lord's table um and so there is a there is a a specific calling and function

00:18:03.760 that the church has uh but could we say the church is more important than the family or

00:18:10.520 more important than the individual or more important than uh the the magistrate in the

00:18:17.280 kingdom of god i would say no we can't say that uh because the kingdom of god is is wherever

00:18:23.080 christ reigns and rules and so that's uh maybe that's probably the best place to start maybe i

00:18:31.060 come on in a moment to talk about the you know the difference between the individual calling and

00:18:34.700 the church's calling but that drawing that distinction between ecclesia and basilea and not

00:18:39.040 conflating them and collapsing them into one idea and i think the what i talk about in four mission

00:18:45.780 is the way in which whether unwittingly or by theological design uh many leaders want to

00:18:52.880 collapse the kingdom of god and the church as though they're identical and of course the

00:18:58.020 implication of that joel is that if if if the kingdom of god which is where christ is reigning

00:19:03.520 and ruling is limited to the church institute then there is only one place in all of culture

00:19:08.820 and creation where christ can actually reign right the church right i i usually use as a

00:19:15.520 illustration if you ever watched the lion king when you know simba he's up on pride rock early

00:19:20.320 in the morning with his father the king mufasa and he's looking at you know the lay of the land

00:19:24.820 and all the different areas where he will one day rule when he inherits the kingship, you know,

00:19:29.260 and everything the light touches is the iconic line that comes from his father Mufasa. That's

00:19:34.060 your, that's your territory. That's what you will rule. And he's, what about that dark shadow he

00:19:38.920 placed over there? And I feel like many evangelicals would say, well, that's politics or that's culture

00:19:43.900 or, you know, and there is no, for the Christian with a biblical worldview, there is no dark

00:19:49.940 shadowy place where Christ does not reign. He is reigning and ruling in all places. And so I,

00:19:54.720 I love that distinction that I've learned from a few individuals, but you uniquely, I

00:20:00.000 think have fleshed that out.

00:20:01.040 The distinction between the church and the kingdom of God, the church, it seems, correct

00:20:04.780 me if I'm wrong, but it seems as though the church only grows in one way, which is through

00:20:09.160 conversion and the church to the church has been given in terms of tools.

00:20:13.180 Each of these spheres of government, the family is also a government, the familial

00:20:16.580 government, this, this, this civil government, the ecclesiastical government of the church

00:20:21.420 and each have been given tools to the father has been given a rod to the churches have been given

00:20:26.760 a sword, but a sword of the spirit. It's persuasion, not coercion. The state has been given

00:20:31.600 a sword. Everything the state does, the reason why we want minimal state involvement. And for me,

00:20:37.240 a smaller government is because everything they do is at gunpoint. Eventually, if I resist,

00:20:42.120 eventually I'm going to find myself at the end of a gun. They've been given a ministry of coercion

00:20:46.880 And that's not wrong so long as they coerce in the jurisdiction that God has actually assigned to them and don't get outside of that.

00:20:54.420 And so the church only seems to grow in one way, which is through persuasion, the sword of the spirit, preaching, the sacraments, conversion, converting hearts. 0.94

00:21:01.760 But the kingdom of God seems to expand every time a just law is legislated, every time Christian art is made.

00:21:13.680 And kind of in the likeness of Luther, Christian art isn't because it has John 3, 16 on the 0.67

00:21:18.020 back of the painting, but the first imperative for the cobbler is that he makes good shoes,

00:21:23.340 not Christian's shoes.

00:21:24.960 And so it's hopeful.

00:21:26.180 And so in all these different ways, the kingdom of God is expanding, even if the numerical

00:21:31.620 growth of the church is not occurring at that exact moment.

00:21:36.840 But if individual Christians in the church, in their various fields and stations where

00:21:42.440 the Lord has sovereignly appointed them outside of the church, whether it be in the state, 0.66

00:21:45.980 in the marketplace, in homes, in schools, if they are living out in actually the sufficiency of

00:21:52.560 scripture, applying their theology in these various fields, then even without numerical

00:21:57.340 growth through conversion in the church, the kingdom of God can still be expanding. Would that

00:22:02.180 be a fair assessment? Yes, that's actually a really good summary. We're talking about

00:22:08.960 fundamentally the fact that the kingdom of God, I mean, the images that Jesus uses for it are

00:22:13.820 mustard seed, leaven in a loaf, starts seemingly imperceptibly small. And, you know, that's

00:22:22.140 actually the image also that we get in Daniel, where the uncut stone smashes the idol of pagan

00:22:31.240 state power and then grows to become a mountain filling the earth. That is the image of the rule

00:22:36.420 and reign of Christ. And we see in that great hymn of Philippians 2, the celebration of the

00:22:41.660 time when every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. So yes, the

00:22:48.440 body of Christ, and that's the individual believers, families, and so forth, applying

00:22:52.700 the reality of the truth of the gospel of the kingdom in every aspect of their lives

00:22:57.840 is what brings about through the work of the Holy Spirit. It's the way Christ brings about

00:23:03.980 the growth of his kingdom and that's why we're taught to pray uh thy kingdom come thy will be

00:23:10.640 done the location isn't it is interesting where on earth yeah as it is in heaven and um that you're

00:23:18.140 right that doesn't just happen through conversion now of course the body of christ is growing

00:23:23.840 through regeneration and it's as those regenerate believers apply the fullness of the word of god

00:23:30.240 that the kingdom of god is growing and i think the the the error that's made in part is that

00:23:36.860 you mentioned these these dark places you know we think oh oh that's a dark place over there's a

00:23:42.740 dark place over there that's culture that's politics that's law there's a dark places come

00:23:47.160 to the light of the church um and of course you're probably familiar with abraham kuyper's very very

00:23:52.640 famous statement you know there's not a square inch of the universe of which christ does not say

00:23:56.180 this is mine um what that really means though is that uh there is no creation we're told in genesis

00:24:04.520 is good it was made good it's very good and even though it's fallen paul says that that actually

00:24:11.480 the redemptive work of christ in romans 8 is bringing about the liberation actually of creation

00:24:17.660 from its bondage to corruption from his beings and the destiny of creation itself is tied to us

00:24:23.500 and the resurrection of our bodies.

00:24:25.320 That's how central our role is.

00:24:27.400 The sons of God being revealed.

00:24:29.340 The creation is, so even that is an interesting point.

00:24:32.640 So for several years, I pastored in San Diego

00:24:35.180 in California, and then I moved to Texas

00:24:37.060 fleeing really from the state of California.

00:24:41.340 And as my wife and I were having more children

00:24:44.180 and wanting to have a large family

00:24:45.460 and coming into some of these convictions,

00:24:47.260 we decided that it was best for us to relocate.

00:24:50.620 But while I was in San Diego,

00:24:52.100 I'm sure you're familiar with Westminster Escondido. And one of the theological distinctions

00:24:57.860 of that particular strain of Presbyterianism is just this very staunch two kingdom theology.

00:25:05.900 And so you have Druden, who's kind of held as the gold standard for two kingdom theology.

00:25:10.700 And so as you were parsing out the different ways in which the Bible uses the word church,

00:25:16.000 I think it's also helpful to parse out for Christians to be aware that the Bible also

00:25:21.120 uses another word in multiple ways, that word being world. When you think of Christians being

00:25:25.700 called out, what are they called out from? Well, they're called out from the world, 0.99

00:25:29.240 but the world in what way? In what sense are we using the word world? Because you're precisely

00:25:34.900 correct that the world as it pertains to the cosmos, the creation is not a curse. And I think

00:25:41.180 some Christians think the creation is a curse. No, it's under a curse. It's under a curse, which is

00:25:45.720 why in the expanse of the kingdom of God, as Christians push back against the curse that is

00:25:50.960 on creation, uh, we can have success. Um, and you know, we can, we can cure cancer by God's grace.

00:25:57.480 We can do, do certain things, but when, when societies and, and people created in the image,

00:26:02.960 God pushed back, not on the curse upon creation, but they push back against creation itself.

00:26:07.880 They start to fight nature, right? Well, that's like every horror sci-fi movie that's ever been

00:26:13.080 created, right? Jurassic park, nature finds a way that you're not going to win that battle,

00:26:17.020 No matter how much technology, no matter how many human advances there might be, when you push back against the curse on nature, by God's grace, he can grant success.

00:26:25.540 When you push back against nature itself, it's going to fail. 0.77

00:26:28.560 And so Christians have been called out of the world, but I think Christians sometimes demonize the world as it pertains to the cosmos, as it pertains to creation itself. 0.70

00:26:37.240 And so Juden and some of these guys, they, I mean, the only thing that they think will transfer into the new creation is our physical bodies, which they have to affirm that without going into full blown heresy, the, you know, the physical bodily resurrection, but everything else, they would look at that verse, you know, that creation itself, you know, with eager groans and expectations awaiting the sons of God being revealed precisely what you're getting to.

00:27:01.280 they would say that the creation is what it's really waiting for with the revelation of the

00:27:05.880 sons of God is a mercy killing from the Lord. The creation wants to give way, die, disintegrate,

00:27:11.820 the earth dissolving like snow, taking a very literal interpretation of that. And so in some

00:27:18.640 sense, they would never outright say this, but in some sense, it seems as though they've demonized

00:27:23.080 the world as it pertains to the cosmos, rather than the saying, no, Christians have been called

00:27:27.860 out, ecclesia called out of the world as it pertains to the world being defined as this,

00:27:33.000 this demonic system underneath Satan's rule that, that where he actually takes, right? Our battle

00:27:39.860 is not against flesh and blood, but there is a sense in which Satan, first Timothy says he takes

00:27:44.100 people captive to do his will. And we've been called out of that. We've been called out of this

00:27:49.360 system, but not called out of this creation, this cosmos, which I believe is not giving way to the

00:27:56.880 sons of God, but it's being restored right alongside the sons of God. Am I on the right

00:28:03.700 track with that? Yes, absolutely. Scripture does recognize two kingdoms, the kingdom of darkness

00:28:10.720 and the kingdom of light. That's it. And they are operative. That's the way of grace and the way of

00:28:17.540 rebellion. And they are operative in every domain of creation. So you cannot flee from one domain

00:28:24.600 of creation into another for safety this is what uh you were talking about with these dark corners

00:28:30.200 the thought that well if i you know politics is is uh you know or culture education these areas are

00:28:37.560 uh uh part of a a broken natural world and and therefore we need to you know flee the arts

00:28:45.560 flee politics flee law leave that to nature leave that to natural law to the way of decay we belong

00:28:53.480 in the realm of grace an upper story of reality and so you've got a notion there that you can flee

00:28:59.160 one domain of creation into another in order to have freedom or salvation or liberation

00:29:06.620 and of course that ends up as you've described it demonizing the world right um and the world

00:29:12.560 becomes in used in the term the sense that you used it that's why when i talked about creation

00:29:18.440 what what these uh these theologies do and i think it's a it's a it's a serious mistake

00:29:24.480 is they they're fundamentally dualistic so what they do is they drive a wedge between creation

00:29:30.480 and redemption there's a radical duality drawn between creation and redemption now i think from

00:29:37.260 a biblical perspective uh the the the i talked about the creation being good though marred and

00:29:44.540 that touches every aspect of our lives far as the curse is found you know the great the great the

00:29:50.040 great carol right where redemption is directed to wherever the curse is found that's every domain

00:29:55.400 of creation those post-mill christmas hymns huh perhaps they're they're a thorn in the flesh of

00:30:01.400 some um but uh the the the reality is is that god's creational laws and norms still hold

00:30:12.840 and he has not abandoned his creation and he's not abandoned his law for creation

00:30:18.260 and uh there there basically there are many structures within creation but there are only

00:30:24.400 two possible directions so there's the structure of family and church and state and the and culture

00:30:29.400 and business and economics and aesthetics and all these different structures that god has given

00:30:34.320 within the within the within the the goodness goodness of his creation law word and they are

00:30:40.720 are all being misdirected because of sin so all the good things that god has created these laws

00:30:46.900 and norms are misdirected now you can you know what we might call the what some scientists have

00:30:52.120 tried to call natural laws which is just god's ordinary way of working right uh cannot be

00:30:57.920 violated uh you know you you try and violate the law of gravity you're going to hit the ground

00:31:02.920 and that's that god's the norms that god's god has established for creation are juridical and

00:31:10.720 moral and and uh cultural norms and so forth these can be violated and that's what misdirects our

00:31:16.860 lives and so what is going on with redemption is the redirection and the reconciliation if you

00:31:23.640 think about all of the different words that the bible uses for the meaning of salvation and

00:31:28.980 redemption it's redemption regeneration restoration renewal and and so on it all presupposes that

00:31:40.420 something is lost something's broken and it's being recovered and restored not abandoned right

00:31:47.260 and that's i think the critical difference you're right in saying that some of the two kingdoms

00:31:51.140 advocates they really do um you you just about escape creation with your physical body because

00:31:58.280 Jesus did. And if you denied that, then you're into full-blown Gnosticism or some kind of

00:32:03.760 doceticism or whatever. But it's a failure to recognize the unity of creation and the fact

00:32:12.360 that creation and redemption stand in historical continuity. And it's the result of the importation

00:32:17.640 actually of Greek philosophical categories into the Christian faith and a nature-grace dualism,

00:32:24.920 a scholastic dualism it's like a double-decker bus is the way i often describe it you know a

00:32:29.820 two-story bus like the famous london red bus you need a story and a lower story and on the lower

00:32:36.580 story you've got you know law politics culture education all the aspects of culture if you will

00:32:43.880 that's the lower story that's the realm of nature that runs just in terms of basically natural law

00:32:50.480 um common uh common grace uh and then you have an upper story which is the really important stuff

00:32:59.360 and that's your personal salvation your personal devotional life your personal piety and the life

00:33:05.380 of the church that's the realm of grace and the best that the church can do as the kingdom

00:33:10.580 really uh is to sprinkle the pixie dust of the church on the lower story a bit

00:33:16.100 to make life a bit better but actually in this life you know it's very aristotelian it's it's

00:33:23.640 the state it's that realm of nature that brings you to the highest degree of moral perfection but

00:33:28.440 in order to reach salvation and to escape this world and to get out of it you need redemption

00:33:35.660 in jesus christ and that's why you'll find among some of those thinkers a tremendous opposition to

00:33:40.640 christian education a christian view of politics you know there'll be jokes like you know there's

00:33:45.120 no such thing as a as a as a christian stir fry or christian plumbing um those sorts of jibes um

00:33:52.880 you know because for them christianity is about this spiritual private upper story of existence

00:34:01.180 and all this other stuff that's just common uh to everyone so instead of seeing a unity a basic

00:34:09.000 unity of creation redemption and seeing the issue of structure and direction there are all these

00:34:14.380 created structures that believers and non-believers operate in together but there are two directions

00:34:19.640 redemption and apostasy belief and unbelief and that motive force is is put into action in every

00:34:31.640 single area of life there is no neutral sphere right the realm of nature is not some neutral

00:34:38.500 area where reason as far as it goes is all you need that's the right at the beginning you talked

00:34:45.380 about the sufficiency of scripture this the problem is that there's an attempt here to synthesize

00:34:50.840 greek philosophy with biblical christianity and it leads to a dualistic worldview

00:34:57.900 and that's where all of the i mean there are varieties of two kingdoms views you've mentioned

00:35:03.640 van drunen there's other nuanced ones i debated matthew tuninger a few years ago

00:35:08.480 um and uh there's uh michael horton as well right there's nuances and then of course you've got the

00:35:14.280 anabaptist so you've got a different forms of of radical two kingdoms views so it's important

00:35:20.100 sometimes in that discussion to say which one are they actually which exponent which version are we

00:35:25.420 actually dealing with but they all share that in common that they want to break up reality and

00:35:31.900 creation into parts one part for the world and nature and reason and one part for god right

00:35:38.720 that's that's so helpful and it sounds like part of what you're getting at and you you mentioned

00:35:41.960 this earlier is we do believe there are two kingdoms but the question is what is the distinction

00:35:47.480 between the two kingdoms what do they represent um and then also i love you know doug famously

00:35:52.260 said years ago when someone was asking him about two kingdom theology he said well i'm not really

00:35:56.940 concerned at how many kingdoms there are as much as i'm concerned how many kings there are you know

00:36:01.620 there's one king. But it sounds like what you're saying is that the two kingdom advocate is going

00:36:07.560 to draw the line between these two kingdoms in regards to the natural and the spiritual,

00:36:13.640 the common and the sacred, whereas scripture draws the line between simply light and dark.

00:36:20.540 So it's two kingdoms, light and dark. So the scripture draws the line, the distinction between

00:36:28.160 what is good and what is bad, what is moral and immoral, light and dark, true and false.

00:36:35.720 Whereas over here with the two kingdom advocate, they want to draw between parts. They want to

00:36:42.900 divide up human society and life, human life. They want to divide up sections rather than

00:36:50.380 goodness, inherent goodness, God's truth and falsehoods. They want to draw the distinction

00:36:56.960 between common things and sacred things,

00:37:00.040 natural things and spiritual things.

00:37:02.760 What they would say are temporal things

00:37:05.380 versus eternal things.

00:37:07.060 And even there, we would push back as well

00:37:09.240 and say, some of the things that you are saying

00:37:11.220 are temporal.

00:37:12.840 I don't believe the scripture actually

00:37:14.580 would be in your corner.

00:37:17.240 So would you agree with that?

00:37:18.820 It's not two kingdoms.

00:37:20.640 And then our position is that there aren't two kingdoms,

00:37:23.460 but it's how are we defining these two kingdoms?

00:37:26.960 Yes, the light and the darkness represent the two directions that we talked about. The distinction between the structure, they conflate structure and direction. They want to say that these structures themselves, they're done with, they are temporal, their creation itself, as we know it, belongs to a lesser or lower realm than the realm of grace and redemption.

00:37:53.660 and so instead of seeing a unity to the plan of redemption reconciliation for all of life in all

00:38:00.520 of creation that christ is reconciling to himself yes creation is broken up one way or another into

00:38:06.800 parts and history is broken up into a multiplicity of parts oftentimes as well so that some would say

00:38:12.880 there's sort of there's the redemptive kingdom and there's the common kingdom right um and so

00:38:18.260 various divisions are bought but you're you're right instead of recognizing there is structure

00:38:23.740 creational structure and there is direction light and darkness for christ against christ

00:38:28.780 faithful unfaithful um true false true false right and and that leads to other dichotomies as well

00:38:38.680 joel so it leads to your your matter spirit uh or you know the duality uh a radical law gospel

00:38:47.620 duality um a radical uh church state uh confusion and dual so rather than recognizing that the

00:38:57.580 totalizing principle in scripture is the kingdom of god rooted in the lord jesus christ uh there

00:39:05.100 there are attempts to find a part of creation that that is the it's a kind of reductionistic

00:39:11.760 process really you find a bit of creation that's most important and then you invest your energies

00:39:16.360 there rather than recognizing that all of creation is subject to christ is being reconciled uh to god

00:39:23.920 that's really good so that that kind of leads into a second question if we could not really

00:39:29.180 even shifting gears but just further fleshing this out so i'll just be um frank uh the gospel

00:39:34.560 coalition so i'm not a big fan um but the you know the gospel coalition some of our listeners

00:39:39.760 will be hearing what you're saying and i think they're going to have certain alarms going off

00:39:43.120 And I know that because if I was having this conversation with you, even just a couple of years ago, I would be a little bit wary because I, you know, so I was in Acts 29 for about four and a half years as a pastor with Acts 29.

00:39:56.340 I left with some of the, you know, woke church being written by Eric Mason and the direction that things were going.

00:40:02.000 It just felt like, man, these guys, it just seems like they're just water carriers for the political left.

00:40:06.560 And I don't really want to be about that.

00:40:09.180 Um, but, but what I initially did, this was maybe three, four years ago is I put the blame 0.97

00:40:15.660 on Kuyperianism. 0.99

00:40:17.260 Um, so I, I was like that the problem here is just too much involvement in the culture.

00:40:22.200 The problem here is, um, and, and so my point is there are listeners who, who, who might

00:40:27.660 be following right now and what they've done to try to, um, avoid involvement with, with

00:40:34.920 some of these very, well, just Marxist, bearing the name of Christ. And some of them may be true

00:40:45.980 brothers in Christ and they're just off in left field and Christ will grant repentance. And then

00:40:51.540 others may we find on the final day, we're actually false brothers and that's for the Lord

00:40:55.620 to decide. But I think there's so much concern right now in the church. And I think of John

00:41:01.060 MacArthur thank God for him and his ministry and his faithfulness over the years but I think a lot

00:41:06.140 of guys are going that direction and just saying you know what the easiest way to divide and make

00:41:10.640 things clear clear categories is just Christ not Caesar's head of the church whereas I know you

00:41:15.580 and I would both say amen and and also Christ not Caesar's head of the state and Christ not not the

00:41:21.980 father is head of the family Christ is the head of all things Ephesians I believe 122 Christ has

00:41:27.740 been appointed by God as head of all things to the benefit of the church. And that's not to say

00:41:32.660 Christ is the head of all institutions in the same way that he's head of the church. He's uniquely

00:41:37.320 the head of the church in the sense that he only has given his life up for his bride for the church,

00:41:43.420 but he is head insofar as that is a governmental rule and reign over all things to uniquely benefit

00:41:50.600 his church. And so anyway, my point is that, you know, there's a bad taste in my mouth with

00:41:56.000 the gospel coalition. There's a bad taste in my mouth with Acts 29. And some of these,

00:41:59.800 these Christian groups that have been involved in political matters, involved in cultural matters,

00:42:05.880 but always, always with a, with a left bent, a democratic, a bent towards neo-Marxism and,

00:42:15.740 and critical race theory and intersectionality and socialism, you know, and, and all these things.

00:42:20.860 And so I think a lot of people, the remedy, the solution has been embracing a two kingdom kind of doctrine.

00:42:28.420 And so one of the things that you've mentioned that was really helpful for me is saying that there are basically two ditches on either side of the road that the Christian can fall into. 0.81

00:42:37.980 One is the social justice ditch, which is seemingly Kuyperian, but it puts all its hope

00:42:45.980 and faith in the state, one sphere, to solve the problems, and it's just substituted social

00:42:51.640 justice for biblical justice.

00:42:52.760 So it's not even trying to apply in terms of the sufficiency of scripture.

00:42:56.860 They're all about sufficiency, but it's sufficiency of something else.

00:42:59.880 It's not the sufficiency of scripture.

00:43:01.180 I don't know what Bible they're reading, but it doesn't have the biblical principles

00:43:05.340 that, that, that the Bible actually contains. But then on the other side, if we're not careful in,

00:43:10.920 in, in trying to avoid that gospel coalition, Acts 29, um, these, these kinds of things, um,

00:43:19.220 there's the, the, the other ditch on the other side of the road, which is this, this, this

00:43:23.520 pietism of, you know, that Jesus is only Lord of my heart. Um, it's a, it's a privatized Lordship

00:43:30.040 of Christ. And so I guess what I'm asking is, um, cause I have even close friends who would

00:43:34.980 uh, put Kuyper in a very negative category. Um, and, but, but I, I'm looking at, and I'm saying

00:43:41.200 they got Kuyper wrong. These guys are not a good representation of Kuyper. So could you help us in,

00:43:46.080 we want to avoid, we've talked about the two kingdom thing, but we don't want to, we don't

00:43:50.500 want to, you know, the Ezra Institute to just be the gospel coalition 2.0. Um, so, so what,

00:43:55.740 what is this, what is this, you know, uh, safe path in between, uh, the, the privatized lordship

00:44:03.840 two-kingdom kind of idea versus this neo-Kyperianism putting all of our hope in the state

00:44:10.260 with social justice and intersectionality and very leftist, Marxist, socialistic principles.

00:44:17.040 Can you speak to that for a moment? Yeah. So, yes. First of all, and I think you have rightly

00:44:27.040 identified it, that's to get Kuyper wrong, to assume that he would be somehow, or Kuyper as he

00:44:37.680 understood his project in identifying a biblical principle of sphere sovereignty, was actually

00:44:43.020 identifying the very opposite of the two kingdoms mentality. The principle of sphere sovereignty

00:44:50.860 is that Christ is Lord and King over all things, over everything, and that he has established

00:44:56.860 various spheres of authority within creation and within human institutions, various spheres

00:45:04.680 and jurisdictions, which need to function in terms of God's word for them. And of course,

00:45:13.580 the primary reference there is to scripture itself. So we can all see that we wouldn't

00:45:18.900 govern our family as we would govern the state. It's not the guiding principle in the life of the

00:45:26.680 family is is the love relationship and of course that does involve discipline and so forth but

00:45:31.680 it's not the kind of uh you know if if fathers were executing their their uh their rebellious

00:45:37.860 children um in the home uh and that became known to the church that would be a problem

00:45:43.680 in the same way the the government of the family isn't identical to the government of the church

00:45:49.260 there are similarities uh but you know i can't ex excommunicate my wife from the lord's table

00:45:55.100 these are these are distinct spheres of authority and we we intuitively know as christians who are

00:46:02.200 subject to the word of god when one is overreaching the other so kuyper's concern was to say christ is

00:46:08.640 king overall god's word must govern everything and god has established his law word for these

00:46:15.080 different areas of life and they delimit one another and that prevents there being any kind

00:46:21.120 of totalitarian absolutizing of any sphere of life if you absolutize the family what do you get

00:46:27.940 you get a mafia where blood is everything right where it's more important than the state and it's

00:46:33.860 not the rule of law and it's actually just about mafia you said you're like a mafia and i was like

00:46:39.140 what's a mafia mafia is at least the texan version that's how we say go ahead sorry um if you

00:46:46.500 absolutize the church what have you got well you've got an ecclesiocracy you have the situation

00:46:51.680 that held for for much of the medieval period uh where the church is trying to rule and regulate

00:46:57.500 through its own clergy and churchmen every area of life if you absolutize the state what do you

00:47:02.720 get well you get statism you get collectivism totalitarianism totalitarianism fundamentally

00:47:09.020 is one institution trying to treat the others in parts to whole fashion so they so so the church

00:47:16.940 the medieval church is trying to say look the church is the all-encompassing institution

00:47:20.560 and we're going to anoint various princes and kings and we're in charge and uh and the state

00:47:27.220 which has been the the primary offender historically especially within you look

00:47:31.300 throughout pagan history you look at the bible egypt babylon persia uh the roman world look the

00:47:37.140 emperor cult you see that the state is the one that has wanted to treat before the actual birth

00:47:42.740 of the first truly free institution in the western world the church uh the pagan state was everything

00:47:48.760 that was the view of the of of socrates of of plato of aristotle the the state is the ultimate

00:47:55.820 organizing overarching and that's wouldn't you say that's where if anything that's the category that

00:48:01.900 we're in currently that's where we are now in our abandonment of the christian faith and the

00:48:06.060 principle of sphere sovereignty we've reached this point where mediating institutions leave us

00:48:11.560 are weakened or disappear and they leave us naked before an all-powerful state which treats all of

00:48:17.400 these things as lesser parts of itself whereas the real parts of the state are actually provinces

00:48:23.900 and municipalities and families and churches are on state a given territory but they're not parts

00:48:30.460 of the state. So that's what sphere sovereignty is about. It's trying to recognize the authority

00:48:36.920 of Christ and the rule of Christ's word in each of those areas. Now, the ditch on both sides of

00:48:45.520 the road is exactly what sphere sovereignty is trying to avoid. And you've talked about the

00:48:50.960 heart a couple of times in the way in which contemporary evangelicalism has tended to think

00:48:55.940 about it in terms of pietism, it's sort of me and Jesus, it's my emotional life, my personal

00:49:00.540 spiritual life. But biblically, the heart is a really important concept. It's the root of the

00:49:07.500 human person. In a certain sense, heart and spirit are used interchangeably. The heart is the eye,

00:49:17.000 it's the center, it's the ego. Out of the heart spring the issues of life, scripture says. Jesus

00:49:22.100 talks about the heart being the root of, of course, of sin and rebellion. It's also where

00:49:28.000 the renewal goes on with the work of the Holy Spirit. So the heart is the root unity. It's the

00:49:34.120 central, total aspect of the life of the person. Think about it like the palm of a hand. This is

00:49:42.080 the heart. This is kind of pre-functional. And these are the various functions of our hearts,

00:49:46.560 our reasoning, our emotions, and various other aspects of the human person. But the root unity

00:49:53.320 is the heart. And when our hearts are transformed and regenerate, that is going to affect not just

00:50:01.400 my church life, not just my personal spirituality, but every single aspect of my life because a

00:50:10.260 total renovation has gone on in the root of the human person. So when we think about the kingdom

00:50:16.380 of god again it's transformed the transformation of people at the root of their being and not the

00:50:22.400 state not the church not the family is the totalizing reality it's the kingdom of god and so

00:50:28.620 transformed people apply at the root of their being apply the radicality of the word of god

00:50:35.700 in the totality of christ's kingdom which encompasses every single aspect of life and so

00:50:43.240 that eliminates the problem of flight into one or this area or that area now in pietism what's going

00:50:51.480 on the the one ditch is that the faith aspect of our lives our personal confession our personal

00:50:58.860 devotions are which are important in our church life are being absolutized that that that's all

00:51:04.120 that matters right and so everything else is reduced in its significance or even regarded

00:51:10.760 as insignificant uh culture education all they just don't really matter that much because all

00:51:16.760 that matters is this faith aspect of my life um in in the social justice movement uh and the

00:51:26.060 influence it's had on some of the uh the church movements you've talked about right um the uh

00:51:32.400 what's going on there in in its most radical form is actually the state is being absolutized and the

00:51:37.760 state not the church is being identified with the kingdom of god that's right that's exactly what it

00:51:43.000 is i couldn't articulate it but you're right yeah yeah and the state is then seen as the institution

00:51:48.540 that brings about the reality of the kingdom in the world and this of course is directly related

00:51:54.640 to the nature grace um division uh as well um we we end up in a situation where what happens is

00:52:05.760 with often you mentioned faithful christians oftentimes who are confused instead of recognizing

00:52:12.740 that the word of god and the authority of the word of god must govern the state as well

00:52:18.500 god's law word must also govern the state just as it governs the family the individual

00:52:24.920 the church separation of church and state doesn't mean a separation of god and state

00:52:29.560 precisely there is a law it's either god's law or man's law so like i mean what should civil

00:52:34.340 of course they have to legislate god's law there's neutrality is a myth you're always legislating

00:52:39.580 morality imposing one set of moral principles on on another and so what i mean what can the

00:52:47.320 christian say other than yeah we the state should should legislate christianly i don't i don't know

00:52:54.040 what other option there is which to me there isn't another option that goes back to the the great

00:52:57.800 commission which we always forget this but it's you know we go so that's that's at least four

00:53:02.380 commands to go to make disciples, to baptize them into the name of the triune God, but then also to

00:53:07.380 teach them to obey all of Christ's commands. And we were saying this before we started recording,

00:53:11.480 but the apostle Paul also talks about remaining in the station where the Lord has providentially

00:53:17.320 assigned you before conversion. And this could refer to being in an unequally yoked marriage

00:53:24.560 with an unbeliever, which he does that explicitly. But this also very likely can 0.66

00:53:30.560 regard vocation. And I think one of the problems that I've seen is some of the most successful

00:53:37.060 individuals who come to Christ, the Lord saves them, because of this two kingdom privatized,

00:53:44.160 only the spiritual matters, they are men with ambition. They're men with gifts and unique

00:53:51.900 talents and incredibly gifted with leadership. They come to Christ and because they've been

00:53:57.880 taught by evangelicals, what's the first thing they do, right? They're a hedge fund manager.

00:54:03.220 They quit and become a pastor there, you know, they're in the art, they quit and become. And so

00:54:07.240 it's like, we forfeited all this ground. And, and so anyway, so all that means if we remain in each

00:54:13.920 station and the Lord saves like jailers, like he did with the apostle Paul, and he remains in that

00:54:20.180 station and he saves if he saves civil magistrates and governors, and if he saves artists, and if he

00:54:26.940 saves doctors and teachers and all these different things. Um, and, and then, you know, if the Lord

00:54:33.300 saves them, we actually make disciples of the nations and make disciples of individuals in

00:54:38.820 different spheres and different vocations within nations. He saves mothers and fathers and, um,

00:54:44.060 and then, and then we fulfill the great commission. The last part, which is to teach them to obey all

00:54:48.180 of Christ's commands. Then I don't know what other logical conclusion we can have other than

00:54:53.360 Christian schools, Christian governments, Christian art. And so for me, the last kind of

00:54:58.360 thing that I'm thinking is I think there are some guys who would be persuaded by this point in our

00:55:02.460 conversation and say, okay, yeah, I get why the two kingdom thing is a problem. And I get why the

00:55:07.020 privatized lordship pietism is a problem. But they can't quite embrace a post mill paradigm. 0.55

00:55:16.400 They can't quite embrace that there'll be a Christian government, not because they have a

00:55:20.300 theological category against it. We've won them over by this point. I'm speaking to that hypothetical

00:55:24.720 section of the audience, but they still don't think it's going to happen because,

00:55:29.780 and I said this before we started recording, because they're committed to losing. 0.97

00:55:32.920 It seems like one of the ways that people escape the idea of a Christian government, 0.83

00:55:37.320 or they escape the idea of Christian education, if we persuade them that they can't do it

00:55:43.160 theologically, then the way that they do it is they say, well, you're right. People do remain

00:55:48.820 in their stations and the sufficiency of scripture applies to every realm of life. And the Great

00:55:54.240 Commission includes teaching people to obey all of Christ's commands and Christ's commands have

00:55:57.680 application in every sphere. You're right about all of that. But the reason this still won't

00:56:02.540 conclude, it won't culminate in Christian government and Christian education and these

00:56:07.200 kinds of things is because we will lose. They're so tightly committed to losing. And so I feel like 0.87

00:56:15.560 the two kingdom thing has to be opposed on the one hand. And then,

00:56:19.140 and then the next thing that has to be opposed systematically as we win people

00:56:22.560 over to the, the, the,

00:56:24.460 the rock that breaks the statue and grows into a mountain as we win them over to

00:56:28.920 that position. 0.87

00:56:29.860 At first we have to attack pietism and two kingdomism and state ism.

00:56:33.860 But then, then we have to, I feel like as some,

00:56:36.400 we have to address dispensationalism and pre-millennial, pre-millennialism,

00:56:41.420 this, this, this losing mindset. 0.91

00:56:43.980 It's like the moment that Christians start to experience some kind of victory, it's almost like they start, they intrinsically feel guilty. 1.00

00:56:51.560 Uh-oh, we must be doing something wrong. 0.99

00:56:54.060 Let's make sure to pull some punches because we've got to lose.

00:56:59.040 So in concluding our conversation, could you speak to that a little bit, Dr. Bu?

00:57:03.760 Yeah, I think the way you've sort of summarized that is linked to what we were saying about church and state.

00:57:15.340 And, you know, you can separate the jurisdiction of church and state, but you can't separate religion and the state.

00:57:21.540 Every state is going to be governed by a given world and life view.

00:57:25.540 the irony of this situation is that when we refuse to bring political life law education

00:57:31.940 all these things that you've just mentioned under the word of god um that's that's why you find

00:57:39.540 these different people in these areas pursuing social justice neo-marxist ideas and so forth

00:57:45.380 in those different spheres because they don't actually believe the fullness of the word of god

00:57:49.860 applies to those areas of life therefore the status quo or the latest idea or the thing that

00:57:55.660 seems popular uh justice gets redefined love gets redefined for the political for the cultural uh

00:58:03.440 truth is redefined in the educational sphere doesn't need to be brought under the lordship

00:58:08.160 of jesus christ because it's just not that area is simply not that important um so and and i think

00:58:16.240 that is linked fundamentally to what you've just said about theologies of failure and theologies

00:58:25.160 of defeat there is a reason why you know it's interesting to track the the history of the

00:58:30.600 development of eschatological perspectives um because they often track with historical trends

00:58:37.000 that are confronting the church uh and uh you know in in the 20th century with two world wars

00:58:44.400 a kind of pessimism began to really take over and that was when that was the sort of the high point

00:58:52.620 of the dispensational hermeneutic and theologies of escape and retreat and I think in many respects

00:59:00.420 the two kingdoms ideas are have been sort of redeployed and some of them are quite novel 1.00

00:59:06.940 because Christians are casting about

00:59:09.980 for a theological framework

00:59:12.700 that will justify our sense of defeat and failure.

00:59:15.900 That's exactly it.

00:59:17.080 And the decline of our culture.

00:59:19.300 Well, and will actually maybe even excuse us

00:59:22.560 of our accountability and responsibility.

00:59:24.940 That's right, absolve us of our guilt.

00:59:26.800 You're right, that's exactly what it is.

00:59:28.100 Rather than saying the church failed,

00:59:31.360 it's one of these, well, this is Jesus's plan, right?

00:59:34.840 we have to lose because who's going to persecute us we got to have someone to persecute us so that

00:59:39.620 we can do something with all these texts you know that yeah yeah and i think that and here's here's

00:59:45.520 where i would just sort of conclude the point uh and i because i think there's a deep there's a

00:59:51.000 deeper problem at work and that is that we associate power uh with the demonic so we think

01:00:02.680 somehow that you know it's it's fine to talk about um uh power in the in the church power

01:00:11.680 and authority in the life of the church um and uh power uh it's permissible to to talk about

01:00:20.380 justice and love and and these kinds of principles in the in the life of the church

01:00:24.980 but as soon as you talk about power and associate the christian with power well you must have lent

01:00:31.520 your ears to the devil you're right that's uh because you cannot equate christ the christian

01:00:38.560 with power but and yet the bible god is omnipotent he's the all-powerful one

01:00:45.800 uh and christ is the one who's been given all power and authority power has nothing inherently

01:00:53.160 demonic in it that's right it's not power itself that's the problem it's our use of power this is

01:01:00.100 the structure and direction issue comes back again the problem is not power the problem is

01:01:04.960 not christians in power because you're right what will often be pointed to is you know i'm a i'm a

01:01:09.020 fan of the puritans i've spent years um reading the english puritans since i was a seminarian and

01:01:14.120 a reform professor introduced me to them um and uh but it's often said well look you know the

01:01:19.800 puritan experiment failed look at the failure of oliver cromwell uh and or or look at even look

01:01:26.540 even at the sort of parallel movement that developed with the Groen van Prinsterer and was

01:01:30.540 followed by Abraham Kuyper in the Netherlands. Look at the Netherlands today, it failed.

01:01:36.240 And so there's a sense that because human beings in their weakness and sin, the Christians have

01:01:43.320 failed in their task, or paganism has taken root, or apostasy and rebellion has taken root in the 0.62

01:01:48.860 churches. I mean, if you want to look, you don't have to look any further than the apostasy and

01:01:53.260 rebellion of the late 19th century early 20th century european and north american church and

01:01:58.160 the invasion of liberalism to account for the collapse of main mainline churches throughout

01:02:04.740 the western world uh it was it was the the the failure and the rebellion of the church and so

01:02:12.860 the tendency is to is to equate power with evil power with the demonic not recognize that actually

01:02:19.020 power and authority is a is something that's actually given to us jesus says go and wait in

01:02:25.900 jerusalem um until you are endued with power yeah from on high um and christ has all power

01:02:36.180 and authority and it's in his power and authority that we go so the problem we all need power in

01:02:40.940 life uh and all of us are given a certain degree of power we have power in the sense of over our

01:02:45.860 own bodies we have power and authority in the family in the church in our vocations the issue

01:02:51.380 is how is power going to be used and it must be put into the service of christ and of course

01:02:58.120 power in the service of satan is deadly so but this this idea that we must retreat from power

01:03:04.260 and that we must retreat from positions of authority and power um actually results ironically

01:03:12.140 Joel, in a radically politicized church. Because we deny that Christians should exercise power 0.60

01:03:20.180 and authority in education, in culture, in politics, and so on. And we say politics doesn't 0.94

01:03:26.080 belong in the pulpit. And because we don't bring culture and all these spheres of power and the

01:03:31.220 authority of the word of God, they all go their own way. We ecclesiasticize the Bible. We have a

01:03:38.220 kind of churchianity rather than christianity and then all those congregants in our churches

01:03:43.720 who never have the word of god brought to bear on their ideas about politics and culture are

01:03:48.600 radically politicized and so they run after social justice movements and this and that and the other

01:03:54.420 and they've got no bearings whatsoever in terms of the kingdom of god around what the word of god

01:04:00.240 says about the exercise of power and authority in all of these other areas of life because we

01:04:06.080 render it all to the world and to the devil. You're right. That's so good because it is ironic

01:04:10.840 because you would think, okay, this is the opposite of being overly political because we've

01:04:14.880 Ecclesiasticized the Bible, which just to flesh that out, because again, your little book for

01:04:23.300 mission, some of our listeners may not know what you mean by that, but it's the difference between,

01:04:26.940 here's the question, was the Bible written to the church or was the Bible written to man?

01:04:30.400 was it written to to mankind because we would say that you know the moral law of god

01:04:34.880 is binding on every person in every time in every place right the the ten commandments are not for

01:04:40.540 christians they're for people and and for christians um it's it's a lamp unto our feet and

01:04:46.380 for people uh and kind of the first use of the law it's it's a mirror that reflects to them the

01:04:51.040 holiness of god and by way of contrast their sin and need for a savior um and then it becomes a

01:04:55.580 lamp unto their feet as well. Um, but, but the law of God is for everyone. Um, that, you know,

01:05:00.540 even, even the Sabbath and unbeliever, and this, this is, you know, controversial for a lot of the

01:05:05.080 Baptists that listen to me, you know, but, um, unbelievers will, will stand before God and be

01:05:09.760 judged for, for not keeping the Sabbath. Um, and, and, and now not keeping the Christian Sabbath. 0.95

01:05:15.080 And, and so, uh, the law of God, the Bible, the word of God and all of its principles,

01:05:19.900 all of its imperatives and all of its indicatives and are written to people. And, and the first

01:05:25.440 imperative is that they would repent of their sin and believe the gospel which is a command

01:05:28.940 to believe the gospel is a command and it's a command to all people in all places in all times

01:05:33.820 and so that ecclesiasticizing of the bible is precisely the problem because then christians

01:05:39.720 think the bible has something to say to christians and churches and it doesn't have anything to say

01:05:44.400 anywhere else and so what we do is we forfeit all this ground so we're at first at first glance it's

01:05:49.240 it's an abdicating of all political activity. But then what it quickly becomes is, well,

01:05:55.340 because the Bible doesn't speak to those things, then each of these spheres outside of the church

01:05:59.600 get to decide what is right. And then any involvement that we have with these spheres,

01:06:05.520 we're now involving ourselves in bad politics and in moral policies and in moral legislation

01:06:12.380 and all these things, because again, we have denied the sufficiency of scripture. And I think

01:06:18.200 that that's precisely with the SBC. I'll just be frank. The SBC won the battle when it came to

01:06:22.740 inerrancy. And I think this was never maybe outright said, but I think that the, the fine

01:06:27.920 print clause that allowed for them to, to win against liberalism. And, and I think of Machen,

01:06:34.680 you know, and Christianity and liberalism. I think part of the reason why some mainline

01:06:38.820 denominations and churches and, and, and seminaries won that battle against liberalism

01:06:43.000 is because there was a, a, a unspoken concession. It was, um, give us an errancy, um, and we'll

01:06:50.060 forfeit sufficiency. So an errancy will lose its teeth. It won't bother you. It won't threaten

01:06:54.700 you. Um, you'll, you'll be, you'll be just fine because we're going to say that the Bible is

01:06:58.940 absolutely infallible. It's perfect. Yes. Jesus was born of a virgin. Uh, yes. Six days. The

01:07:04.340 world was created. Um, but don't you worry. We will never take these principles. You, you give

01:07:10.180 us that you concede and say that we can say that these principles are true and our concession will

01:07:16.180 be that these principles will never be applied. So you let us say they're true and we promise not

01:07:21.560 to apply them. And, and, and the state is just fine with that. The state is fine with, in their

01:07:27.160 perspective, crazy people. So you believe crazy things. That's fine. So long as, so long as they're

01:07:32.700 not applied, but the moment that we start to apply them, then it becomes a threat. And I feel like in

01:07:37.060 some ways you know herod understood jesus his person uh his work um he uh better than the most

01:07:44.140 evangelicals today when he was born herod herod's uh he he knew that his his political power was

01:07:51.220 under threat because it's in the magnificat right there in the magnificat yeah you'll pull down

01:07:56.360 rulers from their thrones that's right and uh you know i think you you've hit on a key point there

01:08:02.440 Now, this goes back to the issue of power and authority.

01:08:08.300 Defeat is implied there in the fact that if you've restricted biblical inerrancy to the church, essentially, and you've really denied sufficiency, then your loss of the culture is guaranteed.

01:08:20.420 Defeat is fundamentally guaranteed.

01:08:23.340 The material authority of scripture is denied.

01:08:25.820 and as you've said the the word of god is the word of god for all creatures

01:08:32.020 and and and of course specifically because of his unique response ability because man has a unique

01:08:40.880 ability to respond to the word of god in a particular way it's given to all people

01:08:44.720 and uh you mentioned the first use of the law of course paul also adds in first timothy one

01:08:51.080 the the law is there to restrain wickedness it says it's not made for the righteous but for the

01:08:56.080 wicked so the the it's crystal clear in the bible it's crystal clear that that that's the word of

01:09:04.240 god is for all of life for all people and it's a question of obedience you know we are homo 0.90

01:09:09.660 respondents we are we we are responding beings and we either respond in obedience and therefore

01:09:16.240 we're believers and we we're we repent and we're regenerate or we are or we respond in rebellion

01:09:22.480 and therefore we're we're at risk of reprobation and uh that's kingdom of darkness and kingdom of

01:09:31.100 light but if we accept an ecclesiasticization of the of the word then we guarantee our cultural

01:09:38.420 defeat and our we will build theologies of failure uh and and and and retreat that will

01:09:45.340 also justify us in our abandonment of all the areas that christ requires of us obedience and

01:09:52.340 people make this uh frequently make this mistake i'm sometimes accused of it joel you know uh oh

01:09:57.780 this sounds like uh this sounds like you know social gospel nothing could be further from the

01:10:02.700 truth with this is about the lordship of jesus christ the fullness of the gospel of the kingdom

01:10:08.500 and our faithfulness in its application and if you don't do it biblically people will ape it they

01:10:15.740 will bastardize it and they'll apply some foreign principles some foreign idea because of course

01:10:21.900 christians have to live in the world of culture and education and politics and they will be uh

01:10:27.020 deceived by empty philosophy you're absolutely right i love what you said about the responsibility

01:10:32.040 we were responsible in light of romans one we're responsible because we know people think that you

01:10:36.540 They often think that ignorance, or I'm sorry, that rebellion stems from ignorance, that people

01:10:40.660 are born ignorant to the truth of God, and therefore they choose to rebel. When Paul says

01:10:44.860 precisely the opposite, it's that people are born rebellious to the Lord, and so they take what is,

01:10:50.000 and I love, you said it's crystal clear. And it's not just, to clarify just a little bit more,

01:10:55.700 it's not just that God has made his principles, his truth, his word crystal clear to all people,

01:11:01.300 unbelievers and believers alike it's not just that he has clearly displayed his truth but

01:11:07.660 Romans 1 says it's been also not just clearly displayed but clearly perceived it actually

01:11:12.380 uses that way so the message has actually been received so it's not just that God clearly

01:11:16.380 sent out the message but but that all of creation not just the believer but all of creation the

01:11:22.140 unbeliever from birth from physical birth has perceived and received the message and so it's

01:11:27.940 it's uh the reason and responds in one way or another you're right and responds one way or

01:11:32.840 another and so so uh rebellion doesn't come out of ignorance people aren't born ignorant and

01:11:37.200 therefore they rebel because they don't know any better but people are born rebellious because of

01:11:41.400 the curse of sin and then what they do in that rebellion is they lie and suppress the truth and

01:11:45.980 deeds of unrighteousness and give way progressively to further ignorance but their ignorance is a

01:11:51.220 culpable ignorance because it's an ignorance that they have achieved by their willful response

01:11:55.900 yeah so amen finally leaves us uh that's exactly right and um where that leaves them in the absence

01:12:04.980 of the salt and light of the fullness of the kingdom of god is uh with as paul you mentioned

01:12:11.180 paul there and what he says also in romans one and and what we see of course in the psalms too

01:12:15.560 about the the creation pouring forth uh the speech that's right yeah uh is uh it leads to

01:12:23.940 um a radically corrupted culture that's exactly what paul says in romans one he says it starts

01:12:29.360 with the exchange the truth about god for the lie and then they worshiped and served the creature

01:12:36.140 rather than the creator who is blessed forever and that leads so you go from a worship exchange

01:12:42.880 a truth exchange to a worship exchange to a sexual exchange and then you have the kind of

01:12:48.240 laws we're seeing passing in canada now right i just preached on that that last sunday joined

01:12:52.460 you guys in solidarity where you're you're now a criminal to counsel people in terms of god's

01:12:57.820 norms for male and female right but but it's not a it's not a neutral ban people need it's not a

01:13:03.000 neutral ban against persuasion or against encouraging or against pushing um it's only one

01:13:07.480 one way you can encourage the cisgendered heterosexual child all day long um to select

01:13:13.520 another gender and so it's it's always and and i think that's key when i was preaching the texas

01:13:18.020 last Sunday and standing in solidarity with you guys and the, you know, the Freedom Coalition

01:13:22.620 Canada and James Coates. And one of the things that I said is it's very particular that Paul

01:13:28.060 uses the word exchange, right? So it's unbelief first and then immediate result is idolatry. So

01:13:33.260 first exchanging the truth of God for a lie and then worshiping the creature rather than the

01:13:37.580 creator. So it's unbelief, then it's idolatry. But even an unbelief, what people need to see is

01:13:42.720 it's not that they rejected the truth of God and therefore worshiped. No, they exchanged it. And

01:13:48.400 what people need to realize is that if you reject the truth of God, there is no neutrality. Immediately

01:13:53.520 a new truth, pseudo truth is believed in its place. And so what, what creatures always do,

01:13:59.420 right? In the same way that we are intrinsically designed to be worshipers, we, if not worshiping

01:14:03.700 God, then we're worshiping something else, namely the creation, because it's the only alternative

01:14:07.440 option. Well, in the same way that stems from the deeper problem, which is the problem of belief,

01:14:12.720 and in the same way that a person does not have

01:14:16.160 the viable option of opting out of worship.

01:14:18.820 They're going to worship something,

01:14:20.040 either the creator or the creature.

01:14:21.880 Well, that stems, that is true

01:14:24.060 because the person is intrinsically a believer.

01:14:27.680 They must believe in something

01:14:28.940 and if they don't believe the truth of God,

01:14:30.720 they will not just reject it or deny it,

01:14:32.760 they will exchange it to believe some other narrative,

01:14:36.580 some other truth, whether it be statism,

01:14:39.420 whatever it might be, naturalism,

01:14:41.760 and that's precisely so the idolatry of exchanging they are exchanging gods in

01:14:47.160 worship because they exchange narratives they exchange truths and in the realm of

01:14:52.440 belief and that's where it begins do you have any final thoughts for us dr. boot

01:14:57.000 on this subject yes the just on on the the issue of the the way in which you

01:15:03.360 know our truncation of the gospel and of the kingdom and of the word of God in

01:15:07.080 all of this um uh affects attitudes towards these kinds of laws that you know you were preaching on

01:15:13.400 with us on sunday uh when you look at scripture and and you know and i think i i would i would

01:15:20.280 leave this sort of encouragement to your listeners is that to make sure that when we look at scripture

01:15:24.620 we're not just looking at bible verses memorizing bible verses and trying to do doctrine it's a

01:15:30.560 fundamentally the the scripture i mean theology in a sense is an outgrowth of biblical world

01:15:36.200 and life view right there's no neutral theology either you can have some pretty bad theologians

01:15:41.320 uh you can have liberal theology you know theology is not a safe zone oh i'm going to do

01:15:47.120 i'm going to become a pastor i'm going to do theology because that's a safe place i'm going

01:15:50.960 to leave engineering or medicine or whatever because i'm going to do theology well theology

01:15:55.440 is just one science among many and it can be done obediently and faithfully in terms of a

01:16:00.380 scriptural world and life view or rebelliously. And I would encourage us to look at these questions

01:16:07.760 that we're facing culturally now in terms of that broader biblical world and life view of creation,

01:16:12.380 fall, rebellion, and the consummation of all things in Jesus Christ. That's the lens to which

01:16:17.700 we need to look at these issues. And when you do that in the area of human sexuality, you see how

01:16:22.500 it's central to the life of the gospel. You see how it's central to the gospel of the kingdom,

01:16:26.460 because uh the bible begins with a wedding um god uh brings eve to adam and ever since the the

01:16:37.500 we and actually it's reflected right to this day in our marriage traditions the father of the bride

01:16:42.940 brings the bride to the man this reflects actually what happens in redemption where the son and the

01:16:52.520 scripture says about marriage that the the man will leave his father and mother and be joined

01:16:57.960 to his wife while the son leaves the father that's right so that he can he can be given

01:17:03.500 a bride by the father that's right and uh israel's relationship to to god is described as a marriage

01:17:12.520 it's an adulterous one on behalf of israel christ comes to us as the bridegroom through the holy

01:17:19.320 family all the the way in which god reveals himself covenantally is in familial terms

01:17:25.060 father and son marriage his first miracle the lord's first miracle is at a wedding

01:17:30.680 the relationship of christ with his church is described as a marriage and history ends in the

01:17:35.780 marriage celebration the marriage supper of the lamb destroy gender destroy male female distinction

01:17:44.920 uh which of course is at the root of our idea of transcendence of holiness distinctness

01:17:51.360 distinction the distinctions that god places within creation he separates light and darkness

01:17:56.960 sea and land the creatures from one another they produce after their kind distinction is basic

01:18:02.480 to god's creation right and it reflects it so marriage becomes one of the cosmological keys

01:18:08.680 to reality, to the cosmos. And when we lose it, when we lose a grip on it, we actually begin to

01:18:15.520 lose our ability and we lose our understanding of male-female distinction and marriage. We lose

01:18:20.400 our ability to understand the gospel and its meaning. So it's all presupposed in the gospel

01:18:28.440 itself. And so I think as we face all these cultural challenges and confront them, we have

01:18:35.800 to recognize that the gospel of the kingdom, which is what Jesus calls it, it's what the Bible calls

01:18:40.220 the gospel. It's not some isolated thing about my soul going to heaven. It's the gospel of the

01:18:46.300 kingdom of God, of the rule and reign of Christ that begins in the root of my own being. And if

01:18:52.680 we understand that, the meaning of the kingdom, then we'll see that this gospel must permeate

01:18:59.180 all these areas of life. And if we don't do that, Joel, if we don't see that permeation into these

01:19:04.760 most fundamental areas that speak of you know Karl Marx understood this well if you want to

01:19:10.040 destroy the holy family you must destroy the earthly family in theory and in practice that's

01:19:15.260 right you want to get rid of God get rid of the earthly family get rid of marriage destroy it 0.98

01:19:19.760 this is an this is an attempt to attack God by attacking his image bearer and it's an assault

01:19:25.400 directly on the gospel and yet so many of our evangelical movements don't see it in fact they

01:19:30.420 they support bans on so-called conversion therapy and think it's a good thing this is actually an

01:19:37.200 anti-conversion law is what it is it's not an anti-conversion therapy law it's an anti-conversion

01:19:42.800 law and so this truncation of the gospel this whole issue that you've dealt with on this program

01:19:47.300 the the the meaning of the gospel of the kingdom comes right home to roost right now for canadian

01:19:54.080 christians but christians across the west increasingly that when you abandon the gospel

01:19:59.000 of the kingdom well you may find yourself locked up in jail for telling your own teaching your own

01:20:07.040 children and counseling your own children that there is male and female and god wants you to be

01:20:11.320 married uh to a man or if you're a woman and to a woman if you're a man uh in a in a in a covenantal

01:20:20.840 union that recognizes the distinction of god's being reflected in the distinction of male and

01:20:24.920 female and reflect that which reflects the distinction between creator and creature that's

01:20:30.940 how fundamental it is that's why paganism actually that's why homosexuality has been called the 0.75

01:20:35.880 sacrament of monism the the uh basically the sacrament of paganism it's why wherever you see 0.55

01:20:42.840 christianity decline you see a denial of distinctions and you see a worship of creation

01:20:48.720 emerge and with it every form of sexual perversion and deviancy that's why it's arising now because 0.79

01:20:55.820 we have retreated we've abandoned the culture in large measure and we've justified it with

01:21:01.960 theologies of abandonment retreat and defeat and we've said god's law belongs nowhere but between

01:21:07.880 my ears and maybe a little bit in the church and until we recover the fullness of the gospel of

01:21:12.220 the kingdom we're going to still struggle with this but i think there's a window of opportunity

01:21:16.280 and hope here to recover it for this generation so that the future looks different. Amen. Yeah,

01:21:22.520 I think providentially God has been merciful these last couple of years with everything that's gone

01:21:26.720 on and just the massive overreach of the state that a lot of eyes have been opened. And I think

01:21:32.880 our prayer needs to be, you know, a lot of eyes have been opened to the benefits of Christ's

01:21:36.520 principles without paying homage to Christ's person. And, you know, if you embrace the

01:21:45.280 principles of christ without the person of christ you'll you'll never have the peace of christ and

01:21:49.960 so you know we have jordan peterson you know launching into the stratosphere ben shapiro all

01:21:53.940 these guys that i'm grateful for in god's common grace um and so i think they're at least in

01:21:58.700 america there seems to be a it seems like we're going to have a red tsunami um you know coming

01:22:04.080 up this year in 2022 and um but my fear is uh we've we've got as christians we've got to show

01:22:11.420 them the goodness everything that people love uh comes from christ every good and perfect gift it

01:22:17.200 comes from christ so thank you so much for for your time dr boot and um we've got a great guest

01:22:22.580 room here in texas um you know as canada continues to lose its ever-loving mind if you ever need to

01:22:28.080 if you ever need to flee well we've got some we've got some runners already and uh more may

01:22:34.420 follow but it's good to know that we have um such good friends uh to the south and uh watch this

01:22:40.820 space because the ezra institute has some um interesting plans afoot to uh to support our

01:22:47.040 brothers and sisters stateside in in the u.s um and um if people do want to follow up joel with

01:22:54.120 the ezra institute they can find us at ezrainstitute.ca okay um and uh there you can find

01:22:59.740 our resources and books at ezra press uh there's a link off the button off the website there and

01:23:05.560 if they want to follow us on facebook and twitter ezra institute or follow me on twitter at dr joe

01:23:10.680 boot, they can keep up with what we're doing. Great. Thank you so much. That's ezrainstitute.ca.

01:23:17.220 That's right. Okay. Thank you so much. God bless you. God bless you, Joel. Thank you.

01:23:21.500 As a special thank you for your gift of any amount, we'll be happy to send you a free digital

01:23:25.900 book from our store. To access this offer, visit rightresponseministries.com slash offer.

01:23:32.180 We highly recommend Pastor Joel's book, Am I Truly Saved? If you or someone you know has

01:23:37.300 wrestle with doubts about the love of God, this would be a great resource. As a reminder, to get

01:23:42.540 this offer, go to rightresponseministries.com slash offer. And thank you for your generous support.

The NXR Podcast - February 01, 2022

THEOLOGY APPLIED - The Gospel Coalition & Westminster Seminary CA： Two Ways To Get Politics Wrong

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