00:04:33.720We would really appreciate if you could let us know whether or not you're coming and how
00:04:38.940many people you plan on bringing with you, right?
00:04:41.160If you've got 10 kids, God bless you for having 10 kids, but we would like to know that you're
00:04:45.580bringing yourself, your wife, and your 10 kids.
00:04:48.140Please come, but please let us know so that we can adequately prepare for this.
00:04:52.720The 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.
00:05:03.160He's going to linger and he's going to preach that Sunday morning at our Lord's Day worship service.
00:05:07.580That's 9.30 a.m. on Sunday, March 13th at my church that I pastor.
00:05:18.760So 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.
00:05:26.600But 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.
00:05:39.340You can find details or directions to join our church that Sunday morning at covenantbible.org.
00:05:46.660Our website for Covenant Bible Church is covenantbible.org.
00:05:51.500Without further ado, let's go ahead and jump into our episode.
00:05:55.200Applying God's word to every aspect of life.
00:06:05.260Hi, this is Pastor Joel with Right Response.
00:06:07.540We're diving into another episode of Theology Applied,
00:06:10.120and I am very privileged to have as a special guest, Dr. Joseph Boot.
00:06:14.280he is in canada i believe toronto is that correct dr boot just outside of toronto yeah just outside
00:06:20.300of toronto you are the i believe both founder and president of the ezra institute is that correct
00:06:25.560that's correct so founder and president of the ezra institute and you've got teaching fellows
00:06:30.460with the ezra institute that some of our listeners would probably recognize guys like dr james white
00:06:35.680is jeff durbin is he one of the teaching fellows he is yeah i i think jeff was added uh last year
00:06:42.660great what what about uh doug wilson in moscow idaho uh we don't have doug yet um uh we uh we
00:06:51.400haven't uh actually approached doug about that but it's certainly on our minds great yeah a lot of
00:06:57.400our listeners and myself personally have benefited um greatly from from him from apology you guys
00:07:03.720yeah go ahead we actually did have him we did have him lecturing uh at a couple of recent programs
00:07:09.100here in canada we've had him up actually before and uh last year we had doug we were blessed to
00:07:14.580have doug remotely lecturing to our students so great great we're it's a good it's a great
00:07:19.360connection so go ahead yeah i totally agree so go ahead and explain for our listeners just a little
00:07:24.080bit of the uh the mission of the ezra institute so the ezra institute was uh founded in 2009
00:07:31.500so 13 years ago now and uh our purpose uh fundamentally well we are a we're a christian
00:07:39.500world and life view think tank um and our concern is with christian philosophy and cultural
00:07:44.820apologetics and how we apply the the biblical world and life view to every aspect of society
00:07:51.180and culture uh so our our aim is to to be able to resort not just speak uh hopefully
00:07:58.680prophetically really to culture I think that's what cultural apologetics actually is it's about
00:08:03.800bringing the the fullness of the word of God to bear on the challenges that face Christians in
00:08:10.100the context of creation so we seek to speak to the issues of our of our of our time from a
00:08:17.800distinctly Christian perspective and then we try and resource Christians as well through
00:08:23.480print and digital resources, as well as in-person short-term residential training programs in
00:08:31.720biblical worldview and cultural apologetics. So that's what the Ezra Institute is about. And we
00:08:37.680have a journal called Jubilee that's published tri-annually. We have a podcast for cultural
00:08:44.480reformation and our fellows, you just mentioned some of them, are located in Europe, the United
00:08:50.720States and Canada. We have 18 teaching fellows who are engaged with our programming. Praise God.
00:08:57.900Yeah, we, you know, we were trying to do something similar. I would never, you know, say that we're
00:09:04.640doing as robust of a job as you guys are, but that's kind of the vision for this podcast,
00:09:09.680Theology Applied, that, you know, we don't want to just salute the inerrancy of scripture. We want
00:09:13.440to hold to the sufficiency of scripture. And we want to hold for the sufficiency of scripture for
00:09:18.440every realm of life from all spheres. And so we want to teach people to actually apply
00:09:24.720their theology and not just have that privatized lordship. At some point, it seems like
00:09:29.860in Western culture, Jesus went from being Lord of all to being Lord of our sweet little heart.
00:09:35.220And we want Christ to be Lord of all. And he is Lord of all, whether we want it or not. But we
00:09:40.560want people to embrace that as a wonderful thing and to practically begin to actually apply
00:09:46.200theology to all of life, wield the sword, not just look at it and admire the sword from the mantle,
00:09:51.580but actually wield the sword. So with that being said, one of the questions that I had for you,
00:09:56.640I was telling you as we were getting started and right before we started recording, I just
00:10:00.560listened twice. It was so good. And I wanted to make sure, you know, when you're listening to
00:10:04.660something, you don't always retain quite as much as you do when you read. So I listened twice
00:10:08.240to your short little book called For Mission. It seems like that's probably where a lot of those
00:10:14.880principles are fleshed out further in your mission for God is what I'm assuming. And so I would
00:10:20.520listen to that. It was fantastic. So one of the first questions that I had that you addressed in
00:10:24.200that book sounds simple enough, but I think a lot of Christians, including myself, would have
00:10:29.060difficulty answering this question. What is the kingdom of God? And to flesh that question out
00:10:34.780just a little bit more, what's the difference between the kingdom of God and the church,
00:10:39.380the church growing and the kingdom of God growing, or another way to put it, what's also the distinction
00:10:45.540between the mission of the church and the mission of individual Christians? Your thoughts on that
00:10:51.200from four mission was just so insightful. So could you explain that to our listeners?
00:10:56.900Yeah, well, you've just drawn a very interesting point there just to begin with when you talk
00:11:03.620about the difference between just affirming the infallibility of scripture and the the
00:11:09.780sufficiency of scripture or what we might call the material authority of scripture so evangelicals
00:11:17.320historically have been pretty good at talking about the infallibility of scripture or its
00:11:23.060inerrancy and arguing in a certain sense in the abstract for that where we've I think fallen down
00:11:31.180is in the area of the sufficiency or the material authority of scripture.
00:11:35.040And so for mission, what I'm trying to do in there is identify the biblical understanding
00:11:42.060of the kingdom of God and the role of the Christian and Christian in the context of
00:11:50.240the family and their workplace and the specific calling and role of the church.
00:11:54.520And I think this is where one of the key problems, one of the critical issues actually is found
00:11:59.840now of confusion in the modern church the the um the biblical word for church in the bible is
00:12:07.400ecclesia and it literally means as you know called out a called out people a called out
00:12:13.580congregation uh and of course that calling is for a purpose um and i think you you mentioned there
00:12:22.540you know how sometimes it's as though we've reduced the the christian life to what's going
00:12:28.000on in our sweet little heart but actually just the very word ecclesia uh a called out people
00:12:33.820um is is a church that is is a people a gathered people that are on mission so um ecclesia literally
00:12:41.780means a called out congregation um but what are they called out in terms of what what what's the
00:12:48.060what's the purpose of their calling how does their calling fit is the church an end in itself
00:12:52.740And 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.
00:13:08.540And 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.
00:13:22.740So first of all, let's just mention that even when we talk about church, church is used in a multiplicity of different ways.
00:13:32.400Are we talking about the universal, invisible church of Christ?
00:13:40.940Are we talking about the visible church of Christ in all of history?
00:13:45.100Are we talking about the church as it exists today across the world in this moment in time?
00:13:53.600Are we talking about the church as a local gathered congregation?
00:13:58.580Or are we talking about the church in Texas or the church in Ontario?
00:14:03.620So 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?
00:14:11.400So 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.
00:14:27.140But from certainly within the evangelical reform tradition, the church is an institute.
00:14:36.260It's a it's a it's a it's a gathered people under certain offices or authorities.
00:14:42.140So the church is a form of government and it has a particular role, has a particular calling, which historically has been understood,
00:14:51.860certainly by the reformed churches following the reformation as the preaching of god's word
00:14:57.420the administration of the sacraments and the exercise of church discipline and some would add
00:15:03.580a certain amount of diaconal care responsibility and those are the uh the sort of three four
00:15:10.780core marks of the church institute now um the fact that we can make a distinction between
00:15:18.780the the church institute and the body of christ uh is actually important in the sense that uh
00:15:26.920not every church institute because we have all kinds of apostate churches right can be called
00:15:33.600parts of the body of christ uh so so the body of christ cannot be identified simplistically
00:15:40.660with the church institute uh and neither can the church institute be identified
00:15:48.020simplistically with the kingdom of God. And I think the big challenge we're facing is that
00:15:52.400what the Bible understands by the kingdom of God is the rule and reign in particular of the Lord
00:16:01.100Jesus Christ, who is king. And he is the king of a kingdom. He's sovereign over that kingdom. He
00:16:06.800gives law within the context of his kingdom. And that kingdom is, biblically speaking, cosmic.
00:16:16.400it's overall of creation everything is being brought into subjection that's what paul makes
00:16:21.500clear in ephesians 1 in colossians 1 the book of hebrews makes crystal clear that all things are
00:16:26.580being brought into subjection to king jesus first corinthians 15 uh and so the the in fact revelation
00:16:34.5801 5 tells us that christ is the ruler of the kings of the earth present tense so the kingdom
00:16:41.140of God is wherever Christ is ruling and reigning. And so we might say that oftentimes if you
00:16:47.920compared, say, a faithful family, a faithful Christian family to a rebellious and apostate
00:16:56.300church, well, that faithful Christian family is a more real and better expression of the kingdom of
00:17:02.640God than that disobedient or apostate church. So the kingdom of God is wherever Christ is ruling
00:17:10.480and reigning first in the individual of course in our families in our workplaces dare i say even in
00:17:16.680the state uh where christ is ruling and reigning in the hearts of magistrates or politicians
00:17:21.860there you see however imperfect an expression of the kingdom of god and of course we see the
00:17:27.280kingdom of god expressed also in the church but it's there equally uh a imperfect expression
00:17:35.380of the fullness of the meaning of the kingdom of god now we would acknowledge and we must
00:17:40.480acknowledge biblically that the church has a peculiar and unique role in the unfolding of
00:17:44.980the kingdom of god uh in so far as it's the place where christians are gathered to hear the word
00:17:51.140and where uh authority is exercised a particular kind of ecclesiastical authority is exercised
00:17:57.520around the lord's table um and so there is a there is a a specific calling and function
00:18:03.760that the church has uh but could we say the church is more important than the family or
00:18:10.520more important than the individual or more important than uh the the magistrate in the
00:18:17.280kingdom of god i would say no we can't say that uh because the kingdom of god is is wherever
00:18:23.080christ reigns and rules and so that's uh maybe that's probably the best place to start maybe i
00:18:31.060come on in a moment to talk about the you know the difference between the individual calling and
00:18:34.700the church's calling but that drawing that distinction between ecclesia and basilea and not
00:18:39.040conflating them and collapsing them into one idea and i think the what i talk about in four mission
00:18:45.780is the way in which whether unwittingly or by theological design uh many leaders want to
00:18:52.880collapse the kingdom of god and the church as though they're identical and of course the
00:18:58.020implication of that joel is that if if if the kingdom of god which is where christ is reigning
00:19:03.520and ruling is limited to the church institute then there is only one place in all of culture
00:19:08.820and creation where christ can actually reign right the church right i i usually use as a
00:19:15.520illustration if you ever watched the lion king when you know simba he's up on pride rock early
00:19:20.320in the morning with his father the king mufasa and he's looking at you know the lay of the land
00:19:24.820and all the different areas where he will one day rule when he inherits the kingship, you know,
00:19:29.260and everything the light touches is the iconic line that comes from his father Mufasa. That's
00:19:34.060your, that's your territory. That's what you will rule. And he's, what about that dark shadow he
00:19:38.920placed over there? And I feel like many evangelicals would say, well, that's politics or that's culture
00:19:43.900or, you know, and there is no, for the Christian with a biblical worldview, there is no dark
00:19:49.940shadowy place where Christ does not reign. He is reigning and ruling in all places. And so I,
00:19:54.720I love that distinction that I've learned from a few individuals, but you uniquely, I
00:20:01.040The distinction between the church and the kingdom of God, the church, it seems, correct
00:20:04.780me if I'm wrong, but it seems as though the church only grows in one way, which is through
00:20:09.160conversion and the church to the church has been given in terms of tools.
00:20:13.180Each of these spheres of government, the family is also a government, the familial
00:20:16.580government, this, this, this civil government, the ecclesiastical government of the church
00:20:21.420and each have been given tools to the father has been given a rod to the churches have been given
00:20:26.760a sword, but a sword of the spirit. It's persuasion, not coercion. The state has been given
00:20:31.600a sword. Everything the state does, the reason why we want minimal state involvement. And for me,
00:20:37.240a smaller government is because everything they do is at gunpoint. Eventually, if I resist,
00:20:42.120eventually I'm going to find myself at the end of a gun. They've been given a ministry of coercion
00:20:46.880And 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.
00:20:54.420And 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
00:21:01.760But the kingdom of God seems to expand every time a just law is legislated, every time Christian art is made.
00:21:13.680And kind of in the likeness of Luther, Christian art isn't because it has John 3, 16 on the0.67
00:21:18.020back of the painting, but the first imperative for the cobbler is that he makes good shoes,
00:24:52.100I'm sure you're familiar with Westminster Escondido. And one of the theological distinctions
00:24:57.860of that particular strain of Presbyterianism is just this very staunch two kingdom theology.
00:25:05.900And so you have Druden, who's kind of held as the gold standard for two kingdom theology.
00:25:10.700And so as you were parsing out the different ways in which the Bible uses the word church,
00:25:16.000I think it's also helpful to parse out for Christians to be aware that the Bible also
00:25:21.120uses another word in multiple ways, that word being world. When you think of Christians being
00:25:25.700called out, what are they called out from? Well, they're called out from the world,0.99
00:25:29.240but the world in what way? In what sense are we using the word world? Because you're precisely
00:25:34.900correct that the world as it pertains to the cosmos, the creation is not a curse. And I think
00:25:41.180some Christians think the creation is a curse. No, it's under a curse. It's under a curse, which is
00:25:45.720why in the expanse of the kingdom of God, as Christians push back against the curse that is
00:25:50.960on creation, uh, we can have success. Um, and you know, we can, we can cure cancer by God's grace.
00:25:57.480We can do, do certain things, but when, when societies and, and people created in the image,
00:26:02.960God pushed back, not on the curse upon creation, but they push back against creation itself.
00:26:07.880They start to fight nature, right? Well, that's like every horror sci-fi movie that's ever been
00:26:13.080created, right? Jurassic park, nature finds a way that you're not going to win that battle,
00:26:17.020No 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.
00:26:25.540When you push back against nature itself, it's going to fail.0.77
00:26:28.560And 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
00:26:37.240And 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.
00:27:01.280they would say that the creation is what it's really waiting for with the revelation of the
00:27:05.880sons of God is a mercy killing from the Lord. The creation wants to give way, die, disintegrate,
00:27:11.820the earth dissolving like snow, taking a very literal interpretation of that. And so in some
00:27:18.640sense, they would never outright say this, but in some sense, it seems as though they've demonized
00:27:23.080the world as it pertains to the cosmos, rather than the saying, no, Christians have been called
00:27:27.860out, ecclesia called out of the world as it pertains to the world being defined as this,
00:27:33.000this demonic system underneath Satan's rule that, that where he actually takes, right? Our battle
00:27:39.860is not against flesh and blood, but there is a sense in which Satan, first Timothy says he takes
00:27:44.100people captive to do his will. And we've been called out of that. We've been called out of this
00:27:49.360system, but not called out of this creation, this cosmos, which I believe is not giving way to the
00:27:56.880sons of God, but it's being restored right alongside the sons of God. Am I on the right
00:28:03.700track with that? Yes, absolutely. Scripture does recognize two kingdoms, the kingdom of darkness
00:28:10.720and the kingdom of light. That's it. And they are operative. That's the way of grace and the way of
00:28:17.540rebellion. And they are operative in every domain of creation. So you cannot flee from one domain
00:28:24.600of creation into another for safety this is what uh you were talking about with these dark corners
00:28:30.200the thought that well if i you know politics is is uh you know or culture education these areas are
00:28:37.560uh uh part of a a broken natural world and and therefore we need to you know flee the arts
00:28:45.560flee politics flee law leave that to nature leave that to natural law to the way of decay we belong
00:28:53.480in the realm of grace an upper story of reality and so you've got a notion there that you can flee
00:28:59.160one domain of creation into another in order to have freedom or salvation or liberation
00:29:06.620and of course that ends up as you've described it demonizing the world right um and the world
00:29:12.560becomes in used in the term the sense that you used it that's why when i talked about creation
00:29:18.440what what these uh these theologies do and i think it's a it's a it's a serious mistake
00:29:24.480is they they're fundamentally dualistic so what they do is they drive a wedge between creation
00:29:30.480and redemption there's a radical duality drawn between creation and redemption now i think from
00:29:37.260a biblical perspective uh the the the i talked about the creation being good though marred and
00:29:44.540that touches every aspect of our lives far as the curse is found you know the great the great the
00:29:50.040great carol right where redemption is directed to wherever the curse is found that's every domain
00:29:55.400of creation those post-mill christmas hymns huh perhaps they're they're a thorn in the flesh of
00:30:01.400some um but uh the the the reality is is that god's creational laws and norms still hold
00:30:12.840and he has not abandoned his creation and he's not abandoned his law for creation
00:30:18.260and uh there there basically there are many structures within creation but there are only
00:30:24.400two possible directions so there's the structure of family and church and state and the and culture
00:30:29.400and business and economics and aesthetics and all these different structures that god has given
00:30:34.320within the within the within the the goodness goodness of his creation law word and they are
00:30:40.720are all being misdirected because of sin so all the good things that god has created these laws
00:30:46.900and norms are misdirected now you can you know what we might call the what some scientists have
00:30:52.120tried to call natural laws which is just god's ordinary way of working right uh cannot be
00:30:57.920violated uh you know you you try and violate the law of gravity you're going to hit the ground
00:31:02.920and that's that god's the norms that god's god has established for creation are juridical and
00:31:10.720moral and and uh cultural norms and so forth these can be violated and that's what misdirects our
00:31:16.860lives and so what is going on with redemption is the redirection and the reconciliation if you
00:31:23.640think about all of the different words that the bible uses for the meaning of salvation and
00:31:28.980redemption it's redemption regeneration restoration renewal and and so on it all presupposes that
00:31:40.420something is lost something's broken and it's being recovered and restored not abandoned right
00:31:47.260and that's i think the critical difference you're right in saying that some of the two kingdoms
00:31:51.140advocates they really do um you you just about escape creation with your physical body because
00:31:58.280Jesus did. And if you denied that, then you're into full-blown Gnosticism or some kind of
00:32:03.760doceticism or whatever. But it's a failure to recognize the unity of creation and the fact
00:32:12.360that creation and redemption stand in historical continuity. And it's the result of the importation
00:32:17.640actually of Greek philosophical categories into the Christian faith and a nature-grace dualism,
00:32:24.920a scholastic dualism it's like a double-decker bus is the way i often describe it you know a
00:32:29.820two-story bus like the famous london red bus you need a story and a lower story and on the lower
00:32:36.580story you've got you know law politics culture education all the aspects of culture if you will
00:32:43.880that's the lower story that's the realm of nature that runs just in terms of basically natural law
00:32:50.480um common uh common grace uh and then you have an upper story which is the really important stuff
00:32:59.360and that's your personal salvation your personal devotional life your personal piety and the life
00:33:05.380of the church that's the realm of grace and the best that the church can do as the kingdom
00:33:10.580really uh is to sprinkle the pixie dust of the church on the lower story a bit
00:33:16.100to make life a bit better but actually in this life you know it's very aristotelian it's it's
00:33:23.640the state it's that realm of nature that brings you to the highest degree of moral perfection but
00:33:28.440in order to reach salvation and to escape this world and to get out of it you need redemption
00:33:35.660in jesus christ and that's why you'll find among some of those thinkers a tremendous opposition to
00:33:40.640christian education a christian view of politics you know there'll be jokes like you know there's
00:33:45.120no such thing as a as a as a christian stir fry or christian plumbing um those sorts of jibes um
00:33:52.880you know because for them christianity is about this spiritual private upper story of existence
00:34:01.180and all this other stuff that's just common uh to everyone so instead of seeing a unity a basic
00:34:09.000unity of creation redemption and seeing the issue of structure and direction there are all these
00:34:14.380created structures that believers and non-believers operate in together but there are two directions
00:34:19.640redemption and apostasy belief and unbelief and that motive force is is put into action in every
00:34:31.640single area of life there is no neutral sphere right the realm of nature is not some neutral
00:34:38.500area where reason as far as it goes is all you need that's the right at the beginning you talked
00:34:45.380about the sufficiency of scripture this the problem is that there's an attempt here to synthesize
00:34:50.840greek philosophy with biblical christianity and it leads to a dualistic worldview
00:34:57.900and that's where all of the i mean there are varieties of two kingdoms views you've mentioned
00:35:03.640van drunen there's other nuanced ones i debated matthew tuninger a few years ago
00:35:08.480um and uh there's uh michael horton as well right there's nuances and then of course you've got the
00:35:14.280anabaptist so you've got a different forms of of radical two kingdoms views so it's important
00:35:20.100sometimes in that discussion to say which one are they actually which exponent which version are we
00:35:25.420actually dealing with but they all share that in common that they want to break up reality and
00:35:31.900creation into parts one part for the world and nature and reason and one part for god right
00:35:38.720that's that's so helpful and it sounds like part of what you're getting at and you you mentioned
00:35:41.960this earlier is we do believe there are two kingdoms but the question is what is the distinction
00:35:47.480between the two kingdoms what do they represent um and then also i love you know doug famously
00:35:52.260said years ago when someone was asking him about two kingdom theology he said well i'm not really
00:35:56.940concerned at how many kingdoms there are as much as i'm concerned how many kings there are you know
00:36:01.620there's one king. But it sounds like what you're saying is that the two kingdom advocate is going
00:36:07.560to draw the line between these two kingdoms in regards to the natural and the spiritual,
00:36:13.640the common and the sacred, whereas scripture draws the line between simply light and dark.
00:36:20.540So it's two kingdoms, light and dark. So the scripture draws the line, the distinction between
00:36:28.160what is good and what is bad, what is moral and immoral, light and dark, true and false.
00:36:35.720Whereas over here with the two kingdom advocate, they want to draw between parts. They want to
00:36:42.900divide up human society and life, human life. They want to divide up sections rather than
00:36:50.380goodness, inherent goodness, God's truth and falsehoods. They want to draw the distinction
00:36:56.960between common things and sacred things,
00:37:20.640And then our position is that there aren't two kingdoms,
00:37:23.460but it's how are we defining these two kingdoms?
00:37:26.960Yes, 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.
00:37:53.660and so instead of seeing a unity to the plan of redemption reconciliation for all of life in all
00:38:00.520of creation that christ is reconciling to himself yes creation is broken up one way or another into
00:38:06.800parts and history is broken up into a multiplicity of parts oftentimes as well so that some would say
00:38:12.880there's sort of there's the redemptive kingdom and there's the common kingdom right um and so
00:38:18.260various divisions are bought but you're you're right instead of recognizing there is structure
00:38:23.740creational structure and there is direction light and darkness for christ against christ
00:38:28.780faithful unfaithful um true false true false right and and that leads to other dichotomies as well
00:38:38.680joel so it leads to your your matter spirit uh or you know the duality uh a radical law gospel
00:38:47.620duality um a radical uh church state uh confusion and dual so rather than recognizing that the
00:38:57.580totalizing principle in scripture is the kingdom of god rooted in the lord jesus christ uh there
00:39:05.100there are attempts to find a part of creation that that is the it's a kind of reductionistic
00:39:11.760process really you find a bit of creation that's most important and then you invest your energies
00:39:16.360there rather than recognizing that all of creation is subject to christ is being reconciled uh to god
00:39:23.920that's really good so that that kind of leads into a second question if we could not really
00:39:29.180even shifting gears but just further fleshing this out so i'll just be um frank uh the gospel
00:39:34.560coalition so i'm not a big fan um but the you know the gospel coalition some of our listeners
00:39:39.760will be hearing what you're saying and i think they're going to have certain alarms going off
00:39:43.120And 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.
00:39:56.340I left with some of the, you know, woke church being written by Eric Mason and the direction that things were going.
00:40:02.000It just felt like, man, these guys, it just seems like they're just water carriers for the political left.
00:40:06.560And I don't really want to be about that.
00:40:09.180Um, but, but what I initially did, this was maybe three, four years ago is I put the blame0.97
00:40:17.260Um, so I, I was like that the problem here is just too much involvement in the culture.
00:40:22.200The problem here is, um, and, and so my point is there are listeners who, who, who might
00:40:27.660be following right now and what they've done to try to, um, avoid involvement with, with
00:40:34.920some of these very, well, just Marxist, bearing the name of Christ. And some of them may be true
00:40:45.980brothers in Christ and they're just off in left field and Christ will grant repentance. And then
00:40:51.540others may we find on the final day, we're actually false brothers and that's for the Lord
00:40:55.620to decide. But I think there's so much concern right now in the church. And I think of John
00:41:01.060MacArthur thank God for him and his ministry and his faithfulness over the years but I think a lot
00:41:06.140of guys are going that direction and just saying you know what the easiest way to divide and make
00:41:10.640things clear clear categories is just Christ not Caesar's head of the church whereas I know you
00:41:15.580and I would both say amen and and also Christ not Caesar's head of the state and Christ not not the
00:41:21.980father is head of the family Christ is the head of all things Ephesians I believe 122 Christ has
00:41:27.740been appointed by God as head of all things to the benefit of the church. And that's not to say
00:41:32.660Christ is the head of all institutions in the same way that he's head of the church. He's uniquely
00:41:37.320the head of the church in the sense that he only has given his life up for his bride for the church,
00:41:43.420but he is head insofar as that is a governmental rule and reign over all things to uniquely benefit
00:41:50.600his church. And so anyway, my point is that, you know, there's a bad taste in my mouth with
00:41:56.000the gospel coalition. There's a bad taste in my mouth with Acts 29. And some of these,
00:41:59.800these Christian groups that have been involved in political matters, involved in cultural matters,
00:42:05.880but always, always with a, with a left bent, a democratic, a bent towards neo-Marxism and,
00:42:15.740and critical race theory and intersectionality and socialism, you know, and, and all these things.
00:42:20.860And so I think a lot of people, the remedy, the solution has been embracing a two kingdom kind of doctrine.
00:42:28.420And 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
00:42:37.980One is the social justice ditch, which is seemingly Kuyperian, but it puts all its hope
00:42:45.980and faith in the state, one sphere, to solve the problems, and it's just substituted social
00:56:43.980It'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
00:56:51.560Uh-oh, we must be doing something wrong.0.99
00:56:54.060Let's make sure to pull some punches because we've got to lose.
00:56:59.040So in concluding our conversation, could you speak to that a little bit, Dr. Bu?
00:57:03.760Yeah, I think the way you've sort of summarized that is linked to what we were saying about church and state.
00:57:15.340And, you know, you can separate the jurisdiction of church and state, but you can't separate religion and the state.
00:57:21.540Every state is going to be governed by a given world and life view.
00:57:25.540the irony of this situation is that when we refuse to bring political life law education
00:57:31.940all these things that you've just mentioned under the word of god um that's that's why you find
00:57:39.540these different people in these areas pursuing social justice neo-marxist ideas and so forth
00:57:45.380in those different spheres because they don't actually believe the fullness of the word of god
00:57:49.860applies to those areas of life therefore the status quo or the latest idea or the thing that
00:57:55.660seems popular uh justice gets redefined love gets redefined for the political for the cultural uh
00:58:03.440truth is redefined in the educational sphere doesn't need to be brought under the lordship
00:58:08.160of jesus christ because it's just not that area is simply not that important um so and and i think
00:58:16.240that is linked fundamentally to what you've just said about theologies of failure and theologies
00:58:25.160of defeat there is a reason why you know it's interesting to track the the history of the
00:58:30.600development of eschatological perspectives um because they often track with historical trends
00:58:37.000that are confronting the church uh and uh you know in in the 20th century with two world wars
00:58:44.400a kind of pessimism began to really take over and that was when that was the sort of the high point
00:58:52.620of the dispensational hermeneutic and theologies of escape and retreat and I think in many respects
00:59:00.420the two kingdoms ideas are have been sort of redeployed and some of them are quite novel1.00
00:59:31.360it's one of these, well, this is Jesus's plan, right?
00:59:34.840we have to lose because who's going to persecute us we got to have someone to persecute us so that
00:59:39.620we can do something with all these texts you know that yeah yeah and i think that and here's here's
00:59:45.520where i would just sort of conclude the point uh and i because i think there's a deep there's a
00:59:51.000deeper problem at work and that is that we associate power uh with the demonic so we think
01:00:02.680somehow that you know it's it's fine to talk about um uh power in the in the church power
01:00:11.680and authority in the life of the church um and uh power uh it's permissible to to talk about
01:00:20.380justice and love and and these kinds of principles in the in the life of the church
01:00:24.980but as soon as you talk about power and associate the christian with power well you must have lent
01:00:31.520your ears to the devil you're right that's uh because you cannot equate christ the christian
01:00:38.560with power but and yet the bible god is omnipotent he's the all-powerful one
01:00:45.800uh and christ is the one who's been given all power and authority power has nothing inherently
01:00:53.160demonic in it that's right it's not power itself that's the problem it's our use of power this is
01:01:00.100the structure and direction issue comes back again the problem is not power the problem is
01:01:04.960not christians in power because you're right what will often be pointed to is you know i'm a i'm a
01:01:09.020fan of the puritans i've spent years um reading the english puritans since i was a seminarian and
01:01:14.120a reform professor introduced me to them um and uh but it's often said well look you know the
01:01:19.800puritan experiment failed look at the failure of oliver cromwell uh and or or look at even look
01:01:26.540even at the sort of parallel movement that developed with the Groen van Prinsterer and was
01:01:30.540followed by Abraham Kuyper in the Netherlands. Look at the Netherlands today, it failed.
01:01:36.240And so there's a sense that because human beings in their weakness and sin, the Christians have
01:01:43.320failed in their task, or paganism has taken root, or apostasy and rebellion has taken root in the0.62
01:01:48.860churches. I mean, if you want to look, you don't have to look any further than the apostasy and
01:01:53.260rebellion of the late 19th century early 20th century european and north american church and
01:01:58.160the invasion of liberalism to account for the collapse of main mainline churches throughout
01:02:04.740the western world uh it was it was the the the failure and the rebellion of the church and so
01:02:12.860the tendency is to is to equate power with evil power with the demonic not recognize that actually
01:02:19.020power and authority is a is something that's actually given to us jesus says go and wait in
01:02:25.900jerusalem um until you are endued with power yeah from on high um and christ has all power
01:02:36.180and authority and it's in his power and authority that we go so the problem we all need power in
01:02:40.940life uh and all of us are given a certain degree of power we have power in the sense of over our
01:02:45.860own bodies we have power and authority in the family in the church in our vocations the issue
01:02:51.380is how is power going to be used and it must be put into the service of christ and of course
01:02:58.120power in the service of satan is deadly so but this this idea that we must retreat from power
01:03:04.260and that we must retreat from positions of authority and power um actually results ironically
01:03:12.140Joel, in a radically politicized church. Because we deny that Christians should exercise power0.60
01:03:20.180and authority in education, in culture, in politics, and so on. And we say politics doesn't0.94
01:03:26.080belong in the pulpit. And because we don't bring culture and all these spheres of power and the
01:03:31.220authority of the word of God, they all go their own way. We ecclesiasticize the Bible. We have a
01:03:38.220kind of churchianity rather than christianity and then all those congregants in our churches
01:03:43.720who never have the word of god brought to bear on their ideas about politics and culture are
01:03:48.600radically politicized and so they run after social justice movements and this and that and the other
01:03:54.420and they've got no bearings whatsoever in terms of the kingdom of god around what the word of god
01:04:00.240says about the exercise of power and authority in all of these other areas of life because we
01:04:06.080render it all to the world and to the devil. You're right. That's so good because it is ironic
01:04:10.840because you would think, okay, this is the opposite of being overly political because we've
01:04:14.880Ecclesiasticized the Bible, which just to flesh that out, because again, your little book for
01:04:23.300mission, some of our listeners may not know what you mean by that, but it's the difference between,
01:04:26.940here's the question, was the Bible written to the church or was the Bible written to man?
01:04:30.400was it written to to mankind because we would say that you know the moral law of god
01:04:34.880is binding on every person in every time in every place right the the ten commandments are not for
01:04:40.540christians they're for people and and for christians um it's it's a lamp unto our feet and
01:04:46.380for people uh and kind of the first use of the law it's it's a mirror that reflects to them the
01:04:51.040holiness of god and by way of contrast their sin and need for a savior um and then it becomes a
01:04:55.580lamp unto their feet as well. Um, but, but the law of God is for everyone. Um, that, you know,
01:05:00.540even, even the Sabbath and unbeliever, and this, this is, you know, controversial for a lot of the
01:05:05.080Baptists that listen to me, you know, but, um, unbelievers will, will stand before God and be
01:05:09.760judged for, for not keeping the Sabbath. Um, and, and, and now not keeping the Christian Sabbath.0.95
01:05:15.080And, and so, uh, the law of God, the Bible, the word of God and all of its principles,
01:05:19.900all of its imperatives and all of its indicatives and are written to people. And, and the first
01:05:25.440imperative is that they would repent of their sin and believe the gospel which is a command
01:05:28.940to believe the gospel is a command and it's a command to all people in all places in all times
01:05:33.820and so that ecclesiasticizing of the bible is precisely the problem because then christians
01:05:39.720think the bible has something to say to christians and churches and it doesn't have anything to say
01:05:44.400anywhere else and so what we do is we forfeit all this ground so we're at first at first glance it's
01:05:49.240it's an abdicating of all political activity. But then what it quickly becomes is, well,
01:05:55.340because the Bible doesn't speak to those things, then each of these spheres outside of the church
01:05:59.600get to decide what is right. And then any involvement that we have with these spheres,
01:06:05.520we're now involving ourselves in bad politics and in moral policies and in moral legislation
01:06:12.380and all these things, because again, we have denied the sufficiency of scripture. And I think
01:06:18.200that that's precisely with the SBC. I'll just be frank. The SBC won the battle when it came to
01:06:22.740inerrancy. And I think this was never maybe outright said, but I think that the, the fine
01:06:27.920print clause that allowed for them to, to win against liberalism. And, and I think of Machen,
01:06:34.680you know, and Christianity and liberalism. I think part of the reason why some mainline
01:06:38.820denominations and churches and, and, and seminaries won that battle against liberalism
01:06:43.000is because there was a, a, a unspoken concession. It was, um, give us an errancy, um, and we'll
01:06:50.060forfeit sufficiency. So an errancy will lose its teeth. It won't bother you. It won't threaten
01:06:54.700you. Um, you'll, you'll be, you'll be just fine because we're going to say that the Bible is
01:06:58.940absolutely infallible. It's perfect. Yes. Jesus was born of a virgin. Uh, yes. Six days. The
01:07:04.340world was created. Um, but don't you worry. We will never take these principles. You, you give
01:07:10.180us that you concede and say that we can say that these principles are true and our concession will
01:07:16.180be that these principles will never be applied. So you let us say they're true and we promise not
01:07:21.560to apply them. And, and, and the state is just fine with that. The state is fine with, in their
01:07:27.160perspective, crazy people. So you believe crazy things. That's fine. So long as, so long as they're
01:07:32.700not applied, but the moment that we start to apply them, then it becomes a threat. And I feel like in
01:07:37.060some ways you know herod understood jesus his person uh his work um he uh better than the most
01:07:44.140evangelicals today when he was born herod herod's uh he he knew that his his political power was
01:07:51.220under threat because it's in the magnificat right there in the magnificat yeah you'll pull down
01:07:56.360rulers from their thrones that's right and uh you know i think you you've hit on a key point there
01:08:02.440Now, this goes back to the issue of power and authority.
01:08:08.300Defeat 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.