The NXR Podcast - THEOLOGY APPLIED - The Top 3 Reasons Protestants Are Converting To Eastern Orthodoxy w Joshua Schooping

00:00:00.200 All right, welcome back to Theology Applied.

00:00:02.740 I am your host, Pastor Joel Webin with Right Response Ministries, and today is the third

00:00:07.660 and final part of our mini three-part series focusing exclusively on Eastern Orthodoxy.

00:00:15.940 Part one, if you weren't there for it, go back, check it out.

00:00:19.520 Part one, we focused on three deadly heresies committed by Eastern Orthodoxy. 0.88

00:00:26.120 Last week was part two, and we drew out the distinctions between Eastern Orthodoxy versus 0.84

00:00:33.340 Roman Catholicism, both similar in many ways, both heretical in many ways, but both nonetheless

00:00:42.120 have important distinctions that Protestants need to understand as we engage both of these

00:00:49.860 two major religions.

00:00:51.820 That was part two last week.

00:00:54.140 Today, what you're watching right now is the third and final part of this mini-series on Eastern Orthodoxy,

00:01:01.120 and our topic for today is focusing on three of the primary reasons why certain Reformed Protestants are switching teams to EO.

00:01:12.940 Right now, and I would argue that this has actually even increased and exponentially begun to ramp up,

00:01:19.480 right now in recent years there are protestant reformed pastors even ministers who have switched

00:01:27.920 from the protestant faith to eastern orthodoxy a deadly mistake the wrong direction but it keeps

00:01:35.640 happening and i think there's three primary reasons why who i have invited to help me in

00:01:42.500 this journey is joshua shuping joshua shuping is a protestant reformed minister but in the past for

00:01:49.080 five years he served as an Eastern Orthodox priest. He's highly experienced and knowledgeable

00:01:54.760 on the topic. He'll be joining me for all three parts, including today's episode on Theology

00:02:00.880 Applied. Tune in now. Whoa, whoa, whoa. You're going to want to hear this. Our next two conferences

00:02:05.540 are coming up quick. We've got first our fall conference. This is November 11th and 12th.

00:02:11.880 That's a full day Saturday and a holdover for the Lord's day, November 12th. Who's speaking at this

00:02:18.360 conference? Well, we've got Jared Longshore and Chris Wiley and yours truly, Pastor Joel Webben.

00:02:24.780 What's the title? The title is The Household and the War for the Cosmos. Now, I know you're

00:02:30.180 thinking, wait a second, you can't use that title, Joel. That's the title for Chris Wiley's book.

00:02:34.860 Well, I can use it because he's going to be there speaking and he gave me his permission. We're

00:02:39.620 going to be talking about the household as the basic building block for pushing back the kingdom

00:02:45.180 of darkness in this world. We're going to be talking about biblical patriarchy. We're going

00:02:49.860 to be talking about marriage and parenting, how to keep your kids, how to shape and form them like

00:02:55.640 straight arrows, like sharp arrows that do damage to the kingdom of darkness. Training our children

00:03:02.160 in the fear and ammunition of the Lord. A full day on Saturday, November 11th, and then holding

00:03:07.760 Jared Longshore over for the Lord's Day, November 12th, to preach at my church, Covenant Bible

00:03:13.400 church in central texas you can register at the early bird rate which will not last long but you

00:03:20.220 can register at the early bird rate today by going to right response conference.com again that's

00:03:26.920 right response conference.com now our second conference is our spring conference this is

00:03:32.640 friday saturday and sunday march 1st 2nd and 3rd the title for this conference blueprints for

00:03:40.720 chrysidom 2.0 blueprints for chrysidom 2.0 we don't want to revert back to chrysidom 1.0 although

00:03:48.960 it would certainly be a whole lot better than the clown world that we're currently living in

00:03:53.900 but we recognize despite the phenomenal features of a prior chrysidom there were certain bugs that

00:04:00.760 we'd like to see worked out so we're not going back we are pushing forward to chrysidom 2.0 we

00:04:07.380 believe that the blueprints are seven doctrines for ruling the world righteously what are these

00:04:14.060 seven doctrines well it's reformed confessionalism it's covenant theology it's biblical patriarchy

00:04:21.020 it's presuppositionalism and kyperianism and general equity theonomy and hopeful eschatology

00:04:29.020 post-millennialism who's going to be teaching us on these doctrines voldemort he who must not be

00:04:35.680 named Pastor Douglas Wilson himself. You also got Mr. Brighthearth, Mr. Kingshall, Mr. Haunted

00:04:42.380 Cosmos, Pastor Brian Sauve. And we also have Dr. Joseph Boot and of course, yours truly, Pastor

00:04:50.620 Joel Webin. We'll be doing seven primary lectures as well as two 90-minute panels with all the

00:04:57.360 speakers together. And we'll likely add a couple more speakers along the way. Again, that's March

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00:05:12.660 early bird rate going right now, but it will run out quickly. So go to rightresponseconference.com,

00:05:19.480 rightresponseconference.com to register today.

00:05:23.600 i wanted to ask you the question i'll give you you know i'll show my hand up front but

00:05:36.520 why the infatuation you know like whether it be with rome or especially i think eastern

00:05:41.500 orthodoxy right now you know hearing stories of this guy you know you know converted over

00:05:45.120 to eastern orthodoxy and i think part of it is as as things have become so uncertain with covid

00:05:50.240 right and and with you know and you have civil tyranny and you have all these in that you can't

00:05:55.640 trust every major institution has discredited itself um and and you know whether it be the

00:06:01.940 media or academia or or um government or whatever it might be um and i think a lot of people feel

00:06:08.480 betrayed a lot of people don't know where what is true what's stable what's secure what what can

00:06:13.680 they trust and so when somebody purports themselves to say we haven't changed in 2000 years which is

00:06:18.940 a joke you know that that's not true of roman catholicism that you know this vatican overrides

00:06:24.320 that vatican this pope overrides that pope this uh priest doesn't agree with that priest you know

00:06:29.040 it's a joke but if you can convince people that that's true we haven't changed we've been steady

00:06:33.240 as she goes rock solid for 2 000 years with the united front across the board um no that's not

00:06:38.840 true but if you can make people think that's true in a society in a culture that that is

00:06:43.800 in disarray with so much instability and people are desperate for what is true and then you walk

00:06:49.740 in the building and to and to go along with this this rhetoric this narrative of we haven't ever

00:06:54.680 changed and never will you also have you know glorious images and everything looks so offensive

00:07:00.420 old big bible and and long robes and tassels and candles and this and the architecture and

00:07:08.000 everything just looks so old and so trusted and so holy, impressive. Exactly. And people are like,

00:07:15.100 they fall for it. Whereas, you know, you walk into my church, we meet at Dale's Essenhaus.

00:07:19.700 Dale's Essenhaus. It's a beer garden. It's a, we meet in their little country line dancing,

00:07:25.100 you know, studio. We have, you know, 200 people in there. I, you know, I'm preaching behind,

00:07:31.360 you know, it's a pulpit, but it's, it's a makeshift pulpit. You know, we've got people

00:07:35.720 sitting in metal chairs. Um, and, and it's just, it's just the Bible. It's just what's central is

00:07:41.080 not a table. Um, it's, it's not, um, an icon. It's not a candle. It's not incense. Um, what's

00:07:47.200 front and center is it's the word and it's faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of Christ.

00:07:52.880 It's not seen. It's just word, word, word, word, preach, preach, preach. And, and that's it. And

00:07:59.140 And I think people are like, and it's underwhelming.

00:08:02.000 It's very underwhelming to walk into a simplistic,

00:08:06.640 regular principle, reformed Puritan type church.

00:08:10.180 And it's just a few chairs and a Bible and a preacher

00:08:13.720 opening up the scripture and giving the sense of the meaning,

00:08:16.900 like in Ezra and Nehemiah.

00:08:19.040 And so I think that that's, to people that just feels

00:08:22.060 like that can't be it.

00:08:23.720 It's gotta be more, that can't be it.

00:08:25.560 It's gotta be more than this.

00:08:26.720 So I think stability is showing my hand.

00:08:29.020 And I think that's one of the reasons why people are going into Easter orthodoxy out of reformed Protestant theology.

00:08:37.120 But I can think of a couple other reasons.

00:08:38.880 But before I mention them, what do you think is the appeal?

00:08:42.160 Why are guys, because you know some of these guys, they're making the switch.

00:08:46.740 They're going the wrong direction, the opposite direction that you came.

00:08:50.140 Why? What's the appeal?

00:08:51.980 Yeah, I think you were really onto it with this notion of stability.

00:08:56.700 I think people, I think we're all sort of sensing the decay of Western civilization.

00:09:03.440 You know, Europe is a few years ahead of us in some ways.

00:09:08.060 And so I think that question of what survived longer than my church that put up its, you know, hung its shingle about 50 years ago.

00:09:20.220 You know, I want to know something that's older than America.

00:09:24.480 What's something like America is going to fall.

00:09:26.300 America's going to collapse. America isn't the gospel anymore. And so I think that notion of stability, but in relation to this kind of like rapid decay of culture, the rapid decay of our civilization, like you mentioned, like politics and like the whole mess of it, it seems terrible.

00:09:47.300 Um, I also think, um, I think the aesthetics are impressive and we're a very impressionistic

00:09:54.900 people today.

00:09:56.440 Uh, we don't necessarily really follow theological arguments, uh, all that well.

00:10:02.300 Sometimes this is people, um, I think a few do, and a few are trained to do so, but a

00:10:07.500 lot of people just church hop, just church shop.

00:10:10.160 So for a lot of converts into Eastern Orthodoxy, it's just like a total aesthetic. 0.88

00:10:16.600 It's an answer to the decay of civilization that provides guidance where they don't have any. 0.87

00:10:23.120 It tells them when to fast and when not to fast because they don't know how to live.

00:10:26.280 It tells them which scriptures to read so I don't just make up my own Bible reading plan.

00:10:31.460 I'm reading together with the church.

00:10:33.240 There's a greater sense of unity.

00:10:36.240 It tells me, I mentioned fasting, the church year also, which feasts to celebrate.

00:10:43.280 We also believe in beauty.

00:10:44.980 So we build beautiful buildings or we try to make things beautiful.

00:10:48.860 And I think there's a place for aesthetics. 1.00

00:10:52.080 Protestants need to be better at that. 0.95

00:10:55.060 Angels in the Architecture is a good book.

00:10:57.740 There is something to be said for high vaulted ceilings, speaking to the transcendence of God, these kinds of – and building things to last.

00:11:04.160 I think part of the reason why Protestants haven't done that recently is – well, in the case of Rome, it takes money and it always helps when you've got indulgence money.

00:11:12.540 you know, that, that's, that's multiplied over 500 years. That's like, that's some good, that's,

00:11:16.740 that's some good cash. So they're always going to have more money when you, when you, you know,

00:11:21.340 told people they were going, you know, their loved ones were going to stay in purgatory unless they,

00:11:25.040 you know, a coin in the coffer clinks, you know, soul and purgatory spring. So that's a, when you

00:11:29.780 got 500 year old money, that's been working for you with interest, you know, where you scared

00:11:33.980 people, scared the hell out of them, then, you know, Rome is going to just have more cash to

00:11:37.520 build those nicer buildings than protestants but also aside from corruption and and stealing money

00:11:43.180 from the poor um i also think that protestants have embraced in large part western protestants

00:11:49.300 have embraced dispensational premillennialism so why build a glorious transcendent you know

00:11:54.800 beautiful aesthetic building uh if jesus is coming back next thursday i think that's part of it too

00:12:00.400 So I'd rather find us building on our hands. Right. Yeah. So I think that that is a good thing. I think it could even be dovetailed into the notion of theonomy. And I know that you affirm a postmillennial position. I think that that is a part of that. I think that that has a really good place there. It fits really well.

00:12:21.260 But I would even say that that it should fit in an amillennial position.

00:12:24.780 We know that that that's consistent with, you know, the Roman Catholic and the Eastern Orthodox with their more amillennial position.

00:12:31.080 But I would say even a premillennial position should still try to build things to last because we don't know when Jesus is coming.

00:12:37.640 And he may come tomorrow, but I think he should find us building.

00:12:40.500 He should find us praying.

00:12:41.980 He should find us laboring for the kingdom, you know, and those are those aren't bad things.

00:12:47.240 But, yeah, I think that's one of the big reasons why people leave, because I think when we don't invest in where we're at, it doesn't look like we're invested where we're at.

00:12:58.180 It looks like, well, we could just pick up shop and leave tomorrow and, you know, and none of it really mattered.

00:13:04.420 But I think the things that we do and the things that we build now matter, just like we write thousand page systematic theology textbooks or four volume systematic theology textbooks.

00:13:14.340 I think architects could do the equivalent with building, you know, why not? Let's I mean, they take years and years of study and research to write these brilliant texts like Herman Bovenk, you know, or Richard Muller doing his study of Protestant scholasticism or or William Shedd or whoever it is that we have that we go back and study.

00:13:37.020 I think that just as we do intellectual work in that area, I think we could do great, beautiful architecture that competes with the ugly architecture of our, you know, you know, contemporary postmodern America.

00:13:49.500 Amen. Well said. Yeah. And that's the all of Christ, all of life.

00:13:53.540 I think part of the reason we don't do that is because of the secular, sacred divide and the Protestants. 0.75

00:13:58.860 I think Protestants, well, all of us, you know, but, but Protestants, I think, you know, part of 0.58

00:14:04.700 it is just, um, this is, you know, this isn't eternal. This isn't going to last. What's going

00:14:10.380 to last is the word of, you know, the word of God endures forever. And so, you know, so it's worth

00:14:14.260 the theology book, um, that's expounding upon the word of God in the text. Um, but the, you know,

00:14:20.500 the building, the material, you know, that's, it's just, it's vain. It's vanity. It's, and I,

00:14:26.080 And I would disagree. So I think whether it's, you know, building a church cathedral or whether it's starting a business with your family and all these things, all of Christ for all of life, every, you know, we want every good work to, you know, to put our heart and soul in everything that we have.

00:14:44.220 do our work as unto the Lord. The last reason that I thought of was, so one stability, one

00:14:50.200 aesthetics. So we're saying, you know, people making the switch out of Protestant faith into

00:14:54.100 EO or Roman Catholicism because the aesthetic and, and a big one because of the, at least the

00:14:59.860 appearance of stability and, you know, being able to say we have a 2000 year old history that's

00:15:04.180 never changed. The third one that I could think of is a lot of Protestant pastors are gay. And I 0.99

00:15:12.200 mean like someone literally gay, they are homosexuals. And then others of them, um, they 0.99

00:15:18.780 don't, they don't go to bed like a homosexual, but they get out of bed and walk around and talk 0.99

00:15:24.440 like a homosexual. They are effeminate as, as the scripture would say that, you know, there is the 0.99

00:15:29.180 sin of homosexuality, but then there's also a feminacy, right? That soft, soft clothing, right? 1.00

00:15:34.920 For, uh, as John the Baptist, you know, what, what did you, you know, Jesus says, what did you go out

00:15:38.240 in the wilderness to see a man in soft clothing, you know, men like that, they, you know, those

00:15:42.280 are, those are princes. And I, you know, I would argue with that, that I think Jesus is making fun

00:15:47.120 of the civil magistrate that like that, uh, the governing official he's, uh, he's the one who's

00:15:51.860 soft, right? Like that, that's a, you want to, you want a man in soft clothing, uh, go to the

00:15:56.100 white house, check out Biden. Right. But, uh, but if you want, if you want a man who's wearing

00:16:00.440 camel skin and eating locusts, like a man's man, masculine, uh, then, then you go and find a 0.89

00:16:05.780 preacher. Then you go and find John the Baptist. But when preachers in Protestantism, um, are just 0.98

00:16:11.160 like politicians and just like any other effeminate man, he's, you can't count on him to keep his

00:16:16.860 word. Um, he's going to tickle ears. He's going to tell people what they want to hear. He won't

00:16:21.040 take a stand. The government comes knocking and says, shut down your church. And he says, for how

00:16:25.220 long Caesar, you know, and they say, wear a mask. He's like, can I wear two Caesar? You know, get a,

00:16:29.900 get a jab to love your neighbor. How about four Caesar? Like the second mile. Yeah, exactly. Yeah.

00:16:35.560 Right. And they're using that kind of, you know, argumentation, which is not what Jesus was saying.

00:16:39.760 Then, then people, and then they see some EO guy. And again, it could just be the aesthetics.

00:16:43.520 We've talked about the aesthetics of the cathedral, the building, but also let's talk about the

00:16:47.060 aesthetics of, of the priest. You see an EO guy and he's wearing black robes and a big chain cross

00:16:55.100 and he's got a beard and you think, oh, finally I could have a pastor that's a male for once in my

00:17:01.100 life. Like, sure. Like, like my pastor has, I'm pretty sure he has an XY chromosome, but I can't

00:17:07.240 be really sure that my pastor is a male. Right. Exactly. Is he a male? I don't know where, but I 0.71

00:17:12.760 can, this guy actually is a dude and I'd like to have a pastor who's a dude for once. So I think

00:17:16.960 it's the aesthetics. I think it's the sense of stability and unity, but I think it's also the,

00:17:22.020 the masculinity guys are leaving reformed Protestant theology because it's like, well,

00:17:27.380 I've got Tim Keller on one hand, or I've got Moses the fourth with a beard down to his belly button.

00:17:35.760 And he's like, when he's not studying to preach, he's, he's benching 350, you know, like, and that's,

00:17:41.900 that's what, you know, there's some EO guys like that. Maybe not all of them, but that's the image

00:17:46.440 that guys have. And they're like, yeah, I'll go to, I'll go to his church. Do you think that that's

00:17:50.220 maybe a thing, the masculine piece? Yeah. I think, uh, was it Vadi Bakam who mentioned the 11th

00:17:56.160 commandment thou shalt be nice right um you know or thou shalt not be not nice kind of thing and

00:18:03.040 it's uh i think we confuse um like being patient uh kind gentle these fruits of the spirit with

00:18:13.500 effeminacy weakness wishy-washiness um where we nuance to the point where now we don't have to

00:18:22.120 have a belief, really, like, we don't want anybody to leave our church. So, you know, we don't preach

00:18:28.320 doctrine that divides, you know, we don't preach against sin, or preach repentance, or preach

00:18:35.300 obedience, you know, that's just legalism, you know, and so we've redefined the word legalism 0.71

00:18:41.300 to mean any sort of obedience or strictness, you know, and so we sort of lose that masculine

00:18:48.240 quality that wants to stand for something, wants to fight for something, fight for the kingdom.

00:18:53.320 I want to fight for the king. One of my favorite scenes, maybe this, you know, it's silly to say,

00:18:59.040 but in Return of the King, I believe it is when Theoden is standing there and he holds up his

00:19:06.960 sword in front of the whole army and he yells death, you know, and he's death, death. And then

00:19:13.220 everybody starts screaming death and they just like run to go fight uh you know to to to defend 1.00

00:19:20.020 the kingdom you know we're gonna die but we're gonna die gloriously yeah right he had black

00:19:25.680 pilled and now finally he's like he's having this realization like no if i'm gonna go down

00:19:31.060 right the the horn the horn uh in road road and will sound once more you know one final like yeah

00:19:38.500 yeah it's amazing amazing scene yeah and so it's like now we have you know romantic jesus we have

00:19:44.420 sweetie jesus we have you know jesus in his flip flops and his you know shorts and his tank top

00:19:50.520 flipping burgers on fourth of july jesus um you know and it's like we don't have like king jesus

00:19:57.800 lord jesus uh the one who's going to ride in with a sword on a uh on a horseback you know and is

00:20:05.360 going to destroy his enemies. And the one that conquers death and the idea of even, well, I think

00:20:13.200 we're along the same page here, you know, this idea of a regained masculinity. Our whole entire

00:20:20.060 culture has become one of effeminate belonging in a lot of ways. But men bond through competition,

00:20:27.920 through pushing against each other. Even the notion of brotherly love, how do brothers love

00:20:32.840 each other they push on each other they fight and they argue um you know but we don't have that it's

00:20:38.160 it's uh we we get self-esteem by being coddled not by not by uh being victorious you know and

00:20:44.860 gaining confidence in our ability and skill and trying our hand at the competition you know uh

00:20:50.740 you know amongst people who are our friends and allies but the ones who push us to be great and

00:20:55.080 to be to be our best you know um but in a spiritual key so to speak you know so it's just

00:21:01.280 It's yeah, it's I think it's a loss of that, that masculine spirit that we need to be able to regain.

00:21:08.180 And we see it all over the place, you know, where, you know, now men don't even know if they're men anymore.

00:21:13.000 Women don't know if they're women anymore.

00:21:15.160 They don't even know what gender is anymore.

00:21:17.820 And so it's just a profound confusion.

00:21:19.680 So people go to these established forms in an Eastern Orthodox Church where very easily there's the man.

00:21:26.480 you know um and i also think uh and i don't i don't know if this is the right term for it

00:21:32.980 because i don't believe in clericalism but i do believe that that the pastor should be the pastor

00:21:38.060 and he should be identifiable um you know um you know in in the past it would have been you know

00:21:45.260 even 75 years ago it would have been pastor webin right it would have been pastor shooping

00:21:49.860 pastor smith uh but now it's uh josh or joel or bobby oh there's bobby my pastor you know

00:21:58.980 uh god forbid oh there's jenna jenny uh my pastor you know sort of thing but like this idea of

00:22:06.960 hierarchy that there is uh authority constituted authority and there's hierarchy in the church

00:22:13.160 um we assume that everything has to be egalitarian yes um but uh that's uh another uh factor i think

00:22:22.360 that comes in to kind of undermine where we don't really respect authority as a culture

00:22:27.480 i think you're absolutely right that was really helpful so the masculinity side but also the

00:22:32.740 the hierarchical side which and those two things are not those aren't even really two separate

00:22:37.560 points. If we're talking about masculinity and biblical patriarchy, that's right in the vein

00:22:46.220 of hierarchy that God made a world, right? That has order. It's not because really egalitarianism

00:22:54.940 always eventually brings along with it androgyny and hierarchy always contains in it a celebrated

00:23:04.600 distinction between masculinity and femininity. And that, you know, biblical patriarchy is

00:23:10.140 inescapable. And that is right in line with hierarchy that we live, number one, God reveals

00:23:15.460 himself as a father. We live in the father's world. He's the father of light. Every good and

00:23:21.140 perfect gift comes down from him. And he works in the father's world. He's baked rules into the

00:23:27.540 very fabric of his creation. So we have no choice but to live in the father's world. According to

00:23:32.560 the father's rules. God will not be mocked. What a man sows, he will reap. And God works,

00:23:38.460 the father of lights, the heavenly father works predominantly through human fathers in each of

00:23:44.480 these various divinely instituted spheres of the home, the church, and the state that we have

00:23:49.280 familial fathers as the head of the home. We have ecclesiastical spiritual fathers. Elders are men.

00:23:55.120 I would hold also to a male diaconate. So ordained officers in the church are men. And then I 0.96

00:23:59.980 I believe that even outside of just the home and the church, but outside of it in the state

00:24:03.760 as well, that we should have civil fathers, the Christian prince, you know, whatever form

00:24:08.960 of government that society has, but still they are predominantly male.

00:24:13.940 There may be some, you know, accompanying roles of administrator or something, but governors

00:24:19.520 and satraps and, you know, rulers and mayors and police and certainly anyone in any form 0.82

00:24:26.520 of combat or anyone exercising authority, I believe should be male. And, and when you don't 0.91

00:24:31.460 have that, you know, like Isaiah, I think it's Isaiah, or maybe Ezekiel that, that speaks about

00:24:35.860 the state, the civil magistrate and describes it in, in, with a metaphor, with, with, with,

00:24:43.000 with a descriptive language, like a bear, it has like claws and teeth and at, you know, 0.84

00:24:51.000 and then you see women, um, in positions of civil authority, like Ketanji, you know, 0.99

00:24:56.800 uh, Brown Jackson, you know, who recently appointed to the Supreme court. And one of 1.00

00:25:01.120 conservatives, you know, objections was, was she soft on crime and particularly, uh, she's been

00:25:05.580 soft on, on pedophiles. Right. And, and you see, you know, you see like with, with, you know,

00:25:10.280 with Putin and Russia and stuff, you know, some famous, uh, political journalist, uh, woman,

00:25:15.600 you know, came out and wrote a poem, um, about if only I was Putin's mom. Right. Well, yeah,

00:25:20.000 that, that is the way that a woman thinks. And, and that's the way that God made a woman to think 0.99

00:25:23.940 is, oh, you know, this pedophile, um, man, he, he just, he needs a good mom, you know, uh, Putin, 0.97

00:25:30.420 you know, a warlord needs a good mom. Um, whereas men think, um, that pedophile, oh, he needs a good 0.98

00:25:36.080 noose. Um, you know, like that's what he needs. He needs to be put to death according to the,

00:25:40.780 you know, God's law, um, that, you know, and, and, but you need both. We're not, we're not 0.96

00:25:45.480 androgynous. We're not supposed to be the same. Women are caring, they're nurturing. I mean, 0.98

00:25:49.540 from their physical stature, the way that they're built in every regard from their disposition

00:25:53.880 emotionally to their physical stature, to their role in society is to nurture, to love, to develop,

00:25:59.680 to build. And men, it's to rule, it's to fight, it's conquest. And we've lost, we've completely

00:26:09.840 lost that. So whether we're talking about masculinity that, you know, yeah, if some

00:26:13.620 church purports to be the same for the last 2000 years without any change, and it's masculine,

00:26:19.540 You walk in, you know who the dudes are and, and, and it's also has a hierarchical order

00:26:25.100 and organization and respect for those in authority and those in the past in authority,

00:26:31.300 church fathers, and these guys, then it's like, as, as much as our society is feministic

00:26:36.760 and egalitarian and androgynous people, as our society becomes more progressive in those

00:26:43.900 ways, I think it's driving more and more people right into the arms of what appears to be

00:26:48.920 the antithesis to those things it's a healthy instinct jumping into a bad it is a healthy

00:26:53.380 instinct yeah that's what i that's what i'm saying and i don't think that's the answer i don't think

00:26:57.640 eastern orthodoxy or roman catholicism is the answer but it appears it has the masculine veneer

00:27:03.940 and it takes about five years or so for all of the internal division to really start to

00:27:09.300 be noticeable uh to people entering into these churches uh so for the first five years it's like

00:27:15.180 I'm disoriented. Now I'm getting oriented. And now I'm figuring out where I fit in. But now I

00:27:20.480 notice that other people have different opinions. And so, you know, you have the famous Callistos

00:27:25.360 Ware, who was a famous apologist for the Eastern Orthodox Church. He was heading up a

00:27:32.560 female diaconate society. Like he was advocating for that there. And so kind of an interesting

00:27:41.960 little tidbit that a lot of people don't know about him um but i would say in terms of that

00:27:46.520 also that hierarchy um and relational nature of life is is baked into the fifth commandment i

00:27:52.140 think that you know the idea that we're to honor our father and our mother i mean like the underlying

00:27:57.220 presupposition of that is that life is relational but life is hierarchical you know and the father

00:28:04.500 was the the priest of the home so to speak you know so they didn't have that arbitrary secular

00:28:09.840 sacred divide you know uh the way that we do so you know i i think that that we see this loss of

00:28:16.780 the hierarchy you know but we have relation so but relation without hierarchy ends up becoming

00:28:22.880 that kind of effeminate sort of culture uh where men aren't allowed to fight really uh men aren't

00:28:29.140 allowed to protect and compete and we outsource all of that and so what's left for them to do

00:28:34.120 well i guess we'll be like a woman yep i think you're absolutely right well i think this has

00:28:39.680 been really helpful for me. I think our listeners are really going to appreciate it. I want to give

00:28:42.820 you the final word, Pastor Shooping. Keep me with the point made earlier. You're right. I think it's

00:28:51.300 good to show that kind of respect, but could you give us just, I don't know, anything you want to

00:28:56.740 leave us with our listeners? I'm sure some, you know, I've done one video on Eastern Orthodoxy

00:29:02.320 and I flew solo for that one. And I just made a few just general points, things that I was aware

00:29:08.260 with not near the specificity that we've gone into today so i think this will be a very helpful

00:29:13.140 follow-up but the general one that i did got a lot of guys who um not a lot of protestants

00:29:19.240 necessarily trying to find out about eastern orthodoxy but a lot of eastern orthodoxy guys

00:29:23.780 watching the video and and getting upset so i i i have no doubt you're going to have a lot of guys

00:29:29.780 who are eastern orthodoxy watching this maybe the final word rather than to the protestant maybe the

00:29:35.980 final word could go to them um do you have anything to say to them um you know i i often

00:29:42.940 try to leave eastern orthodox people alone and and speak uh to protestants and even when people

00:29:49.840 get to the point where they're uh leaving protestantism and they kind of in their heart

00:29:55.540 turn that corner you know uh to become eastern orthodox like i find that that kind of like

00:30:02.060 psychological leap is really profound. And there's really very little that can be said other than I

00:30:08.400 wish them well. But I would maybe only reiterate the concept of the canonical argument where a

00:30:16.800 person needs to actually go and look at the formally approved official documents and official

00:30:22.720 theology, or and the pillar saints whose theology informed some of these councils.

00:30:31.480 So like John of Damascus with icons, I think it's a phony argument that he gives.

00:30:36.700 It's a sophistry.

00:30:39.500 But then also Gregory Palamas, his theology got involved into their idea of hesychasm,

00:30:46.440 their idea of stillness.

00:30:47.740 But he actually turns in his theology, in his second sermon or second homily on the feast of Mary's entrance into the temple, they literally believe, and at the level of their hymns and their formal theology, that she lived in the Holy of Holies from the time she was three years old and was fed by angels.

00:31:11.680 That's a formal, factual belief that they hold to. 0.70

00:31:16.220 That sounds like something they got from Muhammad or something.

00:31:18.500 You know, that's something, you know, you would expect to find in the Koran, right? 0.96

00:31:21.720 Because you find some of those common Christian heresies, you know, that, you know, Muhammad was like, he heard this and thought it was true. 0.89

00:31:26.880 And he picked up on it to, you know, because he's forming his line, a good life, it's going to be believable, you know, keep some things that are true. 0.99

00:31:33.040 But it's anyways, it sounds like a like a Muslim heresy. 0.96

00:31:36.980 Yeah, well, they picked it up from, I think it's a third century text that was kind of like a Gnostic text where the Christians picked up the idea of Mary's ever virginity, the proto-evangelium of James. 0.95

00:31:52.540 And so that text itself was rejected and considered anathema in and of itself at different points.

00:31:59.740 But anyway, it somehow seeped into the water of the Eastern Orthodox Church.

00:32:03.840 But I would also add that not only did Gregory Palamas affirm that about Mary, but he said that she made like mystical ascents up and down to heaven.

00:32:16.880 And that he made that or he said that Mary made a way to heaven through this ascetical, mystical discipline.

00:32:25.040 And that she essentially brought Jesus down to save the world.

00:32:29.880 that Jesus was almost an instrument in Mary's hand.

00:32:35.140 Wow.

00:32:35.940 And that even today that Mary's become a transcendental saving principle,

00:32:41.260 according to Gregory Palamas,

00:32:42.860 that you can't even approach Jesus unless you go through Mary first.

00:32:46.940 Not just that Jesus came through Mary,

00:32:50.360 and therefore she kind of has like a poetic sense.

00:32:53.740 There's a poetic sense in which salvation, who is Jesus, came through Mary.

00:32:57.700 They've turned that into like a metaphor for a permanent situation where now she's a transcendental kind of person that we have to go to to get to Jesus.

00:33:09.820 And that's in their official doctrines and official teachings.

00:33:13.820 And if you look in like the Akathist hymn to Mary, they sing that she's the propitiation for the world.

00:33:20.260 and they mean it when you put it together and you see it like if you're an evangelical and you go

00:33:27.620 into the protestant world you have like so many gospel filters and you just like filter out a lot

00:33:33.960 of nonsense and noise but when you're in there and you're steeping for a while you either absorb all

00:33:40.180 the craziness or the craziness starts to appear to you when you leave but some of that craziness

00:33:45.520 is that they really believe that Mary is a saving principle unless they've been westernized,

00:33:51.280 unless they become like Americanized Orthodox. And then they kind of become Protestantizing

00:33:57.680 because there was a Protestantizing movement in Russian Orthodoxy going all the way back to the

00:34:03.360 1700s. They were reading and even teaching in their seminaries, either Protestant scholastic

00:34:09.360 textbooks or Roman Catholic, like Jesuit type textbooks. So there was a huge Western influence

00:34:15.500 where you'll find in Russian Orthodoxy in particular, some things that sound kind of good,

00:34:20.760 kind of okay. Like, oh, are they teaching, you know, penal substitutionary atonement in

00:34:25.140 this author? But that's because they were reading Protestant and, and reformed authors

00:34:30.060 in Russia at the time. And so it really was hugely influential. But so I would say that

00:34:36.240 That's another thing is like, stop listening to what your local priest says and go to the formal documents.

00:34:44.140 Stop just saying that there's this this made up orthodox phronema or mindset that's independent from what the ecumenical councils and what the later councils all said,

00:34:56.080 where they anathematize Luther and Lutherans and Calvin and Calvinists,

00:35:01.580 and they get rid of the gospel by adding faith and works, like all of that stuff.

00:35:08.080 Like go to the real, actual, authentic documents and stop listening to what your friendly neighborhood priest says

00:35:14.420 because they went to the same seminary I went to or a seminary similar,

00:35:19.120 and I can tell you that it's a jungle out there. 0.95

00:35:22.660 Orthodox don't know what they believe.

00:35:24.240 They just say it's an orthodox phronema and we love the fathers, but we don't take what any one father says.

00:35:30.040 So I couldn't really tell you what we really believe, but definitely not penal substitutionary atonement.

00:35:34.900 And it's just like circles like that.

00:35:38.840 Really helpful.

00:35:40.340 Thank you so much for coming on the show.

00:35:42.160 I really hope that by God's grace, if some guys who prescribe to Eastern Orthodoxy are listening to the show, that they would be open, that they would be humble, that they would at least prayerfully consider the arguments that you've made.

00:35:52.620 I think they're compelling and yeah, I appreciate you coming on the show.

00:35:56.360 And for every Protestant that's listening, everybody who follows this channel that would

00:36:00.040 be within the Protestant and many of you, you know, Protestant reformed tradition, I

00:36:05.400 think it's helpful for us just to be more educated on this particular subject because

00:36:08.760 it doesn't look like it's going to go away anytime soon.

00:36:12.220 And so I think for us to be aware with what somebody within Eastern Orthodoxy actually

00:36:18.060 believes, what they say they believe, but then what the history actually says, what the original

00:36:23.780 documents actually say, so that we can engage with love and with truth, that we can engage

00:36:31.620 for the glory of God and for the good of our neighbors that we want to see truly have saving

00:36:38.100 faith in the gospel of Jesus Christ, that we are saved by grace alone, through faith alone,

00:36:42.920 in Christ alone, according to the scripture alone, to the glory of God alone. So thank you so much

00:36:48.400 for coming on the show. I think it's been really helpful. And I hope that all of our listeners have

00:36:52.200 been blessed. Thanks for tuning in. My pleasure. Thank you for having me, Joel.

00:36:56.220 Fight by flight. Why leaving godless places is loving godless places. I've had a lot of people

00:37:02.860 tell me recently, Pastor Joel, you're post-millennial. You claim to believe that Jesus

00:37:08.820 is king of every square inch, but apparently you don't think he's king of California.

00:37:12.920 because I've heard your personal story that you used to be a pastor there and that you left for

00:37:18.860 the state of Texas. Notice the title, not fight or flight, but fight by flight. Think of the

00:37:26.820 prodigal son. He comes to the end of his rope. He's longing to be fed with the pods given to

00:37:32.480 the pigs. And the parable says no one gave him anything. No member of the father's house tracked

00:37:40.080 him down to give him a handout. He was hurting. He had to lie in the bed that he had made for himself

00:37:47.480 by his foolish choices. You know what the next words in that parable are? No one gave him anything 0.98

00:37:53.180 and he came to his senses. He began to repent. There are 10 million professing Christians

00:38:00.880 currently living in the state of California. What if they're fighting but at the same time 0.65

00:38:07.280 while well-intentioned, they're also funding. What if California could be brought to its knees

00:38:13.560 simply by the faithful not fighting there, but leaving there, and forcing Gavin Newsom

00:38:20.240 and other tyrants like him to actually have to take a spoonful of their own medicine?

00:38:27.480 The book has been forwarded by Douglas Wilson. It's been endorsed by Michael Foster. It's good

00:38:33.080 to be a man. Also Meg Basham, The Daily Wire, and Steve Dace from The Blaze Network. It's available

00:38:39.780 on Amazon, as well as a cheaper copy that can be purchased right from our website, which is

00:38:46.960 rightresponseministries.com. Check it out today. Can I be frank with you for just a second right

00:38:52.820 here at the end? Look, some of you guys, you're financially supporting this ministry, and from

00:38:57.840 the bottom of my heart, I say thank you. I cannot thank you enough. However, some of you, you just,

00:39:05.060 you can't afford it. In fact, some of you, you shouldn't afford it. Let's be honest. I mean,

00:39:11.420 we're living in Joe Biden's ridiculous economy. Our nation and our totalitarian political elites 0.98

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00:39:27.020 cannot cash. It doesn't matter if people change the definition of a recession. We are living in

00:39:33.600 a recession right now regardless. Some of you are struggling to afford a carton of eggs at the

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The NXR Podcast - May 30, 2023

THEOLOGY APPLIED - The Top 3 Reasons Protestants Are Converting To Eastern Orthodoxy w Joshua Schooping

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