Albert Mohler - Ask Anything Live | Episode 10

hello i'm albert Mohler and welcome to another edition of ask anything I always look forward to these conversations and questions have been coming in frankly an unprecedented a number of questions just for the ask anything scheduled for today so we'll look forward to talking about what you want to talk about because by your questions you set the agenda and I'll do my best to get to as many questions as possible our goal here is to think as Christians and to encourage Christians to think to think biblically to think convictional to think in accordance with Scripture and to think together that's a part of the fun of this and that's why this technology affords us the opportunity not only to think out loud but hopefully to think together so we'll go to the very first question it comes from Scott in Hoover Alabama what are the essential elements of the gospel to include in a witnessing conversation that's a very good question and we really do need to know that because when we enter into a conversation and we hope to turn every conversation in the direction of the gospel how do we know we're really doing that and so let me just give you kind of a forward outline that I try to keep in mind and those four words are trying to make it easy to remember problem provision person and promise the problem is our sin so we can't possibly speak rightly about the gospel without beginning with our problem which is our sin and our our infinite guilt and the fact that our sin is is a problem that we cannot solve it creates a barrier between us and our Creator and thus the sinner deserves nothing but the the infinite eternal outpouring of God's wrath that's a problem that's an easy word to remember that's the problem and the second word is provision but God who is rich in mercy you know it's God who takes the action it's it's God alone the holy righteous Redeemer God who who makes the provision for our salvation it's in accordance with his plan it is to his glory and that third word is his person and God's plan his provision is the person Jesus Christ the second person of the Trinity is truly God and truly man incarnate and human flesh we tell the story about how Jesus came and we have to tell the gospel the way for instance the Apostle Paul tells the gospel looking at what Christ did for us who he is and what he did and so you have to go to a text like first Corinthians 15 that he died for our sins according to the scriptures he was crucified for our sins according to the Bible and that God raised him from the dead also in accordance with the scriptures and so that is the fact of how atonement was achieved al atonement was accomplished but that last word is promise and the promise is of salvation and eternal life to all who believe on his name and and so that's really important we have to get to the fact that salvation is promised to all who call upon the name of the Lord who confess with their lips that Jesus Christ is Lord and believe in their heart that God has raised him from the dead and I think the gospel also has to include what the Bible includes which is repentance from sin and so the repentance of sin is also very important believe in repent and and so it's problem and provision and person and promise and so just keep that in mind I'm not suggesting you even use those words when you're in a gospel conversation but make sure you make all those points our problem God's provision the person and the work of Christ that we have to point to Christ alone and then the promise of salvation to all who believe and who confess his name and who repent of sins it's it's that wonderful promise we can't get to the promise until we cover the problem and the provision and and the person of Christ is who has worked for us as well so great questions god I appreciate it there are a lot of gospel issue conversations let's try to avoid those let's try to have truly gospel conversations Dixon writes asking saying by the way he's gonna be coming as a freshman at Boise College so welcome in advance Dixon currently a part of a worship team we've been discussing whether we should sing songs written by and the group here is Bethel music out of Redding California many of their songs have rich biblical truth but their ministry teaches false theology should we seeing their songs basically well that's a very interesting question and and my first instinct is to say no because just having nothing to do with error and and there's some pretty spectacular error out there my first instinct is to say no but I have to check that a little bit let me tell you why in the early church one of the big problems was figuring out what to do with people who had been Christians by their profession of faith and they had functioned even in Christian ministry but then they committed apostasy that is that they publicly denied the faith and in the context of Roman persecution when forced to choose between Caesar and Christ they chose Caesar so the question is what do we do with their ministry the the most important question was what what do we do with the baptisms that they perform the early church trying to figure that out you know even though they may not have been Christians the baptism was still a Christian baptism in accordance with with this thinking and that same logic has applied to the fact that if someone says something that's true it's true even if they say things that are untrue but that doesn't perfectly answer the question because I wouldn't sing a jehovah's witness him no matter how much orthodoxy was in it even if it left out the heterodoxy of the Jehovah's Witnesses but it's a little harder when it comes to some hymns for instance that wonderful hymn it is well with my soul and the fact is it wasn't well with the soul of the hymn writer not long after he wrote that hymn but you know we still sing it and it's words are still so filled with gospel content and so I would say this and Nick's and I really appreciate the question is a theologically sensitive question if singing the song is going to be an affirmation of God's truth and without any complications in the context of the congregation then it probably isn't an issue but if singing that song means that it's somehow understood to be an endorsement of that movement or you know frankly if it if it's confusing to the congregation then by definition you shouldn't do it and you know even when it comes to a hymn like it is well with my soul I feel at times we have to explain that story and he even tell the truth but at the same time we sing those songs and this is also very much the case for some other movements that have no frankly a very thin theology and and sometimes bigger problems than that but they have some really very effective and moving hymnody and music that they've written but I just want to go on and say one other thing Dixon most of the complicated questions we have are avoidable there is so much good music out there from sources that are completely trustworthy and true there's so many good wonderful gospel hymns I would just generally go back to my first instinct and say I just wouldn't use anything that involves any complication that I would later have to explain and I think that's probably a pretty good rule and you have a pretty good instinct I think in asking that question look forward to welcoming you to Boise as a member of the new class Jonathan from Northfield Minnesota in light of recent discussions within the SBC surrounding the role of women in church what are your thoughts on women preaching to the gathered church is there room for disagreement in the Baptist faith and message well that is a question that's being asked by a lot of people and so I'm glad to speak to the Baptist faith and message and I was very honored to be serving on the committee that brought the revision that included that language in the year 2000 that was later affirmed by the SBC and one of his most decisive actions of my lifetime so the Baptist faith a message speaks of the the role of pastor the office of pastor being filled by men and it's very clearly a statement that just men not women one of the interesting questions that comes up is did the did the Southern Baptist Convention believe more than that well well certainly almost every church well no I'll say every church in the SPC has to believe more than that it has to order itself that there aren't just pastors but there are others and it's also interesting to ask the so what did pastor mean here it basically means the same thing is elder so the the very texts that are cited and you see this because they are cited underneath the article in the Baptist faith the message that you look at the text and you can see what they are especially from first Timothy three you can see that this is this is very clearly referring to the elder so the Baptist faith a message just explicitly seeks to create an absolute of center of common belief and also to establish a boundary and saying that the office of pastor the office of elder is is limited to men and that doesn't answer every question about what happens here or there but that that's an extremely important denominational statement a statement of faith statement of conviction and remember that when that was adopted quite honestly there were those who left the Southern Baptist Convention because that they believe that women should serve as pastors as elders they should be in the teaching office and should fulfill the teaching function in the church and that was one of the major issues that led to groups such as the co-operative Baptist fellowship and the Alliance of Baptists as they were known leaving the Southern Baptist Convention so that's important to know it's also important to say that when you're looking at the Baptist faith and message you are looking at what is intended to be the baseline expectation of all who will participate in the life of the Southern Baptist Convention it's a centering document yes it's also a boundary document it's a confession of faith unashamedly so well then the next question is you speak specifically of women preaching to the gathered church well well here's something else that's important there's a context here and that context includes for example the rise of definition the need for definition that that produced what was known as the Danvers statement a statement of biblical manhood and womanhood and also ongoing conversations among Southern Baptists and and other evangelicals and and the clear dividing line is between two groups defined as egalitarian meaning that there should be no distinction between men and when in the teaching officer the teaching role or anything else and then complementarianism that says no God has established in creation a of a very clear distinction there's a quality of status made an image of God but a clear distinction between men and women and a complementarian relationship and God assigns to men specific responsibilities that he specifically does not assign to women and you know in complementarianism you might say they've been to two different polarities or two different arguments from the very beginning and you might say it's kind of a maximal complementarianism and a minimal complementarianism but let's just state that you can't be complimentary in' at all if you believe that women and men have no distinct roles within the church as assigned by god on the authority of scripture has made very clear in the New Testament repeatedly and systematically and you can't be a complementarian and believe that a woman can serve in the role of elder and and here's something very empty I think that's really important you have some people who are trying to make a distinction between office and function and I don't think that's legitimate because the function is the office and the office is the function and if anybody knows that it should be Baptists so you have Presbyterians that can even are our brothers and sisters and friends who are Presbyterian they can talk in a way that we can't talk and so well one of the arguments I've heard some Presbyterians make is that a woman should be able to do anything that an unordained man can do well that sounds easy to understand but the problem for Baptists is that we have no theology of ordination in that sense for Baptists the the offices the function and the function is the office so I'm gonna let Presbyterians argue amongst themselves about how they're gonna deal with that frankly that's not an argument that I think can hold water you know apply it in every situation but even so for for Baptists that's a that's a lot more difficult because we don't separate office and function and we don't have any kind of not only a sacrament of ordination we don't even have a requirement of ordination nothing says that a pastor of a church has to be ordained in the Baptist Convention there's there's no such rule at all now when it when it comes to what you might call just baseline complementarianism it seems to me that there's been a consensus in the very beginning that that that means that women do not preach to the gathered assembly on the Lord's Day specifically when the because that's what the elders that's what the pastor's are assigned to do that's what they do that's what they're assigned to do and both in in function and in office that that's what they're called to do and and and that's not because we've just developed those rules or principles over time it's because looking to text like first Corinthians chapter 11 or first Timothy chapter 2 first Corinthians chapter 14 Titus chapter 2 there are very very clear statements and and I mean you might say they're excruciating ly clear and and so I just think and by the way if you look at the leadership of the Southern Baptist Convention right now almost everybody who's in public leadership in one way or another they're already very much in public out front you know having made statements to this very effect that that teaching role that teaching function in the lord's church gathered for worship is limited to men and again that that has been a pretty settled conviction among the Southern Baptists and among evangelicals would claim to be complementarian now they're always every time you have a word somebody is trying to press the the definition of the word press the boundaries of the definition of the word but if complementarianism is going to mean anything then it's it's got to mean at its very base that where you see the church gathered for worship it's it's a man qualified by scripture not just any man but it's a man qualified by scripture who is fulfilling that teaching role and and filling that teaching office so if you're asking me should a woman preach in the in the church gathered for a Lord's Day worship I would say no and and and that has not been controversial that that that's been a settled conviction now once you get away from that context the thing things have to be spoken I'm in a slightly different way now I still think design principles pertain and and that's one of the things we have to get to if you look at the scriptural teaching and especially I think here at first Timothy 2 and first Corinthians 11 just think of how Paul by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit sets out a logic it's not just it's not just the words of do this and don't do that it's also a logic that he lays out in both the the first Timothy to passage and in the Corinthian passages in chapter 11 in chapter 14 and and so that that principle still pertains and and so that's the reason why where you find evangelical pastors gathered and and something that looks like the local church in worship in its function preaching I think it's rightly been men who've been doing the preaching and I think it would be not only controversial but it would be it'll be difficult to explain if in that context women spoke does that mean that women can never speak when men are hearing well of course not and again you look back to the corinthian passages does it mean oh does it speak to a woman reading scripture or praying in church I don't believe that it does it their principles there but there's no specific there's no specific function there that is just given to elders in that sense so you know when you when you get away from the context of the church gathered for worship that then you know there are there are more words that are necessary there's more thinking this necessary but I still think the same principles pertain and because it's a question of authority I think that's what makes everybody nervous but the Apostle Paul makes that argument I forbid a woman to have authority over a man this is where if you go back to the original controversy in effigy localism and in Southern Baptist life that really was the key issue it's biblical authority did the Holy Spirit inspire Paul to say that or not if the Holy Spirit did inspire Paul to say that finished the Word of God and and and it's it's not just written into one place at one time the very fact that he's writing you to Timothy in a general epistle means this is this is clearly for entire church and the patterns that he gives also in the in the first Corinthians letter it also it it appears by any honest interpretation of scripture to have generally come in general applicability so looking at that you know I have to answer the question honestly and again with a little bit of surprise because this has been a non controversial question among Southern Baptists for decades now it's been a non controversial question among most evangelicals certainly those who would identify themselves as complementarian and that would be that a woman should not preach in the in the Lord's Day worship of the gathered church together now I'm gonna go a little further here and and just say that you know we have to think some about this and and I want to be very careful where scripture speaks and where I'm speaking and so here I'm speaking as best I can understand what God has told us in Scripture we can ask the question why would it be this way but it is interesting the Apostle Paul roots this in creation and and even in the fall that that that's not some you know theologian sitting out on a horse staring at a sunset coming up with this that's the Holy Spirit speaking to the church through the Apostle Paul and so I'll state my own belief here my belief is that if men don't have to do it women will and if women will men won't there's something honestly about men that that comes down to the fact that men don't lead unless they have to and they don't do what they're assigned unless they have to and if someone else can do it they'll let someone else do it and frankly that's a part of the catastrophe of modern culture and I think a result of the fall and so I I'm just this is I don't have a Bible verse for this I'm just telling you that as you look at the scripture and try to think about this if you look at the denominations where women do the preaching they're also the denominations where people do the leaving and I think there's just something about the order of creation and I will cite scripture on that that that that God intends for the preaching voice to be a male voice does that mean that women can't teach in any context of course not of course I'm president of a seminary that's got hundreds of women enrolled every one of them precious every one of them gifted every one of them I want to be fully deployed biblically in the life of the church and the Baptist faith a message by the way to bring this back full circle calls upon us to celebrate the giftedness of both men and women for ministry but also the different nests and that different nests you can either explain it one of two ways if you think it's just human patriarchy then you can get rid of it but if it's based upon biblical authority and the voice of God you can't and not only can you not you've got to celebrate it as there's God's glory in and how he defines what is good for us and good for his church and shows his glory in the church it's not to be talked about when you get into other contexts but I think again the same principles pertain and as I said before the great danger in this is that I'll answer questions at such length they won't get too many so I'm glad to take this further maybe even with follow-up questions but at this point let me take the next question Monica from New Jersey recently on the briefing you discussed how rejecting biblical texts that deal with women in the church would lead to extending that logic to the LGBTQ revolution can you explain that progression well yeah and thank you Monica that's not a logical inference that's something we can see in history so if you consider the denominations that that moved to ordain women in the 1970s and 80s and 90s but particularly in the 70s in the 80s and you can just take a denomination like what became the Presbyterian Church USA now my friends in the PCA and the EPC would be bold for me to very quickly say that there are Orthodox fully biblical Presbyterians and they are my dear friends but the Presbyterian Church USA headquartered right here in Louisville is a liberal denomination made up of the merger of the mainline southern and northern churches in the 1980s and quite honestly they got to the question made the decision to ordain women to the pastor it and enter the role of elder by saying well I know that's what the scripture says but we can dismiss it because that was just Paul speaking to a situation or we now have the ability to interpret the Scriptures such that we don't have to see that as binding on us or it eventually came down to the Apostle Paul is just showing all the prejudices and limitations of the worldview of his age and and we know better now and that's why conservative evangelicals committed to an Aaron C and to the verbal inspiration of the Word of God said that's a completely illegitimate hermeneutic that's that's mishandling Scripture that's denying the authority of scriptures denying the inspiration of Scripture it's denying the sufficiency of Scripture and and those denominations and the less went on and they ordained women as pastors and and and that was their logic we can correct Paul we can find a way around this we can even declare Paul to be you know outdated outmoded and the other writers in the New Testament and we can just we can claim certain texts and try to invalidate other texts and move on and and many of us at the time and I will say I'm old enough to have said it at the time said that's exactly the logic that's going to be applied by those same churches to the LGBTQ revolution back then it was it was it was called gay rights as you go back to the 90s and and you can see why it's the same treatment of Scripture when it comes to homosexuality a text such as Romans 1 1st Corinthians 5 and 6 you look at at those passages you say well that's just the Apostle Paul speaking to that situation or the Apostle Paul's not really talking about this that's another you know hermeneutical technique you can say you know he's talking about something that's not this not what we're calling homosexuality we right now LGBTQ and what will be forthcoming or they will say let the Apostle Paul is just homophobic and and yes they've been making that argument for Paul is anti women and if you can say that and you can say the Apostle Paul is homophobic or whatever you want to say or you can say the Apostle Paul is just limited by what he knew at the time and and if you made that argument about his understanding of the roles of men and women then it's a hop skip and a jump to making the argument the same thing must be true when he talks about sexual morality or marriage or gender for that matter and and the point is is that you can't begin saying the Apostle Paul is wrong or we can find a way around this or I notice what it says when we tell you what it means or worse about Scripture and say I'm gonna draw the line here I'm gonna draw the line on on the ordination of women because morally how do you make that argument if you can liberate women according to your own theology by going around Scripture then why can't you liberate everybody else and that's why by the way once you begin down this road you can't stop and and again I've lived old enough long enough to be able to say look at the churches that ordained women at that time and consider where they are now on the LGBTQ Revolution it's not an accident and on the reefing I've talked about the United Methodist Church and its recent General Conference that drew the line there but that was largely because of people outside of the United States who are now Methodist and by the way they're not keen on women serving as pastors either so in other words over time a consistent hermeneutic works its way out and I hope and pray for four wonderful things in United Methodist Church and a recovery but but if they do recover on the question of sexuality they're not going to be able to stop there either are they they're also gonna have to recover on the question of gender and whether women should serve as pastors if if the Bible means what it says and says what it means on human sexuality it does then the Bible means what it says and says what it means when it deals with the roles of men and win as it does thank you Christopher why were most if not all of the 20th century traditionalist conservative intellectuals such as William F Buckley TS Eliot and Russell Kirk Roman Catholic good question good question Christopher and it's actually a pretty easily answered question the first is that if you look at the 20th century before Vatican 2 in the Roman Catholic Church which took place you can is mostly dated in the 1960s the Roman Catholic Church was the great conservative force within European civilization they just was the in fact the Roman Catholic Church was opposed to change and so if you were a conservative in Europe or in the United States with Europe as your reference point during the early 20th century then the Roman Catholic Church appeared to be the great conservative place to be and and by the way that was because Protestant liberalism began to infect so many of those Protestant churches earlier in the 20th century and just to take one example by the time you get to the end of the 1920s the Church of England is already liberalizing on questions related to sex and and contraception and and things like that you can already see what's coming and at that point a lot of conservatives said well the only the only you know group that will call Christian in this sense that is not moving along with the times is the Roman Catholic Church so if you were a conservative in Europe or in the United States for that matter in the early 20th century then the Catholic Church looked like the great bulwark of not going anywhere fast and and conservative there's something else there was a long tradition of political theory and natural law reasoning that helped to explain the conservative posture of the Roman Catholic Church in the early 20th century and that attracted an awful lot of thoughtful conservative even John Servat of intellectuals you mentioned three in particular we met Buckley Jr now one of the reasons why he was Roman Catholic is he's born to a Roman Catholic family a very prominent American Roman Catholic family so he didn't really decide to be Roman Catholic but he was bad as Catholic as a Catholic intellectual could be when you think about a layman in the Catholic world in the 20th century you mentioned TS Eliot entertainingly TS Eliot was not a communicator of the Roman Catholic Church he was by his own description anglo-catholic and and by the way Eliot fascinating figure just reading from a volume of his letters this week TS Eliot was born to an American of Puritan family then he was raised in st. Louis then he went to England and he was an Anglophile and I'm not saying that as a as a criticism in my own way I'm an English I love England and but he moved there and when he moved there he really was like a convert he became a British citizen he also became a a member of the Church of England and the Church of England's always had three wings the low church wing the high church wing and the kind of middle wing the high church wing is anglo-catholic which means it's like catholics but it's not Catholic and and that's how is Eliot described herself as an Anglo Catholic and so for TS Eliot it was a way of getting to be traditional by buying into someone's tradition so just with the qualification wasn't actually Roman Catholic but he was anglo-catholic so he was Catholic ish your point still continues but if you were a TS Eliot looking for that kind of intellectual Authority in the 20th century that that's where you looked and Russell Kirk again one of the most formative figures in in my life and by the way those three figures are intellectually heroic to me but not theologically and that would include Russell Kirk and William F Buckley Jr and n TS Eliot in a part of my library I have the most influential you know authors of the 20th century in my life and all three of those are in that section and but two things number one I'm an evangelical protestant and so I believe that where the Roman Catholic Church you know established this long pattern of intellectual contribution it was to the failure of evangelical Protestants to do the same and and that just means we're called to do the same on the basis of our theology on the basis of the solos of the Reformation on the basis of the inheritance of truth has been received through the centuries on the basis of a biblical reasoning and and and and so a part of this is judgment upon Protestants and evangelicals for a-goin liberal in the twentieth century especially in the nineteenth century even beginning and and then be for for failing to develop this kind of intellectual tradition such that those looking for that intellectual tradition thought they had to go to Rome but a second big observation here I got to leave it the Roman Catholic Church is no longer it hasn't been for a long time a paragon of cultural and intellectual conservativism there have been Catholic Titanic rather conserving forces and that would include you know someone like Pope Benedict the sixteenth now Pope emeritus and the the oddest title in the Roman Catholic Church but when you look at the aftermath of Vatican 2 the Second Vatican Council when you look at the rise of liberal theologians and church leaders in massive influence in the Roman Catholic Church especially in Europe and and elsewhere you look at the rise of liberation theology amongst Roman Catholicism and kind of now mainstream and so much Roman Catholic theology when you look at Pope Francis the Roman Catholic Church is no longer that place which leads to a very interesting thing that there are some towering Roman Catholic intellectuals in the country now who are clearly conservative and someone like Robert George at Princeton University is probably the most stellar of them but when you look at a lot of the other Catholic intellectuals these days they they've not been Catholic for long and in one sense historically they've kind of joined a church well what is called the Roman Catholic Church they joined Roman Catholicism at the very time their conservatism is growing out of favor so it's me an interesting story to watch a lot of the Catholic converts of the 20th century they have to be second guessing what they were buying into just in political thought political theory and moral commitments where you see the Roman Catholic Church headed fan now for a matter of decades okay from Jackson Tennessee oh thank you for this one can a woman serve as president of the Southern Baptist Convention I thought that might be a derivative question from the earlier question given current controversy and conversation it's hard to know just how serious that Congress station is I was asked this question in public at the Southern Baptist Convention when we met last year in Dallas at the nine marks public event and I answer the question now as I answered it then so if you're thinking about a woman serving as president of the Southern Baptist Convention given just the constitutional responsibilities of the president of the SBC there's there's probably no reason a woman shouldn't serve as president of the SBC if it comes down to presiding at a meeting as a presiding officer by Robert's Rules of Order and the and the governing documents of the SBC that that's not a role that I think scripture elements to men if you look at the making of appointments which is in many ways historically the most important long-term influence of a president of the SPC just in terms of gender there's no reason a woman wouldn't make appointments as good as a man but but obviously I'm headed somewhere with this and that is to the fact that the actual role and that gets back to the the previous conversation about pastor that's far more important or elder when it comes to the office and the function but the reality is that the function of the Southern Baptist Convention president has actually been pastoral for well the better part of the SBC's history going back to 1845 for one thing the SBC president gives a report to or a message to the Southern Baptist Convention and whereas in the early years of the SBC that was kind of a Business Report it didn't stay that way instead has become a major message it's been in almost every case now for many many decades it has been the president delivering an exposition of Scripture and a preaching exhortation to the Southern Baptist Convention well there as I said earlier it's not exactly the situation of a local church but it is a situation which is about as close to the local churches you can get by very design and it's a gathering of pastors largely not all they're laymen who are there too but it's in a context and where what's being done is going to be called preaching and there's a reason why it's been a pastor it has been many decades basically you look at my lifetime since a layman has served as president of the Southern Baptist Convention and it was unusual when it happened and and it was awkward when it happened and there there were people alive when I was in first in leadership in the Southern Baptist Convention who spoke of how awkward it was to have a layman it was Owen Cooper in that case in Mississippi as president of the Southern Baptist Convention because he he couldn't preach in many contexts where that's where exactly what they needed the president the SPC to do the other functional aspect is that the the president of the Southern Baptist Convention by by tradition and function generally preaches all over the Southern Baptist Convention and Southern Baptist churches not just bringing a report about the SPC but preaching fulfilling a preaching and in its own context an authoritative leadership kind of kind of role so if you're just looking at the constitutional responsibilities of presiding at a meeting and making appointments no I don't I don't think that's gender specific but when it comes to the actual function of what it means to be present the SPC I guess I'd have to say two things number one if being president the SPC means what it has meant for for many many decades now then I don't think biblically a woman should serve in that role if if Southern Baptists are going to redefine that role then then that will be a different thing but that really means the SPC we have two decisions to make I think in in that light or at least would be making two decisions whether it's admitting it or not I think it's it's very important that this be discussed by Southern Baptists apart from any kind of personality you know long before there's any kind of concrete proposal or nomination or anything this is a good thing for Southern Baptists to talk about and I was pretty certain that question would come and I'm gonna seek to be as consistent as I can be in answering that question answering it the same way in Dallas I don't ask that years ago when it would seem to be just you know a hypothetical no question and I I'm gonna seek to be very consistent and answering that question as we go on Allen from Louisville Kentucky how do you take your coffee I take it the way God meant it black don't add anything to it don't add to it don't take from it except caffeine when you have to know there's a good have a light-hearted question but I will tell you this I would say this is a testament to my dad and there's no judgment upon anyone who puts anything in coffee god bless you you had enough stuff just don't call it really coffee but nonetheless I drink coffee black because I was 16 years old my dad with for whom I was working who am i dad was just a wonderful Christian dad and he he made dad a verb and he took me to breakfast one morning and I didn't order coffee he ordered two cups of coffee and he put a black cup of black coffee in front of me and I said I didn't order coffee he said no I did for you and I said I don't drink coffee he said no you didn't drink coffee but you do now and he said so drink drink drink the coffee and he said drink it black well the first tip I had of it I thought it was horrible the second sip I thought it was slightly less than horrible and well within a matter of days I was very thankful for the gift of coffee and I won't say I'm thankful to my dad for teaching me to drink it black because it's uncomplicated I was teasing when I said it's the way God meant it to be drunk it's one of those interesting questions who was the first guy who looked at the bean and said let's roast that grind it up add hot water to it and see what happens I'm thankful he did though or she could have been a she either way I'm thankful for it Andrew from Cincinnati Ohio what pronoun should Christians working in the medical field used to refer to someone who identifies with a gender other than their biological one this is not a hypothetical question Andrew it's very difficult question and by the way I am besieged daily not an exaggeration and and besieged I don't mean that I don't want to receive them but I'm grieved by the number of questions I get day by day and week by week by teachers and the public schools people were just in the workplace or as you're asking in a medical field saying how in the world do I handle this my jobs at stake it's a tough world out there so only gonna get tougher for Christians what we can't do is lie and and so if if we're in a context where we have to say what we believe about a situation based on Scripture we have to say it and we have to suffer the consequences but when we're talking about people in a lot of contexts we are talking about someone for whom that's not the presenting issue and it's it's it's not it's not we're convictions on the line and the best illustration I know to give to this is if you're sitting next to someone say an unexpected place most easily to understand if you sit down next to someone on an airplane and and you strike up a conversation you never met them before and this person says I'm transgender or or or presents in such a way that you recognize there's a there's a gender issue very much at stake here and let's say that this person says what's your name and I say albert Mohler and let's say this person says my name is is Debbie and I'm thinking I really don't think that's what your parents named you but and you know the context I don't think it serves the cause of the gospel for me to say I don't think you're really Debbie as a matter of fact in that conversation I'm likely to to try to avoid using a pronoun to be honest because I don't want to mislead but at the same time I want to be able to have a conversation with them and I just think even the person who says you can never use someone's name like that I don't think in that context you're going to respond any differently and and I hope to have future conversations with people or at the very least I hope to leave a conversation I hope to get to the gospel and in that I can speak I can speak as clearly as I can about for instance God's purpose in creation and making us who we are how our identity is established by God first of all in creation and then how my identity is now us too published more than anything else ultimately and eternally in Christ and and and of course if the question comes up I'm gonna answer the question honestly so in a context like you're talking about in a medical context if someone hand you an x-ray and says this is her x-ray you don't have to argue with that that that's not a moral crisis for you if someone hands you the x-ray and says do you really believe that this person is a female even though the x-ray very clearly reveals male well there you got a different situation but in in most context that's that's not what's being demanded of you if what is being demanded of you and this is common now in many fields especially in the public schools if what is being demanded of you is to fully endorse the LGBTQ revolution the entire world view and to abdicate your conviction you can't do that but this is where I don't want to give you an absolute answer but rather to point you absolutely to your local church a faithful gospel Bible Church to help think these things through with you day by day and I really want to encourage this churches right now gospel churches Bible churches you need to right now start these conversations with the people in your church who are going to be facing this so that you can have already kind of mapped out in your mind ways that you think you're going to need to respond to this public school teachers My heavens just think about what's being put on them now the very same thing but what's being demanded of so many of them is just endorsement eager compromise of conviction total bending of the knee and surrender to the the moral sexual revolution before you get to that point hopefully churches are already helping members to think through this on the basis of the Word of God and the demands of Christ good question the questions are only going to get harder here from Facebook Troy and by the way on all these programs you can send in questions of course by going to ask anything live.com or in the right there in the comment section at Facebook how can a church strive for unity the to vast political differences of its members so that's an urgent question isn't it Troy you know one question is what what vast political differences are possible in a church we'd like to think we'd like to think that politics would never divide a church but I don't think that's true I'll be honest especially when the politics as we're witnessing in our time devolves into questions in which there are very clear partisan divides on a question as basic as the sanctity of human life now I'm not saying that a Christian can't be a Democrat I am saying that I don't understand how a Christian could ever vote for a party that would be absolutely committed as the Democratic Party is to the most extreme positions on abortion and it's really hard to know how to handle some of these things now when you say vast political divide is it over Canada a or B well that that could be a divide that shouldn't divide the church is it over marginal tax rates or or reform to the Social Security program or is it over foreign policy is it over how the American government should respond to the North Korean threat I don't think those issues are likely to divide a church so when you use the language of a vast political divide I think every church is going to have to think pretty clearly about what that means I mean for instance just just just to be clear let's go back to the LGBTQ revolution it's it's real and you could say for better or worse but let me be clear it's for worse the two political parties in the United States are moving and diametrically opposed positions on this and and this is something that's fairly new in American politics you go back to the 1960s there was a vast bipartisan consensus a lot of people say we need to get back to that well if you want to get back to that me tell you what you got to get back to you've got to get back to a situation which everybody knew what marriage was the union of a man and a woman you're gonna have to get back to when when the government was in the position of serving the the unborn rather than validating the murder of the unborn here's what you have to get back to you know there was you want that vast bipartisan consensus then guess what you're gonna have to undo the moral and sexual revolution you've been driving for the last several decades so number one I would say the obvious answer you know Troy is we have to preach the gospel and we've got to love each other within the bonds of Christ and and where there are issues in which Christians can disagree without violating Scripture then let's let's disagree as agreeably as we can let's not let those questions that shouldn't divide Christians and shouldn't constitute the belief basis of the church let's not let those things intrude into our fellowship but we're kind of past that point I hate to say right now in the United States where it's it's gonna be very very difficult given the the the baseline fundamental life-and-death issues that are at stake for these issues not to intrude in the local church we just have to pray that Christ will be preached his gospel clearly will be preached that the word will be preached and and that churches will be led by the Holy Spirit in the bonds of Christ to try to handle these things as well as redeemed human beings are capable of dealing with this it's gonna call it the best in all of us it's also gonna call for the best in all of us as Christians at what politically speaking are certainly not the best of times all right Jenny from Pennsylvania my husband and I are about to have come parents would love to know your best advice for sharing the gospel with young children oh what a sweet question Jenny I would say first of all be sure to raise your children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord be sure to raise them in the context of a gospel believing church so they're surrounded by the means of grace and they're surrounded by the warmth of true authentic Christianity all their lives so that you know frankly they would be raised in the comfort of being surrounded by wonderful Christian people who wouldn't suddenly speak of the gospel and of Christ and and and then teach them the Bible the second thing is I would say is is that live out your faith in front of your kids in such a way that it's not obviously something you do on Sunday it's just who you are and your kids will pick up on that they're going to observe that lift that out in front of them and and then actually share the gospel with your children and this means laying the foundation for the gospel means teaching them Bible songs and reading them Bible stories it means speaking a lot about Jesus who he is why he came what he did for us obviously as they get older now you can and we'll talk in greater detail but there's some wonderful resources out there I also want to say cata Kaiser children and use a catechism teach them a formal good wonderful biblical catechism in which they learn how to hear a question and to answer the question Christians have found these to be just tremendously helpful it comes right down to what you find in a passage like Deuteronomy chapter 6 where Israel's parents are told when your children ask you in times to come then you tell them this you tell them God we're God's people we obey Him because he brought us out of captivity to Pharaoh in Egypt he brought us out in order to bring us into this land of plenty him so teach them how to answer those questions drive it deeply into their hearts and then you're gonna pray that at that earliest moment when they are capable they will come to a saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ and profess faith in Him and confess him and yes you're gonna expect the president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary say then to be baptized well once they have made a public profession of faith in Christ and have come to know Christ as Savior so god bless you Jenny what a sweet question my guess is that as you're getting ready to to become parents you're more ready than you think as Christian parents asking such a kind wonderful question Nathan from Virginia I've been recently diving into the study of textual criticism from a pastoral perspective should pastors preach from disputed texts like the long ending of mark or he he says the woman caught in adultery in John the first 11 verses of John chapter eight well Nathan let me give you the best answer for that I taught John 8 1 - 11 - some days ago yeah 3rd Avenue Baptist Church in Louisville Kentucky now I did not teach it without talking about the text issues that are involved and and even pointing out that when you look at John 8 1 through 11 the text is not found in the oldest manuscripts that's true and and that's important and and the other thing to point out though is that John 8 1 to 11 rightly understood actually is in the flow of the Gospel of John coming right down to the witnesses Jesus when he says to the woman caught in adultery who accuses you that is quite technically jesus asking where are the witnesses against you and she says there aren't any in just a few verses Jesus is going to be confronted by leaders who say why should we believe your word there are no witnesses and Jesus says oh but if I'm here there are two witnesses I witnessed to myself and the Father witnesses to me and and of course the text expands so that there's nothing in John 8 1 through 11 that's problematic in any way so I taught it but I also made reference to the fact that there are textual questions about it and so that that's the model I would give when it comes to mark chapter 16 it's a little more complicated I I would still want the church to know what what is in that text but I would also deal with the text questions a straightforwardly and and clearly that text cannot be used as a justification for Christians going and handling snakes or drinking poison which even if there weren't any textual questions is not what's being committed in the text so you ask me how to do it I'll tell you at least the way I know how to do it is what I did just a couple weeks ago which is found in the resources section at albert Mohler calm under speaking and teaching look under my series in the Gospel of John and you'll see it alright David should church discipline be practiced when a church member openly supports abortion I would say yes yes I would definitely say that church discipline is invoked there because what are our convictions on abortion is it is it because we hold to a pro-life political position if so then no church discipline or do we believe it's a matter of life and death and it's a matter actually of being obedient to the command thou shalt not murder and this gets to where we have to answer the question do we really believe what we say about the nature of abortion so if we do and it really is the murder of the unborn which it is and is becoming horrifyingly more apparent so even with these radical moves towards late term abortion legalization and in states like New York and actions being taken in other states including Illinois comments made by the governor of Virginia then yeah I mean we asked after face what we're dealing with here so if you had a church member who was commending adultery or commending fornication or commending murder would you bring church discipline I think the answer is yes I would definitely bring church discipline in the case of a church member who is publicly supporting abortion or involved in abortion and this by the way is in the decay it's it's in some of the earliest teaching of the earliest Church where you have a formal call that no one who does such things is to be recognized as a brother or sister that again by definition that's what church discipline looks like Ryan from Elbridge New York has the wartime strategy Winston Churchill Douglas MacArthur or others influenced you as you've advocated your own theological battles Oh Ryan yes and I don't want to be self aggrandizing here I I don't I don't go around marching in a uniform talking to platoons but Winston Churchill in particular has been a fascination of mine since I was 13 and and I guess the eighth grade I was assigned to write a paper on a great historical person and could choose the person and I just quickly said Winston Churchill and it's become something of an obsession since then and my obsession I mean I've got oral paintings of him in my study and hundreds of books by and about him and and some other things as well Winston Churchill's kind of walked with me but and I mean in my imagination in in my public ministry and by the way that's healthy in the sense that I honor Winston Churchill I'm obviously inspired by Winston Churchill I mean kind of massively so but you know I also hold to a doctor to sin that helps to explain other aspects of Winston Churchill that that I would not emulate and and by the way I'm not gonna make Winston Churchill into a Christian believer when I don't think there's any real evidence he was know those who argue is an atheist or an agnostic I think they're arguing way outside of context I think he was a rather traditional Anglican of the noble class in the 20th century and of course he's really kind of a product of the late Victorian era but so he's not a theological mentor he's been a mentor encourage a mentor and tenacity a mentor in wordsman Smith wordsman ship and the task of being a wordsmith he's been a mentor to me in the role of history his understanding of the world is a Riyaz courage to face evil and to name it for what it is yes he's been a mentor but at the same time the man who is in my study visible more than any others Martin Luther Martin Luther's theological hero again I have a dr. Anderson that helps me to understand why there parts of Martin Luther I do not want to embrace and do not I'm also a Baptist so a Baptist can only you know admire Martin Luther the Lutheran so much but that's massively much and and and so those two figures one secular and and and one blessedly faithful they've kind of guided me I find others very fascinating and if I had time I could rattle off many others who inspired me Douglas MacArthur you I mean in a sense but I can still remember what what Dwight Eisenhower said about Douglas MacArthur when he was serving looking back at serving as one of his aides when he said yes he spent several years studying drama under Douglas MacArthur so these are real men and who stood astride history and and made a difference there's a reason why their biographies are still incredibly informative to us and inspiring in many ways and always thought-provoking that's why movies have been made of all three of these characters I just mentioned not only Luther but Churchill and Douglas MacArthur it's the reason why we're still fascinated with them but you know it's only Christians who can understand the utility and the limited utility of historical models we still believe in in models even as you find in Scripture patriarchs and matriarchs being held up look at a passage like Hebrews chapter 11 and in the secular world we still believe in it I still believe in in statues I still believe in in paintings and portraits I still believe in biographies and you come in my library you're going to know immediately who I find most interesting and from whom I have learned the most you're going to see their portraits you're gonna see their statues you're going to see their bus sitting on a table and unapologetically and and unapologetically given my biblical Christian Augustinian understanding of sin and human nature I can have a statue without buying the manhole and and and by the way the same thing will be true of me it is true of me now I hope there are parts of my life that people would would want to emulate I hope I hope every day my life becomes more faithful and what others would emulate but no one should believe that any historic person any single human being is without sin and one from whom negative lessons can be learned as well and that's an important thing to recognize have Christians have a framework for that recognition I don't know how in the world secular people live with this because everything has to turn out to be either celebrity or disaster for Christians those are not the alternatives mark from from Jamaica what is my view of the impeccability of Christ well I have a feeling that that's a bigger question than just asking about the impeccability of what of Christ but I think I know what you're asking could Christ have sinned and the answer is no given that and this is very important to Christology the person of Christ recognizing his true humanity and his true deity look at how the church has struggled to define that in his two nature's and so in his human nature he experienced genuine temptation dislike Hebrews 4 but he never ceased to be fully designed and as God he could not sin he would not send he did not sin so a lot of this is a hypothetical argument that frankly when I teach systematic theology I don't even find particularly helpful because questions of could and potentiality are the most dangerous theological questions could God have done this well the answer is that scripture really doesn't entertain hypothetical could questions related to God it's declarative telling us in detail who God is what he has done and and what he expects of us alright Andrew from West Virginia if jesus knew about his coming death and understood what he was going to accomplish why did he cry out my God my God why have you forsaken me I think Jesus went to the psalm because at that moment he was experiencing God forsaken us he was bearing in himself our sin the wrath of God poured out on our sin god's judgment came upon him and so this is not actually a problem in the biblical text at all just consider the suffering servant passages out of isaiah where we're told that the father struck him smote him he experienced the full pouring out of the wrath of God God's full judgment upon our sin and in that sense he was experiencing that God forsaken us of which the psalmist spoke but of course here's the point Jesus died for our sins he was buried and if that were the end of the story then God forsaken us will be the end of the story but it's not the end of the story that's why the Apostle Paul in first Corinthians 15 points out the fact that if Christ is raised from the dead then we are also with him raised from the dead and and and so it just points to the the necessity of holding the cross and the empty tomb together crucifixion and resurrection both of as of first priority according to the scripture and and Jesus for knew this he told his disciples this just consider what happens in Matthew chapter 16 where Jesus declares the church upon this rock I'll build my church and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it and Peter gave that confession now at the crisis son of the Living God and Jesus immediately tells them that he's to be handed over to the authorities and and killed and of course Peter says no Jesus is getting behind me Satan you know that they knew what he said he knew what was happening and furthermore you look at the Apostolic preaching consider a Peter when he says all these things happened according to the predetermined plan and purpose of God Jesus said that not because he was surprised on the cross but because he was bearing the god-forsaken us of our sin but he was not forsaken by the Father his atonement was received as payment in full for our sins and if we had more time we look in the New Testament and how best described I think of a passage like Romans three verses 21 and following explains how that is but then you also have Philippians 2 therefore God has highly exalted him and given him a name above every name so he goes from God forsaken us to the exaltation of God giving him the title Lord within three days three days that explain our salvation in some alright I'm gonna take one more question I know we're running out of time Jordan from Canada do you have advice for young preachers perhaps something you wish you had done as you were getting started and preaching specifically or maybe advice or something you did intentionally in the beginning stages of ministry to set you up well Jordan great question and God bless you for responding the call to Christian ministry yeah I mean every one of us who is kind of an old preacher would like to be a young preacher again or at least be able go back and talk to our young self and I did one thing fairly well that I wish I'd done much more extensively and and that is I wish I'd gone to hear some preachers that I could have gone to hear and would have learned from and would like to have said I went to hear them preach and I could have but I didn't and then they're dead I am glad that I had enough of an instinct like that I did go to hear many preachers I did kind of order my life to hear as many of the preachers I wanted to hear as possible but I could have heard a few that I didn't and I wish that I had now and that's not always possible I really wish I had heard Martyn lloyd-jones preach in person but chronologically that was just really not possible I mean it was as if as a 15 year old I went to London but that was pretty impractical but there were people closer at hand I could have gone to hear preach when I knew God had called me as a pastor and a preacher and I wished I had but that's kind of a thing I would just just add to you the other thing is I would I think I would probably keep a better journal just notes of my thinking over time I've done a lot of that but it's not as chronological as I would like it and so just last night I was looking for something and found my notes stuck where I didn't remember sticking them from a message I preached decades ago and it's interesting looking at that and I wish I'd kept a little more comprehensive notes on what I meant in a couple places but that's just it yet take more notes and and go hear more preachers and when I say take notes I mean yourself just your own thoughts but look the most important thing is preach the word in season and out of season and get everything you can get in preparation to preach and teach the Word of God find yourself a group of young pastors and preachers you want to hang around with and learn from and be accountable to go be a part of a faithful church and go build a faithful church and god bless you alright well there are so many other questions coming and we're gonna do this again very soon and we'll announce it just every way we can to say that that's coming I want to thank you for listening today to ask anything I want to remind you of resources that are available at albert Mohler comm and you'll find indeed their videos of asking anything's going way back live events before large crowds and and lots of these done on Facebook and even before that ask anything Wednesday on the old albert Mohler radio program they're all still archived and I want to thank you I want to thank for such marvelous questions for such such wonderful people I want to thank you for trusting me with your questions and I just wanted to say again I hope we've thought the booklet together I hope I've answered biblically and faithfully and if you can if you can ever help me by pointing out here's where you could be more faithful here's where you can be more biblical that would that would only be a gift and isn't it wonderful that Christians are given the assignment to think about these things together to look to scripture together so I wanna thank you for doing that again today and I'll look forward to meeting you next time for ask anything thanks for joining us you

Channel: Southern Seminary

Views: 9,052

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Keywords: Ask Anything, Ask Anything Live, Albert Mohler, SBTS, Southern Seminary, Politics, Ethics, Family, Faith, Religion, Apologetics

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Length: 68min 20sec (4100 seconds)

Published: Fri May 31 2019