Grace Agenda 2018 | Doug Wilson: Winsome Tartness

so if you do anything like I am when you go to conferences like this or you hear talks like this or you read books on this sort of topic you get all churned up inside and you want to go fight win and you want to go do something hit something and and so you you think to yourself where where shall we take our stand where should we gather for our you know run the flag up the flagpole wetware how what what I'm gonna do I will suggest that the place that we ought to take our stand I'll just select at random a small mission building in San Antonio and I want to run a few scenarios as we as we have our little band of valiant culture warriors in this mission building in San Antonio and the tens of thousands of adversaries gather around they have us completely surrounded and they ride up to the gates and they want to parlay they wanna they want to talk to us and they say we demand their Herald says we demand that you acknowledge the right of a boy to become a girl now there are different even with different ways evangelical spokesman could respond to that as and and all of them would be honorable all the responses that I'm gonna suggest to you are honorable responses and some would be more common than others pictures pick three different kinds of evangelical spokesmen defending the Alamo coming out to respond to the demand that we will let you go free if you grant the right of all your little boys to become little girls and that's just one little piece of insanity they might be to be demanding any number of other things but let's say that's what they demand one evangelical spokesman could come out and say we have considered prep we've carefully considered your demand and we regret to tell you that we cannot comply with it and it grieves us that we have come to this point that's an honorable response a second response would be we oppose you we will fight you we will never give it give in that's another honorable response a third response and the one I would commend the one I was inclined to would we have a spokeswoman come out and say to their Herald I don't think so Skippy now this is what my talk is about what was that Skippy part really necessary what what did you gain of other than a chuckle by yourself when you're going to bed that night did you really gain anything with that is is this attitude that comes out from time to time a personality quirk that you just can't help is it just should you seek counseling about it is there any it seems to me that all you needed to do was what those first two gentlemen did we opposed you we will fight you we are not going to comply in this with grief in our heart and you you're you're opposing you're you're opposing you're fighting you're resisting isn't that all that is necessary and I would submit that that's not true I'm very grateful for all the Christians who have resisted wonderfully bravely often against tremendous odds in their schools in their in their own small businesses whether the Vegas bakers are florists or whatever I I appreciate every form of resistance I really really do but the resistance is oftentimes simply resistance we oppose you and that's all we're gonna do what what do I gain with that one word Skippy why why is that word so important to you well it communicates something that the other responses do not communicate the other responses communicate opposition but that third response communicates I'm opposed to you I will fight you and furthermore I don't care what you think I don't care what you think you can oppose the revolution the sexual revolution you can oppose all the madness and yet deeply care what they think about you you can fight them and care and when you care they have a care in the wrong way they have a handhold they have something that they can use on you and when you communicate to them that you do not care that their their mockery their laughter their plausibility structures that they've created for themselves all over the world have no meaning for you and you think it's funny the Lord from heaven holds them in derision the Lord laughs now you've probably heard this saying they won't care how much you know until they know how much you care they won't care how much you know until they know how much you care now like all proverbs of that Saturday Evening Post variety it there's a lot of truth in it all right there and there are many instances where that proverb applies straight across and you really ought to think about whether they care whether they know how much you care before you spout off about how much you know when you're counseling a friend or when you're dealing with a difficult situation it is there is much truth in the proper but proverbs are proverbs they're not algebraic equations they're not axioms out of Euclid they're proverbs there are times when they they don't apply they don't fit very well because if Christians buy into I must care what they think I must care I must be invested in what they're doing and what they're saying I must care in there about their reasons they've got you they've simply got you Pastor Toby spoke yesterday about how much that graph made him happy as it does me it just makes me happy and he mentioned that there are many layers and here's another layer in that picture who cares looks like to me everybody in that picture cares except for one person one person does not care one person is not taking this with the seriousness that it deserves and therefore is the only person who's taking it with the seriousness it deserves do you see that he's not taking it with the serious seriousness they demanded deserves and that means he's taking it with another kind of seriousness so juxtapose these two sayings they won't care how much you know and let until they know how much you care and this from Isaiah 38 through 10 now go write it before them in a table and note it in a book that it may be for the time to come forever and ever that this is a rebellious people lying children children that will not hear the law of the Lord which which say to the seers see not and to the prophets prophesy not unto us right things speak unto us smooth things prophesy deceits when the words are smooth when the words are always smooth look for lies when the words are always smooth look for lies the people demand it prophesy don't don't tell me right things speak smooth things prophesy deceits like Ahab I don't like this prophet Micah he he's just got a negative attitude he always prophesized bad things well there's a certain kind of person that seeks out smooth prophesies smooth tales smooth narratives and then Christians who oppose what's happening they they feel a need to oppose it at the bottom line level but all the other Christians around them say okay you can oppose it you can still oppose it for now but make it smooth make it smooth it doesn't have to be a lie just has to look like a lie doesn't have to be like a false prophet it but it has to look like a a false prophet you have to come across as though you care what they think and we are so far into this that we really have to cultivate a demeanor of not caring now of course we want to be accredited big by God we want to be approved by God we want to care about the right things but we don't want to care in the wrong way and we have a generation of Christians who are in the culture war on the right side fighting for the right things caring in the wrong way alright so that's the that's the thing I want to get across in this talk one of the axioms that our stiff-necked generation has been able to establish in granite is the idea that love is to be defined as that which leaves all our nice emotions in a state of unrefined tranquility if you say or write anything that could be taken amiss or which clearly clearly qualifies as double-plus unnhhh ice then you then you are unloving or just one step up from that may plausibly be thought to be unloving well you may not be unloving we know you're loving but it didn't come across it didn't come across that way now of course for all true Christians all for all true Christians love really is basic love really is basic love is foundationally credible love is the greatest of that great triad faith hope and love love seeks not its own love is not envious and therefore hates socialism love sent the Son of God into the world to rescue the worthless God is everlastingly essentially and eternally loved so of course love really is good yay love amen we have a witness take nothing that I say after this point as dissing or disparaging love love is good you heard it from me love in fact in fact love is so good that everybody wants a piece of the action especially the Socialists and that is why we - we tend to define love as something that justifies and encompasses whatever we were already doing since love is good then love must be this and possibly that whatever we feel at the time is consistent with love we think whatever we feel must be loving because I feel it in the time such as ours at times such as ours if someone is ever guilty of what I'm pleased to be calling winsome tartness he might be called upon at some point to give a defense of it so here I am why do I think when some tart tartness is necessary well it communicates effectively the one thing that I think we're not communicating effectively which is that we care about what God thinks and not what man thinks so for faithful Christians love is to be defined first in all its aspects in the person and work of the Lord Jesus and love is defined propositional E as anything which proceeds from a whole heart and which is in conformity to the Word of God we love someone when we treat them lawfully from the heart we love someone when we treat them lawfully from the heart thus we turn to scripture to define the content of loving words and actions and we also turn to scripture to describe the atmospherics of loving words and actions the Bible defines the content of a loving word or action and the Bible describes the atmospherics the surrounding aroma of what we're doing the the atmospherics do matter but scripture is the only authority when it comes to evaluating those atmospherics you don't want to be kid brings a spelling test home and hands it to his dad and and he looks at the 67% scored this is what what happened here and child says well I don't think the teacher likes me well what is your evidence for this my son do you see all this red this is my evidence she marked all of these things wrong and dad is puzzled having been brought up in a different time he says but are they wrong maybe you don't love me either reminds me of that old BB King song nobody loves me but my mother and and she could be jiving too so what's what's happening is that you can't say well I'm going to the the victim the person who's going to play the victim the person is gonna go out ow that person is the authority on the atmospherics no no because that that's how you walk right into the trap that's that's how you present handles to the world to govern and steer you so you you do want to be under authority you don't want to be some renegade just pouring out scurrilous abuse on other people that's not what I that's not when some tartness that's not what I'm talking about but in order to not be that you've got to be under God's Authority under the authority of the word not the authority of the professional victim class alright we've gotten to the point where the microaggressions are a thing microaggressions are a thing you can we've gotten to the crazy crazy Looney Tunes level where someone some newscaster could get fired for saying why try sir on television or something you know and you say well yeah well it wasn't explicit and that wasn't the context and that's not what he meant but it was a microaggression that was an instance of white privilege all right so that if you submitted the atmospherics of that to scripture now in our generation in our generation the atmospherics the atmospherics have been taken over by feminist sensibilities and feminists feminine sensibilities in the church feminine sensibilities outside the church feminist sensibilities and a lot of the feminist sensibilities are making great inroads into the church and the feminine sensibilities as I'm going to argue in a minute our god-given and are crucial we need them but we need them in a particular place we don't need them everywhere so in our generation the atmospherics have been taken over by feminine sensibilities not only is this error prevalent in the church in many ways the church pioneered the error instead of defining love by a careful adherence of what to what God said to do the way he says to do it we want to define it in accordance with an undifferentiated set of a priori emotional commitments we think we know what love is when we are actually groping in the darkness of self-seeking we everybody assumes that they know what love is and and it's just out of court if you if you ever tell anybody that what they're doing is a sin and that God will judge it that's that's just right out of the right out of the starting blocks that's defined as unloving if you have any kind of coven ental connection to historic Christian teaching on certain sins that you are by definition unloving and it doesn't matter how nice you state it it doesn't matter if you leave off the skippy so when I say feminine sensibilities this is no slam on those sensibilities this is important when I say feminine sensibilities it's not a slam on feminine sensibilities it I'm perfectly happy to slam feminist sensibilities but not feminine sensibilities feminist sensibilities well there's some Christians who think that a biblical worldview and to be biblical on sexual issues all you have to do is make feminists mad and that's that can't be the standard because it's first it's way too easy radical obedience can't be that easy you know how many feminists does it take to change a light bulb that's not funny so I'm happy to be over again feminist sensibilities but feminine sensibilities are god-given God designed and essential in their appointed domain essential in their appointed domain but this is why the scriptures are so careful to police the boundaries of gender gender roles this is why phrases like appointed domain are so important so while feminine sensibilities are the hearthstone of home the cornerstone of nearly all human happiness they are close to useless on a battlefield all right now that anybody wants to say that I'm opposed to feminine sensibilities when I just said that the cornerstone of nearly all humans happiness they there is a place there is a time there is a situation where they're not helpful and so it is that when when women are intruded into a masculine domain like battle then either the nature of women will be transformed or the nature of battle will be transformed and frequently both alright so if you intrude women into combat then you're gonna transform you're gonna transform the women and you're gonna transform the battle and it's all going to be negative I'm speaking both of actual battle and of it's metaphorical cousins if it is the nature of women that is transformed then we are going to find ourselves dealing with harpies and this is just what the Planned Parenthood video revealed not just the dismemberment and sale of children I mean just think about that dismemberment and sale of the parts chopping babies up and selling the livers selling selling the parts and the organization that oversees this gets millions of dollars from the federal government and we're kind of 2 years after the revelation of this atrocity and they're still getting the money all right that it's just breathtaking the the wickedness involved is just breathtaking so it's not just dismemberment and sale of children but also the creation of ethical monsters in lipstick one of the things that was striking about those videos was 90% of the people involved were women selling baby parts and if it is the nature of battle that is transformed on the other hand then we have something resembling the lineup of cute European defense ministers all accessorized and fashionable gone are such old fashioned notions this victory or conquest or defeat of the enemy and they've been replaced with skirmishes extended negotiations and geopolitical pillow fights the same the same phenomenon happens in the realm of ecclesiastical Clemens if Calvin or Luther were to dismiss some false teachers as barking dogs say then someone within the contrived sensibilities of a Rachel held Evans might remind them that you catch more flies with empathetic honey than with vinegar boys boys she might say use your indoor voice catch more flies with honey catch more flies with honey than with vinegar but a kid in the back said yeah but I don't want to catch flies in the evangelical world we have certainly allowed the rising feminine sensibilities to transform the nature of what we think battle means long ago we admit it our mothers wives and daughters to the battlefield and so as noted above either the women will be transformed or the battle will be in the case of evangelicals since we like our women at least to act sweet it has been the nature of our fighting that has been transformed and that explains in part why we are getting our butts kicked if the Lord if the Lord were to raise up someone who started fighting effectively not just on the right side but started fighting effectively the very first thing that would happen is that the little old ladies of both sexes would start complaining about it [Applause] the noise of the guns is unsettling and the heat'll heat of battle is disconcerting people in the nearby towns might misunderstand it we don't want to ruin our effeminate testimony they might think we're fighting them and so it is that nobody wants to point out the obvious fact and say that those who stand those who can't stand the heat should get back in the kitchen now allow me to pause for a moment for that was not an accident allow me to pause for a moment so that reactions to that sentence might cinch my point a couple of turns tighter than it already was not only do we police one another this way oh he made a kitchen joke okay you're chopping up babies and selling them across the country you're man you're marrying one dude to another you're doing all this crazy crazy it's crazy time over there and and what do you start ventilating over what do you start hyperventilating over these little micro things not not only was it a kitchen joke it was a good kitchen joke now let me let me give a couple a few more examples I mean I'm gonna give five examples out of scripture that will expose our duplicitous cowardice the first three the first three examples from Scripture are gonna fit right in with our current sensibilities but the last two are guaranteed to jar okay three three of them are gonna fit right in yeah yeah preach it and then the last two you're gonna say I go and if we really contemplate the last two an unsettling thought might descend upon us with regard to the verse three maybe we don't understand them either second Timothy two 24 and 25 and the servants of the Lord must not strive but be gentle unto all men apt to teach patients patient in meekness instructing those that oppose themselves if God peradventure would give them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth number two Titus 3:1 and to put them in mind to be subject to principalities and powers to obey magistrates to be ready to every good work to speak evil of no man to be no brawlers but gentle showing all meekness unto all men but I unto you love your enemies bless them that curse you do good to them that hate you and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you Matthew 5:44 now one of the reasons I include verses like that in a talk like this or if I'm writing something up on it one of the reasons I include verses like this is that if I'm corresponding with someone or talking with someone who came to me to admonish me about the Skippy joke they are often surprised I think to find out that I realized that these verses are in the Bible they're in the Bible they're authoritative they are God breathed and we must live this way this is this is absolute truth from God this is the way we must be checked we say all these we've kept from our youth up we are the sweetest Christians we know we take pride in it well here's the last to first Corinthians 16:22 if anyone has no love for the Lord let him be accursed our Lord come someone has no love for the Lord let him be accursed or how about Galatians 5:11 through 15 but if I brothers still preach circumcision why am I still being persecuted and that case the offense of the cross has been removed I wish those who unsettle you would emasculate themselves for you were called to freedom brothers only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh but through love don't use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh but through love serve one another for the whole law is fulfilled in one word you shall love your neighbor as yourself but if you bite and devour one another watch out that you are not consumed by one another well this is just plain weird allow me to paraphrase if someone doesn't love Jesus the way we do then goddamn that guy is that now let's be honest let's be frank with one another you can be frank with yourself inside your heart but does that jar if anyone doesn't love Jesus then goddamn that guy that's what Paul said you know it doesn't love the Lord then let him be accursed if someone else says that water baptism is essential to salvation then we wish that teacher would go drown himself in a sacramental bucket again a paraphrase the message we we hardly wish this we why would I wish that some priest wing would go drown himself in a sacramental bucket why would I wish that I will do wish that because of our deep conviction that love is essential that's what paul says love is essential the whole law is fulfilled in the requirement to love our neighbor without love where would we be biting and devouring is utterly inconsistent with our calling in Christ and then we go hmm something's not fitting here Paul's dealing with circumcircle Asian party in Galatian in Galatia and they're saying that you've got to be circumcised to be saved and Paul said I wish they would go the whole way and cut the whole thing off why because love is so important now do you you've got two pieces in your hand you've got to put these things together you've got to put them together either the Apostle Paul was a high hypocrite radically inconsistent or else we do not know what biblical love is all right and let me just intrude something else off the side here people say well I think Paul Paul taught what he'd taught about women women and holding office in the church because he was so enthralled to the customs of his age he was just trapped by the surrounding greco-roman culture he was just trapped in that and then I look at the Apostle Paul who probably out of all of Western history is the one individual who demonstrated unflinching radical willingness to confront all the customs of his age and was chased around the Mediterranean for his pains stoned multiple and you know it had all gotten all kinds of and the people the people who are swept along by the currents of our age are accusing him of compromise on that point when the only reason they're saying what they're saying is that they're their slaves to the to the doctrine of the moment so either Paul was a high hypocrite radically inconsistent or we don't know a biblical love is we don't know what it looks like given the piercing clarity of Paul's scriptural vision the office he was entrusted with and the poured out sacrificial nature of his dedicated life the former option is highly unlikely and for believing Christians excluded by definition that leaves the second option which is that we don't know what love is we think we know what love is we think it's being nice and polite and sugary but that's not how the Bible defines love given our generations firm and unshakable conviction that we have the ability to grave the in grave the Lord's Prayer on the head of a pin using no tools other than a couple of wet sponges the conclusion that we are the ones who are self deceived that conclusion begins to commend itself with no little force in his prophetic book the abolition of man and it's a prophetic book it is andryush that a man together with that hideous strength they were written there they're a team read them reread them it's just prophetic is the only word I know to describe it in his prophetic book the abolition of man CS Lewis points out that the head rules the viscera through the chest through disciplined hard hardened and educated sentiment men with chests right the the head rules the viscera the chest because we have abandoned true education education that that educates and disciplines and trains the the sentiment the right sentiments we've abandoned that kind of education for several generations and the DAO before that on one end of culture we are dealing with insanity masquerading as rationalism and on the other end of it emotional hooliganism masquerading as love if you ask me to connect the dots the evangelical world is being held hostage by the emotional hooligans love is defined for us not by Moses not by Samuel not by David not by Isaiah and not by Christ but rather by a decoupage version of that foot prints poster Rob Scheck arrives around our city walls taunting Jehovah God and we respond with emotional to giver say ssin coupled with a bad case of the shakes so let us take stock of where we are as a nation our silver is dross our gold is rusted through our courts are corrupted and the words of constitutional justice are pulled inside out Mammon runs like sewage down the gutters of our streets we throw over a million children a year into the maw of Molech we sell their parts on the open market we provide federal subsidies to the people who sell these baby pieces anyone who objects to this travesty and any anyone else who anyone else with them are vilified as haters right now I want you to imagine yourself in Nazi Germany fighting to save Jews from being gassed and being successfully tagged by that society as someone who's filled with venom and hate that's exactly where we are that's where we are and this is just mind-boggling we're vilified as haters because we're trying to stop them from chopping of the baby's anal intercourse is celebrated with parades the word pride is draped all over it and we waived the sign of God's promise never to flood the earth again overall these carnal proceedings orgies are encouraged in the streets cops standing by the godly are targeted as being wicked and the wicked are declared righteous the wicked are declared to be holy the priests of Vail dance all around the altar cutting themselves with knives they leap upon the altar and still no fire but someone might opine the real problem in that last episode was Elijah's failure to recognize an opportunity for a true teachable moment how many chances for downstream coexistence and interfaith dialogue were rendered impossible by Elijah's simplistic and very binary approach to a very complex issue we refer to issues that required a great deal more nuance than he was obviously prepared to use and really to introduce scatological polemics at a moment like that banging on the door maybe her gods constipated which is what he was doing to introduce scatological polemics at a moment like that was simply beyond counterproductive not to mention killing his fellow theologians that the brook kisaan afterward that puts a real damper on interfaith dialogue they're not gonna come back next time you you rise it so the real problem for evangelicals in short is now found whenever anybody successfully reveals what the world is actually doing whether through preaching teaching taunts letters stories jibes parables or jokes because such actions thereby reveal what the evangelical church is not doing when we reveal what the secular world is doing and it starts to dawn on us what they're doing at the the scale that they're doing it how manifestly appalling it is from coast-to-coast that and and this is happening in a nation that has millions of Christians millions of Christians so what happens is if someone starts to challenge the bad guys and challenge the bad guys in a way that reveals what the bad guys are actually up to this reveals indirectly what the evangelical church is not up to but ah someone else might say your problem Wilson is that if someone simply jostles your elbow you start writing about our cosmic fiend assay kleh saying the end of the century you know the decadent into the century saying that these dire circumstances warrant a hailstorm of Jeremie ads each one tinged with blue fire you you fulminate about how Western civilization is going to a pack of emaciated scavenger dogs with all our prophets and seers puking on their icy Anik banqueting tables but then having pressed this grim reality upon us you act like a wisecracking spectator as though you just got your bag of popcorn and drink you act as though the sinking of the West into darkness was just another episode of Mystery Science Theater from that hideous strength these appeals to the passion and emotions said McPhee are nothing to the purpose I could cry as well as anyone else this moment if I gave my mind to thing to do is fight within the constraints of God's holy law to fight as effectively as you know how and in order to fight effectively you must be willing to use all the weapons that God has ordained including but not limited to sanctified ridicule sanctified ridicule is found in Scripture all the way through if we want to talk like the Bible if we want to talk like Jesus if we want if we want to be biblical people then we have to be biblical people all the way across and all the way down we have to and someone's gonna say yeah but yeah Jesus in Matthew 23 he did it he let the Pharisees and scribes have it right he just whoa to you scribes Pharisees hypocrites who told you you were going to hell you're whitewashed tombs do you know but they say yeah that is in Matthew 23 but Wilson or you you're not Jesus now that's it's a slam dunk argument isn't it it really is and I say yes and that's why I have no intention of loving my enemy either I'm not gonna turn the other cheek you know why you just gave me a get-out-of-jail-free card I'm not Jesus I'm not Jesus I don't have to do anything he said I don't have to imitate him in anything am I gonna screw it up if we yeah of course but we're still disciples we're still followers we're supposed still supposed to figure out as best we can how to imitate him how to follow him how to how to immerse ourselves in Scripture and duplicate what the scripture does to our circumstances as best we can so yeah will it be imperfect yeah my love for the poor is going to be imperfect but that's not there's no reason to not love the poor that's theirs there's no reason to - there's no reason to refuse to forgive your enemy simply because you're not going to do it well the first time and there's no reason not to you sanctified satire simply because you're not Jesus that doesn't wash of course we're not Jesus but we're Christians were Christians and that means that we should submit ourselves to every man does not live by bread alone man does not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God every word not just some of them not the ones that we cherry-picked not the ones that they made you memorize when you were a kid and not and and it would include the ones that they hid from you that were in the Bible you remember that experience in high school when you were reading through the Bible in your for the very first time all the way through and you found out what Samson was doing in Gaza this was not on the flannelgraph God's Word is our Authority now people will say people come to you when you're when you get when you engage and you actually are engaging effectively people will come to you with two arguments these are fellow Christians oftentimes well-meaning and sincere and they'll come to you first brother I don't think what you're doing is christ-like and you say well I was quoting Jesus there and that's a shorthand form of saying if they say I don't think what you're doing is biblical the response should be that's a wonderful objection let's sit down and have a Bible study if someone says if someone comes to you with an open Bible you should open your Bible - great let's sit down and have a Bible study what does the how does the Bible engage with wickedness how does it how does how does the Prophet Amos deal with the women in northern Israel come now you cows of bation the earrings the size of softballs you say to your husbands bring me a drink you cows of bation now was that productive all the way through the scripture lists alright let's have a Bible study there's there plenty of passages we'll look in the profits we'll look at Jesus we'll look at the apostles we we and and it's amazing how often we think we don't recognize what the Bible is doing because we've put three layers of holy speak varnish on top of a high gloss holy speak varnish you know the kind of thing where we decorate the Bible with you know the sanctified customs that we adorn it with now brethren let us pray and then we read this melodious King James English and it just flows and and then you say you know what Jesus just did you know what Jesus did when he said you said you're you Pharisees you strain out a gnat and you swallow a camel I mean draw a picture of that you're picking the gnat out of your cup of tea and you're the camel in there that you miss Jesus is a cartoonist have you ever thought of Jesus as a cartoonist Jesus is a caricaturist he's a glorious caricaturist the Pharisees that look at this guy look at this guy standing on the street corner blowing a trumpet I'm gonna I'm gonna give some money now do you think anybody literally was doing that well maybe and if but even so he was making fun of it one time years ago many years ago I had to take a trip somewhere and Nancy and the kids stayed home and they went up to coeur d'alene where their folks were and they attended another church and for the weekend and and I flew back and they picked me up at the airport we were driving back home and Nate was just a little kid preschool and they were telling me about about this strange experience at this other Church and Nate excitedly told me from the back seat dad there was a Pharisee there keep your eye on the road just keep on driving so I say oh really you know yeah son how did you know there was a Pharisee there he gave a lengthy prayer so you read the Bible read the Bible without all the gloss read the Bible without all the interpretation Jesus called names Jesus made fun of their clothes or Jesus Jesus did all kinds of things that we think that that's not hmm my goodness all right so that's one objection it's not it's not biblical then the other thing is well it's not effective it may be biblical technically you may be within your ice it may be biblical but I think you're turning more people off I think you're I think this is not effective it's not not effective stop you need to stop it in fact we're going to organize a huge campaign to get you to stop this ineffective thing you're doing somewhere in the proceedings I'm beginning to suspect that I'm being critiqued not because I'm being ineffective but because I'm being effective right they're trying to they're not trying to stop me from doing something that means nothing they're trying to stop me from doing something that's scoring some hits some things are getting through so the thing to do is to fight and within the constraints of God's holy law to fight as effectively as you know how and in order to fight effectively you have to be willing to use everything every lawful instrument that is available to you and use it as best you can if there's one thing that this overstuffed humanistic project cannot really stand up to is the gimlet of satire the pretense to take an example of at random that all the boys that all the boys should be just as eager to date a eunuch as they are eager to date a pretty girl is not exactly a defensible Fortress right you have these on facebook saying these people are just full of bigotry because they don't want to date me after this transition I'm going through does anybody can is anybody willing to point out how lame this position is it's kind of like Disneyland fiberglass Castle trying to hold out against Tamerlane and all his words but alas although there are millions of us evangelical Christians the wrath of Tamerlan is not a phrase that comes to mind the only reason the Disneyland castle of secularism is still standing the only reason and it's a they don't have a defensible position they don't have a defensible world's youth it doesn't hang together it makes no sense it's made out of fiberglass and jeez we serve Jesus Christ who's enthroned at the right hand of God the Father who's been given all authority in heaven and on earth and he's given us a gospel and he's given us an imperishable world he worked he's told us to go out and disciple all the nations he's given us all that and what they have is this lame set of Van vain speculations that they've cooked up and the only reason that this has been able to stand for longer than 10 minutes has been because of our unbelief the issue is not their unbelief the issue is our unbelief so though there are millions of us the wrath of Tamerlan is not a phrase that comes to mind the only reason the this Disneyland castle of secularism is still standing is because the catapults of evangelicalism have been launching wadded-up balls of cotton candy the size of basketballs big just sticks to the side of their thing so the man who takes on this task or those who support those who have taken up this task the people who support those who engage effectively winsome lee and with appropriate tartness where necessary if you're that person or if you're supporting that person or if you're backing that person up you understand that the person the people doing this are not in this task because they're messing around just for grins to take another phrase another phrase from that hideous strength from McPhee right I could cry as well as anyone else this moment if I gave my mind to it McPhee looks up and it says it looked like he had the he had the he should look like he had a hundred coven enters in his eyes what that means is that we know the truth we've been given the truth we've been given the gospel we serve a risen Lord Jesus came back from the dead the the all the established respected authorities killed him and it didn't work they killed him if that was if they ever had an opportunity an opportunity for victory it was at that moment Jesus called it their hour the hour of darkness that was their hour if they if they were going to win it all that was where they would have won but they didn't he came back from the dead and he told us to tell everybody that and he told us to live in terms of it and we just basically we need to start living as though a horse laughs is possible we started you know I'm sorry no that's not gonna work no that's not how God made the world no I'm sorry water doesn't run uphill no I'm sorry you can't put lipstick on a camel and make it look good sorry and so well you then add actually not sorry sorry not sorry we have somewhere to stand and they don't we have the truth and they don't we have arisen Lord and they don't we have a universe that makes sense and they don't they the only thing they have is the ability to lie to you and intimidate you but it's all lies it's all it's all propaganda if the Christian Church comes is given the great gift of Reformation and revival if we are given that gift which is the gift of seeing what we all acknowledge to be true already we all acknowledged on paper these things are true we know the Great Commission is true we know that Jesus is Lord you know it all we affirm all these things but if the eyes of our heart are enlightened as Paul prayed for the Ephesians if we open our eyes and we see see them hear hear them acknowledge acknowledge them if it becomes vivid to us there is absolutely no way there's absolutely no way that the forces of secularism could stand up against a revived Church our Father and God we thank you for your goodness to us we pray that you would help us as we meditate on these things give us places to apply we pray in Jesus name Amen you [Applause]

Channel: Canon Press

Views: 27,962

Keywords: canonpress, christchurch, dougwilson, graceagenda

Id: mHRhb9baoEY

Length: 52min 19sec (3139 seconds)

Published: Fri May 18 2018