Paul Washer | Q and A | G3 conference 2013

the questions we have this evening have been pre-submitted over the past six months and we will begin this evening by asking brother paul washer a question one of the questions was submitted to the website and asked the question if substitutionary atonement is the true biblical doctrine does it provide any room for a universal or general atonement as many free will baptists believe that jesus died for the whole world without exception i would like to go ahead and just start with a more difficult question could you repeat that would you like for me to repeat it yes sir okay here's the question the question is this if substitutionary atonement is a is the true biblical doctrine does it provide any room for a universal or general atonement as many free-will baptists believe that jesus died for the whole world without exception this is something i'm going to answer it in a different i'm going to answer by maybe not even answering it and here's why when i take a doctrine like substitutionary atonement which is talking to me primarily about a glorious salvation and a glorious death reveling in all that that includes and then to see people that the only time they ever talk about it is in a debate over calvinism it really upsets me um i believe in particular atonement i'm a five-point calvinist or a five-point spurgeonist or whatever you wanna but this is just my point some people will take a doctrine and just grind with it when this thing is actually used it's best used proclaimed to the masses of a christ who died and a great call to all men to repent and believe so that would be my answer amen any follow-up from the panel i think that i will say this i think that is very wise answer i think that i fully agree with that as a pastor that i see a lot of people that want to make a platform of debate over issues and we should not do that let me give you another example even john 3 16 the purpose of john 3 16 is not to argue particular atonement general atonement or anything else it's to proclaim a glorious savior and sometimes i feel like we just on both sides take texts and instead of talking about just the beauty of what he's really trying to speak forth we use it to grind out some theological issue there are other verses in the scriptures to do that with we should use each verse according to the purpose for which it was written very good dr lawson the next question comes to you earlier you spoke about the importance of expository preaching and today many people consider themselves expositors but they are not true biblical expositors if you could give us just an overall simple definition for expository preaching yeah um i would draw it from scripture itself um first timothy 4 13 uh until i come give attention to the public reading of scripture to exhortation and to teaching those three parts i think is really the engine that drives expository preaching you read the text you read the text you teach or explain the text and then you exhort with the text all three of those components i think are necessary to reduce it down to two from a text would be second timothy 4 2 preach the word i think that's what expository preaching is i think both words are important in expository preaching i think one without the other leads to extraordinary imbalance all exposition and no preaching you end up with an egghead church all cognitive um all kind of like what paul is talking about here just wanting to argue and debate points that type of thing stoic personalities uh who's really almost their personality has been neutered it's just all cognitive it's just all exposition the other extreme is equally dangerous if not worse all preaching and no exposition it's like the old thing weak point yell here um there it's just all heat it's all emotion um it's all ranting and raving and and there's no substance no content whatsoever but when you marry the two exposition and preaching it's like gas and a fire in expository preaching expository is the adjective preaching is the noun and so expository describes the kind of preaching that it is the word expository carries the idea of being explanatory explaining as we said about calvin the authorial intent the literal meaning to the audience to whom it was first addressed you get inside of a text of scripture the meaning of the text is the text and tell you the meaning of the text you do not have the text and so it's explaining in a very rational logical cognitive way what god meant by what god said but it is to be presented and delivered with all of the elements of of preaching which is to herald which is to declare which is to proclaim and with all of the elements of preaching to to exhort to console to comfort to rebuke to reprove to invite to summons to challenge to confront to convict the puritans used to say you want a fire in the pulpit and a fire gives off both light and heat there is the light of exposition there is the heat of preaching and does both of those elements must be present and i find that most men are top-heavy in one direction they're very brilliant expositors but they really are more lecturers uh they're just talking commentaries uh or men are very gifted in public proclamation they just are very shallow and they have very little to say very little doctrinal content very little theological fiber but when you bring both of those elements together you have a sharp two-edged sword um and i do not believe that there is any more presentation of truth that is more powerful than expository preaching i think everything else is a handmaiden and that expository preaching actually reigns in the life of the church very good brother david miller the next question comes to you and some folks uh when you preached your first sermon with the sermon yesterday they noticed that you did not use notes and you memorized the text of scripture and the question is this to someone who memorizes scripture on an ongoing basis what counsel would you give to someone that would like to memorize large lengthy sections of scripture well it's much easier to memorize in a contiguous passage rather than memorizing a verse here and a verse over yonder often there's a story line and so my pattern has been to start out in chapter 1 verse 1 and analyze that verse just simply break it down and psalm number 1 verse 1 blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly that's one complete statement so i memorized that i see that there are three statements in verse 1. he standeth not in the way of sinners and he sitteth not in the seat of the scornful now your first objective in memorizing scripture is to learn what's being said otherwise you might as well be memorizing a sears roebuck catalog there there's no real virtue in the ability to memorize unless you're going to memorize something that's worthwhile and what greater motive could we have than to hide the word of god in our hearts and so i say i see there are three statements here i say them to myself i would often say them out loud so that my ear hears them and when i have gotten those correctly i move on to verse two and there are two statements there but his delight is in the law of the lord and in his law doth he meditate day and night now it doesn't take a genius to figure out there are two statements in that verse and so i memorized them in this profound uh and and when i've gotten those two verse statements i go back to verse one and i uh quote down through verse two and i just keep adding a verse and the first thing you know you've got several verses perhaps a chapter and if you stay with it uh you can memorize lengthy portions of scripture and guess what one of these days you'll be in a circumstance where the spirit of god will bring to your memory just what you need for that situation that's the value of memorizing scripture don't memorize so that you quote scripture in front of other people people make much of this because i do it that way i do it that way out of necessity i simply cannot handle the scriptures hold the book and so i quote the passage but the reason you memorize scripture is for your own personal sanctification sanctify them through the truth thy word is true dr balkam the next question comes to you and it was written by a single woman and here was her question she says she says i'm a single woman who desires to marry a godly man and i am wondering where the standard should be set she writes it seems like there are so many christian boys but a lack of godly men ready to lead a family i know i will be marrying a sinner she says i don't expect perfection but when i see these boys consumed with video games and boyish things i wonder where the standards should be set when choosing a spouse that makes me sad you know it really does it makes me sad and um i i hear that question a lot too much there does seem to be a famine in the land not just the word of god but in the way of biblical manhood as well and um let me let me just give you these four things i think they'll be easy to remember the four ps i i call them that a man has a responsibility to be a priest and a prophet and a provider and a protector the priest represents his people before god so this is a man who's a spiritual leader this is a man who's a man of prayer this is a man who's a spiritual man the prophet represents god before the people this is a man who knows the word of god who instructs in the word of god he has an obligation to wash his wife with the water of the word to bring up his children and the discipline and instruction of the lord he has to know the word of god in order to do that the provider sees that his people have what they need and so job is more than just a book in the bible he needs to have a work ethic and he needs to be a whatever it takes kind of man a man who says i'm going to do what i need to do in order to provide for those for whom i'm responsible and the last one is a protector a protector is one who puts himself between um his people and that which would harm them um whether that be physical or spiritual or technology and you know things of that nature um he's a protector and sometimes people ask the question well you know what which which should you shoot for um the guy who you wouldn't be scared with if you were in a dark alley or a guy who has sense enough not to take you down the dark alley to which i respond yes but but in all seriousness that that involves wisdom a man who's not a fool a man who's not going to who doesn't who doesn't bring trouble and call trouble but a man who doesn't run from trouble um again these are just basic things um but but those four p's just help to keep that in mind priest prophet provider protector a godly man a christian man um that that's that's what we're looking for um now let me say this and i appreciate the way that the question was worded you know we're we're not looking for uh men who are perfect because there are no men who are perfect and there are some women who can't find a man because the man that they're looking for died on the cross and ascended to the right hand of the father and there's not another one like him so there's that um so we're we're not we're not looking for that but we're looking for a man who understands these things who is in pursuit of these things and who bears some evidence that that these things are are um are true of him um and we can we can we can see that um and i think we ought to pursue that and let me just encourage you two ways women um one way i want to encourage you is that there there are men out there like that there there really are men out there like that and the second way i want to encourage you is this god found a wife for adam when he was the only human being on earth your chances are better than that amen anyone else like to add to that at all um fathers this is a wake-up call for you the coach is not going to teach your boy to be a man the church is not going to teach your boy to be a man probably your wife is not going to teach him to be a man and if the other boys around him teach him to be a man you're going to have a lot of trouble let me just give an example i have two boys one is just turned 11 and the other is six neither one of them know how they got on this planet except that god blessed a marriage so they're innocent in that sense but at the same time both of them have been praying for their wives since they were about six and they do not giggle about it it's very serious when they're schooled they're told that there's a reason why they're doing mathematics there's a reason why they're in okinawa and karate there's a reason why they're doing what they're doing they're being trained to be men so that they could br embrace manhood as quickly as possible and take a wife one of the things one of the reasons for immorality growing so rampant in this country is the fact that young men used to mature and marry quite early so now we have a thing where if young men are awakened to the opposite sex when they're let's say eight years old and then they don't marry until they're 28 they're fighting a natural god-given desire in a very corrupt and fallen world fathers the moment that boy hits the ground he's yours he's yours and it's to teach him and do not count on anyone else doing that this is your job that he become a mature man in the lord and in all other things dr beaky the next question is for you and you have spoken and written about the subject of family worship and if you were to instruct pastors in this in this congregation this evening how to further that cause within their congregation especially the men to lead their families in family worship what advice would you give them yeah it's a great question thank you for it the first advice i give is they've got to be absolutely convinced of the importance of themselves so i'm a pastor i'm a theological teacher i'm an author etc etc but the most important thing i do every single day is family worship that's the center of my life i fail here i feel like i failed everywhere second thing a pastor needs to do is he needs to convey to his people what the scripture says about family worship and i don't have time right now to lay that out before just to say this scripture basically says we should do four things every day with our family we should read the bible we should talk to our children about the bible we should pray with them and psalm 118 verse 15 we should sing with them daily the tense in the tents of the righteous so those four things go on in family worship every day and once we grasp the importance of this that every single day we're talking to our children at least once a day and you multiply that times from 0 to 20 years of age you've got 7 000 opportunities to talk to your children about manhood and and womanhood and and everything in life from the scriptures and so talking about uh intimate things giving them the birds and bees and so on comes very naturally if you every single day are talking to them about the whole council of god so it has this huge benefit of having open communication with your children you need to convince your congregation of that preach a sermon on it more than one sermon refer to it in your sermons on family visitation if your church does that where the elders go out into the churches into the families and ask questions or you do it as a pastor ask the fathers if they're doing it help them do it give them a good short book on which to do it my little book on family worship actually sold better than anything else i've ever done in my life i think put that in their hands ask them to read it it's a one-hour read or other books like it and then go model it for them if their families aren't doing it just say come on over and have supper in my home and let them be included in your family worship that's the way the puritans used to do it they bring the families into their home they model it for them the father would go back and do it the father wanted more help the minister said from the pulpit i'll come to supper at any of your houses and lead your family and family worship to show you how to do it so that's another thing you can go to their house and show them how to do it but the main thing is that you make sure every single father is doing family worship that's part of your supervision in the church of jesus christ and that's absolutely critical did you know that in the 1640s at the westminster assembly the puritans decided that if a father was not engaging in daily serious prolonged family worship with his family every day he would be admonished and then censored if he refused to change he'd be forbidden to come to the lord's supper that's how critical this was in the puritan mind and we've lost that and you know life is so incredibly busy and we have all good intentions we're going to talk to our children about serious things but before you know it the whole week is gone and family worship is a way of gathering around the word every single day bringing them issues of life and death so your conscience knows you need to do it the bible commands you the lord jesus is honored by it we must do family worship thank you can i just ask a follow-up i wonder if uh maybe dr beaky maybe someone else could just give some father out here is thinking okay i've got to do this how would you tell him to do it tonight or tomorrow if he just really wants to start this how should he get started what should it look like just very practically yep he'd go home he said to his wife and his children i'm sorry god forgive me you forgive me please i've been neglecting this we need to start and what we do is we start we'll just start reading the bible you each have a bible on your lap you read these 10 verses you each read a couple verses we share in the reading and then the father just talks about two or three or four practical lessons from those verses and then you pray together the father prays the beginning of family worship each of the children take turns praying at the end of family worship and then you sing and start out small start out with a five minute family worship and build it up to maybe 15 minutes if you have young children if you have older children maybe 20 minutes and just say to the children this is non-negotiable this is as important as eating if your son doesn't want to sing you say well that's quite simple no singing no food they'll sing dr b could i can i get you to share the two-minute version of your personal experience with your family your mom and dad in family worship well what happened when my when my parents said their 50th anniversary is all five of his children agreed to speak a word of thank you to both my father and to my mother and we wouldn't wouldn't talk ahead of time about what we were going to say but the most important thing we wanted to thank them for and we actually taped all this and it was just incredible because all five of us thank my mother for her secret prayer life because it was just awesome and all five of us thank my dad for for family worship um particularly the sunday night family worship my dad had a special family worship on sunday night where he read pilgrim's progress to us every single week and he'd he'd read for about 30 minutes but we could interrupt him and ask questions and often he'd set the book down and he'd just be weeping talking to us about how the holy spirit leads the people of god and i remember when i was converted like i was 14 or 15 i would stay up with him sometimes till midnight and beyond just he and i talking about the spirits leading the life of a christian we'd be asking what does that mean in the house of interpreters wasn't mr talkative talking with them how did christian and faithful relate here what does that mean spiritually i learned so much experientially and practically about vital christianity from my dad in family worship it it formed my for my life and my brothers my sisters maybe to a little lesser degree can say the same thing amen thank you tim the next question comes to you and it's in regards to your book that you wrote the next story and you provided helpful information on how to control technology rather than allowing the technology to control you could you give just a few helpful you might say pointers to help us yeah let's help to look at technology to just understand technology doesn't exist in some perfect world it exists in this world and so the same technology that will be a blessing to us will be a curse to us if we allow it so we have to understand technology is battling us and it's the sort of thing where we create technology in our image and then it tries to return the favor to us so we make something we think we need and over time it reforms us in its image and so we're always just trying to use these things well and use them wisely how do you battle technology well how do you what was the the exact question how do you yeah it's uh the exact question was provide some helpful insight on how to control technology rather than allowing our technology to control us so i think that's just being very very deliberate with it as much as possible so one thing we do at least a week out of every year we turn off everything we go away we go to the woods usually somewhere in a state park in virginia and everything's gone everything's off that just shows us a our dependence on our technology and b shows us just how little we actually need it and how we actually can't exist without it and amazingly the world goes on even when we turn off so when i'm not using facebook it always surprises me that the world doesn't just end you know i don't need to be on it four times a day in order for this world to go on so and then at least one day a week i try and shut everything off as well so i take sunday and i just shut off everything as much as possible and just don't use those things often somebody will send me something you know i sent you a new order of service why didn't you see it that sort of thing but so try and take a day a week and a month and at least a week a year where we just turn them all off i think that's very refreshing and very helpful as we try and understand the way it plays in our lives amen thank you brother dr thornton the question is coming to you next and it's it's this do you feel that allegorical interpretation is a problematic error plaguing the pulpit today if so what are some ways to avoid this error yes uh it is and and it's really bad too and we don't often think of ourselves as allegorists but almost everyone in this room is an allegorist because what we have conditioned ourselves to under to to believe is that allegorism is something like the ancients did where you're searching for things in the text that aren't there but when we get down to the root of the matter any meaning different than the author's meaning is allegory or allegorism because a deeper meaning and a different meaning find the same source something other than what the author meant so it's everywhere i want to just go back because i mean that's the problem that's a kind of a diagnosis of the problem if you proclaim a text and it's not what the author intended in that text then it's algorithm that's the problem let me go back to a definition of expository preaching and say that i agree with everything that steve lawson said earlier sometimes expository preaching is better it's better caught than it is taught and if you didn't see his exposition of galatians 1 last night that is the definition of expository preaching if you miss that you need to repent and then you need to go back and and view it online but that was the perfect example and the perfect definition of expository preaching it's everywhere it manifests itself in different ways and most of you all are either preachers or teachers and if you preach truth you've only done part of your job you must preach truth and your finger must be on the correct text that preaches that truth and one of the big forms of what i consider algorithm is preaching truth from the wrong text because you're not conveying what god intended to convey in that text which means you've replaced yourself as the author of that text and that is a major major problem and it's a problem all over the place so we all done it we all might as well just admit that we're allegorist and then we all might as well say let's go look at dr lawson's sermon and emulate what he did from galatians one that thing was a beauty i mean i i sat back on the third to the last row and i just marveled and when i went to bed i was supposed to be thinking about what i was talking about today and i was thinking about galatians 1 and how awesome that was and so i think part of what we need to talk about when we talk about expository preaching is does it have a lasting impact and to me that sermon had a lasting impact and so that's that's a good evidence that it's expository dr balkam the next question comes to you and it's this as an african-american how do i encourage other african-american christians to consider reformed theology and other deeper things of god instead of being caught up in the emotionalism of pentecostalism and word faith theology um okay that's from a person who doesn't know me or they would never have used the term african-american um because i'm sitting here thinking okay are you from libya or algeria or are you from you know zambia or you know that's one of the great ironies if a person comes here from northern africa we don't call them african-american if they're egyptian or libyan or algerian or whatever it's only if you're sub-saharan africa so anyway that's a whole another i i all of us have a passion for people who are like us all of us and and and that's okay because the apostle paul was the same way when we had that from him in romans um he he had a special passion for people who were like him and a special desire to see his his kinsmen according to the flesh to come to know god and to serve god and there's nothing wrong with that but there would have been something wrong with that if he allowed it to interfere with his calling to the gentiles let me say that again there would have been something wrong with that if he allowed it to interfere with his calling to the gentiles have your passion for people who are like you we all have passion for people who are like us but that doesn't define our calling our calling is to proclaim the gospel of jesus christ to those whom god gives us opportunity to do so that that that's our mission that's the mission and what i don't want to get caught up in is my own personal affinity groups my own personal um you know people who are who are most like me who get my attention so that i then pervert the mission because that's that's not the mission that's that's not what i'm that's not what i'm called to do so when i hear that question my initial gut reaction aside from just sort of cringing is to say we're called to make the gospel clear for all people we're called to warn everyone of idolatry and pursuing anything that is not christ that is not the gospel and the level of melanin in a person's skin doesn't change the significance of that calling that's what we're talking about we're talking about people with more melanin versus less melanin and how do you communicate to a person with more the amount of melanin in your skin does not determine how you hear the gospel there's other assumptions in the question and that is that the the people with more melanin are more pentecostal that's racism because you know those those those african-american people they're pulled toward pentecostalism they're pulled toward word of phrase they're pulled toward that's racism that's racism millions of people are pulled toward that stuff and i want them all turned in another direction amen every last one of them i want turned in another direction and so if i say that loud enough and if i say that consistently enough there will be high melanin people and low melanin people who hear it and that's what i want i want all melanin people to hear to to hear that and nor nor do i have to lose in any way shape form or fashion that natural tendency that god gives all of us to look at people who come from situations and circumstances like we do by the way that's another assumption all black people have the same circumstance you know like black people in new york and black people in la they're just you know all the same and all get along yeah yeah um and so that assumption is that assumption is just not true so but i do have affinities for people who have you know certain things you know in in common with me and i am grateful but here's what i have to remember even about that when i see a person who is like me who comes to faith who gets it who you know however you want to you want to term it ultimately what i'm rejoicing in is being reminded of what god did in me paul wasn't saying you know my kinsmen according to the flesh these jewish people they're more significant more special more whatever he's saying i'm one of them god pulled me out of that same thing and every time i see god pull someone out of that same thing it reminds me of the goodness of god and what he did for me if that's where you are amen hallelujah praise the lord thank god for that but if it's something else if it's i look like this therefore my attention and my focus has to be on others who look like this i think you've stepped over a boundary that ought not be crossed don't beat around the bush next time getting to the answer jump right in there the next question brother paul washer the question was and i'm going to add to this question because a brother came to me just before the q a and he asked me this almost identical question the question was how would you approach sharing the truth with a brother who differs with you theologically what approach would you take all right that's the question but a brother approached me a moment ago and said that he came down traveled to the g3 conference is staying with someone that he apparently doesn't know about an hour away from here they were kind enough to just offer him a place to stay and the person in conversation over the past couple of days he has learned that they're a follower of joel osteen and he wanted to know how to best approach sharing the truth with this individual well in all things christ's likeness in all things bearing the fruit of the spirit in all things speaking with wisdom and throughout the scriptures in jesus's admonition in chapter 7 of matthew plus many verses in proverbs we have guides of when to speak and not to speak when you are speaking truth with someone showing the virtue of christ and as long as they are open to receiving that truth continue on when they close down a wise man will often times also close down his arguments because you're casting your pearls you're giving what is holy you're answering a fool according to his folly my one thing i always do and it's according to colossians chapter 4 verses 2 through 4 where paul talks about praying for an open door praying for wisdom boldness proper behavior is that i have found that when i cannot speak to men about god i speak to god about men i am i am not a great i do not have great reasoning powers i am not a great debater i am so limited when i deal with men but i am not at all limited when i deal with god because the spirit searches my heart and knows how to pray and so i'm going to speak the truth if i sit down on an airplane which i often do i'm usually going to open up my bible i'm going to make it known right there you know they're going to see me looking at the bible and i'm going to talk to them and i'm going to pray that a door will open if a door i see them we're getting you know halfway through the trip a door hasn't opened then i'm going to say to them excuse me um i'm a christian and it would mean everything to me if you would just give me five minutes to share the gospel most people do some people become very angry and when they do i say thank you and i continue talking about what they want to talk about that way when they get off the plane they're not telling their friends i was accosted by some evangelical jerk who tried just rode me the whole time we were on the plane no they're going to get off that plane and they're going to feel ashamed because i served them because i loved them and they were shameful to me and that they would not let me even five minutes to share the most important thing in my life remember in every situation of human interaction according to the sermon on the mount our problem is a lack of christ-likeness our problem is a lack of christ-likeness dr beaky the next question is for you related to your recent book on puritan theology could you provide for us just a bit of encouragement on how the puritans can encourage and help us in ministry today that's a great question um yeah i had a dream in my 20s to write uh a book on a puritan systematic theology because i'm convinced the puritans in all branches of theology have a great deal to teach us about marrying doctrine and practice holistic christian living and um a fellow by the name of mark jones a pca pastor in vancouver actually submitted some chapters to me from puritan area that i have not worked in and so we collaborated and we just published um this book the first puritan systematic theology ever ever written running from polygama to eschatology what the puritans actually believed and so we took 50 different areas and looked at 50 areas where the puritans have contributed something substantial to theology and then looked at how in eight chapters how the puritans take this doctrine and put it into practice in the home in their personal lives and i would say this to you that i think the puritans more than anything else though they have their mistakes and they're not a monolithic group by the way they have differences among themselves they have this united passion to take the whole of the bible and apply it to the whole man for the whole of everyday life and they teach us how to handle trials they teach us how to live enamored with jesus christ they teach us more than any other group of writers the heinousness and spiritual insanity of sin they teach us the glories of a trinitarian-centered theology they teach us how to walk with god day by day they teach us about family worship they teach us so many many things and so if you're not reading the puritans i would i would i would advise you just get this book look at some of the footnotes start reading some of the puritans but use the book and use the chapters to get you into their writings because we try to write in a contemporary way what they believe but we want you to go further than that we want you to be reading the puritans themselves and the main impact when you can get your congregation to start reading the puritans the main impact is you will see not only in your own life but also in the life of your people an increased measure of profound spiritual depth and a real growth in holiness sometimes i feel that in my ministry my promoting of puritan works to my congregation and their actual reading of them and having it change their lives may be more influential influential than my ministry itself so to me i've been reading the puritans for since i was nine years old i'm now 60 51 years of reading them i always have one puritan but going along with other reading and i'll tell you by far and away the puritans have meant more to me than any other means of grace in my life amen brother david miller this next question is for you being that you were involved in the conservative resurgence years ago within the southern baptist convention and then now seeing a you might say a resurgence of the doctrines of grace in sbc life would you say that the controversy that's anti-doctrines of grace has anything to do with you might say or let's just phrase it like this the resurgence itself is it connected in any way to the conservative resurgence of years past the current resurgence of the doctrines of grace being that during the conservative resurgence in the sbc life they would uh encourage us to get back to the you know of course to the inerrancy of scripture and so do you see a connection there in any way absolutely for years we fought the battle over inerrancy in the southern baptist convention took a long time turning a big ship around isn't easy and it takes some time and space but over a period of 25 years we began to turn things around in the convention we decided fresh and new that we do after all believe in the inerrancy of the bible well many of us had always believed that it began to take an effect in the agencies in the schools i said to my wife this is perhaps one of the most prophetic things i've ever said if we can ever get past this debate about the nature of the scriptures if we can settle this i believe that we can move on to discussing some of the other weighty matters perhaps we could discuss the nature of the atonement perhaps the people of god might even ask what was god's purpose in eternity past when he devised salvation's plan i cannot tell you fully how thrilled i am that we are having the discussion in my opinion it is the healthiest thing that has happened to southern baptists in my lifetime a lot of brethren who never considered the doctrines of grace are being forced to look into them and for many of them they're discovering that these things actually exist and they're wonderful now you all pray for me and i'll pray for you because those of us who preach grace ought to have some of it so let's debate let's discuss and let's show grace to one another and the lord god will teach his people i just wanted to to say something at this point because it often is felt in our hearts but it doesn't get said i'm 37 years old i represent a generation within the southern baptist convention and josh does too and i sure i'm sure i speak on behalf of him when i say thank you for making those decisions we in large part we are a a product of the decisions that were made around the time i was born and those decisions were crucial not only to the inerrancy of scripture but to the heart of the gospel because if you lose inerrancy you lose the gospel eventually and so i think our generation does not say enough that we are deeply indebted this conference would not be here today had those decisions not been made and so uh from from our generation to yours thank you and then for our generation we're beginning to make decisions now that will affect my kids let's get it right let's think through these things let's fight for them and let's pick the hills on which to die and die for them if we must amen well the final question will go to dr lawson i quoted you from your book famine in the land in my introduction of you earlier and suppose that you knew someone involved in a very pragmatic focused ministry founded upon a foundation of church growth schemes and techniques of man that caused the gospel to take a back seat and those individuals came to you and asked you to give them counsel on what they should do whether they should stay or leave what would be your counsel to those individuals let me make sure i understand the question they come and ask should they stay or leave in a church where they're they're current members of a church where they are awakened to the truths of the scripture and they see that their their ministries are very pragmatic focused and man-centered yeah well first of all i don't think there's a one-size-fits-all answer each situation is unique each church is unique each pastor who is presiding over that church is unique each history etc so first of all i don't think you can just automatically say what should be done in every situation just across the board i do think that by and large history bears out that those who try to stay inside of a church and change that church end up being rolled up in the process and spit out even our puritan friends who tried to stay inside the church of england in 1662 were thrown out in the great ejection they could not purify from the inside the church of england um i think calvin had greater effect outside of rome than luther who tries to stay within and change um i i think by and large you're going to end up having to follow your conscience and that in most situations for most people is to move on to be with like-minded brothers it's very difficult to you you don't want to fight your own church and and and most movements occur top down from the pulpit church leaders down into the rank and file of the church and um if there is really no hope of capturing the church that can be a very difficult task to try to bring about change and i think there are obviously exceptions to that and i i'm so grateful for the men like david miller who stayed within the sbc and tried to change this from the inside out at that level that was fought over the inerrancy of scripture i'm from bellevue baptist church i was called in the ministry under adrian rogers preaching i'm very familiar with the inerrantus battle and yet at the same time dr rogers champion of inerrancy um would certainly be no friend of the doctrines of grace and so there are certain battles that are more easily fought than other battles and um it would just be difficult for me some of it's even the personality and temperament of the individual it would just be hard for me to sit in a place where the word of god is not honored where the truth is not held held high where there is there's crass pragmatism going on false conversions false baptisms just etc that that would be difficult for me to give my money to underwrite this and in some way feel a participant in this and so i would have to pull personally i would have to pull out after some initial attempts to try to to turn this around but life is so short i just don't want good money going after bad money i just don't want to be pouring water into the desert where what influence i have what efforts i have i mean if i'm investing money in a business and one business is losing money and the other is making money i mean a wise man is going to pour his investment into what's making money and i i don't really want to pour my time my talent my treasure into what's producing false converts and is is really not upholding the truth i want all that i am to be invested in that which is most in conformity to the standard of scripture that's just a general answer i i think that there are noble fights to be fought within local churches but for me there needs to be some evidence of hope that we can turn this around and i think too many people just stay too long in in just dead churches like the church at sardis you have a name but but you're dead and where your influence could really be exponentially used in other places having said that i think every individual christian has to answer that on their own amen you

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Published: Fri Aug 06 2021