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Okay, well we're up my name is 
Cameron Porter. I'm a member at Free Grace Baptist 
Church, so I'll try to facilitate this question and answer period, 
but Richard Barcellos is on the panel, so we'll see how well 
that goes. It's wonderful to have these at the end of conferences. 
Everybody's heard some wonderful lectures. We've been fed by the 
Word of God. We've received some history, 
some theology, some confessionalism, a lot of good content. And so 
it's always good to come to these periods of time where your questions 
can be answered by our question answering panel that we have 
up here, so this is an excellent time. We've had, it was announced 
yesterday that there's the QR code in your confession books, 
or in your conference books rather, and so a number of questions 
have been submitted. That's the only way that we're 
going to engage in this question-and-answer period. There's no open mic or 
anything like that. So we have a set of questions. 
I guess I should have those. We have a set of questions that 
have been submitted. It's good because there were 
only four this morning, but now we have a total of 27 submitted. So that's terrific. Now, this 
is probably the time of the Q&A period where I say there's no 
dumb question, but I'm scrolling through these and... No, they're 
all actually... They're all very good. They're 
all very good questions. We might not be able to get to 
all of them. So if your question isn't asked, perhaps there's 
a time afterwards that you can ask them if you're able to pull 
them aside briefly at all, or I'll give you their personal 
addresses and personal phone numbers, and you can follow up 
with them. Oh, no? OK. So we'll just jump right 
into it. And I think that, yep? Oh, yeah, 
sorry. 1215, the Q&A session is going 
to end. Everyone has to be out of the 
building by 1230. So please, if you could do that, 
that would be great. So we can hand this facility 
back to those who regularly use it. Now, I'll ask a question. And it might be a question targeted. 
It doesn't say it is. Some are specific, but targeted 
to the content of one of the speakers. But of course, the 
others can ask for the microphone. and supplement answers and that 
sort of a thing. So the first question I'd like 
to ask here, and it has to do with IRBS, Jim had mentioned 
that yesterday, and the question is this, seeing as Dr. Renahan 
is the president of IRBS, is there a vision to start a seminary 
in Canada to support theological education and pastoral training 
here? Yes. All right, question number 
two. Our name, International Reformed 
Baptist Seminary, is not an aspirational name. It's not virtue signaling. 
It's a reality. And we, when we changed our name 
to adopt that, we waited until we actually had formal agreements 
in place with a variety of international locations. So we have IRBS UK, 
IRBS PQ, province of Quebec. We have IRBS NZ in New Zealand 
and IRBS Australia. And we have a couple of other 
agreements and arrangements with other international schools. 
And so we've had conversations about doing something here like, 
especially we've done in the UK, that's the most developed. 
The local entities are governed locally, they're not governed 
by us, we don't want to do that, we want the men in the UK or 
New Zealand or wherever to massage the program in such a way that 
is appropriate to their circumstances and their needs. But what we 
do is work with them and supply professors and then the students 
register through our IRBS system and can proceed towards a degree 
with us, though the classes are taken here. The U.S. government immigration laws will 
not allow international students to come to our campus in Mansfield, 
Texas and take classes. We're in the process of seeking 
that approval. It's called an F-1 student visa, 
but it hasn't been granted yet. So we cannot bring international 
students into Texas, into the U.S. for any classes, whether 
they're two days long, which we just had one this week that 
was only two days, or if they're two weeks long. We can't do that, 
but we can certainly come to a place like this and send men. The UK offers four in-person 
classes per year as modules. Dr. Dolezal will be there in 
about two weeks to teach his Doctrine of God class. He's going 
to Australia in early July to teach Doctrine of God. And I'm 
going to New Zealand in early July to teach my course on the 
confession of faith. Timothy Decker, I think, is going 
to the UK later on this year. And Ryan Davidson is going to 
teach his pastoral counseling class. But also, because almost 
all of our classes are live streamed, international students can participate 
in the live classes that we offer in Texas. So Isaac is one of 
our students. Good to see you there, Isaac. 
And we have, let's see, we have, Two or three students in Australia 
right now. I had one of them in my science 
class. He was up at 3 a.m. to participate in our class and 
watched for three hours for four straight weeks. That was a challenge 
for him, but good for him. I think we have eight students 
in the UK. We have a student in France. We are dealing with 
some applications from the Middle East. We have the Australian 
students. So everything is growing. So 
that's why I say, yes, we could do something very much like that 
here in British Columbia for you. According to your needs 
and your desires, we would be happy to work with you and have 
what I would call an IRBS BC. Do you want to add anything to 
that? Sure. Second question, can a 
church be orthodox without being creedal? If not, should we begin 
to disavow anti-creedal postmodern evangelicals as not Christian 
or not Protestant? I feel weird. If you want, you 
can only answer the first one. Now it's on. Can a church be 
orthodox without being creedal? Yes. OK. Question number three 
for... OK. Well, there are some other 
questions that can sort of supplement that particular first question. 
Well, there was a second half to that question. You want me to ask that question 
again? Yeah. The second part of the question 
is, if not, should we begin to disavow anti-creedal postmodern 
evangelicals as not Christian or not Protestant? In my view, 
we have to be really careful with that, because salvation 
is not based on words, nor is it based on works, but it's based 
on faith in Christ. It's my own conviction that it's 
possible for someone who has a poor understanding of Christian 
theology still to have a genuine faith in Christ. And so I don't 
want to make a blanket statement that disavows any group that 
claims to be Christian. We may have great difficulties 
with what they believe, how they present themselves, what they 
practice. But I've had students come to me and they say, do you 
think that so-and-so, some figure from church history, was saved? 
And my answer is always, I don't know. I can't make a pronouncement 
on that individual, unless that person is an open and avowed 
heretic. who denies all of the foundational 
issues of the faith, doesn't resist justification by faith 
alone, denies the deity of Christ, the doctrine of the Trinity, 
then it's easy to make a pronouncement. But when there's what seem to 
be gray areas, let's give some grace. Because you know what? 
All of us are wrong on something. Every one of us. I know that 
I'm wrong. That's why I'm a confessionalist, because I don't trust myself. 
I can trust the history of the church and the Holy Spirit working 
in the church to lead the people of God into the truth. I look forward to the day when 
I learn on which issues I'm wrong. And if I knew now, I would hope 
that by God's grace, I would repent of them. So I'm speaking 
about myself, but I'm speaking about all of us. We're all wrong. 
And so we have to be careful in the way that we speak of others. 
Great. Yeah. Thanks, Dr. Renner. Jim. 
I would also make a distinction between anti-credal. I don't 
know that everybody who doesn't have a creed is anti-credal. 
They haven't adopted it, they haven't embraced it, but I would 
think anti-credal would be, here's what the Nicene Creed says, and 
then them saying, no, I reject that. That sounds like anti-credalism 
where we wouldn't have fellowship and we wouldn't see them as brothers 
in Christ. Lots of churches don't have creeds 
and confessions. I'm with Dr. Renahan. I'm not 
ready to disavow them. And then post-modernism, that 
was a pretty rhetorically charged question to really, you know, 
big contrast here. Life isn't that simple. There's 
some pastoral matters involved and I think graciousness, charity, 
judgment of charity, I think that's the first, you know, first 
place to start. And then as we move down the 
path with them, if there is a, you know, an overarching post-modernism 
or a real anti-credalism, that's a different category versus a 
church that just hasn't been exposed to good teaching or preaching, 
and they've been taught things that aren't consistent. Great. 
Thank you. A question touching upon Dr. Barcelos' content. In Luke 24, 
45, it says, he opened their minds to understand the scriptures. 
Was this a spiritual blindness issue and or a hermeneutics issue 
they were missing? Before I answer that, you hurt 
me earlier, so anything nice I've ever said about you, I take 
back. And I'm not sure I ever want to give it back to you. He said I was going to take over 
the Q&A session. I don't take over, I assist. 
I reform it. Which is, by the way, what we 
want to happen to churches that we might think are deficient. 
We want to see them progress. We want to see them grow. We 
want to see them become confessional. That doesn't mean they're not 
Christian churches. They hold to core Orthodox doctrines, 
however they prove to you that they do, whether on paper or 
not. We don't want to unchurch them. We want to reform them. 
Yeah. OK, so what was that? Yeah, the 
question is from that some sort of illumination happened. It 
was scolding them, too, kind of. Was it, is the question, 
did they get saved on the spot? Or did they just get their minds 
adjusted by grace? Is that what the question is? Spiritual blindness and or a 
hermeneutical issue they were missing. Both. But the spiritual 
blindness isn't that they were lost necessarily. Because we 
saw Peter is a prime example. of somebody who can say something 
gloriously orthodox one minute and then get rebuked the next 
minute, I don't want to say he was lost. So slowly but surely 
the apostles before the resurrection and Pentecost were connecting 
the dots, but Pentecost gave him the power to really connect 
the dots. So I would say it's a both, it's 
a spiritual illumination and a hermeneutical adjustment. By 
the way, there's a book by a Korean scholar, forgot his name, you 
might remember, I was reading G.K. Bill one time, he said, 
this Korean scholar, the thesis of his, Erdman's really dense, 
tough read, I don't recommend you read the book, but his thesis 
was that Paul's hermeneutic got transformed when he got converted. Paul had all the data he needed, 
the Old Testament, and he knew it well, but he didn't put it 
together rightly, okay? So after he gets converted in 
Acts 9, he starts talking like Peter and Jesus, really relatively 
fast, you know? So he got both saved and, a radical hermeneutical adjustment 
all at once. So these were just getting sanctified 
and adjusted. But you did hurt me. Where did 
he get all of that knowledge? Paul. He went to seminary. He went to camellial school. 
He went to the best available seminary and an unconverted man, 
but the Lord filled his head with the Old Testament so that 
when he was converted, the light came on and he was able to see 
Christ there. It's an important point when 
you're talking about seminary. That's right. I believe it. No, I'm not camellial. I'm a gentile. And I'm tall? No, you're not tall, you're rich. There are two questions, two 
questions that are very similar here. So I'm going to ask them 
both because it's, it's essentially the same question, just worded 
a little bit differently. So those two questions are these. 
Do you see an ongoing need for additional affirmation statements 
and clarifications in a creedal context, that sort of a thing? 
If so, any specific modern statements you recommend? And then, is there 
a place for new creeds and confessions to be written today, like the 
Danvers or Nashville statements? Should the church clarify any 
doctrines? Jude says that the faith was 
once for all delivered to the saints. and that faith is embedded 
in the Old and in the New Testaments. It's our task to recognize it 
and to believe it. So I don't think that it's necessary 
to add to the faith that we have. I think that we need to recognize 
what has been defined for us and worked out for us in the 
face of increasing heresies over the centuries Largely that's 
where the older, at least the creeds, come from. Responding 
to heresies. But, you know, I think it was 
William Perkins who made the point that old heresies simply 
appear. New heresies are simply old heresies 
revived. And so, largely, the treasury 
of creeds and confessions that we have inherited are able to 
address almost all of the troubles that we face today. Is it good 
for the church to be able to speak directly to contemporary 
issues? Yes, but I would say, for the 
most part, those contemporary issues come and go, where the 
issues that are addressed in creeds and confessions stay. Those are important and need 
to be addressed at every era of the church. But postmodernism, 
if Christ doesn't come, postmodernism will go away at some point and 
be replaced by something else. You know, I look at our circumstances 
today and I think it's, in some ways, it's the Enlightenment 
revisited. And the emphases of the 18th 
century and the Enlightenment went away to some degree. Now, 
Rich would argue that they inform much of our modern thinking, 
and I wouldn't disagree with you on that, but the focus of 
philosophy on the Enlightenment is no longer what it once was, 
and I think that that's going to happen with postmodernism. 
So, when you have these statements, they may be good to address right 
now a specific issue, but that issue will go away. where a confession 
of faith retreat addresses issues that are permanent. What was 
the first part of that question? The first part of that question 
was the following. Sorry, one second here. I've 
got to scroll back here. It didn't disappear, did it? Yeah. Yeah, sorry, Jim. Yeah, is there a place for new 
creeds and confessions to be written today? And then do you 
see an ongoing need for additional affirmation statements and clarifications? What are additional affirmation 
statements, not new creeds? I see a place for, especially 
associations of confessional churches, addressing confessional 
issues, explaining the intent of the confession, because you 
might have a debate over that. Like when we were in ARCA, we 
helped with creating the statement on divine impassibility. I think that can be helpful, 
theological issues that are already stated by the confession are 
debated. I think it could be helpful. 
I wouldn't want to do it as an individual, and it makes me a 
little, leaning toward the strength of a national association and 
got more brain power, we couldn't have done SIG without all the 
guys. Confessing the Impassible God, which is a book on impassibility. But that came out of our associational 
connection. And just with a local association, 
we wouldn't have, even the Southern California Association with Dr. 
Renahan and me and Sam, we wouldn't have been able to produce that. 
There's just no way. Don't make your association too 
small, and if it is too small, don't write doctrinal position 
papers. I'd also say something that I 
learned going through that impassibility debate from my mentor here, and 
he said, and I agreed with it then, and I've said it in our 
church many times, The issue isn't for us, let's write a new 
confession of faith. The issue is, let's understand 
the confession of faith that we already have. It's a very 
robust, hearty document that is a great summary statement 
of those things most surely believed among us. So the issue isn't, 
let's modernize it and make it better. It's a good thing. It's 
a, as I've explained it before, we don't try to reinvent wheels. 
Wheels do exactly what they're supposed to do. And as far as 
I'm concerned, the second London does what it's supposed to do. 
And I don't think, at least in the last several years, I've 
seen these declarations. What do they do? I mean, if I 
sign it online, what does that do for me? They're not churchly 
documents. That's one thing. I know you're 
going to wax eloquently on this. But let me show you this. Just 
be patient. Cam, get the guys under control. 
All my lectures, you know what it was? I was trying to show 
you what's contained implicitly in short statements in the confession. And I tried to argue these short 
statements embody what I was telling you about Jesus and the 
apostles. He taught me the statements in the confession are reducing 
massive swaths of special revelation into a new form, into a brief 
compass, but they're packed. and what you do is you go to 
the exegetical treaties of the day in terms of the text of scripture 
that they're citing, which opens up the window into theological 
treatments and sermon series and all sorts of things and then 
you're just trying to understand a phrase and you're 5,000 words 
into reading already and you're going, oh man, this is huge. 
The confession gives us windows in one sense, into scripture, 
scripture exposition, theological treatments, and all that stuff. 
So it's way deeper than I ever thought. Let me give you an example. I was in Pennsylvania two or 
three years ago speaking to some men who are on the board of a 
Christian school. And they asked me the question, 
do you have a statement about marriage in your foundational 
documents, your bylaws? I said, well, we have the confession. 
And they said, well, you know, LGBT groups are targeting Christian 
organizations, and if you don't have an explicit statement, you 
need to do it. So I listened to them and I thought, 
okay, maybe we need to have something that explicitly states what we're 
all about and why we reject the LGBTQ agenda. So what did we 
do? We took the Confession, Chapter 
25, and we just stated it in other words, to say, this is 
what our position is, and this is what we expect of all of our 
professors, and all of our students, etc., etc. So it wasn't really 
adding anything, it was just presenting it in a form that 
if we were brought into a courtroom, we could say, here's our policy, 
it was adopted on such and such a date, this is what we believe, 
that's why we've done what we've done. I'm going to take over right 
now. Dr. Ranahan, there are some statements, 
I don't know the names of them, that have been created in the 
last 10, 15 years that aren't churchly, that are out there. 
I know you've been asked most likely to sign them. I don't 
think you do. I've been asked. I'm not going 
to sign it. I have a friend that was trying 
to start a Trinity thing to celebrate our many years of Nicaea and 
wanted maybe a statement to come out. And he wanted me to be involved 
with it. And he had all these, all the 
right guys were going to be involved with this conference and writing 
this document. I said, is this a churchly thing? 
No, we're just getting a bunch of guys together. And I said, 
you need to make it churchly. My church will send me to it 
if it's a churchly thing, and I'd love to go. But if it's not, 
I'm not sure. So talk about some of these statements 
that aren't churchly. Are they helpful? Do they have 
any authority? Or is it just a bunch of small 
popes trying to rule other people? No, I think many of them are, 
they're produced with good intentions, you know, but people don't have 
the perspective on the centrality of the church that we believe 
that we, the New Testament teaches, and that is a problem. You generally 
speaking don't want to have a confession of faith or creed that's written 
by an individual. You want it to come out of a 
church situation. That might be, for ours, it began 
in a local church in Petit France, In other circumstances, it might 
be a broader church in which representatives are sent from 
congregations to participate, that's Nicaea, where the theologians 
were sent to Nicaea, what was it, 220 of them, in order to 
produce this creed against Arianism. So all of those are churchly 
statements, that's what we want. So yeah, they can They can say 
good things, we can read them and approve of them, but I haven't 
signed any. And that's part of the reason. 
I want it to come from a church context, not from an individual 
context. What do you think of church-less 
podcasts? Same thing, because I struggle with churchless podcasts. 
Like, what gives you the authority as an individual Christian to 
pollute the minds of my sheep? I have to flush it out every 
Sunday and stick the good stuff back in them, and then they listen 
to your podcast with no discipline, no pastoral oversight, just a 
guy, anyway, go ahead, yeah. You've heard, So this is a good question, and 
it'd be good for all of you to chime in on this one. Very simple 
question. What are the defining characteristics 
of being Reformed? I would say creedal, you know, 
the early creeds and the definitional statements concerning the triune 
God and the person of our Lord Jesus Christ are the ones that 
we covered, that Dr. Renahan covered last night. Certainly 
Calvinistic or Reformed theology I would include covenant theology. 
I think that's crucial. I think that the way that one 
approaches the scripture, you know, the difference between 
covenant theology and dispensationalism isn't just a question of eschatology. It's a hermeneutic. It's how 
do we approach scripture? How do we view the scope of the 
whole? Those sorts of things. And then 
I would say regular principle of worship. I think that, you 
know, our doctrine informs piety, the way that we live. Our doctrine 
informs worship and when it comes to God and the worship of God, 
that's not a free for all. That's not open for interpretation. We're not to be innovators. We're 
not to be creators. We're to be obedient creatures, 
saved by grace. that worship our God in an acceptable 
manner. And he defines what acceptable 
is and what the conduct is that we need to put in place in his 
house. So Calvinistic for sure, but 
I think reformed theology, being reformed transcends just Calvinism. I think that's in vogue today. 
People, they say they're reformed, and they're five-point Calvinists. 
And I'm not against five-point Calvinists, just saying I think 
there are other things that go along with it, some of those 
particulars that I mentioned. Yeah, confessional, yeah, the 
17th century confessions of faith, whether it be London, Second 
London, the Westminster Savoy, or the three forms of unity. 
You know, in our day, you can claim to be a Reform Baptist, 
not be a member of a second London church, have a podcast, and lecture 
Reformed Baptists on their strengths or weaknesses. It's like, could 
you just, in Pastor Boblo's language, shut up. Leave me alone. People have been telling me. Yeah, leave me alone, and leave 
my people alone. Quit causing confusion. Quit being a troubler 
in Israel. I'm going to be a troubler in 
Israel. I think that there's something else that needs to 
be said. Everybody on the platform is a Baptist. There are some, I think, they 
make a good case to say that the word reformed ought not to 
be appropriated by Baptists. And I understand that. I really 
do. We wouldn't call ourselves Lutheran 
Baptists I was asked this week to be on a podcast with someone, 
you would know his name, he's a friend of mine, who doesn't 
want us to use the word reform, that it was to be a discussion 
about whether or not Baptists can use that word. And I declined 
the invitation. just because I'm not wedded to 
the word. If it went away and we were called 
predestinarian or covenantal baptists or something, I would 
be very much happy with that language and be willing to respect 
the fact that there is an historical definition that attaches itself 
to the word reform that largely belongs to churches that are 
committed to the three forms of unity. In fact, I've met some 
of them who say, The Scottish Presbyterian shouldn't be called 
reformed because they don't hold to the three forms of unity. 
They hold to the Westminster Confession of Faith. So that's 
an internal discussion. I want to say I respect that 
view. In some ways, I wish that the 
title Reformed Baptist had not been created. It came out of 
Westminster Seminary in Philadelphia in the 1950s because Bob Dendalk 
and Ernie Riesinger were working in the development department 
at Westminster and they came to love and respect Ernie and 
so I don't know who coined the phrase. But it came out of that 
in the second half of the 1950s at Westminster Seminary. So what 
does it mean to be reformed? Well, if you think that infant 
baptism is a necessity for being reformed, which many people do, 
I respect that. And I'm willing to drop the title 
out of respect for those who view it that way, because there 
is a historical point to be made. So I'm not trying to be a troubler 
in Israel yet. Rich. There's also a biblical 
origin of the term. Imposed until the time of Reformation. So the inaugurated new historical 
inauguration of the new covenant is the time of Reformation. So 
everybody who believes in Christ is the inaugurator of the new 
covenants, reformed, biblically reformed, right there. And you 
can look up the Greek. That's called a strat. OK. Question, touching upon Rich's 
content, was there an innate knowledge Christ had, according 
to his human nature, whereby he knew he was the scope of scripture, 
or did he learn this from the scripture? Who asked that question? I have no idea. You can tell them. Who wrote 
the question? innate knowledge that he was, 
so, according to his human nature, he had an endowed, or he had, 
in the womb of Mary, he had innate, whatever innate knowledge is, 
that's a tough thing to parse out. I think it's relatively 
simple once you get it, but, so, in the womb, Jesus either 
had full knowledge of himself as 
the scope of scripture, already intact in his brain, Or he had 
a principle from which he could arrive at that, given the information 
itself that came to him. Was it innate knowledge or an 
acquired knowledge? Is that what you're saying? If 
the Son of God became incarnate, and became like us except sin. Whatever is endowed upon us was 
endowed upon him as far as this innate thing, okay? And then did he acquire? I think 
he acquired information. He grew in Luke two, twice. There's two texts, 42 and 50, 
or 40 and 52, something like that, where he seemed to grow 
in stature and wisdom, the skillful use of knowledge, Did he arrive 
at some point, according to his human nature, at a conclusion 
that he didn't already have, namely, I'm the scope. It's weird to think about, huh? 
But I can have in my notes, seminary notes, I have quotes from some 
of our big leading heroes, Gil and Matthew Poole, I think, and 
somebody else, that basically say he had innate knowledge like 
the rest of us, but he did acquire knowledge of himself in virtue 
of the scripture over time. He was a student of scripture. 
You know, by the time he was 12, at the temple, they're already 
blown away at his knowledge at 12. So on the one hand, he's 
like us. On the other hand, he wasn't 
like us. I think he was the greatest theologian, according to his 
human nature, that ever lived. Did he ever not get a text right 
and yet not sin? Did he get a text wrong and not 
sin? That's a good question. Every time Jesus read a Hebrew 
scroll, did he understand it immediately? I would say probably 
not. It wasn't necessarily a sin as 
a six-year-old reading a scroll versus a 16-year-old. So I think 
there's acquired knowledge going on there. And the Son of God, 
in one sense, according to his human nature, learned his identity 
and vocation from the Old Testament. Yeah, if we talk about true humanity, 
we have to say that as a two-year-old, he was a two-year-old. He was 
a toddler, and that was the full extent of his ability. He didn't 
speak Japanese. No, and he had to learn how to 
write the Hebrew characters as he grew older. All of those developmental 
things that we know. Oh, his divine nature is sustaining 
him. That's right. His divine nature is sustaining 
him. But as a true human, he went through all the stages. 
Now, his mind is not tainted with sin. So it's clear and able 
to grasp hold of things so that at 12 years old, he can speak 
to the greatest teachers of his day and they can be astounded 
at his knowledge. That's not because somehow he's 
drawing upon his divine wisdom to be able to answer them, but 
it is unusual for a 12-year-old to be at that point. You know, 
Spurgeon wasn't there until he was 17, right? But that's a joke, 
folks. Yeah, I'm sorry, I'm intruding. But if we think about his humanity, 
we have to think about it in those terms. His childhood was 
a genuine childhood, just like all of us have had, like our 
children, our grandchildren have had, so that he had to learn 
how to, I mean, he would have been killed by Herod if his father 
had not taken him down to Egypt. He would not have been able to 
protect himself. And Herod would have murdered 
him, along with all of the other young boys in Bethlehem, the 
region of Bethlehem, if Joseph hadn't taken him down to Egypt. 
So let's think about his humanity in real terms. You know what? 
It makes it more precious to us. when we think about the fact 
that his humanity is just like our own humanity. Glory be to 
God. This is a serious question. Yeah, 
I saw somewhere recently that it's not the divinity of Jesus 
so much in some circles that presents a challenge, it's the 
humanity. And I think this is Chalcedon. After Nicaea, he's 
the word. He's the triune God. How is he flesh? So you see that 
question asked and then answered, but yeah, the humanity of Christ 
is a very challenging doctrine to consider. In light of today's lectures, 
what does Paul mean about the mystery being revealed in Ephesians 
3, 3-6? Was this information not clear 
or not there in the Old Testament? Okay, so simply because something's 
a mystery doesn't mean it's not revealed. But I don't, I don't think I have a 
ready definition. Do you have deals definition? 
I read the book. I forgot. Okay, that's what I was just 
explaining, basically. It's not that it was never revealed, 
it's that it was revealed, but not revealed as clearly as it 
is now. So the gospel and the Christology 
that becomes, and the Trinitarian theology of the New Testament 
that becomes very clear, is a mystery in the Old Testament. It's still 
a mystery, great is the mystery of godliness, but it's now revealed 
like it, wasn't revealed. It's now in living color. It 
was in shadows and types and all that stuff. Romans 16 does 
the same thing, a mystery, but it was proclaimed in the prophets. 
The mystery's there, but it's not as clear as it is now. So that's that's right. He just said Gentile inclusion 
in the covenant people of God is a mystery. and was revealed, but not as 
clear as it's now being revealed. Yeah, and it goes way back to 
Genesis 3.15. Yeah, we have to be really careful 
with the word mystery because we see it today, we think of 
Agatha Christie. or someone, you know, whodunit, 
and you try to get the clues together, and at the end there's 
a revealing saying, I missed it, but now I see all of those 
things. That's not what mystery in the Bible means. It means 
something that was previously revealed, but in shadows and 
in types, and it's now clarified. So that you're exactly right, 
that what Ephesians 3 is talking about is the inclusion of Gentiles 
in the people of God. That is frequently presented 
in the Old Testament, but in shadowy terms. And it's when 
Christ comes that it's revealed. You know, I think of Augustine's 
famous statement, the new is in the old concealed, the old 
is in the new revealed. And sometimes I like to think 
of it in terms of increasing light. If you think about a clock, okay, 
the prophets of the Old Testament era were prophesying the same 
thing that is revealed later on, but they're at 3 a.m. You 
know 3 a.m. is the darkest time of the day. 
John the Baptist is at 6 a.m. He's an Old Testament prophet, 
but he's different from the rest because he's able to say, behold 
the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. Dawn has 
come. And the Lord Jesus is at high noon because now everything 
is revealed in him. And Paul and the other apostles 
are at 3 p.m. shedding light on what they've 
learned from high noon and from 6 a.m. and seeing that which 
was in the dark at 3 a.m. Another way I liken it is When 
I had kids, well, I do have kids, but when they were toddlers or 
youngsters and they would go out and play in the yard, they'd 
leave their toys out there, and if you walked out in the backyard 
at 3am, you might trip over them, but they're there, they're really 
truly there, but you don't see them. When you get to 6 a.m. or noon time, you're able to 
see them and yell at the kids and say, go pick up your toys. 
So the prophets were like that. They were prophesying true things, 
but not always in the clearest sense. And I think you brought 
that up today when you showed that even the prophets were meditating 
upon their own writings as they were proclaiming these things. 
So be careful with the word mystery. Don't read into it your favorite 
novel. and what happens with the novel. 
The meaning is very different and specific and precise. The 
text in Ephesians reads, by which when you read, this is 3-4, when 
you read, you may understand my knowledge in the mystery of 
Christ, which in other ages was not made known to the sons of 
men, as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to his holy prophets 
and apostles and prophets. that the Gentiles should be fellow 
heirs of the same body and partakers of this promise in Christ through 
the gospel of which I became a minister. So if you think about 
Paul, did Paul believe the Old Testament taught the inclusion 
of Gentiles with Jews in one body? Yes. Did Paul, when he 
proclaimed in the book of Acts, indicate that to us? Yes. Acts 
26, something I skipped in my notes, where he's before Festus, 
is it? Agrippa? Yeah, he says, I proclaimed 
nothing but what Moses and the prophets said to take place, 
that the Christ would suffer and enter into his glory, and 
that redemption or forgiveness of sins would be proclaimed in 
his name, beginning at Jerusalem and then going to the nations 
of the earth, or that he would be the first to proclaim light 
to the Jewish people and then to the Gentiles. And he's saying 
all that's in the Old Testament. So the Messiah would suffer and 
rise from the dead on the third day, and then he proclaimed light, 
which is language from Isaiah 42, Isaiah 49, Luke 2, Genesis 
1-2, a pre-echo of 2 Corinthians 4-4, from darkness to light, the exodus, 
They didn't just first come into play in Colossians 1, transferred 
us from the kingdom of the sun, from the kingdom of darkness 
to the kingdom of his dear son, from darkness to light. That's 
all Exodus language. It's embedded in the Old Testament. 
So he's citing, or at least alluding to Isaiah light texts, and the 
Isaiah light texts are alluding to the Moses Exodus texts. That's why the Isaiah light texts 
are called second Exodus language. The first exodus was a historical 
event pregnant with meaning. The prophets scold the people 
of God and say, hey, remember when God did the exodus? There's 
another exodus coming in the future. So Paul believed the 
Old Testament taught Gentile inclusion, but in mystery form, 
shadowy, tough to tell, see sometimes. And I think that in the book 
of Acts, you're seeing a stark transition between the unbelieving 
Jews and the apostles as the proper interpreters of the Old 
Testament. So in chapter 28, he said you were going to go 
there. He says, I'm here because of the hope of Israel. And he 
can say that as the one, the hope of Israel, Gentile inclusion. I could hear Dr. Walton pray 
tell, the conclusion of the Old Testament isn't Christianity. 
What is it? He said that one time. Master of impressions. Sorry. 
I didn't mean to get you upset. Excellent. This would relate 
to Dr. Renahan's content, but of course, 
all three of you can chime in. Other than baptism and church 
government, are there any other significant differences between 
the Second London Confession and the Three Forms of Unity? Some of the changes, the additions, 
were made in response to problems like those of Thomas Collier. 
So I wouldn't call those differences. I would call them clarifications 
that arise out of a very specific circumstance. I do think that 
the revisions to the third paragraph of chapter 7 of God's covenant 
are important because they adopt a more redemptive historical 
approach to the revelation of God's covenant purposes in history 
than what you find in Westminster Confession or Savoy Declaration. And of course, the trajectory 
of covenant theology as it was understood both prior to, during, 
and after the publication of the Second London Confession 
leads to the practice of believer's baptism, so that there's a relationship 
there. And so I think it's important, 
honest at least, to say there is a difference in the way that 
covenant theology is formulated and expressed in the history 
revealed in scripture and its implications at the end. So there's 
an arc that you could draw from chapter 7 to chapter 28 and 29, 
which deal with baptism. The question was, what besides 
baptism in the doctrine of the church? I think largely the rest 
is the same. This is why when I wrote my book, I've read maybe all, if not all, 
most of the particular Baptist writings of the 17th century. 
And in doing that, sometimes I was frustrated at the fact 
that our fathers didn't address many of the common subjects of 
Christian theology. But there's a reason for that, 
and the reason is that You can read the common writings of the 
other English Puritans and understand that they mean the same thing. 
They state that in the epistle at the beginning of the Confession. 
And so when I wrote my book, I was able to rely on a vast 
majority of individuals from the Presbyterian, from the Congregationalist, 
and even to go back to the continent and rely on certain Reformed 
theologians to clarify the language of our confession of faith, because 
it's all common. So the differences are minute, 
or minor, not minute, but minor. And I don't think that there 
are any significant changes in any of the other doctrines outside 
of ecclesiology and covenant theology and its implications. There's at least one place in 
the Belgian Confession that I really appreciate, and I wish the wording 
was in ours. And it's when they are listing 
the canonical books of the Old and New Testaments, they'll get 
to the Pauline Epistles, and they'll say, Pauline Epistles 
14. Now we usually say 13, but they say 14, and they have Hebrews 
there. I like that. So by the way, here 
are three forms of unity. You confess the Pauline authorship 
of the book of Hebrews. And just practically, I think 
a very helpful book is their Sinus' Commentary on the Heidelberg 
Catechism. Just tight, good theology. It's joyful and good. There are two chapters that are 
different to Westminster. Chapter 15 of Repentance. was 
virtually completely rewritten by the Congregationalists in 
the Savoy Declaration. And that's because of a man named 
John Goodwin, no relationship to Thomas, who was the leading 
Arminian theologian in London in the 1650s. He had a doctrine 
of innocency of infants that was really very bad. He argued that infants are born 
innocent, that sin is simply what is learned as children grow 
older, and he was a very popular writer, so they rewrote the chapter 
on repentance, not to deny what Westminster says, but to clarify 
and respond to John Goodwin. And then chapter 20, of the gospel 
and of the extent of the grace thereof, is a completely new 
chapter also written by them to address questions of really 
ecclesiology. The congregationalists in New 
England were charged with failure to reach the Native Americans 
because there was no ecclesiastical authority, such as a bishop or 
a presbytery, to send out what we would call missionaries. And 
they were responding to that and saying that it was the Socrates 
of God. They were acknowledging that 
they may have been less than as aggressive as they ought to 
be, but ultimately, it's the sovereignty of God that leaves 
people in their sins. And they cited the end of Psalm 
145 and Acts 16.4, where Paul is in Asia Minor in Turkey, and 
he's trying to go down this road, and the spirit says, no. Which 
means the people down that road didn't hear the gospel. And again, 
he tried to go down this road, and the spirit says, no. So there's 
more people he would have gone to to preach, but the Spirit 
says, no, leave them in their sins, and he ends up going to 
hear the Macedonian call and go to Europe to do so. So they 
cite those kind of texts. That's not a difference, but 
it is a response to charges that were made, number one, by an 
Anglican who had visited New England, and then picked up by 
Robert Bailey, Scottish Presbyterian, who made the same charges. Great. Thank you. There's a brief follow-up 
you had mentioned a number of minutes ago, Thomas Collier. 
There was a question in here about what happened, asking what 
happened to Thomas Collier after the late 17th century there. 
Largely, he disappears. His church split. He continues 
to write a little bit, but I think he's been discredited by the 
Confession and by Vindicia Veritatis, and so he disappears. And you briefly alluded to the 
Arbka controversy with regards to impassibility, and the book 
Confessing the Impassible God. This is a question touching on 
that, and touching on the incarnation. Given that God is immutable, 
how does the assumption of a human nature by the sun not constitute 
a change in God? The change is at the creaturely 
level, it doesn't affect the divinity. The change terminates 
on creature, not on creator, not on the divinity. State the 
question. Given that God is immutable, 
how does the assumption of a human nature by the sun not constitute 
a change in God? God is immutable. And you don't 
read creature back into creator. That's a bad step, and that happens 
today. We want to argue that husbands 
are heads of the wives, and wives are submissive to their husbands, 
and instead of just taking Ephesians 5, we try to model it after the 
Trinity. So it's taking creaturely things, 
reading it back into the creator, and that's always a bad thing. 
Gregory of Nazianzus has a very good warning or a very good statement 
about how foolish that is. If the incarnation is to be a 
real incarnation, then God incarnate. There can be no change in Him 
in order to become incarnate because it wouldn't be God 16 
ounces to the pound who became incarnate. It would be God light. You know, it's difficult to understand. 
It's impossible to comprehend. But if we want to maintain the 
Christian orthodox view of the incarnation, he retains divinity 
without change and assumes humanity that changes all the time. If that's weird, good. Yeah, here's an important point, 
I think. We've talked about this in our 
SoCal conference, and it is you must settle the doctrine of God 
before you come to settle the doctrine of Christology. Really. That's why in our confessions, 
the doctrine of God precedes Christology, Chapter 2 and Chapter 
8. And so when you have settle the 
doctrine of God, come to an understanding that he is immutable and all 
that that means, and then when you come to Christology and say 
that the second person of the eternal trinity who is, who shares 
the divine essence, who is himself all that may be said about God, 
you can't diminish that deity when you come to speak of Christology 
and when you think about the incarnation. And so that's why, 
for example, the old writers, some newer writers who are brilliant 
are using the language of assumption. That the divine second person 
of the Holy Trinity assumed a human nature. He took it to himself. 
The Greek word is lambano. He took it to himself. Not to 
change, not that anything can change in God, but that he becomes 
one with humanity. Right? Fair enough? So you just 
did Christology from above through a grid of theology proper, right? The confession does it that way. 
When you're reading and teaching chapter eight, which I listened 
to both these guys going through that and it was excellent, you 
brought your theology proper with you, you cheated. You brought 
your theology proper with you and interpreted your Christology 
through that grid. So Christology is an economic, 
It's God's work. Theology is God in himself. So you maintain the creator-creature 
distinction. God became a creature, by the 
way. You maintain that without ceasing to be God. Creator-creature 
distinction. The Bible does it too. It does 
it in two really key places. In the beginning, God, that's 
theology, and all that God is, the triune God I think there, 
created the heavens and the earth, that's the work of God. That's 
creator, creature. In the beginning was the word, 
that's theology, and the word was with God, and the word was 
God. He was in the beginning with God. All things that have 
come into being have come into their economy. So first, you 
have at least two persons in intra-Trinitarian relation. Previous 
to the act of creation, that's God. Then you have creation and 
you interpret and the word became flesh in light of the theology. 
So you don't do 114 without the context of this word who became 
flesh. is eternally with God and somehow 
is eternally God. I think the Bible itself lends 
us warrant to do theology from above, or Christology from above. And for those who perhaps are 
outside of confessional context, what we're referring to in our 
chapter two of God and of the Holy Trinity, there's a statement 
that God is without passions. And we are part of an association 
in America where that phrase was challenged. And it's the 
doctrine of divine impassibility. So it's a subset. I think the 
questioner mentioned immutability. So immutability means God cannot 
change. Well, impassibility is a bit 
of a subset of that. It means he's without passions. 
And passions always suggest change from one state to another. And 
so the idea is that God cannot increase and God cannot decrease. God is. As Pastor Barcelos has 
written in a book on Trinity and creation, God plus creation 
is God. God without creation is God. There's nothing external. God 
the Trinity, there's nothing external to God that moves him 
from one state to another. So that's kind of the background 
of what we're talking about. We spent a lot of time on a committee 
working through this subject for the association. So it's 
the doctrine of divine impassibility, and it's basically what we find 
in our confession when it says God is without passions. So it 
says he's without body parts or passions. It's surrounded 
by all the attributes or perfections that we know more commonly. God 
is holy, God is just, God is loving. Well, at that time, we 
had to kind of go into those attributes or perfections that 
there are not a lot written on. Now, thankfully, guys are writing. The fellow that's coming, the 
two fellows that are coming next year, God willing, to our conference, 
Dr. James Dolezal and Dr. Samuel 
Renahan, are, you know, first rate. If you want to come back 
next year, I would highly recommend it if you're interested in the 
Doctrine of the Triune God. you can come, yeah. And so just 
some background for those perhaps outside of our confessional circles. Yeah, yeah, but next year, those 
guys are, I hate them. They're both, I'm old enough 
to be their father, and I've spoken with both of them at conferences. I'm intimidated by them. They're 
so gifted and so nice and gracious, and they don't wear white socks 
sometimes. They didn't wear white socks 
today, but I've worn white socks and wore a Q and A. God cannot 
be acted upon God cannot act upon himself so as to move himself 
from one state to another and creatures cannot act upon God 
or cause God in any sense to be something other than he is. Creatures aren't the cause of 
God's mood swings. God doesn't have mood swings 
because creatures can't move God. Matter of fact, God can't 
move God. But that's for next year. Which is actually good news. 
Do you want creatures to be able to move God? How many creatures 
are there on the earth right now? Billions? God would be pretty 
elastic, wouldn't he be? Like, God is, right? He's not becoming, 
right? Excellent. Thank you. What is 
known about the descendants of Puritans? This is a threefold 
question, or three questions. What is known about the descendants 
of Puritans? How many generations of the initial 
group remained faithful? What pitfalls should modern Reformed 
Baptists be cautious about? My wife is a Mayflower descendant. on her father, on her, yeah she 
is, on, let's see, on her father's side. And on her mother's side, she's 
a descendant of a man named John Crandall, who came to New England 
around 1645 or 1650, and was an elder in the Second Baptist 
Church in the New World in Newport, Rhode Island. Almost every generation 
since John Crandall, down to my sons, has had Baptist ministers 
in it. It's an incredible story, really 
amazing story. Most of them in Canada, in the 
Maritimes, which is where they moved. Crandall University is 
named after the family. That's my wife's family. So I 
don't know the answer generally, but I know the answer in her 
family is God has been faithful to them since the 1650s. It really moves me to look at my 
sons and think about the heritage that they have. I don't have 
it. All my grandparents were immigrants. I don't have anything 
like that, but they have it. It's theirs. So I don't know 
if that answers the question, but it does give an example of 
some from the Puritan era in the new world, who are still 
preaching the truth, and God willing, you'll meet one of them 
next year. Excellent. Well, say it again, 
the pitfall? Yeah, so I think with, you know, 
with perhaps losing maybe the theology of the Puritans through 
the ages or subsequent to the Puritans, what did it look like 
as far as the theology of the Puritans? So the question was, 
what are some pitfalls that modern Reformed Baptists could be cautious 
about so that we don't lose perhaps that heritage of antiquity that 
we have as confessors? Of course, the denomination that 
my wife's ancestors would have been part of is now very liberal, 
the Baptist Union of Atlantic Canada. What are the pitfalls? I think 
that one of them is that we cannot assume anything of the next generation. and that we have to press upon 
our children the importance of personal faith in Christ. And 
the method of doing that is bringing them to church. We talked about 
this in our podcast on Sunday. It is making the Lord's Day and 
the worship of God the central activity in the life of children. Two things that I've seen happening 
over the course of my ministry is parents who take their children 
away from church to be involved in sports on Sunday mornings, 
whether it's a little league baseball or it's soccer or it's 
hockey, whatever that might be. Well, we want our kids to be 
able to do these things, so for the next 10 weeks, they will 
be absent because we're taking them to the rink, we're taking 
them to the soccer field. You've just taught your children, 
when you do that, that the worship of God is not important. We have 
a friend, we know well, he's a deacon in a church in Arizona. 
He's got two boys. He said to me once, he said, 
I want to make sure that my boys are at every single worship service, 
because if I don't take them, that's a sermon they'll miss. 
If we skip the evening service in our church, that's 50 sermons, 
52 sermons this year that they will miss, and over the course 
of 10 years, that's 500 sermons that they will miss. So that's 
the first mistake that people make, is letting something else 
have priority. The second mistake is thinking 
that that church over there that has all kinds of youth activities 
somehow will be better for the souls of my children than the 
church of which I'm a part. A church that believes in the 
means of grace and the centrality of the preaching of the word. 
And the observation that children have when baptisms take place, 
whether you're a credo or pedo, it's still seeing what happens 
in baptism, watching the observance of the Lord's table. Those are 
things that benefit children and slowly and gradually as they 
see those things the Lord can use them, the preaching, the 
prayers, baptism in the Lord's supper, in their lives. And of course, it also requires 
faithfulness on the part of parents, parents who live the Christian 
life before their children and who do things like catechize 
them. It warms my heart to see all of my adult children who 
have themselves children. My youngest daughter just got 
married, so she doesn't have any kids yet. but all the other 
ones are catechizing their children. So we go to their homes and dad 
or mom, in one case, is able to ask them the question and 
they give back the answer. Those are great things. If you've 
never read B.B. Warfield's little short article on the shorter 
catechism and what it does for people, it's in his selected 
shorter writings. It's really, it's a very brief 
piece, but it's really helpful on the importance of catechizing. 
So I would say, We can't guarantee anything for the future, it's 
in the hands of God, but I think faithfulness in doing the simple 
things of life, in bringing them to the worship of God, exposing 
them to the means of grace, living as Christians before them, catechizing 
them in the home, those are the things that the Lord will use 
to save them oftentimes. Yeah, thank you. For Dr. Barcelos, What are some hermeneutical boundaries, 
particularly when it comes to typology, to prevent an abuse 
of the method and or text? That's a good question. A type 
is a person, place, event, or institution that foreshadows 
something. between type and anti-type would 
be one of escalation. The type is always greater, the 
anti-type is always greater than the type. There's both likeness 
and unlikeness, but there's also escalation. Adam is both like, 
Christ is both like Adam and unlike Adam. Christ is greater 
than Adam. So if you look at the clear types, 
and the one that's very clearly explicit is the Adam type. When 
you can examine the identity and vocation of the type, and 
then examine the identity and vocation of the anti-type, and 
you come up with these like-unlike Anti-type is always greater than 
the type. There's escalation from the type to the anti-type 
and all that stuff. And then you take that to other texts 
and you kind of use that. There has to be some degree of 
correspondence between the two that's stated in both the type 
and the anti-type or else you might be making a type up. So, 
you know, when you read old authors, by the way, there's a very good 
book in spite of Roman Catholic, Daniel Lu, John Daniel Lu, I 
think is his name. It's a book on typology. And 
he has a lot, it's really helpful. He was a 19th century Roman Catholic 
guy. Another book that's helpful on 
that is Mitch Chase's 40 Questions About Typology and Allegory, 
oops. I endorse the book, but it's 
very helpful. He gives you some parameters. It's traditional 
Christian way of thinking about typology, so it's not like people 
haven't thought through this. No, it's not going to keep people 
from being hyper-typorists, okay, and finding types and anti-types, 
hyper-typorists. Everything's typological of everything 
else, you know. Yeah, they can be abused. But 
you can also get a text wrong that doesn't have any typology 
and all you're trying to do is historical grammatical interpretation. People get the text wrong all 
the time. Most people don't say, what are 
the guardrails for the grammatical historical? We don't want to 
go wacko with it. It's just the typology they do 
that with it. methods of interpreting scripture 
have built-in limitations. So go read my books. I would 
suggest as well that, and Rich brought this out a couple of 
times, there's more than I think we're comfortable with. Because 
I don't think that's been the prevailing way to teach scripture 
over at least my generation. I mean, I was your mentee. And 
a lot of this stuff I've gotten along the way, as you have as 
well. So I think if you read older authors, a John Gill, a 
Matthew Poole, and A.W. Pink, to even a certain degree, 
doing typology, at one time was very uncomfortable to me, because 
I always thought, no, there's one meaning, and you've got to 
make sure I get that meaning. But as I think it was successfully 
explained today, texts are pregnant with meaning. And types and anti-types, 
probably a lot more there than we realize. And so, yes, Rich's 
books, but a John Gill, a Matthew Poole, older guys that approach 
the Bible, and then again, in the way that Rich described, 
the one author, God. rather than, you know, constructing 
various theologies, a theology of Paul, a theology of Isaiah, 
a theology of Matthew. It's one author, God, and he's 
infinitely wise and he puts things in the Bible for us to find and 
I think that that was another emphasis too. to be able to just 
go, aha, or, you know, be thrilled and behold your God and the great 
things that he shows us in scripture. It's a wonderful book. Were you 
saying I was wrong and then I learned? He did say I was wrong. No, I know, you were saying we 
were wrong. We didn't think like historic Christians. Yeah, and 
that's a very important thing. I was wrong. I haven't always 
been right. Here's what I'm gonna say. The 
offices of prophet, priest, and king, we often connect those 
with the Lord Jesus. You can go backwards from the 
New Testament into the Old Testament and find those institutions, 
the prophets and the priests and the kings. but they terminate 
in one person in our Lord. Have they ever terminated in 
one person prior to our Lord? Who was the first prophet, priest, 
and king? Adam, okay? So the fall disintegrates 
the three offices in one person, but those institutions start 
arising. So can we, from that, say, well, 
since Adam was a type of him who was to come, Christ, is the monarchy, the kings, are 
these trying to tell us something about what Adam lost and what 
somebody's gonna gain and be victorious in? I think so. So the priests are typological 
of Christ, the kings are typological of Christ, and the prophets are 
typological of Christ. So, you can get typology that 
way too. If you understand the identity 
and vocation of the first and last atoms, the Old Testament 
just begs you to say, hey, make the connections, you know, they're 
there, and it's within the orbit of the scripture themselves. 
You know, you don't want to bring foreign things in there and make 
lousy connections. But again, I'd rather find Jesus 
where he isn't than miss him where he is, or however that 
goes. Great. Okay. We'll watch the clock here. Next question. What are the threats 
we are facing today in upholding the Bible as the sufficient, 
certain and infallible rule for all doctrine? How can we guard 
against them? The same threats that have always 
been launched against the Bible. And yeah, I mean, they come in 
different garments, but I think it's essentially, should insult 
upon the authority of God. The best way that we can defend 
is to know that we're to know the scriptures as we're exhorted 
by Dr. Renahan in the context of evangelizing sinners, but 
contending earnestly for the faith which was once for all 
delivered to the saints. And I'm not suggesting we stand 
on the street corner with a bullhorn screaming at people, but we need 
to be able as the church of Christ to think the thoughts of God 
as revealed in scripture to a degree, we're going through John's gospel 
in our morning worship, And there's been some technical stuff. I 
mean, we're trying to... Jesus in the upper room, as Sinclair 
Ferguson said, he teaches them about the Trinity when everything's 
going to collapse in around them. So, you know, there is a sense 
where we have to learn that language of the church the way that it's 
been brought to us so that we can protect that same doctrine 
that's in the scripture. I think just knowing, thinking, 
being gracious to one another and willing to contend for the 
faith when it's under assault and to speak up and to speak 
the truth, the words of truth and reason in a way that honors 
the Lord and in a way that defends his word. Notice it makes noise when it 
passes through. You have an electric personality, 
Rich. Okay. There's a subtle danger. You may think it's strange for 
me to point this out, but I will. I think that, especially in the 
20th century and on into our own century now, Christianity 
has been given over to academia as opposed to the church. And 
so a lot of those who are churning out books, commentaries, are 
academics. They're not churchmen. And they 
are introducing new ideas. You know, to get a PhD these 
days, you have to have a new idea. That's what it's all about, 
getting a new idea and proving whatever your new idea is, generally 
speaking. That's not true across the board, 
but primarily that's what it is. And it really troubles me 
that we have allowed Christianity to go into the hands of academics 
rather than into the hands of the church. And I say, you're 
president of a seminary, what are you talking about? Well, 
one of the things that we have done, and I'm not trying to virtue 
signal here, but one of the things that we have done is recognize 
this fact and make ourselves accountable to churches. So we 
have formal agreements, arrangements, with three associations in the 
United States, the Southern California churches, the Texas churches, 
and the churches in the Southeast, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi. All of them We are accountable 
to all of those churches. We develop these relationships 
for the specific purpose of being answerable to congregations directly. So there are, I think, about 
40 or 45 churches who have direct access to us and who can contact 
us and say, I'm troubled by such and such. Why did you do this? 
One of your professors said such and such, can you explain what's 
happening? Because we want to be answerable 
to congregations. We don't want to be on our own. 
We don't want to develop an academic system where we're just making 
pronouncements and expecting everybody to follow along with 
us. We really and truly want churches to hold our feet to 
the fire when that is necessary. And that's protection. It's protection 
for us. I think it's also a protection 
for our students and for the churches that they will serve 
because we're seeking in every way possible to emphasize, to 
turn focus upon Christ's Church, that which he died for. But I 
think that that's a really subtle way that things have changed 
and influences that have come into 21st century Christianity. Can you repeat the question? 
I can repeat the question. I just have to scroll back to 
it here. Oh, sorry. Yeah. It was about 
how can we maintain soul scripture. Yeah, as the sufficient certain 
infallible rule. Well, as a preacher, you can 
let the lion out of the cage. Preach the word every Lord saying 
as a churchman, you can go to church every Sunday to all your 
church's services and receive blessed Jesus at thy word. We are gathered all to hear thee. Okay. Okay, if you have a high 
view of the scriptures and of the doctrine of preaching, scriptural 
doctrine of preaching, that's a medium through which the incarnate 
glorified Son of God preaches to his people, my sheep hear 
my voice, and you keep yourself on that diet over a long period 
of time, it's going to maintain in your church and in your personal 
soul a high view of scripture and that'll be passed on. So 
go to church. Maybe we can make this the final 
question. And again, my apologies that we couldn't get to everyone, 
but we have a number of good ones. All of them are good and 
a limited amount of time. So the final question, how do 
I protect myself from exalting my interpretation of the Bible 
above the Bible itself as the Roman Catholics and fundamentalists 
do and the Pharisees did? I would echo something Rich said 
earlier about new thoughts, and I've tried to communicate this 
in our Saturday morning and sometimes in the pulpit. If you and your 
Bible have yielded a brand new thing, I'm not saying you're 
necessarily wrong, but if Gill missed it and Turreton missed 
it and Augustine and Athanasius, you most likely are wrong. So 
I think the discipline of, you know, not being chronologically 
snobs Go back to the fathers, go back to the medievals, but 
go back to the reformers, read those guys, and that really shows 
you how little you know. And that's good. I think, you 
know, exegesis, the task associated with churchmanship, it demands 
a humility and it demands a recognition that I'm not a pope, I'm not 
infallible, and as Jim said earlier, One of the reasons why we like 
the Confessions of Faith is because we're not that bright and we 
need help in this task and we have the help of the Ascended 
Christ who's given gifts to his church and we're to receive those 
gifts and embrace them as having been given by Jesus. There's 
no, you know, all I need is me and the Bible and the Spirit 
That's what every arch heretic in the history of the church 
has ever said. Those are the guys I want to tell. No, you 
really need a confession of faith. I'll go buy you a systematic 
theology. I think it would be good for 
you to read that. I called it one time self-poping 
potpourri, where it's just you and your Greek text and your 
Hebrew text and you're just doing your exegesis and nobody can 
fight with you because you're just interpreting the word of 
God. You're not poisoned by the history. But people like that 
don't realize that, you know, where are we right now? We're 
in Chilliwack, B.C., right? It's 2024. There are some, mostly Baptists 
here, as far as I know, and probably some pedo-Baptists. There are 
some Dutch people. And then there's the much people. I grew up with Dutchmen, by the 
way, on dairies. My point is, we all have a context of life 
And a present context here, in which we're interpreting scripture, 
and we bring a lot of stuff with us. We have assumptions, we have 
presuppositions. Some of them are good, some of 
them are wrong. I tell my students sometimes, first half of the class, I'm 
gonna blow away all your lousy assumptions. Second half of the 
class, I'm gonna give you the right ones so you can interpret 
the Bible. You know, when we come with, I mean it humbly too, 
the right ones are this. The creeds and the confession, 
I start with those. I say, well, these are the big 
dogs of history. These are recognized across denominations. Something's good about these 
documents. It'll hedge you in. We need hermeneutical hedges. Utilize the creeds and the confessions. 
I often say, utilize the good hymnody, too. Some of the hymns 
we were singing this week, Behind that is a rich and thick interpretive 
method to keep us hedged in. So we have to recognize that 
we live in a, this sounds postmodern, we live in a context, that's 
what's right about postmodernism. They're right, there's no presuppositionalist 
interpretation of anything. We come with assumptions that 
condition our interpretation. If that's true, and I think it 
is, then what we need to analyze is our assumptions and get the 
right ones in place in order to interpret the written word 
of God properly. And that's a lifelong endeavor. 
You have to just keep going, wow, I was wrong. Why was I wrong 
about that? Because I assumed X, Y, or Z 
prior to it, and it's X, Y, and A instead of Z. Very good. Yeah.