Latest / Every Church Flourishing by the Great Commission Association / Episode 18: Anthony Ferguson and the Yellow Card Initiative - World Cup Soccer Evangelism. + Guardian Angels and Do Churches Have Their Own Angels? Maybe!

Transcript

Episode 18: Anthony Ferguson and the Yellow Card Initiative - World Cup Soccer Evangelism. + Guardian Angels and Do Churches Have Their Own Angels? Maybe! · Every Church Flourishing by the Great Commission Association

0:00
Speaker1: Hey, fun show today. We're going to talk about human evangelism,
0:03
Speaker1: like human messengers, and we're also going to talk about heavenly messengers or angels.
0:08
Speaker1: Our guest is, I think, a human messenger, Dr.
0:12
Speaker1: Anthony Ferguson of 11th Street Baptist Church in Upland, California,
0:16
Speaker1: which is a city of about 80,000 that borders Los Angeles. Dr.
0:21
Speaker1: Ferguson is one of the founders of the Yellow Card Initiative,
0:24
Speaker1: bringing the good news to World Cup attendees this summer. Let's listen to a clip.
0:31
Speaker0: And the point of the sermon was why God doesn't do the impossible.
0:34
Speaker0: And the first point was because we don't ask him to. And so I listened to this
0:38
Speaker0: whole sermon about God doing the impossible.
0:40
Speaker0: He said, hey, Anthony, we should make a professionally designed website with
0:45
Speaker0: a professionally designed video that can hold the traffic of hundreds of thousands of people.
0:51
Speaker0: We should make a yellow car gospel track and we should hand out 100,000 at the World Cup.
0:56
Speaker0: Now, 11th Street Baptist is a church of, we average 140. And I looked at this
1:01
Speaker0: brother and I guess I didn't learn the lesson he wanted me to learn from the sermon, right?
1:05
Speaker0: Because I said to him, I said, brother, that's so much beyond 11th Street.
1:09
Speaker0: And this brother looked at his pastor in the face and said, yes, it is.
1:29
Speaker1: Practical advice, soul care, and resources that work together to build up your
1:33
Speaker1: local fellowship and the broader kingdom of God.
1:35
Speaker1: Join hosts, Pastor Chris Cole
1:37
Speaker1: and Dr. Chase Thompson from the Great Commission Association, led by Dr.
1:42
Speaker1: Mike Stewart, as they explore the frontiers of ministry and aim for the goal
1:45
Speaker1: of making every church flourish.
1:48
Speaker1: Hello, everybody, and welcome into episode number 18 of the Every Church Flourishing Podcast,
1:54
Speaker1: sponsored by the Great Commission Association, which is a group of Bible-minded
2:00
Speaker1: Baptist churches in California. And we want to hear from you.
2:04
Speaker1: We want to partner with you if you are in our area.
2:07
Speaker1: Today's guest, Dr. Anthony Ferguson, actually reached out several months ago
2:12
Speaker1: from a totally different association down near Los Angeles and was seeking partnership
2:18
Speaker1: with the GCA and found a great partner with us, and you can too.
2:24
Speaker1: So today we're going to talk with Dr. Ferguson about the Yellow Card Initiative,
2:28
Speaker1: which is a fantastic approach to evangelism.
2:30
Speaker1: And Dr. Ferguson and his team have already done most of the work for you.
2:34
Speaker1: In the episode today, we're going to talk about evangelism with the yellow red
2:38
Speaker1: soccer cards that have a QR code on them and lead to a website with the gospel.
2:43
Speaker1: And one strategy that many churches in the West are using to reach people from
2:48
Speaker1: around the world who are traveling to the United States this summer for the
2:52
Speaker1: World Cup Soccer Tournament.
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Speaker1: We've got Dr. Ferguson for the next three episodes, and in addition to evangelism,
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Speaker1: we're going to talk to him about pastoring,
3:01
Speaker1: church health, the Old Testament, and the Dead Sea Scrolls because he is a PhD
3:07
Speaker1: high-level scholar of the Old Testament and the Dead Sea Scrolls. I cannot wait.
3:12
Speaker1: He was a fascinating guest, and our interview went almost two hours with him
3:18
Speaker1: which is why we have three episodes and I was never bored let's jump in
3:24
Speaker1: It's totally cliche to talk about how excited you are to interview somebody
3:29
Speaker1: on a podcast or whatever, but I will say I'm especially excited to interview Dr.
3:34
Speaker1: Anthony Ferguson, not only because of the Yellow Card Initiative,
3:37
Speaker1: which I think is a really creative, but potentially extremely fruitful approach to evangelism,
3:44
Speaker1: but also ever since I found out that he was a textual criticism scholar in the
3:50
Speaker1: realm of the Dead Sea Scrolls.
3:52
Speaker1: And pretty much every Bible nerd is really fascinated by the Dead Sea Scrolls.
3:58
Speaker1: So as soon as I found that out, I hammered in a couple of Dead Sea Scrolls questions
4:02
Speaker1: for the end of the interview.
4:03
Speaker1: So if you're like me and you're interested in something like that,
4:06
Speaker1: hang on. We're going to get to some pretty wild stuff there.
4:09
Speaker0: Anthony, we are so glad that you are here with us today. And I'm excited.
4:14
Speaker0: Years and years ago, back in ancient times when dinosaurs roamed the earth,
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Speaker0: One of my good seminary classmates pastored the 11th Street Baptist Church in Upland.
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Speaker0: Which is where you get to serve as the pastor today.
4:29
Speaker0: So why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself, about your family and
4:33
Speaker0: how you came to 11th Street?
4:35
Speaker0: Yeah, well, first, thanks. Thanks, Chris and Chase for having me on the podcast.
4:38
Speaker0: Happy to be here. Happy to talk about soccer, Jesus and textual criticism.
4:42
Speaker0: Three things that are really important to me. So what a joy it is for me to
4:46
Speaker0: talk. But yeah, about myself.
4:48
Speaker0: I think the first thing I'm a Christian, saved by grace, got saved when I was
4:52
Speaker0: a kid. My grandpa was really instrumental in that.
4:55
Speaker0: And I'm really thankful for his testimony in my life and God's sovereignty and kindness to me.
5:01
Speaker0: I do pastor 11th Street Baptist Church. I've been here for seven years.
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Speaker0: I'm married to my wife, Kristen Ferguson. We've been married for 17 years.
5:09
Speaker0: We just celebrated our 17th wedding anniversary and we have the extreme blessing.
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Speaker0: I have the extreme blessing of being the father to Asher and Lila Ferguson.
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Speaker0: Love them. My son is 10. My daughter is seven.
5:24
Speaker0: My kids and my wife are just, outside of Christ, the greatest gift I can have.
5:29
Speaker0: And love spending time with them, love camping with them, fishing with them,
5:33
Speaker0: hanging out with them. Just really do love my family.
5:36
Speaker0: Yeah, how did I come to 11th Street? I was finishing up a PhD dissertation and
5:41
Speaker0: teaching as an adjunct online at Boyce College and Cal Baptist and a little bit at Gateway.
5:47
Speaker0: And my dissertation was complete. I was just needing to defend it.
5:51
Speaker0: And I started looking for pastoral positions, preferably near Gateway Seminary
5:56
Speaker0: in Southern California.
5:58
Speaker0: Definitely, we were open to going elsewhere. And in God's kindness,
6:02
Speaker0: he planted me five miles from Gateway Seminary, which is where my wife works. I adjunct there as well.
6:08
Speaker0: And it's been a really big blessing to invest into the Gateway community also.
6:14
Speaker0: Yeah, we've been here for seven years.
6:15
Speaker0: It's a church revitalization, and God has been so kind. In Ezekiel 37,
6:21
Speaker0: can these dry bones live?
6:23
Speaker0: One of my seminary professors, Kevin
6:25
Speaker0: Smith, preached a sermon about church revitalization from that passage.
6:29
Speaker0: Can these dry bones live? Only you know, God.
6:33
Speaker0: 11th Street, we weren't a dead church. We weren't a skeleton church,
6:37
Speaker0: but there were definitely some difficult things, some financial things,
6:42
Speaker0: some theological issues that we needed to work through.
6:44
Speaker0: And God has just been so kind over the last seven years. And I think we're on
6:48
Speaker0: the cusp of what I would define as a healthy church.
6:51
Speaker0: And I do think this year, as we establish a deacon ministry and an elder ministry,
6:56
Speaker0: we'll be there. And it's been a great journey.
6:58
Speaker0: It's been a difficult journey, but one that I'm really, really thankful for.
7:02
Speaker0: We're excited because we're actually recording this shortly after we've recorded
7:07
Speaker0: another episode with the other Dr.
7:11
Speaker0: Ferguson, and your wife has preceded you in a recording on Every Church Flourishing,
7:18
Speaker0: and we get the privilege of having both Drs.
7:21
Speaker0: Ferguson there, and we love your wife and her ministry there.
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Speaker0: We're grateful for her leadership at Gateway Seminary as well.
7:29
Speaker0: So you were an Old Testament guy at Southern, so why Old Testament,
7:35
Speaker0: and how How did you find yourself in ministry?
7:38
Speaker0: Yeah, so I went to a good church growing up, for sure.
7:42
Speaker0: So many strengths of that church. And I am who I am.
7:47
Speaker0: And I would say the yellow card exists because of that church's influence in
7:51
Speaker0: my life. So that church had so many strengths.
7:54
Speaker0: But one of maybe the drawbacks of that ministry was I didn't understand how
7:58
Speaker0: to put the Old and New Testament together.
8:00
Speaker0: I think that's probably common in ministry. It's a very difficult topic.
8:04
Speaker0: What does David and Goliath have to do with Peter and Paul?
8:08
Speaker0: What does the conquest have to do with salvation in Christ?
8:12
Speaker0: What does the near sacrifice of Isaac have to do about my sanctification?
8:17
Speaker0: And so these questions are difficult. And I got to seminary and I was in a class
8:22
Speaker0: by Peter Gentry, one of my favorite professors of all time.
8:26
Speaker0: And he just began to unpack the totality of scripture and showing me the unity
8:32
Speaker0: amid the diversity, by no means flattening out scripture,
8:36
Speaker0: letting each story of scripture speak in its own individual way,
8:40
Speaker0: but yet showing me unity and how scripture is pointing to Christ and the gospel.
8:44
Speaker0: And honestly, I obviously began to know Jesus better.
8:48
Speaker0: I began to learn more of God's sovereignty, his kindness, his providence, his intentionality.
8:54
Speaker0: But more than that, I literally began to love God more. And being an Old Testament person,
9:00
Speaker0: seeing the unity of scripture, I was just loving God. I felt compelled to be more devoted to God.
9:06
Speaker0: And in my ministry, I don't want somebody to have to come to seminary to get what I just got.
9:11
Speaker0: At that moment, I just dedicated myself, I'm going to do a PhD in Old Testament,
9:15
Speaker0: because I'm going to know the Old Testament.
9:17
Speaker0: And then a PhD in the Dead Sea Scrolls, that was really a roundabout way.
9:22
Speaker0: That wasn't my intention.
9:24
Speaker0: You know, John Piper has historically and famously made the comment,
9:27
Speaker0: why are those who are best in Hebrew and Greek one step removed from the pulpit?
9:31
Speaker0: So very convicted, thought that that's very right.
9:35
Speaker0: Early on in seminary, I was like, I'm going to learn Hebrew and Greek as best as I can.
9:39
Speaker0: And so I just did Hebrew and Greek. And in a Septuagint seminar,
9:44
Speaker0: I was introduced to this concept of the Dead Sea Scrolls and concepts like textual
9:49
Speaker0: plurality and fluidity.
9:51
Speaker0: These are very technical conversations, but also extremely important in the
9:56
Speaker0: realms of apologetics and faithfulness.
9:59
Speaker0: And I didn't have an answer. I was being introduced to ideas.
10:03
Speaker0: I didn't know how to respond.
10:04
Speaker0: So I thought, hey, to answer this question, I have to know Hebrew and Greek really well.
10:08
Speaker0: And it's really important because people are asking the question,
10:12
Speaker0: Can I even, can I trust the Bible? And I'm going to put these things together
10:17
Speaker0: and I'm going to do my best to answer the question.
10:19
Speaker0: So I was in seminary. I wanted to be a pastor.
10:23
Speaker0: I thought I would do a biblical theology PhD and I did not expect to do a Dead Sea Scrolls PhD.
10:31
Speaker0: But that's what I did. And yeah, really glad I did.
10:35
Speaker1: That's awesome. It really seems like you've taken a grammatical linguistic sort
10:40
Speaker1: of approach to apologetics.
10:42
Speaker1: Which I think is fantastic for a pastor, I kind of take a historical approach to the same topic.
10:48
Speaker1: Switching to the Yellow Card Initiative itself, doing some research for the
10:53
Speaker1: podcast, I noticed in August of 2025,
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Speaker1: you tweeted or exed or whatever we call it now, praying about how our church
11:01
Speaker1: near LA can reach the nations at the World Cup next summer.
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Speaker1: Any churches, pastors, seminaries, or other organizations out there with a plan
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Speaker1: or ideas? Now I'm going to assume that some point after August 19th,
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Speaker1: the genesis of the yellow card initiative came around.
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Speaker1: So tell us what that is and tell us how it happened.
11:24
Speaker0: Yeah, thank you. Yeah, I don't remember the timeline. So you're a history guy.
11:28
Speaker0: I'm not a history guy. So I don't remember the historical timeline here.
11:31
Speaker0: But it started in, let's see, 2024.
11:35
Speaker0: I think the fall of 2024. Is that right?
11:38
Speaker0: So 2025 was last year. Yes. I reached out to NAMM and IMB, the CSBC gateway.
11:44
Speaker0: And I was like, hey, the World Cup's coming up.
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Speaker0: I love soccer. I am a big Everton fan.
11:50
Speaker0: I played very competitively, played in college and love soccer.
11:54
Speaker0: And so I was very aware the World Cup was coming to North America and loving
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Speaker0: Jesus and wanting to make much of him and my own theological understanding of the Great Commission.
12:04
Speaker0: I saw these as a perfect blending together of soccer, mission,
12:08
Speaker0: leveraging soccer for the mission, leveraging the World Cup,
12:11
Speaker0: spread God's glory to all people.
12:12
Speaker0: So I would say almost 18 months ago now, I reached out to some of our entities
12:16
Speaker0: and just started asking questions.
12:18
Speaker0: Hey, 11th Street wants to do something. What are we doing?
12:21
Speaker0: And we just want to be on the team. And those were some good conversations.
12:24
Speaker0: And I was really challenged to grassroots think through something to do.
12:29
Speaker0: So 2025, I would imagine summer, I started passing out index cards to the people at the church.
12:36
Speaker0: And I was like, hey, they had already heard me talking about this thing for
12:39
Speaker0: months. Hey, we got to do something.
12:41
Speaker0: We got to do something. So we're praying, we're thinking.
12:44
Speaker0: I start passing out index cards. And I say, hey, for the next couple months,
12:47
Speaker0: I want you to write down ideas about what we can do to leverage the World Cup
12:52
Speaker0: to spread the glory of God to all people.
12:54
Speaker0: Through that season, it was probably a three, maybe four-month season of dedicated
13:00
Speaker0: prayer and just soliciting ideas.
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Speaker0: We generated now, I think it's eight assignments 11th Street is doing this summer.
13:10
Speaker0: My plan, Chase, was just, hey, how do I equip 11th Street? How do I equip 11th
13:16
Speaker0: Street to steward this moment well?
13:18
Speaker0: In my mind, God is giving the churches of North America talents.
13:21
Speaker0: Talents if we want to use you know jesus's parable the
13:24
Speaker0: talents here he's giving us talents namely the
13:28
Speaker0: world cup and i think he's looking to see what we
13:30
Speaker0: will do with those talents and i was convicted that we have
13:33
Speaker0: to steward the talent well and my mind was just 11th street we're going to do
13:38
Speaker0: stuff and i had a brother in the church who wants to remain anonymous who came
13:43
Speaker0: to me he bought me lunch came to my office and he said hey i want you to listen
13:46
Speaker0: to this like 50 minute sermon and we're just going to listen to it.
13:50
Speaker0: And then I'm, I'm going to ask you something.
13:52
Speaker0: So we sat down and the sermon was all about how God can do the impossible.
13:56
Speaker0: And it was a sermon. It wasn't super exegetical on, you know,
14:00
Speaker0: Peter stepping out of the boat.
14:02
Speaker0: And the point of the sermon was why God doesn't do the impossible.
14:05
Speaker0: And the first point was because we don't ask him to. And so I listened to this
14:10
Speaker0: whole sermon about God doing the impossible. He said, Hey, Anthony, we should,
14:13
Speaker0: make a professionally designed website with a professionally designed video
14:18
Speaker0: that can hold the traffic of hundreds of thousands of people.
14:22
Speaker0: We should make a yellow card gospel track and we should hand out a hundred thousand at the World Cup.
14:27
Speaker0: Now 11th Street Baptist is a church of, we average 140.
14:31
Speaker0: If everybody showed up, we're probably 160 maybe. And I looked at this brother
14:35
Speaker0: and I guess I didn't learn the lesson he wanted me to learn from the sermon,
14:39
Speaker0: right? Because I said to him, I said, brother, that's so much beyond 11th Street.
14:43
Speaker0: And this brother looked at his pastor in the face and said, yes,
14:46
Speaker0: it is. And so, you know, Chase, at that moment, I have a decision to make.
14:49
Speaker0: Do I just blow it off or do I at least try?
14:53
Speaker0: And I did not have faith. I literally thought, well, I at least have to try.
14:58
Speaker0: I did not expect much. I cannot design websites.
15:02
Speaker0: I cannot design professionally designed videos. the request he made to me was
15:07
Speaker0: completely beyond my skill base and way beyond my limitations.
15:11
Speaker0: I couldn't accomplish it.
15:12
Speaker0: So I just started cold calling people.
15:15
Speaker0: We're talking the secretary of evangelism at NAMM, like cold calling people
15:18
Speaker0: like, hey, this is what we want to do. Can you help us?
15:22
Speaker0: And I finally got to Chris Cole and Michael Stewart at the Great Commission Association.
15:28
Speaker0: And I told them what we wanted to do. And they said, hey, write me up a proposal.
15:32
Speaker0: And I was like, you didn't just hang up the phone?
15:34
Speaker0: And he said, give me a business proposal. So I wrote up a proposal and I sent it back to them.
15:39
Speaker0: And just a few weeks later, they're coming down with a check for $7,500.
15:44
Speaker0: Wow. To support this ministry. And I think the Great Commission Association
15:49
Speaker0: believing in what we were doing was one of the first gifts of God to be like,
15:55
Speaker0: I'm going to do something at this World Cup. and through the yellow card initiative.
15:59
Speaker0: And God began to build my faith. Around the same time, we had a brother at Gateway
16:03
Speaker0: Seminary, Caleb Stallings, who said, yes, I could design your website for free.
16:07
Speaker0: We had a brother who said, yes, I can give you a professional video.
16:12
Speaker0: He gave us the English version for free. And of course, we're using AI to translate things.
16:17
Speaker0: He brought people in who can quality control, quality check this stuff.
16:21
Speaker0: And then I just start cold calling more people, mobilization,
16:26
Speaker0: churches, what churches want to be involved.
16:28
Speaker0: I'm cold calling, emailing random people, convention leaders,
16:31
Speaker0: directors of missions, association leaders.
16:34
Speaker0: And through that, the Texas Baptists, the Pacific Northwest,
16:37
Speaker0: and the Missouri Baptists have all gotten on board.
16:40
Speaker0: And our goal is to hand out 100,000 cards in California.
16:44
Speaker0: I have 5,000 cards right now that are not spoken for, maybe 7,000.
16:50
Speaker0: But I have several churches that went to trainings, are the SoCal training who haven't responded yet.
16:56
Speaker0: So I think we're going to be ordering that second batch.
17:00
Speaker0: And I think hitting that 100,000 card mark is possible just in,
17:04
Speaker0: just in California. So the Genesis was not flattering for me.
17:09
Speaker0: It wasn't that I had this vision from on high. It wasn't that I had,
17:12
Speaker0: you know, this big faith, you know, it wasn't that it was anonymous brother who came to me.
17:18
Speaker0: He listened to his pastor. He presented an idea.
17:20
Speaker0: I said, I have to try. And then God just took over.
17:24
Speaker0: And, you know, Chase, what I love about the yellow card initiative is that nobody
17:27
Speaker0: in their right mind can say, look what I did.
17:30
Speaker0: Nobody can say that. I mean, I can't say that. I didn't even have the idea.
17:34
Speaker0: Like the web designer can't say it. The video producer can't say it.
17:38
Speaker0: Great Commission Association can't say it.
17:41
Speaker0: CSBC can't say it. And why I think that's really special is because we all can
17:45
Speaker0: only say, look what God has done.
17:47
Speaker0: Yeah. And that makes me just really, I would, we use the word excited a lot.
17:51
Speaker0: We've used it several times in this podcast so far, but it makes me really excited
17:54
Speaker0: about what God is going to do. if he brought us this far, what's he going to do at the actual event?
18:02
Speaker0: I'm really excited and I'm looking forward to seeing what God will do.
18:06
Speaker0: And he's the only one who will get the glory. So that's kind of the background
18:09
Speaker0: and the genesis of the Elkhart Initiative.
18:12
Speaker0: I just want to say, brother, first off, thank you for your courageous obedience and your humility.
18:18
Speaker0: So it takes a lot of humility to tell the story that you just did,
18:23
Speaker0: to be honest about the genesis of this, because we don't know that story.
18:30
Speaker0: And I want to thank you for that, because there is so much...
18:34
Speaker0: Movement in the era in which we are engaging people, where we're moving towards
18:39
Speaker0: influence as a commodity and my story and what I'm about.
18:45
Speaker0: And one of the things I love about you, and one of the reasons,
18:48
Speaker0: by the way, that GCA was engaged so early was because you didn't do that.
18:53
Speaker0: We get a lot of approaches from people who are like, I've got the next best, greatest thing.
18:59
Speaker0: It was actually your humility and your willingness to say, I've got some crazy
19:03
Speaker0: idea. I don't even know that God's going to do it.
19:06
Speaker0: Would you guys like to come and join us in some act of obedience here that I'm doing?
19:12
Speaker0: And it's that very spirit that was such a powerful invitation.
19:17
Speaker0: And I think it is a powerful invitation to so many people to say,
19:22
Speaker0: and it's the willingness to not centralize this around 11th Street or one person's
19:29
Speaker0: platform that makes it such an engaging invitation to your current partners.
19:36
Speaker0: And we hope maybe even through this podcast to invite other partners into this work.
19:41
Speaker0: So one question I have is we've sort of been talking about the Yellow Card Initiative
19:45
Speaker0: like a lot of people might know what it is.
19:49
Speaker0: And so how would you describe to
19:52
Speaker0: someone who's never heard of yellow card initiative as it stands
19:55
Speaker0: today what is it why should we be
19:58
Speaker0: part of these these yellow cards right here if
20:01
Speaker0: you're watching this on video these yellow red cards why
20:04
Speaker0: what is this what how does it work yeah what's the basic idea and how can some
20:10
Speaker0: churches be a part of it yeah yeah great so the yellow card i would first describe
20:15
Speaker0: as an infrastructure or a toolbox a set tools which includes three main tools
20:21
Speaker0: so the first is a a website.
20:24
Speaker0: Now, the website is super, super simple. It does three things.
20:27
Speaker0: First, it shares the gospel.
20:28
Speaker0: It shares the gospel via video and via text. So we have two options to share the gospel.
20:33
Speaker0: As people are navigating through the website, they'll come across both gospel presentations.
20:39
Speaker0: Second, we offer people an opportunity to respond to us. So we're going to be using NAMS call center.
20:44
Speaker0: And we also have a form that people can fill out to either become a Christian,
20:48
Speaker0: learn more about Christianity, learn about a local church, so people to connect
20:52
Speaker0: with us. And then the third aspect of the site is just a list of participating churches.
20:57
Speaker0: So we hopefully in the near future, we'll have all the churches who are participating with us.
21:02
Speaker0: That means churches who are engaged in handing out cards, whether or not it's
21:06
Speaker0: through personal evangelism, or they have maybe a digital evangelism strategy,
21:10
Speaker0: whether or not they're going to the sites or trying to get people to come to their campus.
21:14
Speaker0: If they're engaged with us, we'll put their church name on our site.
21:18
Speaker0: So that's the three components of the site, sharing the gospel,
21:21
Speaker0: giving people an opportunity and you respond to us, and then having a list of
21:25
Speaker0: churches for people to check out.
21:27
Speaker0: The infrastructure also includes a suite of social media accounts.
21:31
Speaker0: So if you're on social media, we'd love for you to follow us on X,
21:34
Speaker0: Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, I am not super big on social media, so.
21:40
Speaker0: I probably don't have the right lingua to describe these things.
21:42
Speaker0: But yeah, you can follow us. I have a guy who's leading those efforts.
21:46
Speaker0: And then finally, the infrastructure also has the card.
21:50
Speaker0: So Chris and Chase, you both just held up the card. This is a yellow card gospel
21:54
Speaker0: track, yellow on one side, that's right, red on the other.
21:57
Speaker0: And super simple. It's vinyl. It's rounded edges.
22:01
Speaker0: Official size, it's four by three. There's not actually an official size,
22:04
Speaker0: but that's the general size of the yellow cards.
22:06
Speaker0: General colors used, yellow and red. yellow card initiative is an infrastructure.
22:11
Speaker0: The infrastructure includes social media accounts, website, and the actual card.
22:17
Speaker0: Now, the yellow card initiative is more than just a set of tools. It's a strategy.
22:21
Speaker0: So when most people hear me or somebody else talk about the yellow card initiative,
22:26
Speaker0: they think mainly in terms of street evangelism, sharing the gospel with a stranger.
22:33
Speaker0: And I would say that the Yellow Card Initiative is not just for those who have
22:38
Speaker0: the gift or the ability or the maturity to share the gospel with a stranger.
22:42
Speaker0: The Yellow Card is for anybody who wants to leverage the World Cup for the sake
22:46
Speaker0: of the Great Commission.
22:47
Speaker0: So when we're thinking about the strategy, we think in terms of four cores.
22:52
Speaker0: So the four cores include personal evangelism, developing a strategy in your
22:57
Speaker0: church or your ministry where the people under your influence can use the card
23:03
Speaker0: to share the gospel with their family, friends, and neighbors.
23:06
Speaker0: So at 11th Street, one of the things we are doing is we set out a couple hundred cards in our foyer.
23:12
Speaker0: And the goal is that as people are engaging in normal life, when people talk
23:16
Speaker0: about soccer, they can have something to give to a friend or a family member
23:21
Speaker0: and be able to naturally get to the gospel.
23:24
Speaker0: So we have personal evangelism. We also have digital evangelism.
23:28
Speaker0: We're really encouraging churches to develop a digital strategy.
23:32
Speaker0: So I don't know the statistic.
23:34
Speaker0: But I'd imagine the average person on social media has a few hundred people
23:38
Speaker0: in their social media ecosystem.
23:41
Speaker0: Some people, thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands.
23:44
Speaker0: So if I can train the people at 11th Street to go on TikTok or Instagram or
23:50
Speaker0: do a YouTube short or a Facebook Instagram reel and just say,
23:54
Speaker0: hey, you've probably seen this yellow card in the World Cup.
23:58
Speaker0: Yeah, a player breaks the rules. They get a warning. They do it again. Red card, they're out.
24:03
Speaker0: But what's cool about this yellow card is this isn't just about breaking FIFA's
24:06
Speaker0: rules, but breaking God's rules.
24:08
Speaker0: And we made a video all about what God thinks of you when you break God's rules.
24:12
Speaker0: And I bet you'll be surprised to learn what he thinks.
24:15
Speaker0: Please check the video out in the description below. Like if I can train the
24:19
Speaker0: 150 people at 11th Street, 160 people to do that on their digital platforms,
24:25
Speaker0: we've just 1,000, 10,000 X our influence, right?
24:29
Speaker0: Our ability to spread the glory of God. So when we're thinking about the yellow
24:32
Speaker0: card, it's a strategy that's personal evangelism, digital evangelism.
24:37
Speaker0: But then third, we're really encouraging churches to creatively think through
24:42
Speaker0: a category that we're calling church evangelism, community evangelism.
24:47
Speaker0: That means how can we leverage the moment so that people in our own community come to you?
24:53
Speaker0: So some of the things we're doing at 11th Street is we're doing a fantasy league.
24:57
Speaker0: So we're like generating 10 questions and each question has a score.
25:01
Speaker0: And we're going to have a bunch of people in our league. We're really inviting
25:04
Speaker0: our church members to invite their non-Christian friends to join the league.
25:07
Speaker0: And then the people, top three people at the end of the Fantasy League get prizes.
25:12
Speaker0: We're going to do a FIFA video game tournament. We're specifically targeting
25:16
Speaker0: our young men and trying to get them to come out and invite their friends to
25:19
Speaker0: play out the World Cup bracket in EA Sports 2026.
25:23
Speaker0: So video games for Jesus.
25:25
Speaker0: Video games. This is awesome. Right. Yeah. Soccer for Jesus. Again, we love soccer.
25:31
Speaker0: You know, some churches are kind of like, you know, tailoring their VBSs this
25:34
Speaker0: year to have a soccer emphasis.
25:36
Speaker0: We're going to do that at 11th Street in that we're going to do a watch party.
25:40
Speaker0: Our Spanish and Korean churches are going to partner together to broadcast the
25:45
Speaker0: Mexico-Korea game, South Korea game.
25:48
Speaker0: And it's on the same day as our VBS. So as kids come to VBS,
25:52
Speaker0: we're going to have street tacos and, you know, Korean appetizers,
25:56
Speaker0: churros probably, good stuff.
25:58
Speaker0: And we're going to encourage families to stick around, parents,
26:01
Speaker0: and we're going to use the yellow card to share the gospel with them.
26:03
Speaker0: You know, another idea is we're going to do a big final watch party where Sunday.
26:08
Speaker0: July 19th at noon, we're inviting the entire community to come onto our campus
26:12
Speaker0: to watch the World Cup, to play soccer, to eat good food and to hear the gospel.
26:17
Speaker0: So, you know, there's a number of other things we're doing and a number of other
26:20
Speaker0: things other churches are doing, but we are encouraging churches to think through
26:24
Speaker0: a strategy about how they can leverage the moment to draw people to them.
26:28
Speaker0: But then the fourth thing is we're really encouraging people to go into their commute.
26:33
Speaker0: So this might mean going to local apartment complexes with Costco pizza, knocking on doors.
26:39
Speaker0: Hey, we're outside playing soccer.
26:41
Speaker0: We got some dinner. Would you like some dinner? We're the local church.
26:44
Speaker0: If they say, yeah, you station two people at that door and one person goes back, gets the order.
26:50
Speaker0: Well, when they're at the door, they're sharing the gospel with the yellow card.
26:52
Speaker0: This is an idea that I got from a company in Oklahoma.
26:57
Speaker0: I don't remember the name of
26:58
Speaker0: the company, but they sell these grill attachments that are pretty cool.
27:01
Speaker0: But we're kind of altering the idea a little bit to be Costco pizzas,
27:04
Speaker0: a little more cost effective, I think.
27:06
Speaker0: But that's an idea. Or, you know, even going to venue sites,
27:09
Speaker0: Uber and Lyft drop-off stations, tourist hotspots.
27:12
Speaker0: LA has like eight fan zones. So we're going to be sending out teams to those
27:15
Speaker0: fan zones. There's a church one block away from SoFi Stadium in Englewood. They connected with me.
27:20
Speaker0: And our hope is to send out teams to them to share the gospel on the streets
27:23
Speaker0: around SoFi. So we're encouraging churches to also think through that street
27:27
Speaker0: evangelism component. So what is the yellow card? That was the original question.
27:32
Speaker0: Yellow card is an infrastructure. It's a set of tools to help us leverage the
27:37
Speaker0: moment for the sake of God's glory.
27:39
Speaker0: But it's also a strategy, helping churches think through how they can strategically
27:42
Speaker0: position themselves in this big plan, right, to spread God's glory.
27:48
Speaker0: So that's what it is. It's an infrastructure and a strategy.
27:50
Speaker1: Fantastic. Okay, so we're driving down the road.
27:53
Speaker1: We're talking about the Yellow Card Initiative and evangelism.
27:57
Speaker1: I'm going to slam us off of a side road for just a few seconds and then right
28:02
Speaker1: back onto the interstate in just a minute.
28:04
Speaker1: But I got to ask, because we're talking around it, you're obviously a football
28:09
Speaker1: soccer guy. You played in college.
28:11
Speaker1: I'm just curious how in the world you got to be a blues fan. Are you a Liverpool guy?
28:17
Speaker1: How did this relationship between you and Everton start?
28:20
Speaker0: Well, yeah, I'm a big Everton fan. So if you don't like soccer,
28:25
Speaker0: that would be a great team to start following.
28:27
Speaker0: If you want a team with heart and legacy. But if you want a team with a winning
28:32
Speaker0: record. We're not doing bad this year.
28:34
Speaker1: No, I said no. No, not bad at all.
28:37
Speaker0: We have a brand new stadium, a brand new owner from Texas, the great state of Texas.
28:42
Speaker0: Great coach. We have a homecoming for David Moyes. Oh, I'm so happy he's back.
28:46
Speaker0: Yes, so I'm a big Everton fan. So how did I become an Everton fan?
28:49
Speaker0: Well my last name is ferguson and when i was a kid they had a striker named duncan ferguson,
28:56
Speaker0: and they also you know manchester united at
28:59
Speaker0: the time had a coach named sir alex ferguson but i couldn't like
29:02
Speaker0: them because everybody liked the red doubles and so i couldn't like them i'm
29:07
Speaker0: not a bandwagoner at all i'm the kind of loyal and true guy right so i chose
29:12
Speaker0: everton and i've been a fan actually that year they made it to the champions
29:16
Speaker0: league like qualification round they didn't qualify in 2004 for the Champions
29:20
Speaker0: League, but been the fan ever since.
29:23
Speaker0: There's been some good years. There's been some tough years.
29:26
Speaker0: But I'm very optimistic about the future.
29:29
Speaker0: They have some good players. They have a great, great coach.
29:32
Speaker0: And I'm a big fan. But yeah, how did I become a fan? Duncan Ferguson. That's how it goes.
29:35
Speaker1: Do you despise Liverpool FC?
29:41
Speaker0: Oh, well, that's a hard question. Because they actually have several Christians on their team.
29:46
Speaker1: Oh, that makes it tough.
29:47
Speaker0: So, you know, they have a striker from Holland. Probably not going to say his
29:50
Speaker0: name properly. Gokpo. their goalie from Brazil, Alisson.
29:54
Speaker0: Firmino is a historical Liverpool fan. He's actually a pastor in Brazil now.
29:59
Speaker0: So I used to hate Liverpool.
30:02
Speaker0: And then I realized, I don't know if Everton has any believers.
30:05
Speaker0: But Liverpool does.
30:07
Speaker0: So no, I would not say I hate Liverpool anymore. I'm actually kind of fond of some of their players.
30:14
Speaker0: No, I believe, I recall the other Dr.
30:19
Speaker0: Ferguson, and your wife has a nickname for your team.
30:22
Speaker0: We don't say that. We don't talk about Bruno. We don't talk about Bruno.
30:27
Speaker0: We don't talk about Neverton.
30:31
Speaker0: Is that it? Yes, my wife calls them Neverton. Oh.
30:36
Speaker0: Because in her mind, they never win. Now, in her defense, there was a couple
30:40
Speaker0: years that were very dark for Everton. They never got relegated.
30:44
Speaker0: Praise Jesus, I'm praising you, Jesus, for that. Thank you, Jesus.
30:47
Speaker0: But it's not appropriate anymore. They are not. So my nickname for them is Louverton
30:52
Speaker0: because I Louve them. I love that. Louverton.
30:57
Speaker0: Yes, I was in Neverton.
30:59
Speaker1: Okay, well, hey, Jordan Pickford, at least, is Roman Catholic.
31:04
Speaker1: So maybe on the way to believing the gospel,
31:07
Speaker0: Lord willing. Yeah, I mean, Jordan Pickford is amazing. He is,
31:11
Speaker0: I think, the best goalie in the world.
31:13
Speaker0: I might be a little biased, but he's great. Seamus Coleman, he is an amazing coach. player.
31:18
Speaker0: They have a new striker from Senegal named Njai. He's really good.
31:21
Speaker1: I grew up in Alabama, as I already mentioned. I asked you about the rivals because
31:26
Speaker1: if you're in Alabama, it's civil war between Alabama and Auburn.
31:31
Speaker1: I call it football hate because everybody down there claims to be a Christian.
31:36
Speaker1: It's not real hate, it's football hate. Okay, back on the interstate.
31:40
Speaker1: So if somebody missed the training for how to utilize the yellow cards,
31:48
Speaker1: where would you point them to if you're going to send out a few hundred,
31:51
Speaker1: a church's request a few hundred?
31:53
Speaker1: In fact, my church just signed up this week to request some cards.
31:57
Speaker1: Where would you point people to get training now that the in-person seminars are over?
32:04
Speaker0: We have probably two options. The first option is on our YouTube page.
32:08
Speaker0: So if you go to Yellow Card Initiative on our YouTube page, we'd love to have
32:11
Speaker0: you subscribe to the page. But we have training.
32:15
Speaker0: I think there's 13 videos that take people from interested in World Cup Evangelism
32:20
Speaker0: to being equipped to do World Cup Evangelism.
32:25
Speaker0: And so we start with biblical foundations, then we move on to the theological
32:28
Speaker0: foundations, and then we have a 10-step process of getting equipped.
32:33
Speaker0: What does that mean? And then with the use of AI and a dear friend who has a
32:38
Speaker0: company called Sermon Shots, he was able to translate for us the English videos
32:43
Speaker0: into Spanish and Portuguese.
32:44
Speaker0: So those are available for Spanish-speaking churches and Portuguese-speaking churches.
32:48
Speaker0: So that would be probably the easiest way. Those are abbreviated videos.
32:51
Speaker0: I think the videos are three minutes, five minutes, or maybe one or two, that's seven minutes.
32:55
Speaker0: But they're really digestible on a commute home from the bay,
32:59
Speaker0: from LA, from the port, from down here.
33:01
Speaker0: If you have a long commute, you could probably digest the entire playlist in one sitting.
33:06
Speaker0: Second, I'm teaching an evangelism course at Gateway Seminary this summer.
33:11
Speaker0: And the course is basic evangelism. You can get a two-unit course.
33:17
Speaker0: And I think there might be some more scholarship opportunities.
33:20
Speaker0: So if there's anybody watching this who wants to take a seminary class for a
33:23
Speaker0: reduced price or free, you can reach out to Gateway Seminary's registration office.
33:29
Speaker0: And so that class is going to be a Friday and a Saturday. I think it's June 12th and 13th.
33:35
Speaker0: A couple hours of training on campus. And then we're actually going to be doing
33:39
Speaker0: field trips, excursion trips down into LA to utilize the yellow card.
33:45
Speaker0: So you can do that. And the big part of the class is doing the evangelism.
33:48
Speaker0: And then the students then will duplicate what we did as a class in their own
33:53
Speaker0: church context two times.
33:55
Speaker0: So if you miss the in-person training and you want to get trained you want to
33:59
Speaker0: be involved either A go to YouTube check out the abbreviated training or B take
34:03
Speaker0: a seminary class I think those are probably the two,
34:06
Speaker0: two best ways to get trained at this point.
34:08
Speaker1: Okay, awesome. So what we'll do is on our website, everychurchflourishing.com,
34:12
Speaker1: we will have links to the YouTube channel and the other training.
34:16
Speaker1: And if you just want to look it up on your own, it is at yellowcardinitiative on YouTube.
34:21
Speaker1: I have gone through the training videos and looked at them.
34:24
Speaker1: They are very well made, easy to follow, and worth checking out.
34:28
Speaker1: And on next week's episode, we are going to talk more about the Yellow Card Initiative.
34:34
Speaker1: And we're going to kind of find out some of the experiences Dr.
34:38
Speaker1: Ferguson has had sharing the gospel, using the Yellow Card, and what he would
34:43
Speaker1: say to people who are naturally kind of evangelism shy, very hesitant to approach a stranger.
34:51
Speaker1: So next week, we're going to talk more practicalities on being equipped for
34:56
Speaker1: evangelism, and we'll see you then.
34:58
Speaker1: All right. I love that interview and Dr. Ferguson's zeal for evangelism.
35:02
Speaker1: Remember to reach out yourself to yellowcardinitiative.com.
35:09
Speaker1: That's yellowcardinitiative.com to get your church set up with some excellent
35:16
Speaker1: soccer-related evangelism tools.
35:18
Speaker1: They really are high quality and striking and a good conversation piece and
35:24
Speaker1: a fantastic way to share the good news.
35:26
Speaker1: So let's talk a little bit about angels, well, or not.
35:32
Speaker1: Today, during our preaching time at Valley Baptist Church, I referred to Jesus'
35:36
Speaker1: letters to the seven churches in Revelation chapter 2 and Revelation chapter
35:40
Speaker1: 3, which is a most fascinating portion of Scripture.
35:45
Speaker1: The way those letters began is a bit clothed in mystery and a little bit of controversy.
35:51
Speaker1: Was Jesus writing to heavenly angels or to human pastors or elders? Let's read.
36:00
Speaker0: Revelation 1.20.
36:02
Speaker1: Says, The mystery of the seven stars you saw in my right hand and of the seven
36:08
Speaker1: golden lampstands is this.
36:10
Speaker1: The seven stars are the angels or messengers of the seven churches and the seven
36:18
Speaker1: lampstands are the seven churches.
36:20
Speaker1: So the big question, is Jesus dictating those seven letters in the book of Revelation
36:26
Speaker1: to the supernatural heavenly angels of the churches or to the human messengers,
36:33
Speaker1: the pastors, the bishops,
36:35
Speaker1: the elders, the overseers, the leaders of the churches?
36:38
Speaker1: Now, after this passage, Jesus is going to dictate a letter to each one of those
36:44
Speaker1: seven churches, and all of the letters begin somewhat like the first letter,
36:49
Speaker1: which is to the church at Ephesus.
36:51
Speaker1: For instance, it says, Revelation 2.1, Jesus talking right to the angel of the church in Ephesus.
36:58
Speaker1: Thus says the one who holds the seven stars in his right hand and who walks
37:04
Speaker1: among the seven golden lampstands. So is John writing to an angel?
37:12
Speaker0: Or a human messenger?
37:14
Speaker1: Does every church have its own angel and did Jesus write letters to the angels
37:19
Speaker1: of the church in Revelation?
37:21
Speaker1: Does the church I go to, the church you go to, have an angel assigned by God to that church?
37:27
Speaker1: It's a really great and interesting question to grapple with.
37:32
Speaker1: I'm not sure we're going to solve it today, but I think we will be able to see
37:36
Speaker1: that the preponderance of biblical evidence points to one conclusion.
37:41
Speaker1: But on this issue, there are heavy hitters in the realms of preaching,
37:47
Speaker1: Teaching, theology on both sides of this question.
37:51
Speaker1: For instance, one of my heroes, Charles Spurgeon, preached on this passage in
37:55
Speaker1: a message called The Star and the Sword.
37:58
Speaker1: And he said, quote, when John looked at Christ's right hand,
38:02
Speaker1: he tells us then in it he saw seven stars.
38:05
Speaker1: These are generally understood to be the ministers of the seven churches of Asia.
38:10
Speaker1: We are told in the 20th verse that the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches.
38:17
Speaker1: And I don't know who the angels of the churches can be unless they are the messengers
38:24
Speaker1: of the churches, those ministers, human ministers of whom Paul wrote.
38:30
Speaker1: John MacArthur takes a very similar view, stating the seven stars are the seven
38:36
Speaker1: ministers of the churches, so the author here identifies himself, the Lord,
38:41
Speaker1: As the one who possesses the fullness of the Spirit and who possesses as well
38:45
Speaker1: the ministers, the pastors, the leaders of the church.
38:49
Speaker1: The author is the one who gives the Holy Spirit to the church and sovereignly
38:54
Speaker1: leads through pastors who are faithful.
38:58
Speaker1: Simon And Kistemaker's commentary on the book of Revelation very confidently agrees.
39:04
Speaker1: The word angel, says Dr. Kistemaker, basically means messenger.
39:08
Speaker1: The messengers of these seven churches in the province of Asia are human beings.
39:15
Speaker1: Because John addresses the letters to them, angels from heaven do not lead or
39:20
Speaker1: govern earthly churches.
39:23
Speaker1: John F. Walvoord out of Dallas Theological Seminary agrees with all of the others so far.
39:28
Speaker1: He says the word angel, Greek word angelos, means messenger.
39:33
Speaker0: It is used in the New Testament of both human and angelic messengers.
39:38
Speaker1: In view of the fact that these messengers were meant to be read by the churches,
39:43
Speaker1: it is more probable that the messengers were human.
39:47
Speaker1: Well, in order to convincingly answer this question, we need to know something
39:52
Speaker1: about the Greek word for angel, which is angelos, a G-G-E-L-O-S in regular English alphabet terms.
40:00
Speaker1: Interestingly, this word can mean angel as in the heavenly being or it can mean messenger.
40:08
Speaker1: Angels definitely serve in a messenger capacity, but there are a few times in
40:12
Speaker1: scripture where Angelos seems to refer to a human rather than heavenly messenger.
40:19
Speaker1: For instance, Luke 7.24, after John's messengers left, he began to speak to
40:25
Speaker1: the crowds about John or James 2.25.
40:27
Speaker1: In the same way, wasn't Rahab the prostitute also justified by works in receiving
40:34
Speaker1: the messengers and sending them out by a different route? Or Matthew 11 10.
40:40
Speaker1: This is the one about whom it is written. See, I am sending my messenger,
40:45
Speaker1: my angelos ahead of you. He will prepare your way before you.
40:49
Speaker1: All three of those verses translate the Greek word angelos as messenger.
40:55
Speaker1: And it's very clear they're talking about a human messenger.
40:59
Speaker1: Of further interest, the word angel does not indicate alignment or allegiance with God.
41:05
Speaker1: And what I mean by that can be demonstrated easily from a couple of passages of scripture.
41:10
Speaker1: Revelation 12, 7, war broke out in heaven.
41:13
Speaker1: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon and
41:17
Speaker1: the dragon and his angelos, or angels, also fought. Matthew 25, 41,
41:33
Speaker1: Thus we see that there are evil angels, angelos, that serve Satan.
41:39
Speaker1: Now, that doesn't quite answer our question. It actually complicates it a little
41:43
Speaker1: bit, But I think right out of the gate, we can eliminate one possibility.
41:47
Speaker1: It is certain that Jesus is not saying to John to send a letter to the church's angel of Satan.
41:54
Speaker1: But is he saying to send a letter to the church's angel or to the church's human
42:01
Speaker1: messenger, pastor, bishop, overseer, whatever, perhaps in a metaphorical sense, referring to,
42:08
Speaker1: like I said, a human pastor or leader of the church.
42:11
Speaker1: Many well-regarded and excellent biblical scholars make a compelling case that
42:17
Speaker1: Jesus, through John, is actually sending messages
42:21
Speaker1: to the heavenly angels of the church. For instance,
42:24
Speaker1: Robert Mounts, who is like a biblical Greek guru, says, It seems best to understand
42:30
Speaker1: the angel of the church as a heavenly being who serves as the heavenly counterpart
42:36
Speaker1: to the earthly congregation.
42:39
Speaker1: They are the heavenly representatives of the church.
42:43
Speaker1: Thomas Schreiner, one of our top Baptist theologians, offers evidence for the
42:48
Speaker1: use of the heavenly angel here, and he says, are the angels heavenly beings or human messengers?
42:55
Speaker1: The word angelos can refer to human messengers, and some have argued that the
42:59
Speaker1: reference is to the pastors or bishops of the churches.
43:02
Speaker1: But the word angelos occurs over 60 times in Revelation, and in every single
43:10
Speaker1: other instance, it refers to a heavenly being.
43:14
Speaker1: It is highly likely then, says Dr. Schreiner, that heavenly angels are intended here as well.
43:21
Speaker1: That's a pretty solid argument for math. G.K.
43:25
Speaker1: Beale argues the same way, the angels of the seven churches are best understood as heavenly beings.
43:32
Speaker1: It is unlikely that angels refers to human messengers since everywhere else
43:38
Speaker1: in Revelation, the word refers to heavenly beings.
43:41
Speaker1: Also, D.A. Carson, one of the church's best scholars overall,
43:46
Speaker1: writes, who are the seven angels?
43:49
Speaker1: What are the seven angels? And,
43:51
Speaker1: He says the short answer is I'm not sure, but I have a longer answer.
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Speaker1: The two most common interpretations are these. The angel of each church is,
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Speaker1: on the one hand, senior pastor, elder, bishop.
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Speaker1: After all, the word angel is simply the word angelos in Greek, which means messenger.
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Speaker1: But Carson continues, in some sense, pastor teachers in the church are God's messengers, I suppose.
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Speaker1: The problem with that interpretation is there is no passage in the New Testament
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Speaker1: that refers to pastors or elders or bishops as angels.
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Speaker1: Moreover, in apocalyptic literature like the book of Revelation, angels are common.
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Speaker1: They're all over the place. In other words, you're looking at things from the
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Speaker1: point of view from heaven. It's not surprising a few angels crop up.
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Speaker1: That's why you have angels appearing in Daniel from chapter 6 on.
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Speaker1: You're looking at things from heaven's perspective, so if some of heaven's denizens
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Speaker1: show up, it's not surprising.
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Speaker1: In the context of apocalyptic literature, it is highly unlikely that
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Speaker1: that angels refers to pastors. What then are these angels?
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Speaker1: There are seven of them, one to correspond to each church.
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Speaker1: What I suspect, says Carson, is you have is some kind of analog to Daniel.
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Speaker1: Do you remember how in the book of Daniel, you have angels corresponding to the various countries?
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Speaker1: Clearly, it is impossible to construct out of the few things the Bible says
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Speaker1: about angels as a whole angelology, a whole hierarchy of angels,
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Speaker1: but you can say a few things here.
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Speaker1: While some view angel as a human messenger, the most straightforward reading
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Speaker1: of heavenly messengers seems congruent with other biblical depictions of stars
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Speaker1: symbolizing celestial beings.
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Speaker1: And I'll tell you, I hate to disagree with my guy Spurgeon, but mostly I concur
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Speaker1: with Schreiner, Carson, Beale, etc., but with kind of a both-and twist.
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Speaker1: The preponderance of the grammatical evidence,
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Speaker1: Which I think is very strong here, seems to favor angel in the heavenly being
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Speaker1: sense because the word angelos is used 186 times in the Bible.
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Speaker1: 179, so a lot, of those times seems to be clearly referring to a heavenly being,
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Speaker1: And only seven of those times does it appear that Angelos is referring to a human messenger.
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Speaker1: Those are pretty strong odds. Further evidence in that direction,
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Speaker1: we can see that John never uses Angelos to refer to anything
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Speaker1: But a heavenly being in either the Gospel of John, the Epistles of John,
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Speaker1: or the Book of Revelation.
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Speaker1: Now, does that prove that every church has an angel? I don't suppose it does,
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Speaker1: but it does certainly seem to point in that direction as a possibility.
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Speaker1: Now, two qualifiers. Number one, each of these letters of Jesus to the church
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Speaker1: in a certain location is written to the church of a city.
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Speaker1: That's very important. I myself don't live in a huge city in Salinas,
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Speaker1: California, population a little over 160,000, but it is big enough that we have
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Speaker1: dozens and dozens of churches.
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Speaker1: Does each of those churches have its own angel, or is there an angel of the church in Salinas?
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Speaker1: That is, all of the body of Christ that lives in this city.
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Speaker1: I don't know the answer to this question. God knows, but I certainly don't.
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Speaker1: Now, qualifier number two, it could be that churches in the first century had
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Speaker1: angels and they don't now.
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Speaker1: I suspect that things have largely stayed the same as it was in the first century,
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Speaker1: but since this is observational theology rather than reading things in the Bible
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Speaker1: that are clearly stated,
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Speaker1: then we just don't know for sure.
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Speaker1: Now, one more tidbit, and this is my theory about the whole thing.
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Speaker1: I actually believe, but I can't prove it, obviously, that Jesus here used an
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Speaker1: ambiguous, that means it can mean two different things, term quite intentionally.
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Speaker1: Why would he do that? Because we know that these letters were actually sent
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Speaker1: and received by human messengers.
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Speaker1: How do we know this? Because we actually have a copy of the letters to this
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Speaker1: day, because they circulated around the churches of the time.
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Speaker1: Thus, I think it is likely that Jesus essentially sent these letters both to
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Speaker1: human envoys and to angelic ones.
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Speaker1: And thus, I think that Jesus at least wrote to heavenly messengers.
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Speaker1: May be human one too, and that indicates, if I'm right, and of course Carson, Beale, etc.
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Speaker1: Are correct, that churches do have some sort of angel assigned to them.
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Speaker1: Do humans have guardian angels?
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Speaker1: Well, we can't answer that question convincingly from Scripture either,
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Speaker1: but I will say, again, And there is a possibility based on Matthew 18,
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Speaker1: 10 and not many other verses.
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Speaker1: But Jesus says in Matthew 18, 10, see to it that you don't despise one of these
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Speaker1: little ones because I tell you that in heaven, their angels, possessive,
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Speaker1: their angels continually view the face of my father in heaven.
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Speaker1: Okay, well, let's get our heads out of the clouds for now. check out the website,
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Speaker1: everychurchflourishing.com. There will be more of Dr.
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Speaker1: Anthony Ferguson next week, and leave us a review on Apple Podcasts.
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Speaker1: That would be so nice of you.
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Speaker1: Good day to you, and Godspeed.