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Voddie Baucham - TS&TT Founders Seminary Update with President · Voddie Baucham Sermons

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  Speaker 1: Thank you for joining us for this conversation today on
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  Speaker 1: The Sword in the Trowel. Today, Pastor Tom and I
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  Speaker 1: talk with Dr. Brody Baucom, who is the new founding
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  Speaker 1: president of Founders Seminary. So we're talking about some exciting
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  Speaker 1: things happening at Founders Seminary and the Institute of Public Theology,
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  Speaker 1: as well as at Founders Ministries. We hope you enjoy
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  Speaker 1: this conversation. Stay tuned. Welcome to The Sword in the Trowel.
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  Speaker 1: The Sword in the Trowel is a podcast of Founders Ministries,
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  Speaker 1: and Founders exists for the recovery of the gospel and
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  Speaker 1: the reformation of local churches. I'm Graham Gundin.
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  Speaker 2: I'm Tom Askell.
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  Speaker 1: And today we have with us our friend, Dr.
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  Speaker 3: Voddie Bauckham.
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  Speaker 1: And we want to talk about the exciting things that
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  Speaker 1: are happening at Founders Seminary and Founders Ministries. But first,
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  Speaker 1: we'll let you know that this show is sponsored by
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  Speaker 1: Squirrely Joe's Coffee and the Miller's Grove Soap Company. And
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: then also an announcement for those of you who are
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: regular listeners. or anyone who's listening right now, we are
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  Speaker 1: having a special for those who join the Founders Alliance membership,
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: the FAM. All through the month of June, if you join,
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  Speaker 1: you will get three books along with your membership, and
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  Speaker 1: that is The Beauty of the Binary and Made to
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  Speaker 1: be Glorious by Luke Griffo, and then also Dr. Baucom's
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  Speaker 1: Fault Lines as well. So we want to talk about
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  Speaker 1: Founders Ministries, Founders Seminary, and the exciting things that are
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  Speaker 1: happening here.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, and it is exciting. It's been a whirlwind in
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  Speaker 4: some sense, but our brother... Bodie here has been like
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  Speaker 4: a wandering Aramean until recently, you know, so he's got
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  Speaker 4: some roots beginning to sink down in Florida.
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  Speaker 2: So welcome to Florida, brother.
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  Speaker 3: Thank you. Thank you very much.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, you got here just in time for hurricane season.
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  Speaker 3: And yeah, in the heat.
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  Speaker 2: In the heat, that's right.
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  Speaker 3: It's funny, a lot of people will ask me about that,
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  Speaker 3: assuming that because we came from South Central Africa that
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  Speaker 3: It must have been much hotter then.
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  Speaker 1: I'm like, no, it's way worse here than it is.
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  Speaker 3: Where we were. That's right. Yeah, it's tough.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, this takes you back to some of your roots
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  Speaker 4: in Houston.
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  Speaker 3: Absolutely.
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  Speaker 4: Yeah, I got used to that growing up near there
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  Speaker 4: as well. So, man, it's great to have you and
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  Speaker 4: your family here. It's just exciting to see how God
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  Speaker 4: has put things together over the last several months especially.
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  Speaker 4: But really, you have to think over the last many years,
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  Speaker 4: and we could even think in decades in terms of,
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  Speaker 4: of how God has worked. One of our young men,
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  Speaker 4: an intern last night after church, was talking to me,
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  Speaker 4: and he was wanting to know how old I was
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  Speaker 4: when I came to Grace and then how old Ernie
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  Speaker 4: Reisinger was when he retired over here, and that's the
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  Speaker 4: connection I made with the church. And he was saying,
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  Speaker 4: you know, he said, I'm just almost the age you
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  Speaker 4: were when you started here. And he said, it's just
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  Speaker 4: fascinating to think about. And it's true. Generations, man, generations.
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  Speaker 4: We stand on the shoulders of people. And God willing,
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  Speaker 4: others will stand on our shoulders. And that sense of stewardship.
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  Speaker 3: Is a good thing. Yeah. Amen.
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  Speaker 1: How old were you when you came here?
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  Speaker 2: I was 29 when I came to Kit Coral.
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  Speaker 3: Okay.
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  Speaker 1: I was 27 when I came to Kit Coral.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah. Amazing, isn't it?
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  Speaker 4: But here we are years later. And man, what God's doing,
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  Speaker 4: especially with the seminary and Institute of Public Theology, it's
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  Speaker 4: really encouraging.
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  Speaker 1: So let's talk about the seminary then. This year, this fall,
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  Speaker 1: it's going to be the first classes offered through Founders Seminary. Um,
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  Speaker 1: and I think this is a question that you guys
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  Speaker 1: have been asked quite a bit, but why a new
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  Speaker 1: reform seminary and why now?
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  Speaker 2: Well, founding president, Votie Bauckham, go ahead, brother. Tell us.
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  Speaker 3: Is that how we're dropping it?
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  Speaker 2: That's how we drop it. Yeah. Yeah.
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  Speaker 4: You're the founding president and I'm so excited about that. And, uh,
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  Speaker 4: so you're helping to set the vision for this thing, man.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah. You know, a lot of people sort of assume,
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  Speaker 3: and I don't know why we think about seminary education
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  Speaker 3: differently than we do the rest of the work in
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  Speaker 3: the kingdom. We say we need to send missionaries. We
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  Speaker 3: say we need to plant churches. We get that in
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  Speaker 3: all of these ways. But somehow we think that whatever
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  Speaker 3: number of seminaries there are, that that should just always suffice.
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  Speaker 3: And it's not the case. First of all, I mean, numerically,
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  Speaker 3: that's not the case. But secondly, geographically, that's not the case.
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  Speaker 3: And then thirdly, Ideologically, that's not the case. Founders Seminary
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  Speaker 3: is very distinctive in its orientation, theologically, philosophically, being a
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  Speaker 3: committed Reformed Baptist institution, 1689, Second London Baptist Confession Institution,
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  Speaker 3: but also being an institution that's committed to training men
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  Speaker 3: for pastoral ministry. We're not here for everybody and everything,
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  Speaker 3: but specifically training men for pastoral ministry in that context.
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  Speaker 3: And also with our emphasis on public theology. It's a
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  Speaker 3: unique lane that we're running in. And I think it's necessary,
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  Speaker 3: it's needed. But the other thing is that there's this
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  Speaker 3: spiritual component. God has been at work doing this. It's
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  Speaker 3: not as though we got into a room and thought,
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  Speaker 3: what can we do? How can we amass more work
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  Speaker 3: for ourselves? Or how can we amass power? That's not
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  Speaker 3: what happened. This was very organic. The Lord did this
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  Speaker 3: over time, just like IOPT was very organic. That's right.
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  Speaker 3: And then this being an organic extension of the work
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  Speaker 3: that the Lord did in and through IOPT. So That's
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  Speaker 3: a long way around to answer the question. But I
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  Speaker 3: think you have to have all of those pieces of
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  Speaker 3: the puzzle to understand why we would undertake to do this.
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  Speaker 3: It's not like any of us needed more stuff. I know.
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  Speaker 2: It is fascinating.
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  Speaker 4: The story needs to be told well at some point
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  Speaker 4: in the future. But in 2020, of course, the world
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  Speaker 4: loses its mind with the coronavirus and everybody's going to die.
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  Speaker 4: Those first few weeks, two weeks to flatten the curve,
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  Speaker 4: probably a People don't even remember that anymore in March
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  Speaker 4: of 2020. And as we're trying to get our minds
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  Speaker 4: around that, and pretty quickly it becomes evident, wait a minute,
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  Speaker 4: there's more going on here than just a medical issue.
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  Speaker 4: There's all kinds of horrible ideological, political stuff baked into
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  Speaker 4: this and how it's being used and people are being manipulated. Well,
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  Speaker 4: as some began to get clarity, the idea of trying
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  Speaker 4: to do something that could benefit churches, through training pastors,
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  Speaker 4: begin to just kind of foment. It's not like that's
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  Speaker 4: a foreign thought. That's a conversation we've had for years
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  Speaker 4: and years and years. But I remember distinctly in March,
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  Speaker 4: late March.
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  Speaker 2: Of 2020, I was walking.
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  Speaker 4: I was out walking to some grandkids' house because, you know,
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  Speaker 4: everything's shut down, so you don't want to do it.
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  Speaker 2: I'm just walking. And I read an article about.
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  Speaker 4: A facility in North Carolina that was up for sale
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  Speaker 4: and texted a business friend of mine. and said, hey,
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  Speaker 4: help me buy this facility that's for sale. And so, man,
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  Speaker 4: he got busy and he started putting together an LLC
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  Speaker 4: and making plans. And we made a bid on it.
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  Speaker 4: I think we offered a dollar for it because that's
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  Speaker 4: what we could afford. It was a Christian deal that
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  Speaker 4: we were wanting. They'd sold one before similar to that
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  Speaker 4: on another part of the country. And we made, I think,
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  Speaker 4: to the final three and it got turned down. But
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  Speaker 4: in the process of that, this whole idea of, man,
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  Speaker 4: what can we do with this? We could start a
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  Speaker 4: seminary or we could start a college or we could
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  Speaker 4: have business incubators, we could use this facility in wonderful ways.
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  Speaker 4: And once that began to close of purchasing that, the
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  Speaker 4: question is, why don't we do it here? Why don't
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  Speaker 4: we do it in Cape Coral? And I remember distinctly
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  Speaker 4: the day just as, and Graham, you might've been part
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  Speaker 4: of those conversations, I don't recall, but we were talking about, well,
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  Speaker 4: what if and could we? And I just picked up
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  Speaker 4: the phone and called you. I mean, you're in Lusaka,
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  Speaker 4: you're seven hours ahead. It's probably the middle of the night.
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  Speaker 4: And typically I would text you first, you know, and
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  Speaker 4: see when we could talk. And you picked up the phone.
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  Speaker 4: And I said, hey, Bodie, here's what I'm thinking, man.
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  Speaker 4: What if we put together an institute that would emphasize
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  Speaker 4: public theology to train men for ministry?
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  Speaker 2: So what do you think of that? You said, I'm in.
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  Speaker 4: And so it was like instant, 30 seconds, you know,
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  Speaker 4: you're in. Called Tom Nettles. Tom said, let me pray
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  Speaker 4: about it today. And the next day he said, I'm in,
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  Speaker 4: you know. And so that was the beginning of the
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  Speaker 4: Institute of Public Theology that we opened our doors. That
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  Speaker 4: was 2020, height of COVID. And we opened our doors
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  Speaker 4: in the fall of 2021. We announced it in December
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  Speaker 4: of 2020. And it was not going to be a
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  Speaker 4: degree offering institution. We weren't concerned about accreditation. We just
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  Speaker 4: wanted to provide the best theological education in the world
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  Speaker 4: for men to be prepared for pastoral ministry. And we
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  Speaker 4: had our first graduates, three graduates last fall. One of
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  Speaker 4: them is planting the church. Just June 1st was their
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  Speaker 4: first day meeting as a new church in Michigan. And
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  Speaker 4: the other two are now enrolled in Founders Seminary to
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  Speaker 4: pursue the MDiv. But from that, the IOPT in the
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  Speaker 4: last four years, what's happened now in last fall, the
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  Speaker 4: fall of 2024, Peter Sammons came here in the summer.
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  Speaker 4: And Peter and I are talking. He's looking over things,
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  Speaker 4: just trying to get his mind wrapped around what we're doing.
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  Speaker 4: And in dialogue with him, he said, you know, so
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  Speaker 4: we got the makings of a seminary. Have you ever
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  Speaker 4: thought about just having a standalone seminary? And from that,
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  Speaker 4: things developed. And, you know, it was another, you called me,
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  Speaker 4: I think this time, or texted me and said, hey, man,
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  Speaker 4: you'll never believe what happened about your house and an
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  Speaker 4: opportunity to sell your house that was great at one
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  Speaker 4: point and then fell through. So it didn't happen, but
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  Speaker 4: it got you here. It's what God used. And then
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  Speaker 4: that conversation is, well, we're going to try to start
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  Speaker 4: a seminary, man, you know, and That was just awesome.
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  Speaker 3: You know, the other part of that, though, is there's
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  Speaker 3: another layer. Because also what was happening at that time
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  Speaker 3: is we were seeing the importance of public theology. Yes.
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  Speaker 3: We saw people not handling those issues well from the
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  Speaker 3: standpoint of public theology. from the standpoint of, of, of
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  Speaker 3: not only teaching their people, um, what the Bible has
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  Speaker 3: to say about the role of the state and the
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  Speaker 3: role of the church, but also in terms of making
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  Speaker 3: decisions in that regard. And people were all over the place. Um,
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  Speaker 3: People were attacking one another for the decisions that they
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  Speaker 3: were making. But there was very little sort of coherent
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  Speaker 3: theological thinking as it related to public theology. So I
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  Speaker 3: think that had a lot to do with it as well.
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  Speaker 3: I think that's why there was such an interest in
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  Speaker 3: IOPT and also coming all the way up through to
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  Speaker 3: now with the launch of the seminary.
• 10:46
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  Speaker 1: It seems to me that during... the summer of George
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: Floyd and the COVID stuff and.
• 12:36
  Speaker 3: All that craziness.
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: There are a lot of good seminaries, but during, and they,
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: I think they served the church well for a long
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: period of time. I think we're entering into a new
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: age right now in America and particularly and in Christendom.
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: And a lot of those seminaries, not just the graduates
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: of those seminaries, but also the leadership and the faculty
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: in those seminaries just kind of fell flat on their
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: face when it came to leading well. Through those times.
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: And that's what I think people were looking at and saying, man,
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: we need something more. We need something that's going to
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: actually equip men to lead through these times. And obviously,
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: these are not the institutions to do it because they
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: themselves have failed in these times.
• 13:19
  Speaker 3: Promoting critical race theory within some of the hallowed halls
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  Speaker 3: of our finest seminaries.
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  Speaker 1: Or maybe not promoting it, but just being unwilling to
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  Speaker 1: address it.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 4: Well, in 2019 at the Southern Baptist Convention in Resolution
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  Speaker 4: 9 on critical race theory, intersectionality, the chairman of that
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  Speaker 4: committee was a faculty member at Southern Seminary. That committee
• 13:42
  Speaker 4: was made up of faculty members of Southeastern Seminary. So
• 13:45
  Speaker 4: these were like some of the academic elite within the SBC,
• 13:50
  Speaker 4: which has a pretty big space in the evangelical world
• 13:53
  Speaker 4: in America. And they were pushing this.
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: They were pushing this.
• 13:56
  Speaker 3: And you look at those men's dissertations, right?
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  Speaker 2: I did, yeah.
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  Speaker 3: And you see that they are promoting these ideas and
• 14:03
  Speaker 3: have been promoting them for years and have been brought
• 14:07
  Speaker 3: up through the ranks.
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  Speaker 1: And are still promoting them, just a little less publicly.
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  Speaker 3: Yes, absolutely. Some of them are still doing that. That's right.
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  Speaker 4: And some of those men are still on faculties of
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  Speaker 4: these seminaries. And the seminary presidents were finally kind of,
• 14:20
  Speaker 4: put in a position where they had to make a
• 14:22
  Speaker 4: statement to say CRT is not compatible with the Baptist
• 14:24
  Speaker 4: faith and message.
• 14:25
  Speaker 2: And that brought down all kinds of difficulties from critics.
• 14:30
  Speaker 4: And one of them, I think Danny Akin said, I'm
• 14:32
  Speaker 4: sorry I ever signed that statement, you know, saying that
• 14:34
  Speaker 4: I wish.
• 14:34
  Speaker 2: I hadn't said it that way. And so, I mean,
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  Speaker 2: God bless them.
• 14:38
  Speaker 4: But what is needed today is what we've tried to
• 14:43
  Speaker 4: boil it down to and talking about Founders Seminary is
• 14:45
  Speaker 4: we need to see pastors who have sharp minds, warm hearts,
• 14:49
  Speaker 4: steel spines.
• 14:50
  Speaker 2: Who will not bend.
• 14:52
  Speaker 4: And a lot of the guys who are trying to
• 14:55
  Speaker 4: make that case are trying to avoid just being swept
• 14:58
  Speaker 4: along with these cultural winds that were taking us to
• 15:01
  Speaker 4: bad places. A lot of those guys became pariahs. I mean,
• 15:04
  Speaker 4: you know, Vody, you took it on the chin for
• 15:07
  Speaker 4: your book, Fault Lines, and before your book, Fault Lines.
• 15:09
  Speaker 4: I remember when you wrote the article you did for TGC.
• 15:13
  Speaker 4: When was that?
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  Speaker 2: I think it was 2016.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, 2016, about the Michael Browns.
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  Speaker 4: And, I mean, it broke the servers there. And everybody thought,
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  Speaker 4: you know, Votie, you lost your mind. And then you
• 15:26
  Speaker 4: got a– you were on that panel with Ed Stetzer
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  Speaker 4: and Darren Patrick, I think, was on there. And Thaviti
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  Speaker 4: was on there. And it was a time to speak.
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  Speaker 4: And everybody was speaking, you know, poor Michael Brown, except
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  Speaker 4: Votie Baucom. And you talked about some principles that had
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  Speaker 4: just been forgotten and nobody wanted to talk about anymore.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah. It's really interesting. That last part about men with
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  Speaker 3: steel spines, we're not talking about men who are hard-hearted, again,
• 15:57
  Speaker 3: warm hearts. We're not talking about men who go looking
• 16:01
  Speaker 3: for fights. We're talking about men who stand on principle
• 16:06
  Speaker 3: and men who are not swept away in the midst
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  Speaker 3: of cultural moments like that. And unfortunately, we've seen that
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  Speaker 3: to be rare in some instances. And not only that, because,
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  Speaker 3: you know, anybody can be swept away. The thing that
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  Speaker 3: has bothered me is not that people have found themselves
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  Speaker 3: swept away. I think, you know, you're in ministry long enough.
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  Speaker 3: You have things that you regret. Sure. Right. The problem
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  Speaker 3: for me is that there have been no acknowledgments.
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  Speaker 4: Right.
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  Speaker 3: Right. You know, a lot of guys have sort of
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  Speaker 3: changed their tune, but there haven't been the people There
• 16:49
  Speaker 3: hasn't been the repentance. There hasn't been, you know what?
• 16:53
  Speaker 3: I was wrong. I did this, and I said that,
• 16:58
  Speaker 3: and that was wrong. They just stopped saying it and
• 17:01
  Speaker 3: hoped that nobody heard. But I think that's part of
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  Speaker 3: that steel spine as well.
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: Absolutely.
• 17:07
  Speaker 3: Is being willing to stand up and say, you know what?
• 17:11
  Speaker 3: Shouldn't have done that. Yeah. Shouldn't have been there. That
• 17:14
  Speaker 3: was wrong. And I think another thing that was interesting
• 17:17
  Speaker 3: is nobody got fired, to my knowledge. Right? Some of
• 17:21
  Speaker 3: the people promoting these things slinked off and, you know,
• 17:25
  Speaker 3: went to other places. But I don't think anybody got fired.
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah, no accountability.
• 17:31
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 17:32
  Speaker 4: And I think what you're saying there, too, Vody, it
• 17:35
  Speaker 4: reveals another layer of what we are about at Founders
• 17:38
  Speaker 4: and have been from the beginning.
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: And that is a real.
• 17:43
  Speaker 4: commitment to understanding law and gospel as revealed in scripture
• 17:48
  Speaker 4: because the law tells us what's right tells us what
• 17:50
  Speaker 4: we must do what we must not do the gospel
• 17:53
  Speaker 4: provides for us reconciliation with god and forgiveness of sins
• 17:57
  Speaker 4: and so if we understand the law then we're not
• 17:59
  Speaker 4: going to be making up our own standard of righteousness
• 18:02
  Speaker 4: we're going to say what god says and whenever we
• 18:04
  Speaker 4: violate that we're going to be willing to say look
• 18:06
  Speaker 4: i'm wrong god's right i've sinned And we can say
• 18:10
  Speaker 4: that because we have a gospel. We have the Savior.
• 18:12
  Speaker 4: Jesus has died for our sins. There's no condemnation for
• 18:15
  Speaker 4: those who are in Christ Jesus. And so I shouldn't
• 18:18
  Speaker 4: be slow to repent. That doesn't mean I'm always quick
• 18:21
  Speaker 4: to repent, but I should be quick to repent because
• 18:23
  Speaker 4: I have a Savior.
• 18:24
  Speaker 2: So if we're.
• 18:25
  Speaker 4: Confident in that, why in the world would you not say,
• 18:28
  Speaker 4: you know what, this I did that was wrong, it
• 18:31
  Speaker 4: was damaging, it was contrary to the way of Christ,
• 18:34
  Speaker 4: but Christ has died for my sin, and so I'm
• 18:36
  Speaker 4: free to repent. And I see a lack of that
• 18:40
  Speaker 4: attitude as just being deadly for both understanding what God
• 18:46
  Speaker 4: requires of us and highlighting the things that he's provided
• 18:51
  Speaker 4: for us.
• 18:51
  Speaker 2: I mean, what do you really.
• 18:52
  Speaker 4: Believe about the gospel if you're not willing to apply
• 18:55
  Speaker 4: it to yourself in these public ways that are commensurate
• 18:59
  Speaker 4: with your public sins?
• 19:01
  Speaker 2: It grieves me.
• 19:02
  Speaker 4: Metanoia phobia is a word that I've coined from the Greek.
• 19:07
  Speaker 2: Fear of repentance.
• 19:08
  Speaker 3: It's sad. I think also this gets back to the
• 19:11
  Speaker 3: whole idea of new seminaries and why new seminaries can
• 19:15
  Speaker 3: be helpful. I think we need to have those inflection points,
• 19:21
  Speaker 3: those moments where we call others friends. to view the
• 19:28
  Speaker 3: moment that we're in. We call others to pay attention
• 19:32
  Speaker 3: to the moment that we're in. We call others to
• 19:35
  Speaker 3: recognize that God is at work, that these moments that
• 19:40
  Speaker 3: have gone by, they weren't missed by everyone. And sometimes
• 19:45
  Speaker 3: there needs to be a response. If it takes God
• 19:49
  Speaker 3: bringing people to this place because they've been looking for
• 19:54
  Speaker 3: something else as a result of failures that they saw,
• 19:58
  Speaker 3: if it takes God doing that for others to recognize
• 20:02
  Speaker 3: what has happened, then God God be praised.
• 20:05
  Speaker 2: Amen.
• 20:07
  Speaker 3: And I hope that that does happen.
• 20:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I do too.
• 20:11
  Speaker 3: And I hope that God continues to keep us humble
• 20:14
  Speaker 3: as well, because we're not always going to get it right.
• 20:16
  Speaker 4: No, and what do we have that we haven't received?
• 20:19
  Speaker 4: And anything that we've seen and got right is because
• 20:22
  Speaker 4: of God's grace. And we must remember that and never
• 20:25
  Speaker 4: presume upon that. And again, I wish everybody who's doing
• 20:29
  Speaker 4: anything good, I wish them well. I want every good
• 20:32
  Speaker 4: thing that's being done to continue to go on doing
• 20:35
  Speaker 4: good and being better. But God's given us a pretty
• 20:38
  Speaker 4: clear vision here and a pretty clear agenda.
• 20:41
  Speaker 2: And I'm excited about it.
• 20:42
  Speaker 4: I think it can be something that God willing can
• 20:45
  Speaker 4: serve generations to come. And boy, you talk about sending missionaries.
• 20:51
  Speaker 4: I view this as sending missionaries.
• 20:52
  Speaker 3: Into the future.
• 20:54
  Speaker 4: We can help men get clear-minded on these things, get
• 20:58
  Speaker 4: grounded in law, gospel, confessionalism, understanding the day in which
• 21:02
  Speaker 4: we live. And being unashamed to go out.
• 21:05
  Speaker 2: That's the goal. That's the hope.
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that there's two important things there. Number one,
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: you know, I think just the Reformed Baptist world or
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: Calvinistic Baptist world in general needs more good, qualified pastors
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: than all of our seminaries are currently producing. So let's
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: produce more. And I think that's one of the founders' seminaries,
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: one of the answers to that problem. The other thing is,
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: you know, how do you train men How do you
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: form that virtue in them? How do you develop pastors
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: with steel spines? And your education and your training cannot
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: all purely be academic. We want that. We want good academics.
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: We want to produce real scholars. And I think that
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: Founders Seminary has some real good scholars coming in to
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: teach as faculty. Um, but it can't just be that
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: because just that is not going to produce qualified men
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: and pastors to lead, to lead churches. So how do
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: you form that virtue? Well, there's a lot of things
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: that need to happen. One of the things that needs
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: to happen is sometimes you just have to go through
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: the experience, right? But the other thing, the other really,
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: really important piece in education, in forming virtue in students is,
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: is they're teachers and imitating teachers. Jesus says it's enough
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: for the student to be like his master. And so
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: what you need to do is you need to put
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: men in front of these students who are the type
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: of men that you want the students to be. And
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: they will, whether they're intentionally or not, they will begin
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: to pattern their lives after those men who are teaching
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: them and who are training them. And so when it
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: comes to people like you and like you who have
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: gone through so much and have actually experienced the need
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: to have steel spines and have courage and to stand
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: on principle when it seems like everyone's against you, students
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: come and they sit under your teaching or they sit
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: under your mentorship and they say, okay, this is.
• 22:58
  Speaker 3: What it's like.
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: This is how it is. And there's always going to
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: be a sense in like, okay, yeah, but you really
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: still got to be tested, right? And that courage is
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: not really going to be locked in until you're tested.
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: But you don't get there without faculty, without professors, without
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: teachers and mentors. that students can pattern their lives after.
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: And I think that's where there's a mentorship program that's
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: a part of the MDiv program that I think is
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: a really key component to the education.
• 23:26
  Speaker 4: Are you looking for healthy bath and body products that
• 23:28
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• 23:31
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• 24:01
  Speaker 3: That's millersgrove.com.
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: Listeners to The Sword and Trial can.
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• 24:18
  Speaker 1: I'm excited to introduce to you our newest children's resource.
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: It's the 1689 in rhyme, Old Truth for Young Hearts,
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: by our very own Kerry Regnier. Children can understand more
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: than we often think that they can, and that's why
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: it's important to teach them early and often the basic
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: truths of the faith. Harry has produced a wonderful tool
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: to help parents and grandparents to do just that. His rhymes,
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: or raps if you prefer, are great for both young
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: and old to internalize, memorize, and meditate on the truths
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: of our great Baptist confession. He has helpfully summarized each chapter,
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: maintaining the rich theology in each, yet he has also
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: simplified each chapter in ways that even a three-year-old can grasp.
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: Plant timeless truths in young minds. Grab your copy of
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: The 1689 in Rhyme today at press.founders.org.
• 25:02
  Speaker 4: We talk about wanting men with conviction, but men who
• 25:04
  Speaker 4: have blood mixed with that conviction. And when you got that,
• 25:08
  Speaker 4: you know, when you can see the scars, it just
• 25:10
  Speaker 4: gives that note of authenticity. You know, this guy's not
• 25:13
  Speaker 4: blowing smoke. He's not just speaking theoretically. And you can
• 25:17
  Speaker 4: follow him as he follows Christ. And that's been, in
• 25:20
  Speaker 4: my own life, that has been one of the greatest
• 25:24
  Speaker 4: gifts God has given to me is being around men.
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: Like that.
• 25:30
  Speaker 4: And I think of Tom Nettles, who probably was the earliest,
• 25:33
  Speaker 4: strongest influence on me, seeing him stand against every Southern
• 25:39
  Speaker 4: Baptist history professor in the inerrancy controversy, being threatened with
• 25:44
  Speaker 4: his job if he didn't sign a paper and he refused.
• 25:48
  Speaker 3: To sign it.
• 25:49
  Speaker 4: Seeing him go to another seminary where they understood very
• 25:53
  Speaker 4: clearly his theological convictions, but after seven years or six years, saying,
• 25:58
  Speaker 4: you're no longer welcomed here because you're too popular and
• 26:01
  Speaker 4: students are beginning to believe the things you teach. And
• 26:03
  Speaker 4: him not buckling and just going out for a year,
• 26:06
  Speaker 4: doing odd jobs. Here's an incredible scholar doing odd jobs
• 26:11
  Speaker 4: to feed his family. So to see the way Tom
• 26:15
  Speaker 4: Nettles has been treated and to see him persevere and
• 26:19
  Speaker 4: to make crucial decisions at pivotal points of his life. Man,
• 26:24
  Speaker 4: God used that. There are others as well, but That's key.
• 26:27
  Speaker 4: And Tom's involved in this Founders Seminary. You know, he's
• 26:30
  Speaker 4: part of the beginning of this with the students as well.
• 26:33
  Speaker 4: We've got some special things lined up that he's going
• 26:35
  Speaker 4: to be doing with all of our students.
• 26:37
  Speaker 3: Yeah. Another thing that I was reminded of is we're
• 26:42
  Speaker 3: talking about confessional, right? 1689, Second London Baptist Confession. People
• 26:49
  Speaker 3: shouldn't get the idea that, you know, we're a bunch
• 26:51
  Speaker 3: of 1689 guys who are trying to figure out How
• 26:55
  Speaker 3: we can turn everybody else into 1689 guys.
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: Well, you're not doing that.
• 26:59
  Speaker 2: I am.
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 27:01
  Speaker 3: But people need to understand as well. We saw this
• 27:04
  Speaker 3: in Lusaka also. We're a 1689 school. 1689 churches had
• 27:10
  Speaker 3: started this school. And what I've been noticing is that
• 27:15
  Speaker 3: when guys get to a certain point, they have to decide,
• 27:20
  Speaker 3: where am I going to go? Yeah. And right now,
• 27:24
  Speaker 3: a lot of them will go to RTFs or they'll
• 27:29
  Speaker 3: head to Michigan, after Puritan.
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: Greenville.
• 27:32
  Speaker 3: They'll go to Greenville. They'll go to places that are
• 27:35
  Speaker 3: not even Baptist because there are just not a lot
• 27:38
  Speaker 3: of options for people who hold those convictions, especially depending
• 27:44
  Speaker 3: on where they are. So part of this is a
• 27:47
  Speaker 3: response to that as well. There has been this growing need.
• 27:52
  Speaker 3: And we are responding to that growing need. So this
• 27:55
  Speaker 3: is not a way for us to just be defiant
• 28:01
  Speaker 3: or oppositional or anything else. We're responding to a growing need.
• 28:06
  Speaker 3: As the Lord has brought more and more men and
• 28:11
  Speaker 3: women to these convictions, there's more and more of a
• 28:15
  Speaker 3: need for pastors of this persuasion to have some place
• 28:19
  Speaker 3: where they can train in accordance with their convictions.
• 28:22
  Speaker 4: One of the things, too, along that same line, I've
• 28:26
  Speaker 4: got friends that are not Reformed.
• 28:29
  Speaker 2: They're faithful, good, godly men. I love them. I learn
• 28:32
  Speaker 2: from them. I fellowship with them.
• 28:34
  Speaker 4: And one or two of them have asked, you know, man,
• 28:36
  Speaker 4: so you guys are doing this.
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: This excludes me. This excludes my guys.
• 28:40
  Speaker 3: I say, no, not at all.
• 28:41
  Speaker 4: We're just putting our colors up on the mass so
• 28:43
  Speaker 4: you know what you're going to get. But we're not
• 28:45
  Speaker 4: going to be ugly to people that love Jesus. You
• 28:47
  Speaker 4: come here.
• 28:47
  Speaker 2: You can train here.
• 28:48
  Speaker 4: And, you know, you disagree, that's fine. You just make
• 28:51
  Speaker 4: your case and you get grounded so that you know
• 28:52
  Speaker 4: how to stand. So we're not apologizing for who we are,
• 28:56
  Speaker 4: but we're not going to castigate people who say, oh, well,
• 28:59
  Speaker 4: I can't dot your I's and cross your T's.
• 29:01
  Speaker 3: Just like those schools we just mentioned. Exactly. Right? Exactly. Yeah.
• 29:04
  Speaker 4: And another funny thing, and Tom told me, Tom Nettles
• 29:08
  Speaker 4: told me recently that many, many years ago in one
• 29:12
  Speaker 4: of the seminaries where he was being dismissed, that a
• 29:16
  Speaker 4: man came to see him that was a friend, and
• 29:18
  Speaker 4: he said, you know, you guys, founders ought to start
• 29:20
  Speaker 4: their own seminary. And so he said, I think I'm
• 29:23
  Speaker 4: going to call him and say, hey, man, we're taking
• 29:25
  Speaker 4: your advice, you know, 30 years later, 40 years later.
• 29:28
  Speaker 4: And then I was also reminded, Vody, I don't know
• 29:31
  Speaker 4: if this was said to you, but it was said
• 29:32
  Speaker 4: about you, that you will become the first black president
• 29:37
  Speaker 4: of a Southern Baptist seminary.
• 29:38
  Speaker 2: Do you remember hearing that?
• 29:39
  Speaker 3: Uh, Patterson. Yeah. In his house. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.
• 29:45
  Speaker 3: The Pattersons had me over when I was a student
• 29:47
  Speaker 3: at Southeastern doing doctor work there and myself and another student.
• 29:51
  Speaker 3: And during the meal, he just paused and just pointedly
• 29:57
  Speaker 3: looked at me and said that, You know, almost like
• 30:01
  Speaker 3: when you look at me and say, God loves me
• 30:03
  Speaker 3: and you have a wonderful plan.
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: For my life.
• 30:06
  Speaker 3: But he, yeah, he made it clear that that was
• 30:09
  Speaker 3: a desire of his heart and a prayer of his.
• 30:12
  Speaker 4: And, you know, that prayer has been answered, not in
• 30:14
  Speaker 4: the SBC, but in a Baptist seminary. I mean, you
• 30:18
  Speaker 4: just look at these things. It's fascinating to me to
• 30:20
  Speaker 4: see how God's woven it together. And then, man, you know,
• 30:23
  Speaker 4: our relationship and just even how that began and that
• 30:27
  Speaker 4: it just God was doing all.
• 30:29
  Speaker 2: Kinds of things none of us could have known about,
• 30:31
  Speaker 2: you know.
• 30:31
  Speaker 4: And, you know, Graham, one of the points you made
• 30:33
  Speaker 4: about being mentored, we want our students to be around
• 30:37
  Speaker 4: men who are in the trenches. And so we've got
• 30:39
  Speaker 4: elders here that are going to be involved in some.
• 30:41
  Speaker 3: Of that mentoring.
• 30:42
  Speaker 4: There's elders in other churches around us with good, solid,
• 30:46
  Speaker 4: faithful brothers that are doing well. And that's going to
• 30:49
  Speaker 4: be a key component is them watching, seeing, observing, participating
• 30:54
  Speaker 4: in some degree's in the life of ministry that goes
• 30:58
  Speaker 4: on in a pastor's day-by-day existence.
• 31:00
  Speaker 2: And there's no substitute for that.
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: So the programs then that Founders Seminary offers, there's two, right?
• 31:08
  Speaker 3: Two different programs?
• 31:09
  Speaker 2: Currently, yeah, that's right.
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: Okay, so there's the MDiv, which is the kind of flagship,
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: over 100 credit hours.
• 31:15
  Speaker 4: 101 credit hours, elder qualified men only. And by that,
• 31:21
  Speaker 4: we mean churches have to recommend you And we've turned
• 31:24
  Speaker 4: down some applicants because of that. And one man said, well,
• 31:29
  Speaker 4: what do you mean I've got to be recommended by
• 31:30
  Speaker 4: a church? And I said, well, you've got to have
• 31:32
  Speaker 4: elders or people that know you that can commend you.
• 31:34
  Speaker 4: And he said, well, I'm not in a church. So
• 31:36
  Speaker 4: you need to get in one. So how long will
• 31:38
  Speaker 4: that take?
• 31:38
  Speaker 2: I said, I don't know. I'm looking at it. It's
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: probably longer than you think. But no, that's exactly right.
• 31:45
  Speaker 2: But the other.
• 31:45
  Speaker 4: Program is the Master of Arts program. in apologetics and missiology.
• 31:51
  Speaker 4: And this is a fascinating development, man, with ABWE, which
• 31:56
  Speaker 4: is a great mission facilitating organization. The Association of Baptists
• 32:01
  Speaker 4: for World Evangelization, our friend Alex Kochman, who's written for
• 32:05
  Speaker 4: Founders and will be speaking at the conference this coming
• 32:07
  Speaker 4: next year in January, has been instrumental in that. But
• 32:11
  Speaker 4: also Evan Burns now is over a lot of their
• 32:14
  Speaker 4: theological training. And so Evan and I, our folks have
• 32:18
  Speaker 4: talked and they, they said they want every one of
• 32:21
  Speaker 4: their candidates to be trained at Founders Seminary.
• 32:25
  Speaker 3: Wow.
• 32:25
  Speaker 2: We haven't had our first class. Right.
• 32:27
  Speaker 3: And it's amazing that the Lord has sent men here
• 32:31
  Speaker 3: to be part of this who have experience in missions
• 32:34
  Speaker 3: and apologetics.
• 32:35
  Speaker 2: That's right.
• 32:36
  Speaker 3: You know, that's exactly right. Years of field experience in
• 32:40
  Speaker 3: that regard. So again, this is providence. It is. You know,
• 32:45
  Speaker 3: this is not something that just, Was made up, something
• 32:49
  Speaker 3: that we were trying to do, trying to force. It
• 32:53
  Speaker 3: was providence.
• 32:54
  Speaker 4: You know, and at the 2025 January Founders Conference, Votie,
• 32:58
  Speaker 4: when we announced we were doing this and that this
• 33:01
  Speaker 4: is how things are going, that was on Thursday night,
• 33:05
  Speaker 4: I think, of the conference. And Monday morning is when
• 33:09
  Speaker 4: I got a phone call from people who had been
• 33:11
  Speaker 4: at the conference, and they said, you know— We would
• 33:13
  Speaker 4: really like to help out with this.
• 33:15
  Speaker 2: We're not wealthy people, but we've received an inheritance.
• 33:17
  Speaker 4: And we were trying to buy a building at that
• 33:20
  Speaker 4: time that would facilitate us getting founders, ministries, headquarters situated
• 33:25
  Speaker 4: just right so that what we have here can be
• 33:27
  Speaker 4: completely transformed into the seminary and IOPT classes.
• 33:32
  Speaker 2: And they gave.
• 33:33
  Speaker 4: It was $ 1. 5 million we needed. And so that was
• 33:37
  Speaker 4: a pledge of $ 1 million Monday morning, which I was
• 33:39
  Speaker 4: just blown away by it.
• 33:41
  Speaker 2: And then Wednesday.
• 33:42
  Speaker 4: Night I had another conversation with another couple of people,
• 33:45
  Speaker 4: and they said we would like to give the other $ 500, 000.
• 33:48
  Speaker 4: So in less than a week that happened. And you
• 33:50
  Speaker 4: can't do this without financial investments. And I'm so grateful.
• 33:56
  Speaker 4: Other people have reached out and said we want to
• 33:58
  Speaker 4: be a part of this, but we need that. To
• 34:01
  Speaker 4: do what we're doing cannot be done without partners whom
• 34:06
  Speaker 4: God has blessed financially. And the conversation I've had with
• 34:09
  Speaker 4: some of these folks is, is look, man, God's blessed
• 34:12
  Speaker 4: you in your business world, in your financial management, and
• 34:17
  Speaker 4: you're a steward of that. God has blessed us with
• 34:20
  Speaker 4: an opportunity for theological education and training of men. He's
• 34:23
  Speaker 4: brought this together in ways that we couldn't have imagined
• 34:27
  Speaker 4: several years ago, but he's done it, and we're stewards
• 34:29
  Speaker 4: of this. Why shouldn't we partner together in working for
• 34:33
  Speaker 4: the things that we're both passionate about and utilizing the
• 34:36
  Speaker 4: gifts that God has entrusted to each of us to
• 34:39
  Speaker 4: go forward?
• 34:40
  Speaker 2: And I hope that'll happen.
• 34:41
  Speaker 4: If you're listening to this and you're interested in investing
• 34:44
  Speaker 4: in this ministry and what God is doing here and
• 34:47
  Speaker 4: God willing he will continue to do for generations to come,
• 34:50
  Speaker 4: please contact us. We'd love to have conversations with you
• 34:52
  Speaker 4: and help you to know specific needs and specific ways
• 34:56
  Speaker 4: that you could partner with us.
• 34:58
  Speaker 2: In this effort.
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: So I got two questions. Over 100 credits for the MDiv.
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: That seems to be the opposite of the trend right now.
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: It seems like fewer and fewer credits are required for
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: an MDiv. I think some of them are in the
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: high 70s at this point.
• 35:15
  Speaker 3: And 60s.
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: And 60s?
• 35:17
  Speaker 4: And 60s.
• 35:18
  Speaker 3: Really? Yeah.
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: So why is that?
• 35:22
  Speaker 4: Because the Bible hadn't changed, you know. I mean, church
• 35:26
  Speaker 4: history keeps getting longer.
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: So you just added some more church history classes?
• 35:30
  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 35:34
  Speaker 4: I want to invite you to join me and Pastor
• 35:36
  Speaker 4: Mike Law, Pastor David Schrock in Woodbridge, Virginia, July the
• 35:41
  Speaker 4: 29th of this year, 2025, as we have a one-day
• 35:45
  Speaker 4: pastor's seminar dealing with the issue of persevering in pastoral
• 35:50
  Speaker 4: ministry and how you continue on through trials, difficulties, and uncertainties.
• 35:56
  Speaker 4: We are going to spend the whole day together. It
• 35:58
  Speaker 4: is exclusively for pastors and elders, those that have the
• 36:01
  Speaker 4: responsibility of leading Christ's church's throughout the United States, and
• 36:04
  Speaker 4: especially there in the Northeast region of the United States.
• 36:08
  Speaker 4: If you need more information about this or if you'd
• 36:10
  Speaker 4: like to sign up, go to founders.org and you will
• 36:13
  Speaker 4: see Pastor's Seminar listed there as one of the events
• 36:16
  Speaker 4: that is upcoming.
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: What if our understanding of Christianity and politics is fundamentally flawed?
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: King of Kings, a reformed guide to Christian government, is
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: the result of needing to rethink political theology in recent years.
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: In it, Pastor James Baird presents a bold and compelling
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: case for a radical proposition, that governments must promote Christianity
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: as the only true religion. Drawing from scripture, the reformed confessions,
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: and the insights of the American founders, this concise but
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: powerful primer offers a clear and urgent call to Christians.
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: It's short enough to read in one sitting. It provides
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: a gateway into a rich tradition that many have forgotten
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: and a vision for recovering it today. You can order
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: your copy today at press.founders.org.
• 36:57
  Speaker 3: Part of the commitment that we have is commitment for
• 37:00
  Speaker 3: men to be able to handle the text. and to
• 37:03
  Speaker 3: spend the time necessary to be able to handle the
• 37:06
  Speaker 3: text in the original languages and to not forsake that.
• 37:12
  Speaker 3: It's been easy to forsake that because of a lot
• 37:14
  Speaker 3: of tools that have come along, right? And we're grateful
• 37:17
  Speaker 3: for those tools that have come along. But we want
• 37:22
  Speaker 3: men to be students of the text. The other thing
• 37:27
  Speaker 3: is we want to make sure that men are firmly
• 37:31
  Speaker 3: rooted and grounded in their theology, in the history of
• 37:36
  Speaker 3: the church, in apologetics. And so rather than trying to
• 37:42
  Speaker 3: sort of take things out and see how quickly we
• 37:45
  Speaker 3: can get men through, our goal is to see how
• 37:50
  Speaker 3: thoroughly we can get men trained. Yeah, amen, amen.
• 37:53
  Speaker 2: And we know that a seminary cannot make a pastor.
• 37:56
  Speaker 2: I mean, God calls us churches. to raise up men.
• 38:00
  Speaker 4: We want to be a facilitator of that and helping churches.
• 38:03
  Speaker 4: That's why you've got to have a church behind you
• 38:05
  Speaker 4: to come and enroll at Founders Seminary. But I've had
• 38:10
  Speaker 4: some conversations, and good people, they've got their understanding of
• 38:14
  Speaker 4: what would be best in their context. But whenever they've
• 38:18
  Speaker 4: described what they're doing in kind of reducing the MDiv
• 38:21
  Speaker 4: requirements and trying to get guys in and out fast
• 38:23
  Speaker 4: so that they don't lose their impetus and excitement when
• 38:26
  Speaker 4: they first start and can get out into the field
• 38:29
  Speaker 4: we're doing just what you said. We're going the opposite way,
• 38:33
  Speaker 4: and that's okay. Again, I want every good thing that
• 38:36
  Speaker 4: anybody's doing to be blessed of God. I want them
• 38:38
  Speaker 4: to do better and just keep going, and I'll cheer
• 38:40
  Speaker 4: them on for every good thing they do. But we've
• 38:43
  Speaker 4: got a pretty clear vision of what God's put in
• 38:46
  Speaker 4: front of us and trying to understand the times and
• 38:50
  Speaker 4: know what ought to be done. It struck me several
• 38:53
  Speaker 4: years ago in trying to sort around in my own
• 38:56
  Speaker 4: thinking about what's happening in the world today Remember, Jesus
• 39:00
  Speaker 4: chastised the Pharisees because they didn't understand the times. He says,
• 39:04
  Speaker 4: you can see the sky, you can read all that,
• 39:06
  Speaker 4: but you don't know the day of your visitation. And
• 39:09
  Speaker 4: then he wept over Jerusalem because you didn't understand. You
• 39:12
  Speaker 4: didn't understand who was here. And so we're commended to
• 39:17
  Speaker 4: think rightly about the day in which we live. And
• 39:20
  Speaker 4: I love the Puritans, and I can enjoy stories and
• 39:25
  Speaker 4: reading about those days. And I love the old revival
• 39:29
  Speaker 4: stories and histories and could wish maybe in some ways
• 39:33
  Speaker 4: that I could go back and experience some of that.
• 39:35
  Speaker 4: But God didn't put me in the 17th century, and
• 39:38
  Speaker 4: he didn't put me in one of those great times
• 39:41
  Speaker 4: of awakening, though I still pray that I might live
• 39:43
  Speaker 4: to see one.
• 39:44
  Speaker 2: But he put me in.
• 39:45
  Speaker 4: America here at the beginning of the 21st century And
• 39:50
  Speaker 4: we have a stewardship for how we are going to
• 39:52
  Speaker 4: live our lives and carry out the responsibilities we have
• 39:56
  Speaker 4: as ministers of the gospel now and with the generations
• 40:01
  Speaker 4: to come. We want to be faithful so that others
• 40:03
  Speaker 4: can benefit from what we're doing now.
• 40:05
  Speaker 3: Amen.
• 40:07
  Speaker 1: So this is not a program that you can kind
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: of get your degree online.
• 40:14
  Speaker 3: No.
• 40:14
  Speaker 2: Correct.
• 40:16
  Speaker 3: We want to see your face.
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: That's also kind of going against the current trend as well.
• 40:21
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it is. And that's another evidence that this is
• 40:26
  Speaker 3: not just some fly-by-night scheme to try to get as
• 40:32
  Speaker 3: many bodies as we can as quickly as we can
• 40:34
  Speaker 3: to fill up our roster as fast as we can.
• 40:40
  Speaker 3: This is mentorship. This is discipleship. this is our lives
• 40:45
  Speaker 3: being poured into the next generation of faithful ministers. Um, again,
• 40:51
  Speaker 3: as Thomas said repeatedly, we're, we're grateful for and pray
• 40:57
  Speaker 3: for everyone who's doing every good thing, you know, uh,
• 41:02
  Speaker 3: but right now this is what we're doing. And our
• 41:04
  Speaker 3: emphasis is on that face-to-face life on life mentorship and discipleship. Um,
• 41:13
  Speaker 3: that we believe is extremely important for what we're trying
• 41:18
  Speaker 3: to do.
• 41:19
  Speaker 4: And we have options for people to learn online from us.
• 41:24
  Speaker 4: We've been doing this for decades now. But the Founders
• 41:27
  Speaker 4: Study Center has just received a massive facelift. And we've
• 41:30
  Speaker 4: got three or four courses. I think we've got your
• 41:31
  Speaker 4: cultural apologetics course, my ecclesiology course, and a political theology
• 41:36
  Speaker 4: course up. And we're adding more to it. And those
• 41:38
  Speaker 4: are standalone courses. I think it's $ 25 is all you
• 41:40
  Speaker 4: can take. And churches are using some of these courses,
• 41:45
  Speaker 4: I know for a fact, to do discipleship work with
• 41:48
  Speaker 4: different people in their congregation. So you go to founders.org
• 41:51
  Speaker 4: and just click on the learn or the study and
• 41:54
  Speaker 4: go to the study center and see all the courses.
• 41:57
  Speaker 4: We'll be continually uploading more courses to that. And the
• 42:00
  Speaker 4: Institute of Public Theology now, it's not going away. It's becoming,
• 42:04
  Speaker 4: as of this fall, a four-year Bible college. And that's
• 42:08
  Speaker 4: just another amazing development God's done. And there will be
• 42:12
  Speaker 4: many courses online for that. In fact, I think you
• 42:15
  Speaker 4: could probably, over time, take everything you need online for
• 42:19
  Speaker 4: the four-year.
• 42:21
  Speaker 2: Bible college degree. And there's going to be three tracks
• 42:25
  Speaker 2: in that.
• 42:26
  Speaker 4: One's public theology, which is the heart and soul of
• 42:29
  Speaker 4: why we started what we started years ago. Another's going
• 42:32
  Speaker 4: to be business, because there's a lot of confusion. And
• 42:35
  Speaker 4: we're living in a day. A lot of the complaints
• 42:37
  Speaker 4: of your generation is that my generation messed up things
• 42:40
  Speaker 4: For you, it's hard to buy a house, hard to
• 42:42
  Speaker 4: get going as a young man and young family.
• 42:44
  Speaker 2: That's all right.
• 42:47
  Speaker 4: And, you know, there's some points to that to be made.
• 42:51
  Speaker 4: But the scripture hadn't changed. And thinking biblically about wealth,
• 42:55
  Speaker 4: about finances, about work is much needed today. And some
• 42:59
  Speaker 4: of the gurus of 20, 30, 40 years ago, the
• 43:03
  Speaker 4: formulas that they had aren't working today.
• 43:06
  Speaker 2: And so they just need to be rethought with time.
• 43:08
  Speaker 2: a proper biblical grounding.
• 43:10
  Speaker 4: And we've got some masterful minds that have already committed
• 43:13
  Speaker 4: to help teach for the business track. So you've got
• 43:16
  Speaker 4: public theology, you've got business, and then you're going to
• 43:18
  Speaker 4: have classical Christian education. And you're going to be teaching
• 43:22
  Speaker 4: one of the initial classes in.
• 43:23
  Speaker 2: That as well.
• 43:24
  Speaker 4: And we're excited about that because this is a movement
• 43:27
  Speaker 4: that has just exploded over the last 10 to 15
• 43:30
  Speaker 4: years or so. And yet there are things in it
• 43:34
  Speaker 4: that I know you with the Fletcher School here in
• 43:36
  Speaker 4: Cape Coral you guys are trying very carefully to guard
• 43:39
  Speaker 4: against falling into some bad traps about what are the
• 43:44
  Speaker 4: good things with this model that we need to capitalize
• 43:46
  Speaker 4: on and what are some of the bad things that
• 43:49
  Speaker 4: can creep in that we need to just put a
• 43:50
  Speaker 4: strong wall against. So you want to talk any about
• 43:53
  Speaker 4: the classical Christian education?
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: Yeah. So we're going to be starting with our first
• 43:57
  Speaker 1: class this fall, intro to classical Christian education, which I'm
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: very excited about. But it's just a wonderful opportunity to
• 44:04
  Speaker 1: be able to kind of breathe some uh, solid doctrine
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: formed theology, but then also, uh, experiential practice into the, uh,
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: the classical Christian education movement. And yeah, that's right. I mean, there,
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: there are a lot of classical Christian schools that are
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: doing it really well. And over the past 10 years,
• 44:23
  Speaker 1: there have, there are some who have really just kind
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: of gone off a cliff and there are there, we're
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: at the point where we can see some proclivities of, um,
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: of graduates of classical Christian schools that just are not healthy,
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: not helpful. I think the space has been dominated by women,
• 44:40
  Speaker 1: which is not a bad thing. I mean, women can
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: be incredible, wonderful educators. But when it's the vast majority
• 44:47
  Speaker 1: of the teachers are women and then the education becomes
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: very feminized and then the young men who are educated
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: become very feminized and And so just helping men to
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: get plugged into the movement and helping men to understand
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: that you have a role here and you need to
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: help educate the next generation as well. So, yeah, there's
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: a lot of things there that are part of that.
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: And I'm really excited about the whole program that is
• 45:08
  Speaker 1: going to be coming out.
• 45:09
  Speaker 3: I've worked with.
• 45:10
  Speaker 1: Peter Sammons, to develop it. And it's going to just
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: be phenomenal. I don't think there's anything, I've not seen
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: anything like as thorough as what IOPT is offering for
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: classical Christian education.
• 45:21
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 45:21
  Speaker 4: And I mean, I don't know of a Reformed Baptist
• 45:24
  Speaker 4: Bible College. There might be one, but I just don't
• 45:27
  Speaker 4: know of it. But by God's grace, this will be
• 45:29
  Speaker 4: a four-year program. And it'll also provide a way for
• 45:34
  Speaker 4: those who believe they might be called to ministry to
• 45:37
  Speaker 4: If you want to do, I think it's a six-year
• 45:39
  Speaker 4: or maybe seven-year track through IOPT and Founders Seminary, you
• 45:44
  Speaker 4: can do that as well. If you keep going, you
• 45:46
  Speaker 4: can do some extra work and have some of the
• 45:48
  Speaker 4: courses credited to you for the Masters of Divinity. Go
• 45:52
  Speaker 4: online to foundersseminary.org and you get more information about it
• 45:56
  Speaker 4: or founders.org and look up the educational opportunities or IOPT.org.
• 46:03
  Speaker 4: So there's three different sites that you can go to.
• 46:06
  Speaker 4: to get information about this.
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: Well, I'm very excited about this fall. It's going to
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: be incredible. I mean, a couple of dozen students, I think,
• 46:15
  Speaker 1: already enrolled.
• 46:15
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think we've got 24, 25 in the seminary
• 46:19
  Speaker 4: and about 20, I think, in IOPT.
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's going to be a good influx of good
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: men and women coming down here to Cape Coral, Florida.
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: And you said earlier, Vody, about the importance even just
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: of geography. And that is actually an important point. We
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: feel like it's not very important today because we've got
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: the internet and this and that. But I think geography
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: is really important. And what other place would you want
• 46:42
  Speaker 1: to live other than Southwest Florida?
• 46:44
  Speaker 2: The free state of Florida.
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: The free state of Florida. I mean, you're here and
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: you're free and you've got the beautiful beaches and you're
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: learning about public theology. And we currently have a governor
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: who's been a wonderful governor. civil magistrate. So yeah, geography
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: is an important thing. And we're very glad to have
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: you down here with us as well.
• 47:07
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm honored. I really am. It's been good.
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: Well, if you're interested in Founders Seminary or in IOPT,
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: you can go to our website at founders.org, or you
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: can go to foundersseminary.org as well and get information there.
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: And just reach out to Founders Ministries. We'd love to
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: talk to you about all those things. And Thank you
• 47:26
  Speaker 1: for joining us for this conversation today on The Sword
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: and the Trial. If the conversation itself has been helpful
• 47:30
  Speaker 1: to you, we ask you to like and subscribe and
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: to share with anyone else who it could be helpful
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: to as well. And we'll see you next time.