Latest / 4-Freedom Podcast / 185. Life Under Ruckman - The Steve Channer Story

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185. Life Under Ruckman - The Steve Channer Story · 4-Freedom Podcast

0:00
Welcome back to the Four Freedom Podcast.
0:02
We have a special interview today for you.
0:06
Today is Tuesday when we're releasing this.
0:09
Typically our episodes come out on Thursday, but we are excited
0:14
about having two different interviews this week. 1 is with
0:19
the guy we're interviewing today named Steven Chandler, and he
0:22
was under Ruckman for many years and he's going to share his
0:26
story. And then later this week, we're
0:28
going to share another interview with a guy that was in a roll
0:32
off and ruckman and excited about Mr. Jason Tackett and his
0:36
story that we get to share this week.
0:38
I do want to remind you we do have Israel coming up in just a
0:42
couple of months. We would love for you to join
0:45
with us. I know there are several who
0:48
have reached out to us. There are still couple of spots
0:51
still available for that. And if you want to join in with
0:54
us, it's going to be a fantastic time, one time where you will
0:58
get to see Scripture come to life, the the Bible coming into
1:03
real life. And you don't want to miss it.
1:06
You don't want to miss spending a week with me and Brett.
1:09
That right there is going to be well worth the time that you
1:13
spend in the trip. And that's going to be a great
1:16
time experiencing the locations and sites where Jesus was at.
1:21
The Lord has truly been blessing us.
1:23
I know Brett is gearing up for a revival coming up, a big tent
1:28
meeting there, a big county wide revival.
1:31
And so if you would continue to pray for him and his church as
1:34
they're planning toward that. Also, if you could help us out,
1:37
I'll be in Tennessee this week setting up some books and cigars
1:42
and different things for sale. If you want to go and support
1:46
our podcast, the easy way to do that is by going to our cigar
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page. You can also check out my new
1:51
book from Brokenness to Freedom. Me and John co-authored this and
1:57
we've had a lot of good success in people reaching out to us.
2:02
Got a couple interviews coming up on that of just talking
2:05
through the look, but it's a great time, a great resource for
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you if you've ever been hurt in a church abuse world as well as
2:15
well as you just have been broken and you were looking for
2:19
some some counseling, a book that's going to be able to walk
2:22
you through that. It's 8 simple chapters of stages
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of legal leading legalism, but it also can be applied in in
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hundreds of different areas and and contexts.
2:33
If you're struggling with grief, anger, doubt, whatever it may
2:37
be, this is a great resource for you, a great tool for you on
2:42
your table to be able to go to as you're struggling.
2:46
Lots of homework in there, lots of things that you can use to
2:49
help benefit you and your walk with the Lord.
2:52
And so we hope that's a blessing to you and looking forward to a
2:56
couple of things coming up in the future.
2:59
We've got our state convention for North Carolina coming up.
3:01
If you're in North Carolina, love to meet with you, love to
3:04
be around you. If you're going to be in
3:06
Tennessee this week or around Tennessee this week, I'll be
3:10
there Thursday, Friday, Saturday, reach out to me, love
3:13
to get up with you and meet up there in Middle Tennessee, about
3:16
an hour South of Nashville. I'll be at John's house.
3:20
There's a small conference down there.
3:22
And so we're excited about that. Looking forward to interview
3:25
today. Hopefully you enjoy it.
3:27
Stephen Chandler is going to jump on with us here in just a
3:30
minute and excited about you listening to his story.
3:34
Hope it's an encouragement to you.
3:36
As always, if this is a blessing, leave us a rating and
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review and like and share this on all your social media
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platforms so that other people can be blessed to hear this
3:48
interview today. Thank you for listening, we hope
3:50
you enjoy it. For freedom set me free.
3:53
Not for change, not for guilt, not for Pharisee.
3:56
Grace lit the flame. Now I'm puffing Peace, cigars
3:59
and victory. Justified.
4:01
Released. Welcome to the Four Freedom
4:04
Podcast. This podcast exists to bring the
4:08
freedom of the gospel for everyday Christians with
4:11
everyday issues. Saved by dress codes, not by
4:14
what I eat. I'm covered in the
4:16
righteousness, washed from head to feet.
4:18
No tally of tradition. No man made code.
4:21
Blood bought my freedom. Now I ride that road.
4:23
They clutch pearls when they see smoke rings rise.
4:26
But my prey still ascends past the legalist cries.
4:29
Christ plus nothing. That's the real math.
4:32
So miss me with your fence laws and your extra path.
4:35
He sat with sinners. I'm sitting with Saints, sipping
4:37
grace from the bottle. No room for face.
4:40
I like one for liberty. Toast to the king.
4:42
Every ash of sermon. Death has lost its sting.
4:46
For freedom He set me free, Not for change, not for guilt, not
4:49
for Pharisee Grace let the flame now puffing, peace, cigars and
4:54
victory justified released. For freedom he set me free, Not
4:59
for change, not for guilt, not for Pharisee grace.
5:02
Let the flame now puffing peace, cigars and victory justified,
5:06
released. Let grace begin for freedom,
5:10
death me free. Not for change, not for guilt,
5:12
not for Pharisee grace. Let the flame.
5:15
Now here are your hosts, James Seyfried and Brett Martin.
5:20
All right. Well, today we've got Steven
5:22
Chandler here with us and Steve is willing to come on and share
5:26
about his time under Mr. Ruckman and PBI.
5:30
And I want to start out by just asking you, Steven, your intro,
5:34
tell us about yourself, your background, where you're from,
5:37
and even what you're doing now. OK, my name is Steven Channer,
5:42
and I was born, raised in Fort Myers, oh, got saved.
5:47
That's about 11 years old. My parents were going to a large
5:52
Southern Baptist church, McGregor Baptist Church.
5:57
And yeah, we're just here basic, you know, I'm like I said, yeah,
6:03
I'll say nominal Christian, you know, family, you know, we're
6:05
going to church. But as far as like under
6:08
fundamentalism, we weren't a part of fundamental
6:11
fundamentalism. Then, you know, went to public
6:16
school and then on graduation, my brother had found out that
6:24
Doctor Rutland was going to PPI. And so that's how I end up going
6:28
to PPI for my brother. And then, so I went there right
6:31
after graduation and I graduated from P Guy about 2001, stayed
6:38
around for about another year after that, went to deputation
6:42
for Ukraine, stayed over in Ukraine for about 10 months,
6:47
came back and that time I met my wife.
6:52
We got married in 2007. And Long story short, now I'm in
6:59
A not a Southern Baptist church. I guess they're part of the
7:03
Florida Baptist Convention. I'm not too sure how they're
7:05
connected with the Southern Baptist Convention.
7:10
And we've got 8 kids and I'm right now I'm working a job at
7:18
the AC manufacturing plant and just trying to be a faithful
7:23
church member here at the church that we go to now.
7:27
Well, good deal. Well, let's talk about your time
7:30
in the Independent Fundamental Baptist movement.
7:33
How did you first get involved in the IFP?
7:36
What? What initially attracted y'all
7:37
to it? So like I said, it was my
7:42
brother that got me and going into PVI and at first it was
7:50
just the all the doctrinal teaching, right?
7:53
So the church I was going to, they really didn't, you know,
7:56
dive deep into doctrine. You know, all the, how the New
8:01
Testament works together with the Old Testament, a lot of the,
8:06
you know, symbolism and typology and stuff like that.
8:09
And, you know, the relations to Adam and Esau and, and, and all
8:18
that kind of intrigued me as my brother was telling me this
8:21
stuff over the over the phone as he was going to PVI.
8:27
And then it was really when I visited a couple times before I
8:31
went to the PVI, it was it was the excitement, right.
8:35
So, you know, I've never seen anybody just, you know, hoop and
8:40
holler about being safe, you know, search.
8:44
I went to is, you know, pretty, pretty quiet.
8:47
And if anybody said Amen or said something like that, people like
8:50
turn around and get them a stern look, you know, So it was that
8:55
kind of, I guess say hi. Southern Baptist Church, you
8:59
know, they had the the choir, big choir with all of them that,
9:04
you know, fancy robes and stuff like that.
9:07
The specials that they sang were somewhat, you know, operatic.
9:11
The pastor's wife was did the vibrato pretty well.
9:16
And so just the excitement. I remember Jack Patterson
9:20
getting up there and singing Chip Ahoy, that's PBI.
9:24
And I mean just the whole place just erupted in in cheers and
9:27
you know, see people running the aisles and stuff like that.
9:29
I was, I just laughed like the whole time because it was like,
9:32
this is crazy. You know, this is nuts.
9:35
So the joy and then excitement and the boldness, you know,
9:41
they're not ashamed to, to, to preach about, about the Lord.
9:46
You know, that's, that's something I just, I never, I
9:48
never seen, you know, I went St. preaching with my brother a
9:53
couple times, you know, before I did it, you know, myself after I
9:59
get into the PBI and just, you know, seeing how people, you
10:06
know, brothers and sisters in Christ, just actually, you know,
10:09
dealing with people one-on-one. That's something I just, I
10:11
never, I never seen before. And so just the the boldness and
10:17
the joy really is what attracted me.
10:20
Yeah, as we have done research and looked into Ruckman a little
10:24
bit and I'm familiar with Ruckman, I've got several
10:27
churches and friends that are near me that are big into the
10:31
Peter Ruckman movement. I've got a church that I know of
10:35
that you walk in their lobby and to the right is a life-size
10:38
portrait of Peter Ruckman. Now you walk in and they'll say
10:43
we worship Jesus and we serve Jesus.
10:45
No man's going to tell us what to do.
10:47
But the first person you see when you walk in is Peter
10:49
Ruckman. And so when you were at PBI,
10:53
sort of a couple of questions here as we go through it.
10:55
The first one is, what was your experience like while you were
10:57
there specifically? I don't know if you were under
11:00
Ruckman at all and were directly involved in his teaching or
11:04
maybe had some interaction with him, but what was your
11:06
experience like while you were at PBII?
11:08
Say it was good, you know, there was there was a a time shortly
11:13
after I I got there where, you know, you know, I started to
11:18
doubt my salvation and that was that was a rough time.
11:22
You know, I remember, I remember, you know, just kind of
11:25
wanting to want to leave and go home, you know, because my
11:28
salvation experience wasn't like a lot of these other guys, you
11:30
know, that were coming in and all these, you know, dramatic,
11:34
you know, changes, You know, a lot of these guys that were
11:37
coming in were, you know, drug addicts, you know, I've gotten
11:41
saved in prison and stuff like that, you know, so that that
11:44
really didn't, you know, line up with, with how I got saved, you
11:48
know, and I was just about 11 years old and went to a had an
11:55
Easter pageant at that church. And I, I can't really remember
11:59
what was said after the pageant, but I just remember, you know,
12:03
Holy Spirit speaking to me said, boy, you're not going to make
12:05
it. And so I, you know, bow my head
12:08
and and receive Christ, you know, then and there and, you
12:12
know, and I guess just not having, I guess the, the type of
12:18
preaching maybe, but that and, and, and and teaching, I guess
12:28
difficult teaching, just kind of the regular, you know, every
12:31
Sunday salvation message and, and things like that.
12:35
And I really can't say what was taught at as far as on the youth
12:41
group level. I just, for some reason, I just,
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I just don't, I can't, I can't recall it.
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I mean, I'm, you know, I'm 45 now.
12:48
So that was quite a few years, you know, years ago.
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But you know, I know, I know the Holy Spirit's in me.
12:55
He talks to me, you know, the Lord, you know, has confirmed my
12:57
salvation many times. But at that point it was, it was
13:01
pretty rough. Like I said, I want to leave,
13:03
but but after that, you know, the experience was, was good.
13:10
I had a good time with all of the brothers there, you know,
13:15
going to class, learning a lot. You know, it's kind of, it's
13:22
kind of demanding, I guess in a way.
13:25
You know, you, you have to find the, you have to find your own,
13:27
your own place to live. You got to, you know, obviously
13:30
find a job to work, pay your pay your way through.
13:33
No one's going to, you know, pay your pay your bill and you know,
13:38
clap of that night from about 6:00 to 10:00 every day except
13:45
for several Fridays unless you you're taking English.
13:50
But on Fridays, a lot of us, you know, we played hockey in the
13:52
gym for hockey, basketball, racquetball St. preaching was
13:57
was fine. I don't know.
14:01
It's it's for those that have never been St. preaching.
14:05
There's lots of different styles, lots of different people
14:09
do it differently. And the way we were taught is
14:12
basically just to quote scripture.
14:13
You know, we weren't taught to to yell at people and, and, and
14:16
tell them, you know, you know how you know how they're, how
14:19
they're dressed in the wicked and they're going healthy and
14:22
the women need to iron their husband's socks and all that
14:24
stuff like some people do to to get a reaction, right.
14:28
We just quote a scripture and tell them that they need to get
14:30
saved. You know, that's not to say that
14:35
there weren't a few wild cards in there that that made some
14:38
trouble. You know, and I remember going
14:43
out to the beach St. preaching. I'm not going to do that ever
14:46
again. But you know, we did that and we
14:51
just had a good time, you know, fellowshipping and serving the
14:56
Lord, trying to trying to win folks to the to the Lord and and
14:59
learn the Bible. Yeah, when I was in college, we
15:03
had a couple years before I got there, they had initiated a
15:07
midnight cry and we would go out at midnight and we would preach
15:12
right beside bars St. preaching as if we're coming out.
15:15
They were drunk and we would witness the people and man, you
15:20
would interact with some crazy people.
15:23
Had one guy, he just, he's like, hey, I'm, I'm going in that bar
15:27
and he went in and he got up on the stage and he started
15:29
preaching because that little karaoke and I, I said, I'm
15:32
staying outside, like I'm not going to have any part of that.
15:35
And like 10 minutes later they're like throwing beer
15:37
bottles at him. They're they're trying to pick
15:39
him out. It was crazy.
15:41
But I can definitely relate to that as far as been a part of
15:45
some of that stuff. Brett, what you got next for us?
15:48
Well, let's see, are we are we still under the three section?
15:53
OK, Can you tell us a little bit about, while you're there, what
15:57
was the church culture like as far as the leadership style?
16:02
What What did you notice about the leadership style of of the
16:06
church? So Bible Bible Baptist Church is
16:12
a unique church. You're you're not going to find
16:15
it's, it's set up, you know, even in even a lot of your rock
16:18
line churches, to be honest, Doctor Ruckman is very it was
16:23
very hands off. He delegated a lot of stuff to a
16:27
lot of the other guys to brother Donovan deacons in the church.
16:31
You know, Doctor Upman did not want you coming to him about
16:35
buying a car or buying a house. You know, he he would, he would
16:39
preach against, you know, those preachers that would require,
16:41
you know, those things of, of church members.
16:43
You know, he wasn't PBI was not legalistic and in that kind of
16:49
sense, you know, you can say it was legalistic when it came to
16:53
like to music and obviously, you know, the Bible as far as dress
16:57
standards, you know, there are people that had different dress
16:59
standards and things. Doctor Robin did not look at
17:04
your giving statements. You know, he didn't want to know
17:07
anything about that. He just wanted to, you know,
17:09
preach and and and and write, you know, and minister in the in
17:13
the classroom and things like that.
17:17
So it was very, so it was very open in that, in that sense.
17:23
And as far as the, the culture, you know, you kind of had like
17:26
you kind of had two different cultures.
17:28
You had the church and then you had the school.
17:30
And you know, a lot of the members did, did go through the,
17:34
through the school. But you know, there's, there's,
17:39
there's, there's a difference after you graduate and kind of
17:42
hang around versus while you're, while you're in the school.
17:47
I, I don't really don't know how to describe it other than it's
17:50
like a lot of the guys that were, that were there, if
17:57
they're around, they're pretty much just kind of waiting till
18:01
God call them elsewhere. You know, there was a, a big
18:06
push, a major, there's a major push for permissions at, at
18:11
Bible Baptist. And so the, the encouragement
18:15
to, to go out, you know, and, and do something for the Lord
18:18
was, was very strong there, you know, like as soon as possible.
18:22
That's, that's kind of like how I got into going to to Ukraine.
18:25
And I thought that, you know, I needed to go as soon as, you
18:31
know, as soon as I graduate. But you know, like there's,
18:36
there's a few deacons. They don't have a whole lot of
18:38
deacons. And yeah, every other Kegel at
18:46
that time led the music. And so that was that was his job
18:49
was the music. Brother Turner LED visitation.
18:52
So he pretty much headed that up St. preaching was I, I forget if
19:00
it was during during the school year.
19:05
I can't remember exactly who was over that.
19:07
If that was brother Turner or Brother Ginsky did the headed up
19:11
the street preaching during the offseason.
19:13
We would go to to Milton and Mobile in, in other places
19:19
outside of Pensacola. So that was, that was kind of
19:22
his ministry. And you know, if you wanted to
19:26
do something, you could, it was, you know, it was open game as to
19:29
what you wanted to do. You know, if you thought Lord
19:31
wants you to do something, you'd go ahead and do it.
19:33
There's no, no restrictions as far as that.
19:36
So it was very, very open leadership.
19:40
But if but there was a any trouble, it was, it was handled,
19:44
you know, pretty pretty swiftly. You know, there would, there
19:48
would be a, a call after the service or something like that.
19:51
And you know, they would, they would, they would take care of
19:55
us. There's only like maybe one or
19:57
two times where someone was, was brought forward for the church
20:03
and it was, it was after, you know, they had been corrected a
20:08
few times but didn't for whatever reason, you know, so
20:13
there wasn't, I can't say that there was anything.
20:16
You know, hid under the rug. I'm not aware of any, you know,
20:21
abuse that that went on at that time.
20:28
So, yeah, the, the leadership's out.
20:31
Doctor Rugman was ahead, right? But he delegated a lot to the to
20:35
the church member. You know, I was thinking through
20:39
that and also you going to Ukraine as a missionary.
20:43
I've got 2 questions. The first one is how did that
20:46
environment shape your view of ministry in the gospel?
20:50
But also personal question for me, what conspiracy theories or
20:56
crazy things was taught from Rutman while you were there?
21:00
I know he talked about aliens and Saturn and crazy things.
21:04
What did you personally? That as well.
21:08
So on the conspiracy stuff, like, I don't know if you've
21:11
ever read The Black is Beautiful.
21:13
I don't ever read that at night. It's, it's a, it's a, it can be
21:16
scary, but you know, being, being a young kid and I, I, you
21:22
know, I enjoyed all that, you know, because there's something
21:25
new, something wild. I remember going somewhere to,
21:31
to preach a street preacher with my brother went to a different
21:34
town and we came across this little country, you know, shack
21:39
for, for breakfast or whatnot. And this, there's this one guy,
21:43
you know, country boy, you know, talking about how the, the
21:49
burden of revelation was connected with, you know, the,
21:52
the Concorde at that time, you know, because of the eagle was
21:54
shaped like an eagle. And I, I remember that time
21:57
where I was like, you know, I was latching on to anything
21:59
because I like I said, I wasn't taught any kind of Bible at all
22:04
where I, where I was other than just, you know, basic Bible
22:06
stories. And, and afterward my brother
22:09
was like, yeah, you just kind of need to be be careful about, you
22:12
know, what you, what you take in because just because somebody
22:14
says something from the Bible doesn't, doesn't make it true,
22:17
you know, And you know, so, yeah, there is, there are, like
22:24
I said, there's, there's PBI guys are so different.
22:29
It's just like the IFP. There's, there's, there's a
22:31
broad spectrum. You got some guys that are way
22:34
crazy into that. The guy that I roommated with
22:38
was really heavy into conspiracies.
22:42
He had a lot of books. He even had some, some Masonic
22:46
books that you're not supposed to get.
22:47
I forget how he how he had them, but he, he, you know, he was,
22:51
he's a book collector. He got him.
22:54
He even had a 1828 unabridged dictionary, which was really
23:00
enlightening. But yeah, the conspiracies and
23:11
stuff, yeah, there's, there's some people that are hardcore
23:13
into it and there's others that aren't.
23:16
What was the the other the other questions again?
23:19
Yeah, how did just the environment that you're in?
23:21
Oh, I'm shaming the gospel. Yeah.
23:23
So the the I believe as far as like preaching the gospel, the
23:30
unadulterated, you know, gospel, I believe it was, I mean, it was
23:35
there. I mean that was like, you know,
23:37
the main thrust is to is to when people the Lord, you know, and
23:42
that anybody, anybody can get saved.
23:44
Jesus Christ, you know, and die for for everybody.
23:47
And you know, he's he's wanting everyone to get saved and you
23:51
know, whosoever will and come and, you know, and that with
23:56
with missions, you know, the gospel was very, very real
24:01
there, you know, and when it comes to the the ministry, it
24:09
there wasn't really a negative aspect to the ministry.
24:12
I remember watching, you know, these missionaries that come
24:15
through. Mike Roberts was was one of them
24:19
really struck it forward with me because he was a missionary over
24:21
in Vietnam. And just, you know, his his
24:25
interactions with the people was one thing that really got me to
24:30
want to be, you know, a missionary.
24:32
I don't think God never really taught me to it to be a
24:35
missionary, but but it, you know, being a missionary was
24:43
like the the the front lines of Christianity, if you will.
24:47
You know, they're they're the ones that are going out, you
24:50
know, into all these places where you know, they've never
24:53
heard the gospel, you know, preaching Jesus to them when in
24:57
people to the Lord building, building churches and then
25:00
establishing get them so that they're self-sufficient and then
25:03
going on and doing it again. You know, so it was it was a,
25:10
you know, preaching the gospel. It was something that every
25:13
Christian should do. You know, you know, the militant
25:17
aspect of that, you know, you know, Christian should be a
25:20
soldier. You know, Doctor Ruckman was,
25:22
was in the Army. Lots of guys that came through
25:24
there were prior military and stuff like that.
25:27
And so the, the militant thrust of, of preaching the gospel and
25:30
and getting the gospel out was there.
25:34
And so I think as far as the gospel was that I think there
25:36
was a my, my opinion, you know, there's, there's a healthy view
25:40
of the gospel. The unhealthy view I think came
25:43
from after I've gotten out and gotten into a a hyper
25:48
fundamentalist church where the there was, I call it a
25:59
Calvinistic type of preaching of repentance at the hyper faunal
26:02
mount was where you actually had to like beg God to not pass you
26:07
by and, you know, beg God to grant you repentance in order,
26:15
you know, to be saved. And that that cost me a lot of a
26:20
lot of turmoil and a lot of say several hours at the altar, you
26:26
know, but but at PBII believe is I believe is a as a healthy and
26:33
presented as an honorable thing. It's something that a Christian
26:35
ought to do is to appreciate gospel and when, when souls.
26:39
Before I ask my next question, I want to piggyback off your your
26:43
last question. When, when I was at First
26:47
Baptist Hammond, we would lead people, you know, the gospel was
26:50
there just like what you're saying, but we would lead people
26:53
to Lord on the bus route and then we'd never see them again.
26:56
There was like 0 discipleship. What what was your experience in
27:02
in that area like there? My personal experience, the
27:08
people that I LED to the Lord, sadly, I I wasn't able to to
27:13
follow up on them. I remember a guy named Chris
27:16
Eller. He was at, at some park and I
27:19
could never, you know, reached back out to him.
27:23
There was a guy named Hector. I remember him and I wish I
27:27
could go back and, and, you know, I, I tried to give him a
27:30
Bible, but I, but I never went back.
27:33
And I to this day, like I said, I remember those names.
27:36
Not I, you know, I regret not doing it.
27:38
But there there was a, you know, when whoever you witness to like
27:44
on visitation, you know, you were supposed to go back and,
27:47
and you know, and, and, and retouch with them, trying to try
27:51
to disciple them. That was that was part of our
27:54
visitation class was to go out and not just, you know, talk to
27:58
somebody, but to but to bring them to church.
28:01
The disciple 1, you know, do follow-ups and stuff like that.
28:05
That was something Brother Turner was that's part of your
28:10
part of your part of your grade. And they had a military
28:16
ministry. So there are guys coming in, you
28:19
know, all over, but as far as like the amount of people that
28:26
that got saved and got brought into the church and then
28:30
disciple and grew up in the church, you know, I, you know, I
28:33
couldn't really give you a number.
28:35
I don't really remember seeing that a whole lot.
28:41
But but there wasn't any easy believism, you know what I'm
28:46
saying? I remember going out with a
28:48
friend of mine from, from PBI that I still talk to to this
28:50
day. And we went to into a, one of
28:56
the apartment complexes and witnessed to him, went into this
29:00
one guy and he was, you know, we were, we were, you know, he said
29:04
he was a Christian, right? A lot of people in the South say
29:06
they're a Christian, say they're safe.
29:08
And after we got done talking, talking to him, you know, he my
29:13
friend, his name is Brian. He's like, so would you have any
29:16
problem trying to leave that leave that guy to Lord, Even
29:19
though he said that he was saying I was like, no, he's
29:22
like, good, because there, there were some that you know, they,
29:25
they do. I think it's just a a human
29:29
nature, fallen nature tendency just to to to get to get a
29:32
response, you know, but but as far as the easy beliefs and it
29:39
wasn't, it wasn't like the Hiles type.
29:43
I guess I can. Good deal, good deal.
29:46
So I want to talk about the King James issue.
29:50
I want to know if it was such a big issue.
29:52
And I, and before you answer, I'll tell you, I'll be searching
29:55
through clips on TikTok and things like that.
29:58
And now I'll hear guys say, Oh, the King James can correct the
30:03
Greek and it, it makes me think, oh, is he a, is he a Rutmanite?
30:08
Is, you know, so Speaking of that, what what, what was that
30:11
like? So, yeah, yeah, that was that
30:17
was that was taught, you know, the the the English corrects the
30:22
Greek and so well, that's uniquely Ruckman.
30:27
I don't know, Doctor Ruckman got a lot of his beliefs from a lot
30:29
of different places. Yeah.
30:34
The so the, the issue of the King James Bible, one of the
30:38
questions that you had sent, I'll put, I'll put it like this,
30:41
the mindset of it, right? So the King James is the Bible,
30:46
right? That's, that's the standard,
30:48
whether how, how you agree with that or not, you know, And so
30:54
that's the standard, that's the basis.
30:56
That's our foundation. And someone who tries to go to
30:58
change that, and if it is changed, if it is wrong, if the
31:03
Bible is the word of God, and then we can't trust the word of
31:07
God, then what do we have right. So that's so that's the mindset.
31:11
That's why it's, it's such a big issue.
31:16
But yeah, you'll find, you'll find clips of of Sam Gibb, you
31:22
know, saying that the, you know, you have in order to get the
31:29
truth of the word of God, you got to go to the English.
31:34
And you know, I don't just because of all the different
31:40
languages, I don't, I don't, I, I can't, I can't hold of that
31:45
anymore, you know, now do I do I still love the King James Bible?
31:50
Yes. Do I still read my King James
31:52
Bible? Yes.
31:53
Am I to the point where I can say that every version is the
31:57
word of God? I'm not there yet, You know,
32:03
there's there's just enough differences where I'm like, you
32:06
know, but I'm not to the point where a lot of guys are where,
32:12
you know, if you read a different Bible, then then
32:15
you're lost. You know, even at PBI it the IT
32:20
was not taught that if you read a different version that you
32:22
were lost, right. It wasn't taught that if you got
32:25
led to the Lord outside of a different version that that you
32:28
never were saved. You know, that that was never
32:29
taught. But but the issue is that Jesus
32:35
Christ is so connected with the word of God, with the written
32:40
word, that, you know, they, they find any, any deviation from the
32:46
King James is almost like a, a deviation, you know, from the
32:52
Lord and you know, so that's, that's kind of like the mindset.
33:01
Yeah, I remember Sam GIF was was big in our teaching as well.
33:06
And one of the the things that helped me understand the King
33:11
James only debate was the anchor Burger debate.
33:14
Sam, get those on there with, you know, four or five King
33:18
James only guys. And he's asking a couple of
33:20
questions, sort of a bait and switch type question to sort of
33:23
hook them and then they're near the end.
33:27
It's like 4 parts or five, four, you know, a couple hours long.
33:31
The one of the other guys asks him a question and then I think
33:36
it was James White and then switched the question the way he
33:40
answered and he goes, you got bait and switched me on that And
33:44
he goes, you've been doing that the whole time.
33:46
Like, but it was just so eye opening to hear that and to see
33:49
that debate. If you've never watched, it's a
33:51
great 1. So I want to sort of transition
33:54
the, the conversation to why you left or the reasons you left the
33:59
decision for leaving PBI and hopefully the IP movement.
34:04
You said you're part of a part of Baptist network SBC church.
34:09
The the question we often ask is this, is this a specific turning
34:13
point, an event that happened in life, or was this a gradual
34:17
shift in, in in leaving the the movement?
34:22
So I left you guys, I graduated right and I was going on
34:28
deputation to to Ukraine. So that was really the reason
34:32
for leaving PBI. Long story short, you know, I
34:37
ended up after deputation going into a, like I said, a hyper
34:42
fundamentalist church. I didn't really see it as a
34:44
hyper fundamentalist church. I had a friend of mine that was
34:48
was at that same church and he, he kind of warned me and, you
34:57
know, saying that the pastor had these legalistic tendencies and
35:01
stuff like that. And I was like, no, he's not.
35:04
He's not, he's not legalist, you know, and legalism being, you
35:08
know, Lordship salvation and stuff like that, you know, and
35:13
but shortly after I was like, yeah, yeah, I can see it.
35:15
But you know, you know, whatever, you know, I was not,
35:22
like I said, PBI is not very legalistic, right?
35:25
So the doctor would never preach on, you know, dress code
35:29
standards and, and things like that.
35:32
Now he had his, he had very high personal standards, but he
35:36
didn't preach them. And, but the, the church that I
35:41
went to after I got off deputation, he did preach, he
35:48
did preach high legalistic standards.
35:51
And, you know, went to all the verses in Isaiah about, you
35:54
know, you know, uncovering the thigh and uncovering the locks
35:57
and stuff like that. You know, and, and so I got, I,
36:06
I forget what it was, but he had, he had made some, some
36:11
statement that got me to, to question it.
36:15
And, and I eventually, you know, I, you know, gave in and said,
36:21
you know, OK, yeah, you know, you're right.
36:22
You know, women should wear everything down to the floor and
36:26
men should wear shorts and, and, you know, not too much make up
36:32
on the on the women and, and all that.
36:34
And, and he was really big on on repentance.
36:40
And I think it was right to a certain extent about repentance
36:46
being a being a not just a, a change of mind.
36:51
However, like I said, it was so, you know, you almost had to beg
36:57
God for that, for that repentance.
37:02
And it was actually through that pastor's, my son wrote an e-mail
37:13
to a girl. And the next 4 weekends, the
37:18
next 4 Sundays, the every sermon was directed at my son because
37:24
that was viewed as an, you know, a no, no, just an e-mail.
37:30
There was nothing perverse in the e-mail that I can remember
37:34
as of right now. It was just an e-mail that was
37:38
to a girl, right? And the whole courtship thing,
37:42
right? You know, you're not supposed to
37:44
do anything without the eyeballs of your parents being on there.
37:47
You know, everywhere the the hyper sexuality was was very
37:54
big. You know, guys don't touch
37:57
girls. You know, you don't look at
37:59
girls. You know, it's that, that
38:02
extreme and and so that, that it's a miracle that my, that my
38:11
oldest son is in is in church to this day because of all that.
38:15
And my wife was, was, was ready, was ready to to leave that
38:19
church. Me, I was like, I didn't see it.
38:21
I was like, I was so blind, brother.
38:22
I was like, no, he doesn't he, he can't, he can't be doing that
38:26
on purpose. You know, he can't.
38:29
And he and he would say that he, that he didn't, you know, he
38:31
would say it was, it was just of the Lord.
38:33
And, you know, looking back, it's like, you know, brother,
38:36
come on, you know, you know, for four weeks straight, you know,
38:40
you're talking person A, person B, you know, and person B being
38:45
the bad one. I mean, there's only two feet.
38:47
It's a small church. So everybody knew what was going
38:50
on. Everybody knew who was preaching
38:51
at, you know, it's not like you can't just, you just can't
38:56
preach on something and not, and people not, not know about it,
38:59
you know, and, and there are some other things that are going
39:04
on in that church where people were questioned the, the pastor
39:07
about it. And eventually the pastor just
39:12
just resigned. He, he gave the church over to
39:14
another brother who at the time was listening to the RFP and got
39:20
me listening to the RFP and got me to, you know, change my
39:24
mindset on a lot of different things, especially standards and
39:27
stuff like that. And so that was kind of our
39:32
exodus out of the IFP. We were kind of a IFE light
39:37
church because the brother said, look, I can, I can say I can, I
39:41
can say you people, but I can't reach this church, right?
39:46
It's got to be a different church.
39:47
We renamed the church and and then another blow up happened,
39:53
which which was which was really bad.
39:58
And so that pastor resigned and it's caused us to to move to to
40:03
the church that we're at now. You know, my wife couldn't,
40:09
couldn't take being in a hyper fundamentalist church.
40:13
So there, there's several King James Baptist churches in, in
40:17
our area. And she was like, you know, I'm
40:20
not, I'm not going to be a part of stuffy, you know, legalistic
40:23
church. You know, I just, I just can't
40:24
do it. And our, our kids can't handle
40:26
it. And, and so we ended up going to
40:30
this church. It's, it's a very large church.
40:34
I wasn't quite comfortable with it, you know, because I knew
40:39
what, what I come from as far as what I was, you know, grew up in
40:44
and, you know, I didn't, I didn't, you know, want that for
40:50
my kids, but the kids enjoyed it and anything that's going to
40:55
keep the joy of them going to church and then hearing about
40:58
the Lord, You know, I'm, I'm, I'm for, because brother, the,
41:02
the, the church that we were at, see, there was nothing for the
41:04
kids, you know, like everything was there, you know, in the
41:07
church, in the main service, right?
41:10
They, they did try to do Sunday school for the kids, you know,
41:15
later on, But like it, you know, the Lord, the Lord has this
41:21
where we're at, you know, for a reason.
41:23
And, and, and I'm thankful for it.
41:24
It's, I believe it's a, it's a safe church.
41:27
They take, you know, kids safety very seriously.
41:30
Like I said, it's a large church.
41:31
They got a good tracking system, you know, making sure that the
41:36
parents or that the adult is with, with, with a kid, you
41:40
know, like they, they got these little tags.
41:42
So no one can just come up and take your kid, you know, out of
41:46
there. You've got to have the, the tag.
41:48
And it was funny because if there was one parent that that
41:50
was there, a newer parent didn't have it.
41:53
And the person, the workers like, no, I can't, I'm sorry.
41:55
You got to go down and get a get a ticket.
41:57
You know, you got to, you know, they, they won't let them take
42:00
it. And parent was found a little
42:03
irritated, But I, I just kind of laugh and smile.
42:05
I'm like, that's good. Yeah.
42:07
So I, I, I appreciate it. And but yeah, so it was, it was
42:16
not like a, an individual personal decision.
42:19
It was just kind of circumstances that that let us
42:21
out, I believe. I can definitely relate to that
42:25
with the larger church mindset. When we moved back to North
42:29
Carolina 10 years ago now, we began visiting a lot of little
42:33
small independent churches that I knew and was just still trying
42:37
to get in that world. And everyone, my wife was like,
42:40
Nope, not going here. Nope, not going to happen.
42:44
And so right around the corner of our house was a large
42:47
Southern Baptist church. I knew about it, but I'm like,
42:50
this is Southern Baptist. Like, I can't go there.
42:52
If I go, I'm going to lose my salvation.
42:53
Like this is horrible. And so we finally went one day,
42:58
literally it was right around the corner.
43:00
We always went left because I didn't want her to see it.
43:03
And then we finally went right. She's like, why don't we go
43:05
there? We went in great children's
43:08
ministry. The preaching was phenomenal.
43:11
And when we picked our kids up from that first service, he
43:14
said, James, I think we thought our church, I'm like, OK, it's a
43:17
Southern Baptist. Like I've got to, I've got to
43:19
find out some things. And so I sit down with the youth
43:21
pastor and we talked for a while, but he was Liberty grad.
43:25
And so it was I can understand that same mindset and that same
43:29
shift that that you're going through as well.
43:31
Brett, why don't you ask her a last question?
43:33
Then we'll close it down for any final thoughts.
43:35
Well, we, we want to see if you can give some advice for those
43:39
searching for church or leaving the IFB.
43:43
So one of the last questions we want to ask is what would you
43:47
say to someone who's starting to question their IFB church or
43:51
upbringing? Oh yeah, question.
43:54
You know, just go to the scripture.
43:56
You know, I would not tell anybody to.
44:03
That is a bad thing to question. I mean, you know, the job
44:06
question the disciples question Jesus, you know, Jesus never
44:09
reviewed them for for questioning.
44:11
You know, it's not anything back to your question.
44:14
If your question just just go to the scripture, you know, and and
44:20
check to see what's what's So check content context.
44:25
You know, that's one thing I'm I'm glad, I'm really thankful
44:28
for at at PB is, you know, I can say that I was taught so to
44:32
learn to read the Bible. Sadly, I did not exercise that
44:39
the practice in, in reading context in every situation,
44:42
because if I had done that, then I would have been questioning a
44:45
lot of things that my IFP pastor, you know what it would
44:51
have said, you know, and you can't just take the one verse
44:58
that that they're using and and run with it and say, Oh yeah,
45:01
that's what it means. Now you got to read the chapter
45:04
or yeah, read the chapter before it, you know, maybe even read
45:08
the whole book, you know, just to see what's, what's really
45:10
going on, who is talking to. But if you got questions, go to
45:14
the scripture, you know, ask Laura to show you get outside
45:18
your echo chamber. You know, that's, that's,
45:20
that's, that's what I did, you know, listen to the RFP even, I
45:26
even listen to the, the, the guys that, you know, RFP people
45:30
don't, don't like. I listen to Calvinists.
45:32
I listen to non Calvinists. I listen to the there, there's
45:38
some not often, but there's some hyper, like I don't say hyper,
45:45
but there's people with different end times views and
45:48
stuff like that, people with different views on the rapture,
45:50
people with different views on not just everything.
45:52
And you know, I listen to them. Sometimes I agree with them.
45:56
Sometimes I can point out scriptures that they're not
46:00
taken into consideration or things you know, and so you
46:03
know, I don't, you know, agree. I don't just swallow everything
46:06
that everyone teaches, but you know, get outside your echo
46:08
chamber, you know, read the scriptures, pray, you know,
46:13
fast, ask, ask the Lord to show you, you know, if you're but if
46:18
your question, it's OK to question.
46:20
You may end up disagreeing with what you're being taught and you
46:24
may end up agreeing. You may maybe maybe the place
46:27
where, where the Lord, you know, where the Lord wants to and the
46:30
others in this whole process, I've learned that there are the
46:34
body of Christ is a very diverse body.
46:38
You know, I'll listen to the, the Roy's report podcast and
46:44
talking about a situation and, and one of the people on there
46:47
was, was talking about how body is different.
46:50
And this person was pointing out things that the other body
46:55
couldn't see, you know, and I can see, but a finger can't see,
47:00
you know, And so there's different parts of the body and
47:03
the different members, we all help each other.
47:06
And you know, if you hurt your, the body, you know, your pinky
47:12
tail gets hurt, the whole body reacts to it, right?
47:15
And so there's, there's different parts for everybody in
47:18
the body of Christ. And not everybody's going to be
47:20
the same. I think that's one thing that
47:24
the IFB gets wrong is that they want everyone to be a cookie
47:27
cutter. They want everybody to believe
47:28
like them, think like them, act like them.
47:34
And and you know, so yeah, question, but just go, Lord.
47:40
Yeah, absolutely. I think that's one thing like
47:42
even in my college upbringing, we would, they would get up and
47:46
they would teach, let's just say the Rapture and they would only
47:50
teach that view and they would say there's many other views,
47:53
but we don't even think about it because this is the right way.
47:56
And a good theological understanding is studying every
48:00
aspect and every other one and then letting your position
48:04
defend itself based on scripture and based on other things.
48:08
And so that that's one of the interviews that I go to often is
48:11
the John MacArthur and RC Sproul on baptism.
48:16
You know, we were taught baptism was by immersion.
48:19
Jesus was a Baptist because he was baptized by John the
48:22
Baptist. And you know, we, we've heard
48:24
those things, but they never defended either side.
48:28
They just defend their side. They never allowed for the
48:30
argument of like pedo baptism. And John MacArthur and Archie
48:34
spoke, great friends, loved each other in the ministry, but had a
48:38
very cordial debate back and forth on what they believed.
48:41
They walked away. Neither one of them agreed with
48:44
what the other one said, but they won't make good friends.
48:46
And they have this good debate. And I think we often don't have
48:50
that in ministry. And then the IFB, we just want
48:53
to preach, we believe and not preach the other side and say,
48:55
hey, This is why we believe. We believe this is the errors of
48:58
the other side versus they're just wrong.
49:01
And so I appreciate you saying that because I think that's a
49:03
good thing. Any final thoughts for you?
49:06
I appreciate you coming on today and I appreciate you sharing
49:09
your time and story with Under Rutman.
49:12
Yeah, I would say the the biggest thing that I've gotten
49:14
out of the out of, you know, the all also that's that's gone on
49:20
the last few years literally since, yeah, since covert all
49:24
this stuff has that's happened or a little bit before, about a
49:28
year before. The biggest thing that I've
49:31
learned is is grace. You know, I will say that that's
49:36
probably the one thing that's that's lacking not only in the
49:39
IFP, but in, you know, some of these PVI churches is, is a lack
49:45
of grace. And you know, it is kind of
49:50
funny because you know, they, they would say, you know, all
49:52
these other different churches used to gather around and have
49:55
these tent meetings and have all these revivals together.
49:57
And you know, doctor, I would say even back in the day, you
50:01
have meetings that that he was that, that, you know, you'd have
50:04
Lester Roth and all these other other different preachers that
50:06
were not aligned the same theologically, right?
50:11
You know, and they would, they would rib each other on on their
50:13
different beliefs in in the meeting, but they would, they
50:16
would preach and preach the gospel.
50:18
You will get saved. And then they, you know,
50:20
fellowship all afterwards. And that is not today.
50:26
People just do not have don't have grace.
50:28
They don't have grace with the Bible version issue.
50:31
They don't have grace with music.
50:32
They don't have grace with dress different theological, you know,
50:38
beliefs and and stuff like that. And you know, there's, you know,
50:41
I'm, you know, I agree with, you know, theological, you know,
50:44
triage and stuff like that. But you know, there's, there are
50:47
some things that are more important, but you know, making
50:50
everything the main issue isn't it's not healthy, you know, and
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it's just grace is the the big issue that I believe is is
51:00
lacking and a lot of IP searches.
51:04
Hey man, that's a good word and thank you for coming on again.
51:09
Make sure you like and share this.
51:11
And if this has encouraged you, please go and share this episode
51:14
as well. But until next time, to God be
51:17
the glory. Great things he has done.
51:20
Found my new name, found that good grace, found that healing,
51:26
and the tears fell down my face when I found my beginning that
51:32
has nowhere. Thanks for listening to the Four
51:53
Freedom Podcast. If you enjoyed our content, do
51:56
us a favor by liking, subscribing, or sharing our
52:00
podcast or whichever podcast platform you use.
52:03
Be sure to join us next time for the Four Freedom Podcast.