Latest / 4-Freedom Podcast / 194. The Future of Fundamentalism - Charlie Clark and Vision Baptist College

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194. The Future of Fundamentalism - Charlie Clark and Vision Baptist College · 4-Freedom Podcast

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For freedom, you set me free. Not for change, not for guilt,
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not for Pharisee Grace, lift the flame.
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Now I'm puffing. Peace, cigars and victory.
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Justified. Released.
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Welcome to the For Freedom podcast.
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This podcast exists to bring the freedom of the gospel for
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everyday Christians with everyday issues.
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I ain't. Saved by dress codes, not by
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what I eat. I'm covered in the
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righteousness. Washed from head to feet.
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No tally of tradition, No man made code.
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Blood bought my freedom. Now I ride that road.
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They clutch pearls when they see smoke rings rise.
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But my prey still ascends past the legalist cries.
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Christ plus nothing. That's the real math.
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So miss me with your fence laws and your extra path.
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He sat with sinners, I'm sitting with Saints.
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Slipping grace from the bottle, No room for face.
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I like one for liberty. Toast to the king.
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Every ash of sermon. Death has lost its sting.
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For freedom He set me free, Not for change, not for guilt, not
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for Pharisee Grace let the flame now puffing, peace, cigars and
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victory justified released. For freedom He set me free.
1:07
Not for change, not for guilt, not for Pharisee.
1:10
Grace let the flame now puffing peace, cigars and victory
1:14
justified, released. Let grace begin both.
1:18
Freedom He let me free not for. Change not for guilt, not.
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For Pharisee grace, lift the flame now.
1:24
Here are your hosts, Victor James Seyfried and Brett Moore.
1:28
Welcome back to the Four Freedom podcast.
1:29
Man, what a great time it is. I'm here in North Carolina,
1:32
Brett's there in Mississippi, and we have had a great week
1:36
with John here at our revival last week.
1:39
We had such a blessing. I hope you enjoyed that episode
1:42
and Brett there Mississippi just got done with his Mississippi
1:46
Baptist State Convention. Meet up and hope you had a great
1:51
time. Brett, how are you doing?
1:52
How are you and the family doing?
1:54
Tell us about the convention there in Mississippi.
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Man, we had a great time at our state convention this past week.
2:01
We had it at a new location. Usually we have it First Baptist
2:04
Jackson, but we had it in Madison at Broadmoor Baptist.
2:08
And man, it's just kind of a safer area in Madison as
2:12
compared to Jackson. And then not as many potholes.
2:15
And so kind of worked out, worked out well.
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But we had a great time. Emily came with me.
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Just a time for us to kind of take a break, recharge, listen
2:25
to some preaching, listen to some worship.
2:28
Wasn't a lot of drama. And so man, we just had a great
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time. We've had a, we've been having a
2:33
good time in church. Like we talked a little bit
2:36
before we started recording Today I'm going through the book
2:40
of Ecclesiastes in church. There's a book called, I think
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it's David Gibson is his name, but it's called living life
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backwards. And you know, the point of the,
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the, the main thrust of the book is, you know, a proper
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perspective on death is the key to true life.
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And he's proposes, that's the point that Solomon's trying to
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make, because when you start from, you see, still living life
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forward going to your death, if you start at your death, you
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live life backwards. That's, you know, gives you a
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proper perspective on life. And man, we've really enjoyed
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it. You know, we've been doing some
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some I've been getting a lot of good responses from it.
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And I really like the book of Ecclesiastes.
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And so, you know, it used to be challenging for me to preach on,
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but, you know, I challenge. I've got to the point in the
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ministry now where, you know, a book or a passage is challenging
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to me. You're hard for me to
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understand. I just preach on it.
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And then, you know, I have a new appreciation for it.
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And I will tell you that I'm glad that you and John got a
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chance to record. I hate once again, that I had to
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miss recording because every time John comes on, I'm not
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available. And but one day, all three of us
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are going to get together. Yeah, it's going to be great.
3:56
You know you said living life backwards are reminding me we're
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not sponsored by this, but if they want to sponsors, they can
4:02
backwards planning, financial, you know, it sort of starts to
4:05
the end of your life and plans backwards.
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And so that's a that's a great way to do that.
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I think they sponsor Haunted Cosmos and a couple other
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podcast I listen to. Yeah, we had a great time with
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John while I'm here. Next week is our convention and
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so I'll be going to Greensboro 1st of next week for that.
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Looking forward to that. But yeah, me and John, we had a
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great time just recording last week, catching up on old times.
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He preached a great set of revival messages.
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We entitled it Restore. So restoring our soul, restoring
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our worship and restoring our family and what that looks like
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in a practical way. And he knocked it out of the
4:41
park, did a great job and was just glad to be with him.
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We hit 100,000 downloads. Brett, the podcast made it
4:50
there. Never thought it'd get that far.
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But you guys have been faithful to listen, faithful to comment,
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faithful to give us a good feedback.
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And we appreciate that. But yeah, we are looking forward
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to the future of the podcast, the future of fundamentalism.
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As we look at this series, we should finish it up before
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Christmas time or right around our Christmas break, and then
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looking forward to what we've got in the bank for our next
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episode and our next series. I think we've got almost all
5:24
2026 planned. And so it it.
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I'm excited about the future, excited about what God's doing
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and just the future of what we got going on so well.
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Speaking of the future, Brett got two big things coming up,
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first of the year and middle of next year, what's got what's
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going on 1st off. First off, we've got our Israel
5:45
trip coming up end of January, beginning February and I am
5:49
extremely looking forward to this.
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I'm going to, I'm going to ask you a question and I'll, I'm
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going to answer it first, but I want you to be thinking of it
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while I'm answering. I want you to give me a place in
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northern Galilee, in Galilee that you want to let you look
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forward to seeing again. I'm going to place in Jerusalem
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that you look forward to seeing again.
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I'll tell you mine. I mean, there's a lot of great
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places in Galilee from Caesarea Maritime to Caesarea Philippi,
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Mount Hermon and, you know, Mount Precipice.
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But I'll tell you, man, I love just the Sea of Galilee.
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Magnolia was good too. But man is waking up that
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morning before the sun came up, watching the sun come up on the
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Sea of Galilee, seeing those fishermen out there fishing in
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this sea that that Jesus, his disciples fished in, that he
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walked in, that so much of his ministry took place in.
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And then for me, so many places in Jerusalem, from the Temple
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Mount to the Garden Tomb. But I'll tell you, I don't want
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to just walk down the streets again.
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I miss it so much that I just want to walk down the street to
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the Muslim quarter and the Jewish quarter and just, you
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know, you kind of feel like a adventurer, like you're, you
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know, you're a crusader, You're on a, you know, you're on a
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trek. You know, you're on a journey of
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a lifetime just exploring the streets of Jerusalem.
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And then I cannot wait to get back.
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I talked to some pastors today in my meeting that we're jealous
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that I'm I'm going back so soon and we're we're me and you are
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hooking up with Marcus Merritt and looking forward to, you
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know, going. There's a very, very short
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window if people want to go. I mean, it's literally just a
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couple weeks left that you can, you can jump in on our trip, but
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if you'd like to go, we want you to go.
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So let us know. So now you answer the question.
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Give me a place in Galilee, a place in Jerusalem.
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Well, you know, think of Galilee.
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So many places come in my mind, you know, that we went to, I
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think the place of course, Magdala was awesome.
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I can't wait to go back there, see if Galilee fantastic.
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The place that struck me that I wasn't expecting two places.
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I can't just say 1. I got to say 2.
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First one was Caesarea Philippi. Upon this rock I'll build my
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church. That whole preaching and
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teaching moment there was fantastic.
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But the second place was Megiddo, there at the the valley
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of Armageddon. Yet I began just weeping
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uncontrollably. Sit standing there on the edge
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of Megiddo, looking out into the the valley there of the Megiddo
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Valley and seeing cars come by. And our God Amir told us this.
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Even the Jews believe that the end of the world is going to
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happen right here. And they were driving by this,
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this place like it was a Walmart.
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No care in the world, no care that this was going to be
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happen. It just broke me and I can't
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wait to go back and be in that place, the place that I want to
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go that we didn't get to go because there are people there
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is the place I want to go the most in Jerusalem.
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And that is the Church of the Flag Galatian to go down in the
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underground, which is the, some of the original, the underground
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tomb, the, the streets down there.
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They say it's the original streets in the original stone
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where Jesus was beat at before he was brought before pilot.
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And so I want to go and I want to experience that.
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Of course, I mean, I, I can mention the Garden of
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Gethsemane, the, the, the garden tomb, like all those places are
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great. I want to see that because I was
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so looking forward to experiencing and seeing what
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that looked like when they beat Jesus and to see that so.
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That's going to be great. I, I for I actually did forget
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we were going there. We are planning on going there
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this next trip. And that's just another place
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that I just can't wait to see because some, some of the places
10:07
where that they say, OK, this happened here.
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You know what, you kind of look at it cross eyed, like, you
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know, maybe that's just tradition we added on later.
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But some of the places like the Church of Flagellation, like
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this is a stone where they know. Look, this is where they be
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people. This is a known fact.
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Well, and in my in my rock collection, I've got all the
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rock collection of different places we went and that's the
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one that I really wanted was a rock from where the Church of
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Flag Galatians at where that stone is that.
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So I can't wait to add that to my collection.
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It's going to be great. So after that, we're we're doing
10:45
a little meet up like we do every year in Orlando this year
10:48
for the SBC meet up, if you're SBC or you're in Orlando area,
10:53
hit us up. We're going to have Airbnb,
10:55
AVRBO. The Airbnb and VRB OS down there
11:00
in Orlando are much nicer than the other places we've stayed.
11:04
And so we're excited about having a little bit more room to
11:07
have some people over. And so if you're close by or
11:10
you're just going to be in the area, hit us up.
11:12
We'll have a great time of fellowship at night time.
11:14
We'll try not to be on the ghetto streets and see the women
11:19
of the night. Some of the pastors that came to
11:21
Airbnb in Dallas, they had some stories to go back and go back
11:25
and tell. Yeah, what is this crazy guy
11:27
from North Carolina doing? He's bringing us in Mississippi,
11:29
bringing us out here to the hood to get jumped.
11:32
It was. It was great.
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So yeah, anything else, bro? We got going on?
11:37
Of course, we're in the middle of the holiday season.
11:40
If you haven't picked up. I spoke to Chance this week.
11:44
We've got a lot of cigars that have went out the door.
11:46
Our, our experience box is selling out.
11:49
We're really close to selling out of that.
11:51
And so if you'd like to get a great gift for your family,
11:55
limited supply, we've only got 10 or 12 of those boxes left.
11:58
We've almost sold out. So go by check it on our
12:00
website, heavily discounted right now for you and for your
12:04
convenience for cigars, a box of soap and a bag of coffee to
12:10
support our Nicaragua mission trips.
12:14
Our missionary down there not supporting our trip, but
12:16
supporting our missionaries down there to help church plants.
12:19
There's nine church plants right now.
12:21
And it's a great opportunity of partnership that we have.
12:25
And so we hope you all value yourself to that.
12:27
It's a great opportunity for you to support us, but also support
12:31
that as well. Brett, go ahead.
12:32
When are you? When are y'all going back to
12:35
Nicaragua? Do you have a trip planned?
12:37
Yeah, I told Mark Marcus. I told Lee.
12:44
February, May or July. So he's looking at those three
12:49
months for me. I've got one when the new year
12:52
starts. I've got just a couple of dates
12:54
that I can float around and so those are the dates that I'm
12:57
looking at right now. So when are y'all going?
13:02
We are going back in July. Oh next year.
13:06
So July may work. So shoot me your July date or
13:08
tell me what that date is. And my July just opened up.
13:11
We moved our Bible school back a week or back to June and so my
13:15
July is wide open now so. Oh, good.
13:18
But let me give you my dates. Maybe we can get our, get our,
13:21
you know, go, go together again. I think that's pretty much, you
13:24
know, we've got Israel coming up January, our church, like we
13:28
just said, we're going back to Nicaragua in July pretty much
13:32
we're going to Orlando. We're looking forward to that.
13:35
And so, you know, we just got some things coming up and we're
13:37
excited about it and excited to be here at the podcast.
13:40
I think that's all we got. Hey, I'll tell you this right
13:42
before we get started, I had a guy named Bryce.
13:44
He reached out to me. He's been listening to the
13:46
podcast. Actually, I've had an event a
13:49
couple of weeks ago here in Taylorsville and met a lot of
13:52
great people, a lot of people that had just never been exposed
13:55
to the podcast to Cigar Company and I shared that with them.
13:59
But Bryce reached out to me. He's a get his doctorate from
14:02
Liberty and was raised in a very fundamentalist church.
14:06
And he told us, he said, I just really appreciate the podcast.
14:10
He says it's been a breath of fresh air.
14:12
I know you guys care about what you do.
14:14
And he said, I just want to tell you that it has blessed me to be
14:17
listening. So, you know, we don't always
14:19
hear that, but I do want to share that there has been a
14:22
great, great feedback from that. So I appreciate you, Bryce.
14:27
And he's wanting to come on and share his story.
14:29
And so we'll be getting him hopefully lined up here in the
14:31
next couple of weeks. He was in the military and so he
14:35
got to experience that through the military, which goes into
14:38
our episode today as we talk about the the next installment
14:43
of the future fundamentalism young up and coming guy that
14:46
we're going to talk about today. So let's get started with
14:49
today's episode. Today we're tackling another
14:53
giant in the world of the IFB. This is one of the guys that you
14:58
know, you wouldn't necessarily say this would be in the IFB
15:02
because it's so far away from the mainstream IFB area.
15:07
This is in the Northeast corridor.
15:09
The name of the church is Solid Rock Baptist Church.
15:11
I'm sure you're if you've been around IFB, you've heard it
15:15
before. Vision Baptist College led by
15:18
the Clark family. Yeah, I mean, if you've been in
15:20
the IP circles any length of time, you've probably heard the
15:23
name Clark. You've got Charles Clark Senior,
15:27
Charles Clark Junior, and now Charles Clark the Third.
15:30
You know, it's like a dynasty in Vision Baptist College.
15:33
It started in 2014. It's kind of quickly becoming
15:37
like this prominent training ground for young IFP preachers
15:41
and workers. And you know, a lot of people
15:43
have heard about this church and school and and this family.
15:46
Yeah, we're going to walk through the foundation of Solid
15:49
Rock, the founding of it, the transition to Charlie Clark the
15:53
Third, and then the birth of Vision Baptist College.
15:57
It's now famous for what people call the boot camp approach of
16:04
of the IFB. And we've got a video that we're
16:06
going to play here in a little bit in our notes.
16:09
And then there's been a little bit of controversy along the
16:11
way. And so we're going to talk about
16:13
where it's all leading, sort of what this model means for the
16:16
future of the IFB. Right, so, you know, buckle up,
16:20
this one's going to be a bumpy ride.
16:22
Yeah, it's going to be fun. I'll sort of give you my
16:24
background, Charlie Clark, before we get started into the
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notes. Charlie Clark for me was a
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picture that always came at, during camp meeting at my
16:32
college there at Gospel White and Hot Springs Champion
16:36
College. And so he'd come in, I went to
16:39
New Mana for a youth rally one year while I was at college and
16:44
Charlie Clark was there preaching.
16:45
And so I've been around him very, very articulate.
16:52
He speaks very well. All of his family sings.
16:55
They're great singers. But Charlie was one of those
16:58
guys who you either liked him or you didn't.
17:01
And that's sort of how his approach was.
17:03
And so I, I enjoyed listening to him preach, especially his
17:07
singing. I love his family and the way
17:09
they sing. But today we're going to sort of
17:12
rewind to when Solid Rock was founded.
17:15
It was founded in 1981 by Charlie Clark Junior.
17:19
And this was in South Jersey, the Berlin Township.
17:24
They came just across the river from Philadelphia.
17:27
And really, Brett, this was not a hotbed for the IFB at the
17:32
time. You, you think about where I'm
17:33
at and maybe where you're at, there's churches on every
17:36
corner. Half of those churches are
17:38
Baptist churches. This wasn't the case where
17:40
they're at. All right.
17:41
Yeah, This is up in the Northeast.
17:43
This is, you know, like New Jersey, you got Catholicism,
17:48
mainline Protestism kind of dominated there.
17:51
Fundamental Baptists were outposts, not mega churches.
17:54
So for solid rock to kind of rise up and draw thousands, it
18:00
was, it's quite an unusual thing to happen for that area.
18:04
Yeah, Charlie Clark Junior was cut from the mold of the fiery,
18:09
unapologetic preachers. He built his church with a
18:14
strong emphasis on soul winning, big revivals and a no nonsense
18:19
style of preaching. Right.
18:20
He had a, you know, his reputation kind of grew because
18:24
he was willing to stand and sometimes fight for the old
18:28
paths. We know about those old paths
18:31
and they hosted big conferences and you'd have big name guys
18:35
come up there like Jack Hiles, Tony Hudson, other IFB
18:38
heavyweights up there over the years preaching the pulpit, and
18:43
so you have these big names come through there.
18:46
Yeah. Now, Brett, did Charlie Clark
18:49
ever come to Hiles while you were there?
18:51
Did you ever have any experience with him or down in the church
18:56
in the College in Tennessee that you went to?
18:58
No, we I never, I never came across him.
19:02
OK, so you solid rock as it became this hub for Northeast
19:07
fundamentalists. And for a decade there Charlie
19:10
Clark junior LED this with a very strong hand, not just
19:16
building a congregation, but he began building a name for
19:19
himself in this movement. And and lots of people, young
19:23
preacher boys, were attracted to this style of leadership.
19:27
Right. And then 2014, Charles Clark
19:31
Junior stepped aside and his son, Charles Clark the Third,
19:35
become senior pastor. Yeah, this, this was a big
19:37
transitional moment for them. You you've had powerful founding
19:42
pastor for 30 plus years, many decades he was leading and now
19:46
he's passing on to the sun, which Brett is not uncommon in
19:50
the IFB, right? You, you, you begin to build
19:53
this dynasty. Your son's got to be a preacher
19:55
boy because you're a preacher. And so you began to sort of lead
19:59
in this way. And this is what happens.
20:02
It either goes really, really well or you get a Jack House,
20:07
Jack Scott. And everything implodes.
20:10
So this is this this is this fun moment as you're looking through
20:14
history as you're looking back. I was sort of living through
20:17
this. I graduated in 2011.
20:20
Vision Baptist College had began started talking about building
20:25
this college even in 2011. And Brett at Champion, and this
20:29
is sort of off our notes. At Champion, we had probably
20:36
4030% of our students from the Northeast Corridor and a lot of
20:40
them were from Charlie Clark's church.
20:42
Charlie Clark was sending a lot of his students down to Eric and
20:45
down to Champion. And so it was sort of this
20:49
moment where Champion went left and went liberal in the Ifb's
20:52
mindset. And so how do we counter this?
20:55
Well, let's just start our own college and we're already
20:57
sending all of our students down there.
20:59
So they'll just enroll in our college.
21:02
So this was sort of the beginning foundations of this
21:05
college. Look here, right.
21:07
And another thing, one of the things that I think about, I may
21:10
not necessarily heard of him while I was in college, but I
21:14
did have a lot of at Hiles. I had a lot of people there from
21:17
New from the New Jersey area. Now that I think about it could
21:21
have very well been from his church.
21:23
And and to your point, I do want to say that, you know, if in my
21:30
experience, most of the time when you pass the torch on, it
21:34
doesn't work either. Very few instances in my
21:38
recollection where I've seen a pastor, we're going to hand it
21:42
off to the son. We're going to hand it off to
21:44
the son-in-law and it actually work out.
21:48
If the church has a chance, they're going to have to just
21:51
get a pulpit committee and and get, you know, get a pastor the
21:55
regular way. And I'm not saying that always
21:57
happens, but from from my money, most of the time it doesn't work
22:02
out very well. But you know, Clark, the third,
22:05
he'd been involved. He'd preached, he LED
22:07
ministries. And be honest, the transition
22:10
was relatively smooth. Yeah, they they sort of Co
22:13
pastored for a couple of years there during that transition
22:18
which helped out a lot. And what's interesting about
22:20
Charles Clark the Third is when he took over, he didn't just
22:24
keep the ship selling the way it was going.
22:27
He began putting his own step on things.
22:30
He began saying, you know, we're going to change some things a
22:32
little bit, and this is the way our church is going to be going
22:35
to go. And one of those huge changes
22:37
was Vision Baptist College. And it happened the same year he
22:41
took over. So same year he takes over as
22:43
pastor. Boom, we're starting a Bible
22:45
college, right? That was 2014, right?
22:48
Yeah. And it happened until.
22:50
Yeah, right there on the campus. Yeah.
22:52
And their mission statement is this, Brett, is to develop
22:56
servant leaders who are doctrinally sound, practically
23:00
equipped, and spiritually passionate to serve Christ and
23:04
their local churches and beyond. Right.
23:07
You know that that servant leader language is important.
23:10
You know, it's not just ivory tower academics.
23:13
Their model has kind of always been about hands on ministry and
23:18
you know that and I do have to say, and a lot of IFB colleges,
23:23
that's kind of like, you know, it's kind of par for the course.
23:27
You know, the, the ministry stuff.
23:29
I mean, you're actually out there, you're getting kids on
23:33
buses, you're reaching families, you're leading people to the
23:35
Lord. And, you know, so being out
23:39
there and some of the stuff that was in, in especially House
23:43
Anderson for my, for my money, some stuff going on behind the
23:46
scenes was not right. But being out there and being
23:51
out there in ministry, hands on ministry, you know, a lot of
23:55
churches, they do do that, right?
23:58
Yeah. And I agree with that.
23:59
But I think that hands on ministry approach is something
24:02
that the SBC gets wrong. It's more theology in the
24:06
classroom and not practically out the streets and, and knowing
24:09
how to do ministry. And so that would be the one
24:14
area that I would say they do it right.
24:16
They probably just go a little too far and they have less of
24:18
the academics. And this is where the Northeast
24:22
context comes in. Again, kids in that region
24:25
wanted to have this training from credible IFB colleges, not
24:31
necessarily accredited, but credible.
24:33
And so they would leave if they'd go to Pensacola or they'd
24:35
go to House, or they'd go to Champion or they'd go to Crown
24:38
or they'd go to West Coast because they wanted this
24:40
training. And as the third grew up, he
24:43
said, you know what, let's give him a homegrown option.
24:47
Let's give him something right here, right now where we can
24:50
dictate what they learn from them.
24:53
The moment they're born. We're going to get them in our
24:55
daycare, we're going to get them in our Christian School, and
24:58
then we're going to keep them here all the way through
25:00
21/22/23 years old. And we're going to train them
25:03
for for their entire life. And we're going to mold
25:06
everything they think and believe.
25:08
Right, and, and and they didn't want to, they didn't want to
25:11
position it as, you know, Bible college light or training course
25:15
or something. But you know, they wanted a a
25:18
serious training Center for their college, and that's what
25:22
they wanted to put out there. Yeah, and this is where it
25:25
brings us to their own words and their own actions.
25:28
In 2017, Charlie Clark the 3rd put out a promo video for the
25:34
college. It's on their mission page.
25:36
It's still there. Now you can go and watch it.
25:38
We're going to play it here in just a minute.
25:40
But but Brett sort of tell us about what he lays out here and
25:44
then we'll play the video. Oh yeah, if you haven't seen it,
25:47
Pastor Clark the Third, he lays it out.
25:49
He literally compares vision to a military boot camp.
25:54
Yeah. So listen to the video if you
25:56
can't, if you're if you're just listening, you're not going to
25:58
see it, but listen to it and then we'll come back and we'll
26:01
talk about it in just a second. Vision Baptist College is a
26:04
ministry of Solid Rock Baptist Church.
26:07
We have three years of existence.
26:08
That means we're still a brand new college pioneering this work
26:12
for the Lord's honor and for the Lord's glory.
26:15
Bluntly, we're not trying to get everybody to come to Bishop
26:17
Baptist College. We're trying to get people to
26:19
come whom God wants to be here. We are a Bible college.
26:24
That means we study the Word of God and we studied the work of
26:27
the ministry. Everyone who graduates from
26:29
Vision will have a Bachelor of Theology degree in Biblical
26:33
studies and church ministry. We believe that Christ Church is
26:36
the greatest organization on earth.
26:39
Therefore we believe that Christ Church ought to have the
26:41
greatest workers on earth. Vision is God's word in action.
26:46
Proverbs 2918 says where there's no vision that people perish,
26:49
but he the keep of the law, happy is he.
26:52
So when people apply the word of God, when God's word is in
26:56
action, then great things happen.
26:59
We believe our country and all around the world needs to have
27:02
servants of God who are helping teach people the word of God.
27:06
Therefore, the Bible is our main textbook here at Vision and
27:10
Learning ministry is something we're very excited about.
27:13
Our church is an exciting church.
27:14
It's a vibrant place. If you were to come here and be
27:17
here, you'd get to be part of the work of the church here at
27:20
Solid Rock. My dad has been our pastor, and
27:23
he started almost 37 years ago. You could come and learn under
27:28
Pastor Clark. He teaches the Bible each
27:30
semester. The college is a little bit
27:32
different in that basically we're trying to train good
27:36
soldiers of Jesus Christ, and we have a little bit of a military
27:40
mindset. Let me explain.
27:41
Anyone who comes to vision the freshman year would have what's
27:44
called our core classes. It's kind of like you're going
27:47
to boot camp 20 credits in the fall semester, 20 credits in the
27:51
spring semester. All freshmen take the same
27:53
classes. If you were in the Marines, they
27:55
would say every Marine is a Rifleman.
27:58
What we want you to do is learn how to have every good soldier
28:01
Jesus Christ to be able to handle the Word of God.
28:04
That's our spiritual weapon. Also, when you're here in your
28:08
core classes, you become what we are.
28:10
And what I mean by that is we want to be good soldier of Jesus
28:13
Christ and we want you to be 1. Also, after you finish your
28:17
freshman year, we have what's called common classes.
28:20
Common classes are the classes you'll take your sophomore,
28:22
junior, senior year, and everybody has to take in order
28:25
to graduate. What I mean by that, we want to
28:27
want you to flip your tassel without knowing the content of
28:30
those classes. In the military, there's
28:32
something called an MOS that's a military occupational specialty.
28:38
You don't even remember that, but here's why it ties in.
28:40
We have what's called an MSA, a ministry specialty area.
28:44
In the military, you are a good soldier, and then you have a
28:48
specialty area. We believe in the work of
28:50
Christ, that you have been gifted by God to do some
28:54
specific purposes in His work. After your freshman year, you
28:59
choose what would be called your MSA, your ministry specialty
29:02
area, and then over the next three years of school, we work
29:05
to develop your expertise in that calling of yours.
29:09
So they're called calling classes.
29:11
It's something you'd be passionate about.
29:13
Might be you want to be a Christian School teacher.
29:15
Might be that you want to be a youth specialist.
29:18
Maybe you feel God's called you to be a pastor.
29:20
We love to teach the work of the ministry.
29:23
Vision is an exciting place. We're big on preaching.
29:26
We have Chapel Monday through Friday and the preaching's hot.
29:29
That means we get into the pulpit.
29:30
It's not dead, dry, dusty, but we're bringing that preaching
29:34
with passion. The young people here are having
29:36
a great time. If you came to Vision, you'd
29:38
make friends for a lifetime. We have a lot of stuff going on
29:42
where you're rubbing shoulders with people.
29:44
Band of brothers. Like by the way, we do have
29:46
ladies that are here, but they're ladies that are game
29:49
face on. We're not trying to have a bunch
29:50
of Baptist Barbies or cupcakes for Christ.
29:53
We want soldiers. If you really care about the
29:57
cause of Christ, you could come to Vision Baptist College and I
30:00
believe with all my heart, God could take you to the next
30:03
level. We have a great campus is here
30:05
already, although it's only three years old.
30:07
If our girls dorm house, our guys dorm house, they're both
30:10
beautiful, great food here at Vision, intramural sports
30:13
program, etcetera, etcetera. So the point would be, although
30:16
we're only three years old, we're rolling along.
30:19
Last year we had just over 70 students and their kids that
30:22
have a heart for God. I didn't say they're perfect,
30:24
but they're committed. Your parents.
30:26
Parents are major part of this and your pastor is a major part
30:29
of this. If they would not be
30:31
recommending you to come, we wouldn't want you to come.
30:34
We're big on the local church. If you're not from Solid Rock
30:37
and have him raised up here, we don't even let you join the
30:39
church or tie it here because we support your pastor and the
30:43
local church there and we want you parents would be all in with
30:46
this. I don't know what God has
30:48
planned for your life exactly, but I know God has an exact
30:51
plan. If God wants you to come to
30:53
Vision Baptist College, then this is where you would need to
30:56
be. And if you come, I personally
30:58
commit that we will give our very best in training you for
31:02
the work of the ministry and it would be a great time in your
31:05
life to become further equipped to advance the cause of Christ.
31:10
I think about the Continental Army.
31:11
I think about the Continental Congress.
31:13
Philadelphia's only 15 miles from here.
31:15
Independence Hall, Declaration of Independence.
31:18
There was a time in American history when people rose to the
31:21
occasion. They brought their gifts, their
31:23
talents, their passions, and they poured themselves into the
31:26
founding of our country to give us freedom.
31:29
I believe that God still has a plan for America.
31:33
I believe God could still save our nation just like those
31:36
people and their day rose to the occasion.
31:39
Now it's time to rise to the occasion for the spiritual war
31:42
that we're in. We need some young men, some
31:44
young women that will just go all in, committed for the cause
31:48
of Christ. I don't know that we'll see a
31:50
great national revival, but I believe it could happen.
31:53
And even if we don't see great national revival, great
31:55
worldwide revival, there's always been a remnant Group A, a
31:59
Bible group, A people that would stand true to the Word of God.
32:03
We're pretty radical around here.
32:04
We're teaching old school. We're teaching the way that has
32:07
been done traditionally as Bible believing churches.
32:10
We believe it still works. And you could be part of that
32:13
'cause you could commit to that. God could use you in a bigger
32:17
way than you'd ever dream possible.
32:19
If Vision Baptist College is part of that plan for your life,
32:22
I hope to see you this fall. All right, so here were his
32:26
words. If you went to boot camp for the
32:28
military, they would train you and drill you, and it wouldn't
32:33
be easy. But when you graduated, you'd be
32:37
prepared to serve. And that's what we want Vision
32:40
College, Vision Baptist College to be for ministry.
32:44
You know that imagery is strong. You know, boot camp is about
32:48
breaking you down, disciplining you, reshaping you.
32:52
He's saying this college is not for comfort.
32:54
It's training for war and spiritual war.
32:58
Yeah, Students have echoed that. They've talked about long
33:02
ministry hours, tough standards, constant involvement of solid
33:06
rock. You're not just in class, but
33:08
you're in the trenches of fighting through this.
33:12
And you know, I want, I want to right before you, you have this
33:15
moment. I want to say this.
33:17
There is a war. There is a spiritual warfare,
33:21
but oftentimes the warfare that they are talking about is
33:27
against flesh and blood. It's not against the
33:29
principalities of the world. It's you've got to stand up and
33:32
you've got to fight for legalism.
33:34
You've got to fight for what you believe is right.
33:36
You've got to stand up for your country in this sense of the
33:41
American right. And as a Christian, I'm an
33:44
American right as well. But they are just looking at the
33:50
physical warfare, not the spiritual warfare, which I
33:53
believe is a whole lot more. And if the devil can distract us
33:56
from fighting against the spiritual things, he wins.
33:59
Because the Bible says that we don't fight against the
34:01
physical, we fight against the spiritual.
34:04
But their training is more physical than spiritual.
34:06
Right. You know, that's what and that's
34:07
exactly what the devil's trying to get Christians today to do is
34:10
to distract us to fight over man made constructs and man made
34:15
governments and stuff down here when there's a bigger battle to
34:19
to fight. And but the, you know, this
34:21
mentality that he has in the College in the video, it appeals
34:26
to a certain type of young person, especially if they're
34:29
zealous, passionate, ready to do hard things for God.
34:33
But it raises eyebrows for others like we Like are we
34:37
shaping disciples or we drilling soldiers?
34:41
Yeah, you know, really reminds me.
34:43
And I just came in my mind as you were saying that, Brad, I
34:45
put probably should have put these in our notes, but it
34:47
reminds me of the if you watch the Shiny Happy People 2 on
34:53
Prime Video, the Shiny Happy People warned was about the
34:55
duggars #2 was about the drilling of this new generation,
35:01
this young generation that was going out on mission, that was
35:04
doing things. And they were literally, some of
35:08
the kids were actually dying on the mission field because of
35:11
health problems and other things.
35:12
And I talked about it on there, but everything was for I'm
35:16
laying my body down for the cause of Christ and I am being
35:20
persecuted for the cause of Christ.
35:23
And this is sort of this mentality they're pushing of,
35:26
you know, hey, we're in this war and sometimes there's going to
35:29
be casualties. So buckle up, because here it
35:31
comes. Yeah, so, you know, and that
35:34
leads us into the controversies. So let's be honest, Vision is
35:38
not without its critics. One of the biggest criticisms is
35:43
the intensity of control. And some say boot camp.
35:46
The boot camp analogy isn't just about training.
35:49
It's about conformity, strict rules, limited freedom, a
35:54
culture that can feel authoritarian.
35:57
And, you know, just, you know, before you go on, I want to say
36:00
that, you know, we can, you know, we don't have to
36:03
manufacture persecution. You know, persecution is going
36:07
to come on its own. You know, we don't have to to,
36:09
you know, we have to make it up to like we're suffering for
36:13
Jesus. The devil will find a way to do
36:16
that on its own, on his own. Absolutely.
36:19
What did Jesus say? He said they hated me first.
36:23
They killed me because they hated me.
36:25
If they hated me, no, they're going to hate you and they're
36:27
going to come after you. But fear not, I've overcome the
36:31
world, and that's where we live. We live in that fear, not
36:35
because he's overcome the world and we get to live in that
36:37
freedom. You know, another issue here
36:40
that we have heard as we've done research is the insularity
36:44
thought of it. And this is because vision is so
36:47
tightly controlled and ran by solid rock, the Clark family,
36:52
that the students are under the same leadership under their
36:55
church, under school, under ministry events.
36:59
It can, it really can foster this type of loyalty mindset of
37:06
you have to do what I do because of the man that I'm leading and
37:09
a lot of man worship in that sense.
37:12
It also limits exposure to other perspectives.
37:15
But I don't know if you've got this when you were in Bible
37:17
college, but but when I was there at Champion, they only
37:21
ever talked about one side and it was the side that they
37:23
believed. And so for instance, we're going
37:26
to talk about eschatology. We're going to talk about the
37:29
pre pre Trib rapture, pre millennial reign of Christ.
37:34
And we're not going to tell you the other side or explain the
37:36
other side because our side is right.
37:39
And you don't need to know what the other side is.
37:41
And a lot of the training that you get here is the same way is
37:44
you're just being told one side of the story and not the other.
37:48
You know, that's so true because, and you know, I'm even
37:51
seeing that in our modern circles today because you've got
37:56
some a millennialists out there that are like staunch against
38:01
pre meal. Now I'm pre meal.
38:03
I'm not ashamed to admit it, but at the same time, I'm not going
38:08
to be so arrogant to think that I have it all worked out and
38:11
that my way is the right way. And you know, when I teach it,
38:14
I'm going to teach. Look, these are the options.
38:17
This is the one I believe. I think that's the proper way to
38:20
teach. And when you go out there, even
38:23
if whether it's pre, whether it's ah, when you go out there
38:26
and say, Hey, this is the way. And if you know, it's, you know,
38:29
if you believe something else, if you believe Darby from the
38:32
1800s, then you're wrong. And you know, I just think that
38:36
that, you know, we don't need to be so arrogant that we think
38:39
that, you know, we know everything.
38:42
And then we'll get getting back to vision.
38:45
Then of course, there's a classic IFB critique and that's
38:49
separation. You know, Vision is
38:51
unapologetically KJV. Only tradition, traditional
38:56
music, strict and standards. For some, that's refreshing.
39:01
For others, it feels like doubling down on an insular IFB
39:05
structure that's already shrinking.
39:08
Yeah. And you know that that's the
39:10
part that that I see is the shrinking side of it.
39:14
This is this ancillary term where it works in one region,
39:19
but you get to another region that doesn't and it's it's
39:21
starting to fall flat. People are wanting to have the
39:24
freedom in Christ that is promised through salvation.
39:28
And so you occasionally will hear pushback from former
39:31
students online. There's a couple of Facebook
39:33
groups out there that you can find that stories about burnout,
39:36
unhealthy expectations, or even feel Brett, this is 1 feeling
39:41
spiritually crushed under the boot camp system.
39:44
And you can imagine the the, the physical and spiritual turmoil
39:49
that someone would have after they you can see it in in
39:53
military folks right when they come out of boot camp, they
39:56
don't even look like the same person anymore because of the
39:59
stress that came on. Imagine taking this into the
40:01
spiritual realm and putting someone under the boot camp of
40:04
that and how they would respond. Exactly, exactly.
40:08
And, you know, to be fair, fair, you heard, you hear strong
40:11
testimonies from loyal alumni who say that boot camp saved my
40:16
life, gave me discipline, prepared me for the ministry.
40:19
You know, it really all depends on who you ask.
40:22
Yeah, I agree 100%. I had a guy that I ran into just
40:26
a couple of weeks ago and he said the spiritual rigor of just
40:34
getting up and reading my Bible and the discipline is what I
40:37
needed to break me from different addictions that I have
40:40
and I needed that. And I think definitely it's
40:43
their teachers own. But when you try to take your
40:45
step, I'll I'll illustrate this prep.
40:47
There was one week in Chapel and this is how my wife was.
40:51
She was very much, if the pastor says it, this is what I have to
40:55
do. And so on Monday we had someone
40:58
in Chapel and they got up and said, you know, what you need to
41:01
do is in the morning, you need to read your Bible every morning
41:03
before your feet hit the ground, you need to read your Bible and
41:06
pray. That's a great device.
41:08
And so the next day, Tuesday, we had Chapel and the pastor got up
41:11
and he said, you know, the best time that I found to read my
41:14
Bible is in the middle of the day.
41:16
I'm awake, I'm alert. And so I carve out 30 or 40
41:20
minutes in the middle of my day. And that's why I do my Bible
41:22
study and prayer and devotions. And my wife, she wrote down,
41:26
that's a great thing. I'm going to write it down.
41:27
The next day, Wednesday, someone came in.
41:30
We didn't have Chapel on Wednesday because we had church.
41:31
Thursday we had Chapel. And the pastor got up and he
41:35
preached and he said, you know, the best time to do your
41:37
devotion, and there's three different guys I found is at
41:40
night time, man, right before you go to bed, you had a long
41:44
day. You need to be spiritually
41:45
recharged. And so I get down beside my bed
41:47
and I spend 30 or 40 minutes and I read my Bible and I pray and I
41:51
have my devotion and I just get spiritually charged for the next
41:54
day. My wife looked at me.
41:55
We, we met the end of that week and she said, James, I'm
41:57
exhausted. I said, why?
42:00
She said we heard three different messages this week.
42:03
I've got to do my devotions in the morning.
42:04
I've got to do them in the middle of the day.
42:05
I've got to do them at night. She said, I've been doing like 3
42:07
or 4 hours of Bible study and reading and prayer and I, I
42:11
just, I'm worried. I don't know what to do.
42:13
This is that mentality, right? You are, you're, you're, it
42:17
works for one, but it doesn't work for all.
42:20
And so you begin to make take these thoughts and take these
42:24
ideas that other people have that's not going to work for you
42:27
personally. And, and I challenge people find
42:29
what works for you. Everyone's different.
42:32
It doesn't have to be the way Jack Howes did it.
42:34
It can be the way that God has designed you and your body and
42:37
the way you work. So the bigger question, Brett, I
42:41
want to ask you is what does this model mean for the future
42:44
of IFB? I think vision represents one
42:47
possible trajectory and that's double down on intensity,
42:51
structure, high standards. You know you won't attract
42:55
everybody, but you'll attract the highly committed.
43:00
Yeah, I would definitely say it is not mass market Christianity
43:04
here. It's very selective and that may
43:08
work in regions like the Northeast value where they're
43:11
very much regimented. In that sense the the cultural
43:15
Christianity is already sort of weak and you need strong
43:18
identity markers and so it may work in their region.
43:22
Right. But but the risk is
43:24
sustainability here, you know, can you keep producing students
43:28
when the broader IFB movement is shrinking?
43:31
Or does the Boot Camp model burn too many people out?
43:36
Yeah, I agree. And I think that's where we see
43:39
so many people leaving the IFP because they're getting burnt
43:42
out on the legalism and their standards of what's going on.
43:45
And then there's this question of the dynasty question, solid
43:48
rock and vision. They're so heavily tied to the
43:50
Clark family. That can be a strength, but
43:53
Brenda can be a vulnerability as well.
43:55
What happens when the next transition comes?
43:58
What happens when the next generation comes and they're
44:01
maybe not as militant, they're maybe not as strong in in some
44:05
of these things that the Third has and Michael Clark has, and
44:09
they begin to maybe change a little bit?
44:13
Is the church in college going to be open to that change the
44:16
way they were when Charlie Clark the Third came in and made
44:18
change? Right.
44:21
You know, before we go on, let me just before we close out
44:25
here, let me just interject this.
44:27
You know, you've got vision over here treating students like
44:31
we're in boot camp. And when I was how's Anderson,
44:35
they was treated us like we were teenagers at summer camp.
44:39
And I just wish one of these colleges would have actually
44:42
treated us like we were adults, you know, because we got out
44:46
into the world and we still acted like kids because they
44:49
treated us like kids, you know. And so if that's one of the
44:54
things that's constant across, you know, these IFD colleges is,
45:01
you know, just treat these kids like I got to grow up sometime,
45:05
you know? So that's just my two cents.
45:09
Either way, Vision Baptist College has already become a
45:12
flagship in the IFB, especially in the East.
45:15
It represents both the strengths and weaknesses of that movement.
45:19
You've got zeal, discipline, doctrinal clarity, but also
45:24
insularity. And potential authoritarianism,
45:28
absolutely. I agree with everything you just
45:30
said, Brett. I think we need to treat adults
45:33
like adults. I would say a lot of my mistakes
45:36
that I made in ministry is because I was treated as a child
45:40
when I was in college and I was AI was 21.
45:43
I was 2021, I was getting married and yet I still had some
45:47
of the same rules and regulations that are 18.
45:50
But there I say a 14 year old would have under those same
45:54
rules in the school and the in the Christian School mindset.
45:58
And so giving that freedom, giving that ability for us to
46:01
grow and make mistakes in college, I, I assure you, would
46:05
have saved me a lot of heartache in ministry as well.
46:08
And so that's where our deep dive into solid rock the chart,
46:12
the, the Clarks and the vision Baptist College.
46:16
Maybe you are listening and you have been there or you'd like to
46:19
come and Share your story. We always are open to people
46:22
coming and sharing their testimony, and we'd love for you
46:25
to come be one of those people on the show.
46:27
I've got a couple that I'm talking to right now, but we'd
46:30
love to have you on to share that.
46:33
Absolutely. And, and you know, whether you
46:35
see them as a beacon of training or a bastion of old school
46:39
control, you can't ignore their influence.
46:42
Yeah, the influence is there, the power is there, the
46:46
structure of power is there as well.
46:49
And I'm really looking forward to the next hour.
46:51
We're going to talk about next Guy has made waves for many,
46:54
many years. The church split who we talked
46:57
about briefly last week was from there Will Hess from Jeff Fugate
47:02
and Commonwealth. And there's some friends of
47:04
yours that have reached out to us that want to share their
47:07
story about Commonwealth as well.
47:09
And so we've got them lined up to come on and share.
47:12
And so we're looking forward to that, looking forward to jumping
47:15
into Jeff Fugate story and the things that he is doing there.
47:20
And so, until next time, to God be the glory.
47:23
Great things he has done. Found my new name, found that
47:28
good grace, found that healing. And the tears fell down my face
47:34
when I found my beginning. It has no ending.
47:36
I found that second chance, found my best friend, Found my
47:38
forgiveness, found my happiness. I've been singing ever since.
47:57
Thanks for listening to the Four Freedom Podcast.
48:00
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