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Voddie Baucham - Voddie Baucham Culture is not Neutral · Voddie Baucham Sermons

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  Speaker 1: I find it ironic that the people who are nervous
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  Speaker 1: about the idea of us working for cultural influence are
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  Speaker 1: not nervous about the idea of the culture working its
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  Speaker 1: influence on us. I mean, because essentially influence is going
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  Speaker 1: to happen. And so we have to decide, are we
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  Speaker 1: going to live within this culture that is actively working
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  Speaker 1: to impart a worldview on us as and the coming
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  Speaker 1: generations and simply be passive about it? Or are we
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  Speaker 1: going to make sure that we do our job to
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  Speaker 1: impart a biblical worldview on us and coming generations and
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  Speaker 1: do it intentionally in a way that makes them aware
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  Speaker 1: of and opposed to the worldview that the culture is
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  Speaker 1: trying to impart? To me, I can't comprehend why that
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  Speaker 1: would make anyone nervous. Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: I think some people are nervous about, oh no, if
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  Speaker 2: we give vent to what some have taken, or at
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  Speaker 2: least some have emphasized in the cultural mandate, that it's
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  Speaker 2: just building, it's bringing in the kingdom of God through
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  Speaker 2: our efforts. And if we get enough Christian businesses and
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  Speaker 2: the right kind of politics and the right kind of education, then,
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  Speaker 2: you know, this is going to bring in the kingdom
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  Speaker 2: of God. And so I get that, but I don't know.
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  Speaker 2: I don't know if I know anybody who's actually saying that,
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  Speaker 2: you know, I think some people, hear that whenever folks
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  Speaker 2: talk about, hey, we need to be involved in politics
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  Speaker 2: and culture. And the fact that we are Christian and
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  Speaker 2: that we're called to make disciples is not an afterthought,
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  Speaker 2: and it's not set aside in trying to take seriously
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  Speaker 2: what God said to Adam in the Garden of Eden.
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  Speaker 2: And I'm preaching through Genesis, and so I spent a
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  Speaker 2: lot of time in Genesis 1 and 2 recently over
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  Speaker 2: the last few months. And it was helpful for me
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  Speaker 2: to try to wrap my mind around it. And I
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  Speaker 2: don't know, I'm not finished with this, but what.
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  Speaker 1: Would it look like?
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  Speaker 2: You know, what would it look like if Adam had
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  Speaker 2: successfully done what God commissioned him to do in Genesis 1,
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  Speaker 2: 26 through 28? You know, subdue the earth and exercise
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  Speaker 2: dominion over every living thing. What would that have looked like? Well,
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  Speaker 2: it wouldn't have been a sterile kind of, um, in
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  Speaker 2: the world, it would have been a garden. It would
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  Speaker 2: have been a temple, making the world a temple, I think,
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  Speaker 2: which would include the internal realities of being rightly related
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  Speaker 2: to God, which he was before sin.
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  Speaker 3: Being a priest.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah. So that's been, I think if we can get
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  Speaker 2: clear in our mind, what was it that God had
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  Speaker 2: in mind for Adam in giving him that original mandate
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  Speaker 2: and then take that and carefully identify what it is
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  Speaker 2: Jesus said in the Great Commission, that maybe we can
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  Speaker 2: have a meeting of the minds and not talk past
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  Speaker 2: one another.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah. I think the other thing too is a lot
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  Speaker 1: of people act like, you know, you either live as
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  Speaker 1: though the fall happened and then all bets were off.
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  Speaker 1: Jesus came so that he could save us, but just
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  Speaker 1: keep us from going to hell. So that one day,
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  Speaker 1: one day, you know, we could see his rule and
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  Speaker 1: his reign, right? And that we shouldn't do anything in
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  Speaker 1: the here and the now in order to prepare for that,
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  Speaker 1: in order to act as though we really believe that,
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  Speaker 1: in order to act as though it is important. It's
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  Speaker 1: what we yearn for. It's what we long for. If
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  Speaker 1: that's what we yearn for and what we long for,
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  Speaker 1: then we live like it. That doesn't mean that we
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  Speaker 1: believe we're ushering in the totality of it in the
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  Speaker 1: here and the now, right? It's that already not yet tension.
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  Speaker 1: And I think the other thing is people are not
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  Speaker 1: giving us credit. There are different camps out there eschatologically
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  Speaker 1: that lead to different views of this. And there is
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  Speaker 1: that sort of theonomic post-millennial reconstructionist ideology, that's not us.
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  Speaker 1: We're more in the Amil camp, you know, optimistic. Speak
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  Speaker 1: for yourself. That more optimistic Amil, you know, maybe historic pre-mill.
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  Speaker 1: But we're in that camp. And so it's always interesting
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  Speaker 1: to me is that, you know, whenever you start talking
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  Speaker 1: about anything in this regard, people take all the assumptions, right,
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  Speaker 1: of this– you know.
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  Speaker 3: One particular idea.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah. You say one word that exists in
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  Speaker 1: a Gary North book, and all of a sudden, that's
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  Speaker 1: what you're trying to do. But that's no more true
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  Speaker 1: than us believing that, you know, God has called us to,
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  Speaker 1: you know, raise up and disciple our children somehow makes
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  Speaker 1: us Paedo-Baptist, right? That's right. We're Baptist. We hold on
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  Speaker 1: to those convictions, even when we start talking about our
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  Speaker 1: children and our future, so on and so forth. So
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  Speaker 1: I think people are, they're not being gracious, right? They're
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  Speaker 1: not being gracious enough to say, these guys have told
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  Speaker 1: us who they are. If they're doing this conference, they're
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  Speaker 1: doing it, right, consistent with who they are. So it
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  Speaker 1: would be foolish to think that what they're doing is
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  Speaker 1: something that they're not.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: Amen.
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  Speaker 3: And one of the things that's helpful for me as
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  Speaker 3: I think through this is we're commanded by Christ to
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  Speaker 3: go and to disciple the nations. What does it look
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  Speaker 3: like for a nation to be discipled?
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  Speaker 1: Mm-hmm.
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  Speaker 3: If we think about missions as fulfilling the great commission
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  Speaker 3: in discipling the nations, we often think of going into
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  Speaker 3: a foreign field and proclaiming the gospel where the gospel
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  Speaker 3: has not been proclaimed, planting churches where the churches have
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  Speaker 3: not been planted. And yes, and amen, we want to
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  Speaker 3: see that. We want to work to support that. And
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  Speaker 3: we want to be involved in that ourselves. But is
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  Speaker 3: that the entirety of, you know, if, if there's a
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  Speaker 3: church planted in an unreached language group, has the great
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  Speaker 3: commission then been fulfilled for that people? I would say that,
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  Speaker 3: you know, I even just asked the question, is our
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  Speaker 3: people group discipled? Is our nation discipled?
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  Speaker 1: And I like to put the question this way, right?
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  Speaker 1: Having participated in cross-cultural ministry in a setting like that. Okay,
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  Speaker 1: so we go from here to there and we do
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  Speaker 1: the work of missions and we plant churches among people
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  Speaker 1: where there hasn't been a church. Here's the question I
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  Speaker 1: like to ask people. Then what do they do? Right?
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  Speaker 1: What do they do? Do they continue to live exactly
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  Speaker 1: as they did before the gospel got there? Do they
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  Speaker 1: continue to live their lives in their pagan culture with
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  Speaker 1: their pagan worldview? Do they continue to practice their polygamy
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  Speaker 1: or child sacrifice or anything? Like, what do they do?
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  Speaker 1: And if your answer is anything other than they begin
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  Speaker 1: to allow the truth of the gospel to the presence
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  Speaker 1: of the Holy Spirit in their lives, the power of
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  Speaker 1: Christ and the word of God to then transform them
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  Speaker 1: and transform the way that they live. If your answer
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  Speaker 1: is anything other than that, I'm worried about your concept
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  Speaker 1: of missions. And it has to. It has to transform
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  Speaker 1: their culture.
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  Speaker 3: Has to. If it's not transforming their culture, then it's
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  Speaker 3: not real for them.