41. RFP Network Crossover Part 3: The Young Baptist Podcast & How Legalism Distorts Baptist Theology

And here we go. And here we go. Big James Safer. How's it going, James? I'm doing well, John. I hope you're doing well. It is good to be in the other state, the state where Jesus lives at and breathes at and gives his Holy Spirit's power here in the great state of North Carolina. And I hope that you are doing well in Tennessee. We've had a crazy busy week and it's been fun, but we're just loving what we're doing. And we are loving this series that we're in right now. The series. Yes, we are in a series. We are. It's called the Great Epic Crossover Event. We change the name of it every week. It's the RFP Network Crossover Main Event Avengers Team Up. Main event. I like the main event part, John. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, we've been loving it. And I hope the listeners have been loving it, but we've been having some fun time, especially like around the, before the recording. If only we could just like drop the unedited beforehand talks. I mean, some interesting stuff being said. It's fun. But, but, uh, so we've had, we had the 26 letters, Dave and Sam on. And then last week we had JC. Yeah. Great. And so, oh yeah. Loved JC. And, uh. I was talking about 26 letters, John. Sorry. I'm just messing. I'm just messing. They were both great. They were both great. Right. The beard. The beard. Yeah. It was great. And then, uh, this week is, uh, the Young Baptist guys, which we'll get to in just a second. So we are, we are pumped. And, uh, so, um, I think, uh, we're going to, we're going to forego, uh, the preliminaries that we normally do, uh, because we had a lot to cover in these episodes. So, um, James, without further ado, let's jump into it. What kind of shallow person do you want to become? Recovering from fundamentalism or something. They're everywhere. And I think to myself, well, you were just stupid to begin with. And if there's such a word, you're stupider now. Uh, don't get flubbed up like us. And all you flubbed up people, you come and we'll all flub up together. And we are so excited to be here today with our next interview. And that is with the guys from the Young Baptist podcast, Josh Johnson and Clay Maynard. Josh and Clay, thanks for being here today. Welcome guys to the For Freedom podcast. Thank you guys for having us. We really appreciate it. Yeah. It's great to be with you guys. I wondered, John, because I started listening to you, uh, near the beginning. And I wondered if you picked somebody named James as a co-host on purpose, just to be, uh, more biblically accurate. No, no, uh, James and I have known each other since we were in the nursery together and, uh, have been friends and stayed friends. Wow. That's cool. Yeah. Yeah. So, um, we, uh, are, it just works out that way. Sons of thunder, right? That's right. That's right. That's right. Big James, baby. Big James. James was in my wedding. Um, I was not in James's wedding. Ooh. Because John wouldn't come to my wedding. That's true. I invited John and John was part of my bride, my groomsmen's, but, uh, ministry was more important than him than friendship. But I forgave him, but, you know, we don't talk about it much. Okay. So, uh, we've been, uh, interviewing these, uh, different guests and, um, for the RFP network crossover main event Avengers team up series. And, uh, so we, we've got through a couple now and now, and then covering a different range of topics. And so we're excited about the topic we're going to get in here with the young Baptist guys. Um, but, uh, before we do that, um, I want to sort of get an idea. I know that, um, Clay, you did, uh, you were on the RFP. Josh, did you do an interview with the RFP guys? Okay. So I did not. Okay. So, um, give us a little bit of background to starting your podcast and getting the young Baptist podcasts on its way. Sure. Yeah. Um, well, really, it kind of comes back to where I'm at right now. My office, Clay would come down here for lunch and we would just have conversations. Uh, we kind of discussed it today, focused really primarily on our Baptist background and as many conversations as you can imagine about any number of topics. And kind of like the first of 2020, I had, I had thought maybe I should start a podcast. It seemed to be the thing everyone was doing. Right. But I didn't think I had anything to really talk about. And one day I don't even remember what me and Clay were sitting in here talking about, but pastor Tyler, he walked up to the door and he was like, you guys, you guys should start a podcast. And we kind of looked at each other. Like, why did we never think of that? And so now, I mean, we sat down and brainstormed it and here we are today. Yeah, Josh, what's weird is I got the invite to go on to the RFP, uh, in the middle of us initially talking about starting a podcast. And, you know, when we, when pastor Tyler first suggested that, I remember thinking who, who else cares about this stuff? This is just our weird little history and the things that we share in common. Who else would want to, would want to listen to these conversations? Is there, are there really a lot of people out there who would be benefited by the conversations we're having after exploring it, after talking to some other people about it, it became clear. Yeah, there is, there are a lot of other people out there wanting to have these conversations. Yeah. That's sort of how John started, started his. And, you know, when we started, he started before me and brought me on halfway through this past year. And, uh, it's been interesting. It's been definitely fun to think about and to talk about. Um, you definitely start more conversations with people. Um, now that you're a part of something like this, uh, that you never thought, you know, when we started, I started getting people that I went to college with, that I grew up with, that started messaging me, John, the same thing. Um, Hey, what are you guys doing? Why are you doing this? You know, are you guys even still believers? You know, cause they just hear recovering and they're thinking, oh, you're an addict, you're whatever. And so you definitely hear some great conversations starters. So, yeah, I mean, I've heard from several guys that I went to school, just reached out and said that they, they started listening. They've really been helped by the content. And it's, it's still kind of surprising to me that more than 10 people even listened to our show. You know, that when we set out to, to do this, we just thought, man, we're having a great time talking about this. Let's put it out on the air and that people actually want to hear what we have to say. Kind of, it just blows my mind. Yeah, I totally understand what you're saying. Uh, a hundred percent. I mean, I thought, uh, I said this last week with JC, but I felt like when I started, uh, let's give it a shot. If, if, if one episode, if, if like an episode gets a hundred downloads, oh, you know, per episode, then, okay, then I'll keep doing it. And then, you know, me and James are, are, are past that and beyond past that, you know, and it's just, it just, it's mind boggling. And, you know, I think that you guys too have also hit, um, uh, like an interesting little, um, segment of that because, and I hope we don't destroy your cred for being on ours because we could be a little bit more, uh, what's the term hot take ish a little bit on ours. Uh, we're not, uh, so concerned at all with, uh, maybe offending somebody or say it we're, we're a little raw sometimes. And, and you guys are like straight on point, always on subject and, you know, very kind, if I could say that towards things. And, and just really, really specific to staying, uh, with like the theology, what you've been going through. And so I, I think that it's, it's definitely, um, an area that that's, that's needed. Yeah. To that point, John, we've, we've wanted to, to go through what we believe and stay on point. I mean, there's a few times we get a little in the weeds, but we more or less try to, try to, we've up to this point, try to stay pretty much on the, on the, the, uh, the main topic and, and, and keep it real close to home primarily because so that in the future, when we, when we do take on a little bit more hot button issues, what I can't be accused of and what Josh can't be accused of is not being grounded doctrinally, not being grounded scripturally that we don't know what we're talking about or that, or that we've left, you know, we've left somehow, um, traditional Baptist views or anything like that. We've wanted to, to establish that groundwork on the front end. So that later on when hopefully there's a little bit more trust, you know, when our Baptist listeners are following us along and then we are willing to tackle tougher subjects, you know, they trust us a little bit and they say, they see who we are and they, they realize, Hey, these aren't just some, some crazy guys that are just got a, uh, you know, a burr under their saddle. So they want a microphone to air their grievances. That's not who we are. And, and, you know, our hope has been that we can build a little bit of trust along the way so that later on when we are tackling, um, tougher subjects, they, they can appreciate that there's nuance and thought that we've put into these topics. It's not just, uh, throwing mud because we feel like it, you know? Absolutely. Absolutely. And that's where we're going to go next. So with having you guys on, we wanted to discuss this sort of topic. We've been, you know, a lot of this and James and I sort of had a conversation about is there going to be overlap with some of these interviews, but I think that this goes to the issue of legalism, how pervasive it is in all of life when it's allowed to, to, to grow and to fester. And, uh, so we want to discuss with you guys how legalism distorts Baptist theology. And we've covered Baptist theology here on our podcast. I had, um, uh, Matthew Lyon on and we, we went through the Baptist distinctives there. And that's sort of what you guys have been going through on your podcasts and, and nailing the Baptist distinctives an episode at a time. Um, so, um, I don't know if we can do this a short amount of time, but in a nutshell, let's sort of, let's see if we can run through like, um, uh, definition of Baptist theology or the distinctives. I mean, isn't it something like, don't we define Baptist theology? Isn't it like the book, the blood and the blessed hope? Isn't that, isn't that Baptist theology? Come on. That's about right. Well, John, John, the Baptist, that's where you get it from. All you got to do is do a word search of the new Testament for the word Baptist. And then the first thing you find, boom, that's it. We come from John, the bad man. That was a lot quicker of an answer than you thought. Wasn't it, John? There we go. Oh, that's awesome. Love it. Awesome. Uh, seriously though, I think the best way to define Baptist theology. would be by the first distinctive being biblical authority. That's really where the root is because the Bible is our final authority on everything that we do. Uh, you know, that's where we get all the Baptist distinctives. If it starts at the Bible, that's where we, that's where we would define Baptist theology. Yeah. And we, yeah, there's, there's, there's the distinctives and it's not any one distinctive that makes us a Baptist. You know, we, you, there's a lot of people who agree with individual distinctives that Baptists believe. And so it's, it's the culmination of all of them and the way that we approach those topics that, that make one a Baptist. And so, you know, historically there are people sometimes disagree on, on where Baptist theology, um, you know, comes from, where was the Genesis of it. But really you can, you can start to see it written down and codified and, and, and in a place that's observable in written history around the 16, early 1600s, maybe late, you know, maybe late 1500s. Uh, but it's where people start to articulate these distinctives that were, that were unique. And, and you see a trend starting going from there historically to what we, what Baptist churches believe today. And it's those distinctives that Josh just mentioned biblical authority. That's the King of the distinctives. Everything flows from there. Truthfully to be a Baptist, you know, the most distinctive thing about a Baptist church should be that when anyone asks a question, the answer to it is always, what does the Bible say? You know, that should be the Baptist distinctive, but then flowing from that, the thing that distinguishes us from other, um, ecclesiological, uh, systems and, and ways of looking at Christian life are the distinctives themselves. And they've been outlined by the word Baptist as an acronym. Um, so in addition to biblical authority, it's the autonomy of the local church, the priesthood of the believer, um, autonomy, the local church just means that, that the authority for the church comes within the body itself, not from some external source. We don't have some hierarchy that dictates to us, um, what the church should do, what a local church should do. Um, priesthood of the believer is, is the idea that every individual person, um, has the ability and the responsibility to serve and that we're all priests, uh, in the new Testament, the priesthood of the believer. You have, um, the two T's get rotated sometimes, but there's the two ordinances, uh, the Lord's supper and, um, baptism, which are the two ordinances. Is that Baptist belief from scripture, uh, that we should observe, um, individual soul liberty, uh, which we just covered on our, on our podcast, uh, which is my favorite of the Baptist distinct distinctives if I'm allowed to have a favorite. Uh, but that's, um, it was a phenomenal one. It just basically means that in matters of the conscience that nobody, no King, no pastor, nor, no priest, no Pope, no man can insert himself in between God and the conscience that the God is the Lord of the conscience. Um, and that ultimately it's, it's up to an individual to pursue a relationship with the Holy spirit to make decisions in matters of faith. Um, and then there's, there's the last two, which are a saved church membership that should, that everybody in a congregation should be, uh, regenerate followers of Christ. And then, uh, I'm sorry, did I get those mixed up? No, that's right. Safe church membership. And then the last T being two offices that's of the elder or pastor and the deacon. And then a lot of people use an eighth one as well. Separation of church and state. Uh, we'll cover that on our podcast, but if you want to be Baptists plural, you can include separation of church and state as well. Amen. And that probably came in, um, 1800s, 1900s is when they added that last S, uh, separation of church and state. Um, so what we're going to do now is we're going to transition a little bit into talking about how legalism can distort Baptist theology and can it even, can legalism even infuse itself into these doctrinal beliefs that we hold near and dear to our hearts? Can legalism affect that? And then we're going to transition into three ways, three categories that, um, ultimately can distort it. So what's your guys' thoughts on that as far as legalism, um, infusing itself into these theological points? Yeah. Um, I definitely think it's possible, especially if we look at Baptist theology and like Clay was mentioning biblical authority being the king of the distinctives, that being the foundation, the sufficiency and the authority of scripture. If we're tethering anything else to the Bible at some point, Baptist doctrine is not going to make as much of a difference anyways, because you're building your own system. And that's found it fundamentally, in my opinion, that's what legalism is. You're just rebuilding your own system of your relationship with God. And at some point you're just going to drift from your actual Baptist theology. Uh, if it's not grounded solely in scripture, then no, I mean, you're not, you're not going to stay the course of, of being a true historical Baptist in the long run. You're going to start adding things. And then next thing you know, church is going to be a mess. It's going to be a whole checklist system. It's going to be, you're a Baptist because you do X, Y, and Z, not because the Bible says X, Y, and Z. And I think we just have to be super careful there that we're not trying to add to scripture and remove ourselves from the sufficiency and the authority of scripture in that way. Yeah. I think Josh is saying that it's, he's saying it can be fused together. And your question is, can you, can you fuse legalism with Baptist theology? I think, I think it can happen, but I believe it's definitely your question is, does it distort it? And it for sure distorts it. So I don't, there's no way you can historically align with Baptists and be a legalist because, and the truth is that's, that's pretty true of, of all Orthodox Christianity. You can't believe the gospel. You can't believe the faith once delivered and, and be a legalist. And, and I know there are, there are shades like, so maybe there's this spectrum where some people are a little bit more legalism, right? That, that mentality creeps in just a little bit, but in general, it is a distortion of basic Bible doctrine that leads to legalism. And there's all kinds of reasons for that. I mean, we, you know, if you were to, if you were to try to ask, why do we, why do we do that? Why do we take doctrine that, that is so that's basic and fundamental to what it is for us to be a good church and for us to lead a committed Christian lives? You know, why does it do it? And it, what it boils down to is that legalism feeds our flesh. Now it's, this is a, um, this is maybe something a lot of people don't understand. They think that because legal, because legalistic ideas, which is, let's just be for anyone listening. Legalism is the idea that you're going to achieve acceptance with God or feeling of purpose apart from God's grace. You're going to do it with something that you do. Um, so that idea is, is very, uh, flesh exalting. We, we somehow convince ourselves it's not flesh exalting because, well, you know, you're, you're actually striving really hard. So isn't that, isn't that flesh crucifying? Well, maybe, but when, when I go to the gym and work out, you could say that that's, that's, um, that's killing the flesh, right? That's sacrificial, right? And so in some way that's denying my flesh. Well, it's, it's denying my flesh in some ways, but everybody knows that vanity can lead somebody to, to, to be in really great shape. And so working out or being in really great shape, just as much as it can be a healthy thing that you're doing in denying your flesh, it can just as easily be a flesh exalting thing. You know, the culture of vanity is all around us. So this idea that just because I'm making sacrifices means that I'm doing it from an altruistic, uh, love for Jesus. Um, that's a misunderstanding. There's a lot of people who do a lot of the things they do and they do it. Because it gives them notches on their belt and they, they've achieved things and it makes them feel good about themselves. Now we've wrapped, we've wrapped scripture around all of it so that we've, we've convinced ourselves it's what, what Jesus commands. That's not always the case. And so when we, um, when we drive sanctification with checklists and rules and not in relationship with Christ, we can take any good doctrine and we can distort it in that way. But, but to be clear, that's just our flesh informing those doctrines and twisting those doctrines for our own purposes. And those purposes are always so that we will feel good about ourselves. I mean, look at the prodigal son, you know, that that's the, the prodigal son who chases flesh and pleasure. That's the obvious sin. That's the, that everybody knows when they see that, that that's wrong, that that's sinful. But the elder brother was just as much in sin. And that was actually the point of Jesus's story was that the elder brother was also wrong, but the elder brother was convinced that he's the one who was representing the father. Even to the point that when the father calls him out on it, he stands up to the father and says, don't you, you're not saying things correctly, you know? And so that's what we do often. You know, that's where legalism creeps in. We, we start to hijack, um, God's word, um, because we've, we've turned it into something that makes us look good. We've turned it into something that we can be achievement oriented about. And when we do that, it, it just, um, it's self-will, um, but it steals, it steals just like the elder brother did. It pretends that we're representing God. And to me, that's what makes it more, um, so it makes it more dangerous and more harmful, at least with the, with the prodigal who's away, he knows he's away. Uh, the, the prodigal who stays, he's convinced himself that he's representing the father. When, when he, he knows the father's heart as little, uh, as little as the, as the brother who's left home. Yeah, the prodigal who, who stays wants to make grace conditional, which automatically eliminates it as being grace. Yeah. Let me back up just a second, because I think the reason why I wanted to cover this topic, specifically the merging of Baptist theology and the topic of legalism is because I think a lot of times what we are interacting with and what we are, at least, I don't want to speak for you guys, but for me and James proclaiming against and trying to give a voice to, um, is, is, is the legalism that is given, given by a group that calls themselves Baptist, right? And even so, that same group will take what Clay just rattled off the Baptist distinctives and champion it. And so, I think many times that maybe either those that's left or been harmed will then struggle for, with things like, you know, Baptist or the Baptist distinctives or something that we, we should, you know, if you're going to remain a Baptist, so the Baptist distinctives are something that you should, uh, take, uh, heart to that, that it's a good thing. I mean, the, they were, they were written out by solid theological men and, and God used them. And so, maybe sort of, I guess what I'm trying to do with this discussion is divorce the two, where some people, I think, through being a part of the movement or being in their church have seen them intertwined. Does that make any sense? That makes a lot of sense, John. When, when you, when we talk about the Baptist distinctives, let's, let's say one thing. I believe legalism distorts biblical authority, but legalism is an absolute rejection of individual soul liberty. It is literally the opposite of what legalism requires. Legalism requires one person to tell another person, you have to do these things because the Bible's not telling them those things. The Bible is not saying that Christians have to do some of these things. So when a pastor or when, uh, a church environment or a culture is impressing these things on, on people, it is, it is a distortion of biblical authority, but it's an outright rejection of individual soul liberty. So they're pretending in some way that it's biblical authority because they've, they've, they went and scrapped together verses that, that don't actually say what they're saying. But they're, they've scrapped it together. So it's distortion. But in the, in the, in the case of individual soul liberty, I believe it's completely contrary to a legalistic mindset. You cannot believe in individual soul liberty and, and get into legalism. Um, so I, I, my experience has been that even, even though they'll in, in some ways talk about individual soul liberty, they'll put it out there. They won't define it properly. They won't support it historically. They won't talk about what it actually is because if they do that undermines that, that, that, uh, manipulative culture that they've, that they're trying to put forth. And I would add to that, I think because of individual soul liberty, being a true Baptist should be extremely liberating and freeing because of your commitment to individual soul liberty, because of your willingness to say, God is the Lord of the conscience. And that, and even you take the two offices, if you're going to be biblical, you're not going to have dominion over anyone's faith. You're not going to Lord over God's heritage. And because of that, in my opinion, no one should walk away from a Baptist situation and think those people are trying to make me look like them. Because if you're a true Baptist, you know, that person has individual soul liberty to let the Holy spirit lead them and guide them in their Christian life. And that's so good guys. I wrote down this that Clay said, and I thought it was awesome. Uh, and I don't even know if you realize you said the statement, but you said hijacking God's word, man, that was powerful. And if anything, that's what we should be taking away from this episode is how often do we hijack God's word? And we make it what we want it to say. And, uh, you know, we did a whole episode about exegesis, eisegesis, uh, and all that. And too many times we take our preconceived thoughts and we put them into God's word and we make it our words. Um, and I've said this before and I heard it from somewhere. Uh, and I think it was actually on your podcast and I credited to you guys the other day, um, that we as pastors, as preachers are not the author. We are not the editor in chief. We are simply the delivery boy. And when we get that, did y'all get, did you guys say that on your podcast? That was Brian saying, I think Brian. Oh yeah. Yeah. Brian said that man, it was awesome. When I heard that, it totally just blew my mind and I couldn't stop thinking about it because, uh, that is, that is literally what it is. We are not trying to change anything. We're just delivering things, but this legalism comes in and we try to interject our own self and our own standards and our own thoughts into this methodology. And it really could mess people up. So John, go ahead. So we, we've talked about, we've, we've hit biblical authority a little bit. Josh talked about that. Clay's talked about individual soul liberty. I was wondering, and, and, and, and I'll mention my goal for, for doing this in just a minute, because like I said, I think what we're getting at is showing that someone that is using legalism, no matter how much they want to proclaim it, actually is not a Baptist. And, and so I was wondering, are there any other categories of Baptist theology that legalism just obliterates? If I can use a strong word. I think you've got priesthood of all believers, because if we believe that's about serving one another as believer priests coming together for the edification of each other, what's legalism do at the end of the day? It really changes the heart of why you even gather with the church. Because with legalism, your heart ends up being more about being seen and heard than contributing and making a difference in somebody's life. It's more about, you know, people know that you're there than, you know, edifying your brothers and sisters. And the more we're talking about it, I'm just sitting here thinking, I don't really know that there's a Baptist distinctive that legalism wouldn't just completely destroy. Because if like autonomy of the local church. If you get super legalistic, you're going to say, well, that church over there doesn't look just like me. Well, there goes autonomy. Two offices, we could go into a whole spiel on that one. I don't know that there's a single distinctive that legalism doesn't mess up in some way. Yeah, I was going to say, Josh, you mentioned autonomy of the local church. And two elders, two offices, elders and deacons. Both of those are distorted by legalism because legalism requires, because if you're going to tell people they have to do things, but man, as hard as I look, I can't find a Bible verse for that. What I then have to do is I have to say, well, how can I convince these people that God wants them to do it? And the only way, the usual way is to set up some sort of hierarchy in the church. Usually it's a pastor or a spiritual leadership figure. And we say, look at this person and look how successful their spiritual life is. I mean, goodness, just look at what a man of God this person is. And look at how successful his family has been. Look how successful his marriage has been. And never mind that stuff you heard somewhere else. We're going to pretend all that didn't happen. This person is basically flawless. Look at how amazing their Christian life is. And the moment you do that, you're distorting the biblical doctrine of eldership. Because that's not what an elder is supposed to be. And then you're distorting the autonomy of the local church because now you're not a congregationally led church. You've got a dictator who's speaking down to everybody, who's not accountable, who's seen as unquestionable, who's not being discipled himself. And so that's two. The two offices and the autonomy of the local church are both distorted by legalism in that way. Because legalism requires that kind of overbearing authority. It requires a man or a group of men to wield the kind of power that Scripture does not give them. Because they're trying to institute things that Scripture doesn't say. Absolutely. Yeah, I see that a lot in the leadership. Because when you're trying to handle things from the top down, eventually – and this is why I think one of the – I even think it gets into the cultic. Like, and I've gone rounds with someone over this because I think sole pastoral authority is one of the most abusive things that you can do in the church. Because it leads to – I don't want to make a grand statement of like 100% of the time, but to me, sole pastoral authority leads to many forms, if not – it will lead to some form of abuse. If it's not just spiritual abuse, it may lead to a sexual abuse. It may lead to a emotional abuse or something like that. Yeah, John, I would like – I can speak to that. The pastoral authority thing, you referenced that it can get cultish. And I can readily agree that a lot of Baptist people, even Baptist people who are on the – who have been in churches on that legalism spectrum, they've not really experienced anything that they would define as cultish. But a lot of people have experienced elements of cult-like environments. And it's not that their church is a cult or that their pastor is a cult leader. But do yourself a favor if you're listening. If you feel that oppression, if you just feel like, man, I can never live up. And, man, it doesn't matter how hard I try. I just can't ever measure up to the people at church. And, man, I just want to be as holy as my pastor. If you've ever had that kind of mentality while you're at church, it's a very unhealthy environment you're in. And that's the fault of that church. You feeling that way is not your fault. And you're made to feel like it is because you can't spiritually measure up. But go to the Kohl Institute Research website and look at the characteristics of a cult. And you're probably going to have to pick up your jaw off the floor how many of the characteristics match some of the things you're experiencing in your environment. And that happens – I'm not going to just say this happens in Baptist churches because I don't believe that that's true. I think it happens in a lot of churches. But it doesn't mean it doesn't need to be called out where we see it. And in my context, I can absolutely say you see cult-like tendencies and even overt – I mean, I could give you stories and examples of things that a lot of listeners would be mind-blown if they heard. But the question you have to ask yourself is how did we get there? The question is not let's just all laugh at them or throw rocks or say, wow, that's so crazy. That should be a Netflix documentary, right? The real thing – the point is how does a Baptist church who claims to believe the Baptist distinctives get to that point? How do you end up with a pastor who's overbearing or manipulative and doesn't see it, truly is doing it with the approval of his conscience, believes that that's what he's supposed to be doing? And how do you get people who willingly submit to that and allow abusive and manipulative controlling behavior and believe that they're being faithful to God's word as they do it? And that's where a better understanding of Baptist theology would help. That's where really understanding historically what these doctrines are teaching would liberate people from that. Yeah, and I think that the aspect that if we have gotten across a point at all, it's that if any of these things are happening in the context you're in, it's not Baptist. Or they have – they're not practicing Baptist theology. If that's taking place, they have left practicing Baptist theology. They're no longer doing it. They have traded it in for something of their own making. I was just going to say, if I could just throw a caveat in here too about the way Baptist churches who are trying to hold the Baptist distinctives get into legalism, I think fundamentalism has a lot to do with that. And I call it neo-fundamentalism or hyper-fundamentalism, and that is the fundamentalism of the last few decades. Because what fundamentalism was good for is that it told us in the early – in the end of the 1800s, beginning of the 1900s, these guys sat down and talked about these fundamentals and said, this is where we fight. We need to know for sure where we unify and where we fight because there's a difference between being a Christian and being a non-Christian. And you have to believe certain things. It doesn't matter what you call yourself. It matters what you believe if you want to be a Christian. And so they outlined those things. And that was both a unifying thing but also a dividing thing because it separates as much as it unifies. And so – but the problem is fundamentalism just ended up growing more and more as a theology of fighting. And I think what legalism is trying to do, one of the things it's trying to do, it's trying to circumvent sanctification. And I know we've talked about that a little bit already. But the other thing that it's trying to do is it's trying to protect us from the bad guys out there, the wolves, the world, the flesh, the devil. So legalism expects that if we put these rules in place, it will do a better job of protecting God's children than if we didn't have these rules. So it's trying to do those things. And fundamentalism, the attitude and the mentality that fundamentalism has taken on in the last few decades has only – has really contributed to that. You know, the fundamentals – there's nothing wrong with the fundamentals. But fundamentalism has become as much about a psychology as it is a theology. And that is it's a mentality that sees the – that basically it's always defensive and it always is looking for a place to fight. You even hear people talk about being a fighting fundamentalist. Or I'm sorry, a fighting fundamentalist. So it just – fundamentalism tells us where to – fundamentalism is not the Bible. It's a man-made movement. It's a man-made system. And it's useful for certain things. For example, telling us where to fight. The problem is it can't tell us when to stop fighting. And I'll just – I think a lot of fundamental – the people who thump fundamentalism the loudest have been fighting for so long. All they can do anymore is fight. And so if you're a cat always looking for a rat, eventually everything's going to start looking like a rat. And so if we run out of rats, we make up new rats, right? I got a new doctrine. I got a new rule. I got a new verse out of context that gives me more holiness than you. I'm more separated than you. And so it becomes this pharisaical game with these insane rules, these standards that you have to follow. And if you don't, well, you don't belong to us anymore. You're not part – you really don't – you don't fit in in our church anymore. And so I think the fundamentalist mentality – not the fundamentals, but the fundamentalist mentality over the last few decades is a big part of why legalism has taken such a stronghold. I was talking to Josh earlier about this. Over in Jude, he says – verse 3 and 4, he says, I wanted to write to you of the common salvation, but it's needful that I should exhort you to earnestly contend for the faith. So in other words, he's saying, I want – what I really want to talk about is the gospel, but I realize I need to address areas where we need to make sure we're contending for the faith. We do the opposite. We say we're going to be as contentious as possible anywhere we can, and we're going to make church. We're going to make our conferences. We're going to make our revival meetings. We're going to make our Christian lives all about the things we're against. We're just going to fight, and we're going to look for every place to be contentious, and then where necessary, we'll talk about the gospel. Well, that's the opposite of what Jude's priorities were when he wrote that. And so I think – I just think fundamentalism, this mentality of always looking for a fight that we had where we're – we think we're contending for the faith, but to be honest with you, we're just often being contentious. Go ahead, Josh. And I think what's sad about all of that is that's now the known stigma for a church that has the name Baptist on the sign, that people don't know why they're Baptist. What gets tethered to being a Baptist is legalism, cult-like behavior, all of these things. And there's, I would say, literally thousands of people sitting out there. They don't even know what it means to actually be a Baptist because this is now how they view themselves. That legalism has become so second nature to them that when they actually study and hear the Baptist distinctives, they're like, whoa, that's what it means to be a Baptist? And it makes – honestly, as we've been going through the distinctives on our show, it's been encouraging. It's been awesome. But it's also been kind of disappointing and sad that I went through how many years of my life and never heard any of this stuff? And that we're getting messages from people all the time saying, I've been in a Baptist church my whole life, and no one's taught this. I've never heard this. How – yeah, Josh. What? Pastors reaching out to us saying, hey, that stuff on Individual Soul Liberty, how have I never heard that before? Baptist pastors. Let me ask you this, guys. I know, Josh, you went to Bible college. John, you went to Bible college. Did any of you have a Baptist distinctive class where they taught these seven points? Yes, I did. You did. I don't remember us at our college having that, John. Did you remember? They had the class. I never took it because some of my friends took it, and they basically didn't do anything but complain about it after it was over because it became a Baptist brighter discussion because the teacher was a Baptist brighter. Okay. Yeah. Don't quote me on this because I might be wrong. I'm pretty sure the trail of blood was used in my class. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. That was big deal at our college. Yeah. So, I guess here's the question. What's the answer? How do we fix? I know that's the big thing. Like, how do we fix or turn the ship? But, like, speaking specifically into Baptist theology and the problem that Josh just brought up. Well, right before that, guys, I do want to just say this. I was a prominent evangelistic pastor was in our area just yesterday when we were recording this. I had some teenagers wanting to go, and so they were going to go, and I thought, you know what, I'm going to listen to the message online. I'm not going to go. I'm not going to mention the pastor's name because everyone would know who it is. But he began talking about worship, and he began using a form of legalism in worship. And he was talking about Hebrews 11 and talking about how Jacob worshiped the Lord. And all of a sudden, legalism was seeping out of his messages in worship. And as you guys were discussing these things, my mind immediately went back to that and thought, you know, because legalism is all these other forms, it's going to overflow into even the simplest form of worship. Praising God turns into legalism. No, you can't raise your hands because— He said that. That's what other people do. He said that. Yeah. That was one of the things he said when he was talking about worship. He was like, well, some of you over here, you're raising your hand for the message, for the songs, but you're not raising your hand when the pastor's preaching. And all of a sudden, I'm thinking, what in the world? But that's where legalism eventually begins any little point. And I think Clay said it, but I loved how you said that it makes us feel more spiritual because that's what legalism does. It makes us feel better, and it tears everyone else down. It's a form of sanctification in our mind. So let's get to this question. What is the answer? How do we solve? How do we fix legalism? A three-point ABC, repeat after me, fixing legalism. That's a lot. That's a lot of pressure right there. I've got a two. I've got a two. Go ahead, Josh. You go first. Okay. You want to take it, Clay? And then I'll come back around after you're done. Sure. I said I got a two-word answer, and then I got a longer answer. The two-word answer is the gospel. It's a misunderstanding of the gospel to teach legalism. And you say, well, what do you mean by that? And this is where I always get pushback. You guys have, I'm sure, heard this too, this idea that, oh, legalism is requiring works for salvation. So how can you say that I'm a legalist because I don't preach works for salvation? And I get pushback on that. They say we're redefining legalism to talk about these churches being legalistic. And then they get a little bit of ammunition when I say things like I just said, because I just said it's a gospel issue, that the gospel is the solution to legalism. And then their response to that would, of course, be, well, I believe the gospel. So what's the problem? The problem is that we're not misdefining or redefining legalism. If you could just Google legalism and it tells you on Google the definition is excessive adherence to laws or moral codes that restrict personal freedom. And in case you think that's a new definition, John Bunyan was writing about, he called it the legal spirit. You can actually read an entire essay written by John Bunyan back in the 1600s where he talks about the legal spirit. In that essay, he talks about looking to the law to do something that only grace can do. That's what he defines as a legal spirit, looking to the law to do what only grace can do. The gospel doesn't just save us. It sanctifies us. And the grace of God doesn't just save us. It sanctifies us. So anytime you look back to the law, which was a schoolmaster to get you to Christ, anytime you look back to the law to do something for you that only grace can do, you're adopting a spirit of legalism. We call that legalism, but Bunyan was calling it a legal spirit in the 1600s. The main point is you can call it Barney if you want. Just stop doing it. It's wrong and it's against scripture. So we can argue about definitions or we can admit that where this is happening, it's sin. It's wrong and it's a distortion of God's word. But the answer is in Galatians 2. John Bunyan actually talks a lot about Galatians in that essay he wrote. And of course, then they jump right back out. You know, the detractors jump right back out and say, well, Galatians is talking about works for salvation. Well, that's one of the things it's talking about, but it's not the only thing. You know, somebody told me recently they did a word search in the book of Galatians. And it said justification X many times and it said sanctification zero times, which my response to them was if Bible study was a word search, we could all be theologians by the end of the week. But Bible study is a little bit more complicated than that. Galatians 5 talks about the fruit of the spirit. You're going to tell me that's about salvation? That's about justification? I don't think so. And so the works of the flesh are in Galatians in the same chapter. We're saying that that's talking about justification. No, no way it is. It's talking about sanctification. So Galatians 2 is also talking about our view of sanctification. So he rebukes Peter. Paul rebukes Peter in Galatians 2. And everybody out there who's thinking right now, Galatians is talking about works for salvation. Legalism is about works for salvation. Are you saying that Peter in Galatians 2 was teaching works for salvation? I would love for somebody to tell me that that's what the apostle Peter was preaching in Galatians 2. No, of course he wasn't. So what was he doing? He was disfellowshipping with people over secondary issues. And Paul calls him out on it. And he says, he actually says, it says right there, Peter withdrew and separated himself. That's the actual words from Galatians 2. So I guess Peter just wanted to be more separated. Like why throw stones at the guy who just wants to be more holy, right? The problem was he was separating from other believers on the basis of those rules. It wasn't a problem that Peter was circumcised. It wasn't a problem that Peter wanted to observe the things he observed. The problem was when he withdrew and separated himself and divided and attacked the body of Christ on the basis of his preferences. And so if you read what Paul says in Galatians 2, 14 through 16, he's the one who says it's a gospel issue, right? Verse 16, if you go back and read it, he says it clearly there. The reason you're doing this, Peter, is because you've forgotten that we are justified by faith in Christ, not by the works of the law. And so if you go back to that passage, it's absolutely clear. So I'm not the one saying it's a gospel issue. Paul's the one saying it's a gospel issue. When you withdraw fellowship from people on the basis of these things. So he says we're justified by faith in Christ, not by the works of the law. And when you withdraw from believers over these secondary things, you are forgetting that. You're forgetting the gospel. And if you think about the logic of it, it really makes sense. I mean, think about this, guys. If my division with James or with John or with Josh over secondary issues is worth me withdrawing from them over and above our unity in the gospel, then that's a gospel issue because I am saying our division over secondary things is more important to my Christian walk than our unity in the gospel. Well, that's a gospel issue then because what are you doing? You're shining now as a Christian. I've made my Christian life and I've made my church life and I've made my preaching. I've made all of it about shining a light on the law, not on shining a light on the cross. And so Paul gives you the solution there in Galatians 2. That's the answer to legalism. Get the light back on the cross. Get the light back on the finished work of Christ and realize that the work of salvation and the work of sanctification is done not by your rules but by the gospel. And so I think if we really start studying Bible doctrine, if we get into Galatians 2, it absolutely will. And there's other passages too that will destroy a legalistic mindset. Let's look at what Paul says there. Let's remember, hey, when I look at my brother and sister in Christ, I'm not seeing somebody that I should push around or tell what's what or explain to him why he should be doing something different. I'm looking at somebody who's clothed in the righteousness of Christ. I'm looking at somebody who's justified by faith in Jesus Christ. And I think I honestly believe when we really believe that, not just say it, when we really believe that and get that down in our hearts, it'll start to loosen the grip that legalism can have on any of us. I don't know. I don't know. There's a whole lot more to add to what Clay just said. I agree, though. I think the answer is the gospel because the gospel takes us from due to done, from it is almost finished to it is finished. And what legalism does, and we just interviewed Jared Wilson a couple days ago, and he talked about this briefly as far as pastors go. But what legalism does is it makes me a functional Messiah. It makes me save myself. It's like we tip our hat to Jesus for our justification, and then we start living, waiting for him to tip his hat to us for our sanctification. And that's anti-gospel. If we truly believe that it is finished, and we've heard it like a million times. I'm pretty sure I've heard it on y'all's show. I've heard the RFP guys say it. We labor. How does he say it? We labor from acceptance, not for it. And that's all there really is to it. We have to get back to living our Christian life, that he that began the good work in us will perform it till the day of Jesus Christ. Get back to living from done, not due. And I have to go back to Jared Wilson. The guy's a gospel beast. I got it. He said, we have to remember that our obedience to Christ is not the grounds of our relationship with him, but the overflow of it. And he also said, he said, do's and don'ts accomplish nothing resembling biblical Christianity. And when they're attached from the done of the gospel, the gospel gives us oxygen and space to breathe. And I think. I love what he says there. Do's and don'ts accomplish nothing resembling biblical Christianity when they're attached from the done of the gospel. This is something that God has been teaching me over the last. Honestly, like year, year and a half. That it's the gospel that changes everything. And that I can do all these things for Jesus. But if it's not rooted in the done. Man, I'm just making myself a bigger checklist. Yeah, that was excellent, Clay. Because and Josh, because when somebody I wanted to get to that earlier, but I just decided not to because just think it was it would have taken us off topic a little bit. But that idea of, well, you don't understand legalism. Legalism is about adding works to salvation. As soon as they say that, they reveal two things. Number one, they don't understand the gospel. Number two, they don't understand the book of Galatians. Because if you look in the book of Galatians, one of the things that he dealt with all through the book, the book as a cohesive whole, is the Judaizers adding circumcision to the gospel. And it played out not just in their salvation, but also in the fact of them having right standing with God going forward in their Christian walk. And here's a prime example of how I know they don't understand it. Listening to – a couple years ago, I was listening to Sam Gipp as sort of listening to from the mouth of the person of crafting an argument for King James onlyism. I was like, all right, I'm not going to assume what they say. I want to hear what they say. So I'm trying to get his arguments in on it. And one of his criticisms of newer versions was because in Galatians chapter 6, Paul, talking about the issue of circumcision, says that for those that do all of this, everything that he's talked about through the entire book, I wish they were, in the King James language, says cut off. In a couple of other modern translations, it says that they would be castrated. Well, if you understand the book, you understand that what he's talking about is they're wanting them to be circumcised. He says, you know what? If that's what they're wanting to do, I think it would be better if they were castrated. So that's what Sam Gipp says as his argument against this. He's like, whenever it says cut off, that means being churched, kicked out of the church. That's his theological understanding of studying the Bible. And when it's that shallow, you're killing me. Yeah. Paul is saying there, he's saying, if cutting off some makes you holy, man. Yeah. James, you have something to say? Yeah. The only thing I wanted to say, sort of combining what both of you guys said was, what I sort of got out of it was, legalism lets us set our own bar of holiness. It allows us to say, if I do this, if I go three to thrive, if I'm wearing the right clothes, then I will be at the apex of my Christianity. Don't have to worry about what the Bible says, but we can set our own standards. We can look different. We can act different. And then that means that I'm a holy person. And I think that's where this, you know, because sometimes someone can be holy and have a beard and have a Jeep. Sometimes someone can be holy and wear jeans or whatever they want to wear. I don't care. That doesn't define our holiness, but yet they want to put some type of outer appearance to say, well, we don't look like that, so we're more holy. Don't get flubbed up with them. Don't go stupider. So I think that's the root of all this and sort of what I got out of both your guys' takeaway, which was fantastic. So, John? Guys, thank you so much for being on your list today. Do you have any closing comments for us, for our listeners? I'll say this. The more that I studied the New Testament, the more I question how anyone can walk away from Christianity that's not rooted in the gospel. I mean, if you look at everything that the Apostle Paul writes, he's very consistent. You got to give him that. He always opens up his books with remember the gospel, and it's after you remember the gospel. Now here's how you're supposed to live in the gospel. So I don't know how you can read the New Testament and walk away a legalist. I mean, you have to almost completely neglect some of the writings of the Apostle Paul. Yeah, James, something you just said there. You know, two of the things you'll see, very routine, if you want to look at your environment and say, is my church dealing with this legalism? The first thing we need to start assuming is that yes. Most churches have that, at least somebody in the church who tends to be that way, and most likely most of us that have the tendency to be that way. One way you'll know for sure that your church is blind to it, though, is when you start hearing holy Christian living and good church living described as this mountain where there's only one side off the mountain, and that side is license. If you only ever hear that that's the slippery slope, then you know that your church has a blind spot because there's the other slippery slope of moralism. And as Josh was talking about, forgetting the done of the gospel and focus on doing this obsession with works. So you'll see both of those. And if you only ever hear that the way off the mountain is down the one side, then you'll know that your church has a blind spot there to Phariseeism. And the other thing that you'll see as a regular marker of a church that doesn't see this is, as you said, because you don't have the Bible to establish right and wrong. You have the Bible, but you want to go a lot farther than the Bible goes. You know, there was a lot of stuff God wanted to tell you. He just forgot. So I'm going to tell you, when you do that, you have to set up somebody in the church as the ultimate. You have to idolize somebody. You have to give a gift of God. You have to treat a gift of God as a God. You have to, things that were meant to be gifts to us, we have to idolize them, whether it's a church leader or whether it's a brother or sister in Christ that we respect. You have to because somebody's got to give us these extra things that God forgot to say in the Bible. And so that's why you see so much rife idolatry of spiritual leaders in these cultures that deal with legalism. Because somebody's got to give it to us. And whoever it is, they're outside the bounds of Scripture already. So how can we hold them accountable to Scripture? How can we tell them they're wrong? We're depending on them to give us these rules. And so that person, by definition, is the standard. Now it's not God. It's not the Holy Spirit checking me in my relationship with Christ. It's how close am I approximating the traveling evangelist who just came in? How close am I approximating my pastor and his family? And so that idolatry, if you see somebody in the church held up as the example, more than you hear of Jesus being held up as the example, then your church probably has a problem with legalism. James, closing statements? I'm great. All right. Well, thank you guys so much for listening. Clay, Josh, thank you guys for taking the time and joining us for this. And everybody, go listen to the Young Baptist podcast and follow them on Twitter and Facebook, and you'll get more of this great stuff that you got tonight. I have a question, guys. Are you guys planning on being at either one of the meetups for the RFP guys? I might be able to make it on June the 4th. It just depends where our families will be vacationing in Savannah, so we'll see kind of how the schedule plays out. All right. So the For Freedom audience needs to put all the pressure on these guys to be in Missouri. Yes. Take your vacation time. Yeah. I'm not sure. I'm going to have to play it by ear. I would like to be at one of them, but I'm not sure how it's going to go. We'll see. Okay. All righty. Well, we will close her down from there. Thank you, everybody, for listening. I hope this was a help to you. And please share the podcast. Give us a like, a rating, or a review on Apple Podcasts. And until next time, to God, not idolatry. Be the glory. Thank you for listening to the For Freedom Podcast. If you enjoyed this podcast, please give a rating, leave a comment, or share it on Facebook or Twitter. To find more helpful resources for your journey through the independent fundamental Baptist world, check out RFPNetwork.org, where you can find this podcast and others, such as the Recovering Fundamentals Podcast, the RFWP Podcast, the Young Baptist Podcast, the Church Split, the Preacher's Kids Podcast, the 26 Letters Podcast, and the RFWP Podcast. God bless.

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