Pastor Joel Webbin refutes Jason Farley's claim that Credo Baptist theology caused the transgender movement, arguing instead that the root issue lies in Arminian decisionism and revivalism championed by Charles Finney. Webbin contends the real conflict is between monergistic grace and synergistic human choice, noting similar shifts within Presbyterian circles like the PCUSA. He urges Reformed Christians to reject this distraction, focusing on unity under a theonomic framework that applies all of Christ to life rather than fixating on baptismal modes. [Automatically generated summary]
Transcriber: CohereLabs/cohere-transcribe-03-2026, WAV2VEC2_ASR_BASE_960H, sat-12l-sm, script v26.04.01, and large-v3-turbo
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Five Star Review Request00:04:50
Hey guys, real quick before we get started, I have a small request.
If you've been blessed by our content and you like this show, would you take just a brief moment and leave us a five star review?
This is quite possibly the most effective thing that you can do to ensure that this content gets out to as many people as possible.
Thanks.
All right, welcome back to another weekly live QA with myself, Pastor Joel, with Right Response Ministries.
We do this every Monday afternoon at 12 p.m. Central Time.
We've missed a couple because of Federal holidays and certain things going on, but we try to be as consistent as we can every Monday at 12 p.m. Central Time.
A live QA session with yours truly, Pastor Joel Webbin with Right Response Ministries.
So, today I wanted to start off, and we'll see how much time we have to get to other things, but I wanted to start off with some of the controversy that's been unfolding on social media, especially Twitter, which is constructed deliberately to kind of foster little smart aleck quips and things like that.
So, Twitter certainly breeds controversy and conflict and those kinds of things, but The controversy surrounding Cross Politic.
Cross Politic, for some of you guys who are not aware, they are a podcast out of Moscow, Idaho.
Toby Sumter, for a long time, he's one of the hosts.
There's three of them.
Toby Sumter, for a long time, he was a pastor with Douglas Wilson at Christ Church.
He's now a senior pastor of a church plant.
I believe it's King's Crown or something like that.
Does that sound right, Nathan?
I think it's King's Crown Church.
If it's not King's Crown, it should be because that's a great name.
But King's Crown Church, Toby Sumter is the lead pastor, senior pastor there.
They also have David Shannon.
He goes by the moniker Chocolate Knox.
And then they also have, as their third host, Gabriel Wrench, who goes by the moniker Water Boy.
And that's because he's a deacon at Christ Church.
And so it's kind of just a tongue in cheek playing around with him because he's a deacon.
So, anyways, Cross Politic is a great podcast.
It really is.
They have a lot of really good things.
There's certain things that I don't always like because there's really no podcast that I perfectly like, including my own.
I go back and listen to some of the things that I've done, and I think, oh man, I wish I had done that differently or I wish I had done that better.
One of the challenges, I think, of Cross Politic, just practically speaking for a moment in terms of their format, is that it's three guys.
And so, you know, with Right Response Ministries, we have kind of our flagship show that's called Theology Applied.
It airs on Tuesdays.
And in that show, I have a guest always that joins me, somebody that I respect and somebody that I would have at least some measure of theological agreement with, somebody who is an Orthodox Christian and who has some expertise in a particular field, whatever subject we happen to be talking about in that episode.
And in those episodes, even just with one other person, one other guest, it's easy to say things because you're going back and forth, you're having a good time, you're enjoying one another and the conversation that's unfolding, and you can say something.
That if you were just speaking solo, you probably would have said more thoroughly.
You would have offered more disclaimers, more clarity surrounding a particular statement where people would probably get the information better.
But when you're doing a discussion, especially if it's the cross-politic guys, they're having a really good time on their show.
They're laughing, they're joking, and they're saying things that are really, I think, much of what they say is true and profound and helpful.
But even when they say things well, I often find myself wishing that they would have slowed down and just one guy talked for a little while, you know, and fleshed that thought out a little bit more.
So, my point is, it's hard when you're being interrupted, when you're interrupting one another.
Sometimes clarity falls to the wayside.
And so, the particular comment that was made was made by one of their guests, and he's on the Fight Laugh Feast Network.
The Fight Laugh Feast Network is kind of the host of Cross Politic, and the Cross Politic show is their flagship show.
Those are the guys who started.
Fight Laugh Feast.
But Fight Laugh Feast has multiple podcast contributors and authors of blogs, and they hold an annual Fight Laugh Feast conference.
And so they had one of their Fight Laugh Feast fellows, for lack of a better term, I'm not sure what they call him, but Fight Laugh Feast podcast host, Jason Farley is his name.
And he came on the show as a special guest on a particular cross-politic episode, and he made a comment about Credo Baptist theology.
Credo Baptist Theology Explained00:02:35
They were talking about, you know, these guys are Presbyterians, and so they're Pado Baptists.
Infant baptism.
And so they were talking about the Credo Baptist position, a believer's baptism, baptism following faith, and a credible profession of faith being made by the individual who's being baptized.
And Jason Farley likened it to the transgender movement.
And Gabe actually paused for a second and said, Did you just say that?
I can't remember exactly how Gabe worded it, but he said, Did you just say that the Credo Baptist position?
Is similar to transgenderism.
And Jason Farley doubled down and said, I didn't say it's similar.
I said it caused it.
And so he had a chance right there.
He had an opportunity to kind of clarify or backpedal a little bit, go a little bit softer.
But he leaned in and actually said that the credo Baptist position, a believer's baptism, that doctrine and that viewpoint is the cause of the transgender movement that we find in our pagan culture.
Today, all right, so I'll give you my thoughts on it, but first let's play a game, okay?
Let's play a game.
So, a believer's baptism, uh, credo Baptist position that there needs to be faith preceding baptism, that we're not baptizing someone into the new covenant and then later trusting that they're going to become internal members of the covenant, they're externally members of the new covenant, receiving external promises and blessings, but they have to internally, um, actually.
Actually, lay hold of those promises through faith, and that will come after.
It'll be a post experience.
So it's baptism first and then faith following baptism.
Well, the believer's baptism, Credo Baptist position, is the opposite that faith comes first, that faith is the door into the new covenant.
So there aren't two tiers of new covenant people with external new covenant people and internal new covenant people.
There's just one new covenant people, and the door is faith.
So, how do you get into the new covenant?
Well, by virtue of being in the new covenant, you have union with Christ.
By the Spirit and the door to union with Christ, being a recipient of the new covenant is faith.
That Christ is the mediator of the new covenant, all of its blessings, all of its promises, and Christ mediates this new covenant by his blood.
So I am a Baptist.
Jesus Purchases New Covenant00:09:37
I agree with Presbyterians on many things.
I frequently upset my Baptist brothers, they feel like I'm too close to being a Presbyterian.
But the reason why I am still a Baptist.
And as far as I can tell, unless God does something radical and changes my mind, I will always be a Baptist, live a Baptist, die a Baptist, is because, well, for one, because I'm a Calvinist.
Okay, and let me clarify that.
This is why it's helpful to have a solo show.
Because Presbyterians are Calvinist, they are reformed in terms of the doctrines of grace, their view of soteriology, all those kinds of things.
But my understanding, I should specify, my understanding of Calvinism, particularly as it pertains to the The third point on the tulip, limited atonement, or maybe better put, definite atonement, meaning that Jesus died for a definitive group of people.
It's not a universal work at Calvary, but rather, no, Jesus did not die for each and every individual, but as the good shepherd, John chapter 10, the shepherd lays his life down for the sheep.
And not everybody is a sheep.
We know that at the end, he will separate the sheep from the goats.
And we also have wolves in sheep's clothing that are not sheep, they are ravenous.
Wolves.
And so the Bible paints its picture with multiple players on the board.
There are sheep, there are goats, there are wolves, there are under shepherds that are also sheep, but there are also elders and leaders in the local church, under shepherds, the chief shepherd being Christ.
Not everybody's a sheep.
And John chapter 10 says that Jesus, he lays his life down.
The good shepherd gives his life not for sheep and goats and wolves and any other animal that might be on the field, but he actually lays his life down, particularly for the sheep.
And so, because of my affirmation of limited atonement, I believe.
That Jesus died to purchase not just salvation, but all the benefits and the promises that accompany salvation, all the promises of the new covenant.
Meaning that Jesus didn't just die so that you could go to heaven to atone for the wrath of God.
He did that.
But in so doing, what that includes is that Jesus died to purchase your regenerate heart.
He died to purchase for you the gifts.
They are not works of men, we don't conjure these things up, but the gifts of faith and repentance.
Jesus died not just for your justification, but to Purchase the work of the Spirit in your life from justification in the realm of sanctification.
Jesus died to purchase, even in glorification, your new resurrected and glorified body that we will one day possess with God in eternity.
Jesus died to purchase all these things.
So the Arminian believes that Jesus died, his death is universal, and what it purchases is a universal potential of salvation.
Jesus died to purchase.
The possibility of salvation for all.
The Calvinist believes Jesus died to purchase the actuality of salvation for some.
So Jesus did not die to purchase the possibility or the offer of salvation for all, but he actually died to purchase the guarantee of salvation for a specific list of names for the new covenant people.
And he is mediating all the promises of the new covenant, which just to list a few, I already said regeneration and faith and repentance, but To put this in scriptural terms, some of the prophecies that we have from Jeremiah or Ezekiel, it says, I will remove the heart of stone and replace it with a heart of flesh.
So that's speaking of regeneration, a heart of flesh that is softened and malleable and receptive to God's word and God's commands and God's truth, his gospel.
But furthermore, we see that, you know, under the Old Covenant, we had the Ten Commandments, they were written on tablets of stone.
And we can also argue, because we know that even in Gentile nations before the coming of Christ, The Ten Commandments, God's moral law, was written not just on tablets of stone, but on the hearts of men.
But the new covenant takes it further and says, I will write my law on your hearts and I will cause you to walk in my ways.
So, not just that you will have an external and even internal sense of God's moral law, the Ten Commandments written on your heart, but I will cause you to obey that law.
I will cause you to walk in my commandments.
Or another one is, I will put the fear of myself within you.
Within you.
We see Israel, you know, surrounding Mount Sinai when God gives.
His law to Moses on tablets of stone, and the mountain trembles and it shakes, and there are flashes of lightning and thunder and smoke, and the people are trembling.
The people are afraid.
But the difference in the new covenant versus the old covenant is that God promises not just externally to do great and marvelous things like the parting of the Red Sea or the angel of death killing the firstborn in Egypt.
These are fearful things, but in the new covenant, God says, I will put the fear of myself within you.
I am going to guarantee that my people fear me.
I'm not just going to write my law on tablets of stone.
It's going to be in your heart.
But furthermore, I'm going to cause you to walk in all my ways.
These are the benefits, as scripture lays it out, of the new covenant.
Now, Jesus is the mediator.
He purchases the new covenant.
We might say it like this this is what Hebrews teaches.
Jesus purchases the new covenant by his death.
Right?
So, Jesus.
His sinless life, fulfilling all righteousness, his life on earth, his earthly ministry, and obeying all the law of God.
I have not come to abolish the law, but to fulfill it.
So Jesus, he didn't just avoid sin.
It's not just mere innocence, but an act of presence of righteousness.
This is the act of obedience of Christ in his substitutionary life, right?
Because Jesus didn't just die in our place, he lived in our place.
In his substitutionary life, through his act of obedience and fulfillment of all righteousness, and in addition to that, his substitutionary death, absorbing the wrath of God for the sheep, for his people.
In these ways, Jesus he purchased the new covenant and all its promises.
But the Bible goes further Jesus did not merely purchase the new covenant, but he rose from the dead bodily on the third day, and not only rose from the dead, but then ascended to heaven at the right hand of the Father, where he is interceding on our behalf.
We have an advocate, a helper who is with us, namely the Holy Spirit sent by the Father and the Son.
But we have actually in Christian thought two advocates we have one that is with Us, namely the Holy Spirit, sent by the Father and the Son, but another advocate who is with the Father, and that is the righteous, the God man, Christ Jesus, at the right hand of the Father.
So Jesus lived and died to purchase the new covenant, but he rose and ascended and lives forevermore at the right hand of the Father to mediate the new covenant, right?
So think of it like UPS, like a package delivery.
Somebody could buy a certain item for you, but it's another step for them to say, I'm going to purchase this item for you on some online store, but then I'm also personally, to ensure it doesn't get lost in the mail with all the shipping chaos, thanks to Joe Biden, I'm not just going to buy this item for you, purchase this item for you, but I'm personally going to deliver it.
Jesus, by his life, namely his act of obedience, his substitutionary life, and his substitutionary death, in those ways, his life and death, he purchases the new covenant and all its promises.
For his people.
But in his resurrection and ascension and living forevermore as a high priest forever in the order of Melchizedek, priest and king, Jesus is not merely purchasing the new covenant, but he is ensuring that he personally will administer the new covenant.
He will mediate it, he will deliver the new covenant.
So he bought it, and he's also the delivery man who is going to deliver the new covenant so that he ensures that not one person misses it.
And so I say all that to say the reason why I'm a Baptist.
Is because the same Jesus who dies for a particular group of people, limited atonement, definite atonement, is the same Jesus who mediates that new covenant.
He doesn't just purchase it in his limited atonement death, but he mediates the new covenant in his intercessory role at the right hand of the Father.
And so for me, the idea that somebody could be in the new covenant that Jesus didn't actually die for, so Jesus purchases the new covenant for this many people.
This is the decretal elect, if we want to use those terms, people who will actually inherit salvation, those who will actually be regenerate at some point.
The decretal elect, the New Covenant People 2.0, these are the ones that Jesus died for.
And he didn't die for anyone outside of that.
If you deny that, then you're not a Calvinist.
And Presbyterians can't deny that and won't deny that because they are Reformed.
And so you have the decretal elect, those that Jesus died for, those that Jesus purchased by his death, the New Covenant for.
But then you have a wider spectrum of new covenant people that Jesus is mediating the new covenant for.
Decretal Elect and Salvation00:16:02
And that's what I struggle with.
Jesus mediates the promises of the new covenant by his blood, the very same blood that he only shed for one group of people, namely those who will be regenerate.
So I don't see one circle, a tighter circle of decretal elect and then a wider circle.
I just see one circle.
And the door in is not baptism, the door in is faith.
And then baptism quickly should follow in obedience to that faith.
So.
There you have it.
That's my Baptist card.
For anybody who's wondering, is Joel going to become a Presbyterian one day?
I don't know what God's going to do.
But as far as I can tell from the scripture, no, I have no plans of changing in my Baptist card for a Presbyterian card.
And that doesn't even get into the issue of polity.
In some ways, I'm even more convictionally persuaded of the Baptist polity, a congregational polity.
So I am thoroughly 1689.
So I say all that to say this, all right?
Now, understanding that the new covenant and covenant theology, a Westminster covenant, Covenantalism, federalism from the Presbyterian side of the aisle, and then understanding the Baptist working of that.
Now, let's play a game.
All right.
So the game goes like this Jason Farley says that the credo Baptist position is the cause of transgenderism.
Essentially, what he's saying is this that a grown adult or a teenager, but somebody who knows what they're doing, it has the cognitive ability to make a decision.
They first make a decision about their internal identity.
I have decided that internally I am not lost, I am found.
I am not dead, I am alive.
I am not a pagan, an enemy of God, but rather I am a friend of God.
I'm an adopted son through Christ Jesus.
I've made an internal decision, a change, a transition about my internal identity, and then I'm going to perform some outward manifestation, some outward demonstration that.
That displays my inward identity shift.
So I'm making an inward decision to shift my identity, to transition my identity inwardly.
And then I'm going to now externally display that through baptism as a sign of faith.
And this faith being displayed through a credible profession of faith.
I am following Jesus.
And so Jason Farley is saying that rhetoric, that doctrine, theology of a credo Baptist position, a believer's baptism, says you make a decision, you wait till somebody's grown and cognitive.
And then they make a decision about their identity internally, and then they do something externally to represent that.
And isn't that just like transgenderism?
You decide on the inside, if you're a man biologically, one day when you're older, you decide on the inside that you're a woman trapped in a man's body, and then you do external things that try to line up with your internal transition in terms of your personal identity, like wearing a dress and wearing makeup or getting surgery, you know, and those kinds of things.
That's Jason Farley's argument.
I get the argument.
Okay, and I'll come back to that in a moment.
I think it's dumb, but I think that there's also a lot that is true, but it has nothing to do with baptism.
So I'll come back to that in a moment.
But the game that I'd like to play is all right, so you could say that grown adults in the pagan culture of America today who transition and embrace the transgender movement, grown men in our culture today who eventually identify internally as women.
And then begin to outwardly manifest that internal identity choice by wearing a dress is caused by the credo Baptist position.
Okay, well, then can we say, if we can do that, here's the game could we say that two parents who have a baby and the baby is not cognitive and not able to make an assessment or a decision about their identity,
these two parents say to that baby and they perform an outward sign, namely, A pedo baptism, an infant baptism that says this baby has the identity of being a new covenant child.
Now, again, I'm a Baptist, okay, so hear me out.
In my Baptist theology, as a credo Baptist, I think Presbyterians are wrong.
So I think that when they say that their child is in the new covenant and not just a seven year old child who may have professed faith in Jesus and may truly be regenerate and born again, but no, a three month old child is now getting a baptism.
And being called, labeled, and externally receiving some kind of external demonstration to line up with this, what they see as a reality.
They're saying, this is a new covenant child.
Now, as a Baptist, I'm going to say, no.
The only door into the new covenant is faith.
And I do believe that God's promises are for us and our children.
I'm not a dispensationalist.
I have a 1689 federalism, a view of a reformed particular Baptist view of the covenant.
So I would hold to covenant.
Theology, not the Westminster expression, but I'm certainly not a dispensationalist.
So I do believe God has promises for our children.
You guys have heard me say, and it was controversial, and lots of my Baptist brothers disagree with me, but I do believe even that my children, I believe it is 100% God's intention to save my kids.
But I'm not saying that my kids come out of the womb regenerate.
I'm not saying that.
And with God saving my kids, one of the big reasons why I say that, just for the record, is because I believe in unconditional election, but not arbitrary election.
And I think Baptists make this mistake.
Let me say that again because you guys probably missed that.
And I think that there's something here.
And we Baptists need to hear, we need to understand this point.
There is a distinction between unconditional election and arbitrary election.
What I mean by that is that if we are truly reformed in our view of salvation, if we are truly Calvinist, then we cannot sever God's predestinated ends from his predestinated means.
And the Bible clearly shows that there are means of grace, there is a means of how God saves people, meaning God saves people unconditionally, yes, yes, but God does not save people arbitrarily.
All right, so God saves through means, and one of the primary means we see in Romans chapter 10 how will they believe unless they hear?
And how will they hear unless someone is preaching to them?
And how will they preach unless they are sent?
And as it is written, blessed are the feet that bring good news.
What we see in Scripture and what we see in experience is that God saves people unconditionally but not arbitrarily.
He saves people who have been under preaching of the gospel.
Now, it's true that there are certain times where God in his mercy and grace may save an individual who only hears the preaching of the gospel once.
But God never saves any individuals apart from the preaching of the gospel.
It is the power of God for salvation.
That's Romans 1 16, right?
We all should be able to agree on this.
So, my position of being hopeful for my children, not believing that my children are born regenerate, but believing that my children are elect and that it is not a matter of if.
So much as it is a matter of simply when, believing 100% that my children, it is the full intention of God to save my children.
Some Baptists, they operate in, and I'm talking about Calvinistic Baptists, they operate in this kind of position of fear.
Like, God may save my kids and he may not.
My kids don't really stand any more chance of being saved than the Muslim kids in some Islamic nation.
And I say, no, that's not, no.
No, I disagree with that.
Because God's salvation is unconditional, but it is not arbitrary.
God saves through the hearing and for them to hear the preaching of his word.
Meaning what?
It means this.
It means that if you are Christian parents and you, by God's grace, it's not your works, God doing this through you, his work in and through you, but by God's grace, if you saturate your home with the preaching of the gospel and catechizing your children, And family worship.
Our family, you guys have heard me talk about family worship.
We do about 30 minutes of family worship in the morning and about 30 minutes of family worship in the evening.
My children, my three year old, has more scripture memorized than most Christian adults that I know.
We are working through catechisms, we're working through the Bible.
And right there, you're going to say, that's not unconditional election, Joel.
You're saying that you can earn the salvation of your children by your good works of Christian parenting.
No, I'm not saying that.
No, I'm saying that yes, unconditional election.
No arbitrary election.
When a person is submersed in the preaching of the word, Romans 10, how will they believe unless they hear?
Well, one surefire way to get to hell is to never hear the gospel.
Now, if someone does hear the gospel, it's not a one to one ratio.
Those who don't hear the gospel always go to hell.
Those who do hear the gospel sometimes go to heaven.
But there is a biblical principle to say that for those who hear the gospel truly, Faithfully, regularly, and who are preserved and protected by the grace of God through good parenting from hearing anti-gospels, enemies of the gospel.
I think there's a lot of Baptist parents who, the reason why they've hopped so on board with this idea of our kids don't stand any more chance of being saved by God than a pagan family's kids on the other side of the world.
You know why Baptists have embraced that?
I'm just going to be real.
I think they've embraced it because most Baptist parents and Presbyterians, for that matter, over the last multiple decades, sent their kids to public school.
And they can't bear the thought that their kids grew up and ultimately denied the faith and that it might be their fault.
Because they want to say, we preach the gospel in our home.
We raise our kids right.
We were Christian.
Did you?
Did you have a nightly and every morning?
Did you have daily family worship in your home?
No, but we took them to church.
Did you?
Or did you send them to a room next to church called children's ministry?
And they were in a separate room and actually never attended the church where the ordinary means of grace were being administered, where the Lord's Supper was being administered, where the preaching of the word was happening.
They were actually in a separate wing of the church called children's ministry, then middle school ministry, then high school ministry.
All the way till they were 18, and all the while not doing family worship in the home and sending them to public school, which is public atheism.
They teach atheism as a worldview.
And then you sent them to a liberal college, and you're saying, you know what?
Unconditional election.
That's where I'm going to hang my hat.
Praise God, I'm a Calvinist, so I can still sleep at night, and I don't actually have to deal with the moral responsibility of the fact that I led my own child to hell.
But you did.
You did.
So, you can say, see, unconditional election.
There are some kids who grew up in a Muslim home and God saved them.
Yes, amen.
Praise God.
And there are some kids who grew up in a Christian home and God didn't save them.
Well, that's where I want to pause for a moment and say, did they really grow up in a Christian home?
The parents might be Christians, but was it a Christian home?
There's the difference between unconditional election and arbitrary election.
All right.
So, all that being said, my point is as a Baptist, I don't believe that my children are born regenerate.
I do, though, even as a Baptist, have the utmost eager and hopeful expectation that my children are elect and that it is simply a matter of when, not a matter of if, that God is going to save my children.
And He is not going to do so arbitrarily.
He is going to do so through my gospel preaching in the home, not because my gospel preaching is a work that merits God's salvation for my kids, but because God saves through means.
And the same God who predestinated the salvation, the End, the salvation of my children, also in his grace predestinated the means that they would be in a Christian home with a father who regularly preaches the gospel.
And all of that, both the end, my children's salvation, and the means, my diligence to lead my family in worship and in the Christian worldview in the gospel, all that being grace.
What I do in preaching the gospel in our home is only because God sovereignly ordained that it would happen by his grace.
So it's not my works earning something, it's God's determinative.
Ends of grace coming about by his determinative means of grace.
Unconditional election, yes.
Arbitrary election, no.
Okay, so back to Jason Farley.
What I would say is this I can make the same argument as a Baptist towards the Pado Baptist.
It goes a little something like this You've got parents who they claim that their child has an identity of being a part of the new covenant, they're a new covenant child.
Now, as a Baptist, as I've thoroughly explained, I don't believe that they are a new covenant child because there's only one door.
And the door is not what parents you are born to.
The door to the new covenant is faith.
So, when a Pado Baptist baptizes their child into the new covenant, I believe that that is not objectively occurring.
They're saying it is.
They're calling their child a new covenant child, and they're giving to their child the new covenant sign, the sign and seal of the new covenant, but they're not actually a new covenant child.
So, how does that relate to transgenderism?
I don't know.
Have you watched the libs of TikTok recently?
Have you watched some of these progressive moms?
It's usually the moms.
Not the dad's.
The dad's still at fault.
He's absent and apathetic.
But these progressive, crazy, liberal moms who have a child, a young child, who has not made a decision that they want to transition in their gender, but they have this little four year old boy, and this mom dresses the boy up in a dress and puts makeup on the boy and tells the boy that he's a girl.
Right?
Well, maybe that's what led to transgenderism.
And I can draw an argument from the Pado Baptist position for that.
You see what I'm saying?
Now, is that my position?
Is my position, is my response to Cross Politic and more particularly Jason Farley to say, Credo Baptist didn't cause transgenderism?
Pado Baptist did.
No, that's not my position.
You know why?
Because I'm not stupid.
By the grace of God, only the grace of God, I'm sure it left to myself.
I'm plenty stupid, but by God's grace, I'm not stupid.
Pado baptism did not cause moms transing their kids.
Adult males to identify internally as a female and then start wearing an outward dress.
Neither of those positions caused transgenderism.
It's just a dumb argument.
It's dumb.
However, in cross politics clarification now, so not the original episode where Jason Farley made his comment that I think was less than wise, I think it was foolish to make that comment, but to cross politics credit, they have followed up on social media, in their Twitter posts, but then also with some recordings.
Revivalism vs Decisionism00:14:59
And clarify their position.
And so I want to be fair to them and give their actual position.
And this is what they have said.
They have said that you're right, it's not really the Baptist position, credo or pedo.
That's not what has caused this transgender movement in our pagan nation today.
But there is something to be said for decisionism, revivalism, Charles Finney, some of these heretical Christian ideas.
Charles Finney was a heretic, by the way.
You can read his systematic theology.
First Great Awakening, Jonathan Edwards, good.
Second Great Awakening with Charles Finney, bad.
And I do think that Charles Finney and his bad theology, Charles Finney, that's where we get the altar call from, right?
So if you grew up in a church, you know, a Baptist church or Presbyterian, but let's be honest, it probably would be Baptist.
And I think this is what Jason Farley's trying to say, although I think he said it poorly.
But Baptist churches that would have an altar call, you know, like right now, who wants to give their life to Christ?
Who wants to make A decision to follow Jesus, to become a new creation, to transition in your identity.
I see that hand, brother.
Come on down the aisle.
We're going to pray for you and you're going to sign a little piece of paper.
And Billy Graham, all the Billy Graham crusades.
Billy Graham, there was some good, but there was also some bad.
And some of the bad in Billy Graham is the outflow of Charles Finney.
Charles Finney, up until that time, the reform position was the dominant position in American Christianity.
Charles Finney pushed.
Vehemently against that.
Charles Finney believed that revival was a work of man rather than a work of God.
Charles Finney said that you can, man can orchestrate revival by simply saying, you know, that's where we get the idea of our church is having a revival service.
What do you mean?
Like, you don't have a revival service.
You just live the Christian life, and God either pours out revival or he doesn't.
But you can't predict.
I mean, that's as silly as some dispensational premillennialist trying to predict the return of Christ and date the return of Christ.
Of Christ.
You can't date a revival.
You can't say, you know, three weeks from now in our tent meeting, God's going to send revival because A plus B plus C equals revival.
And so we're going to do this and we're going to do that and blah, blah, blah.
That's Charles Finney.
And that is, that took root.
This decisionism, the idea of it's less of the object of our faith that saves and more of the size of our faith.
How sincere were you?
How emotional were you?
Did you feel it?
What's your testimony, right?
Somebody who just grew up in the church and doesn't remember a time of rebelling against Christ.
David said, From my mother's breast, I trust you.
Or Polycarp, the disciple of John, 86 years have I served you.
And every biblical commentator says he was only 86 years old.
So he's just saying, I never remember a time that I didn't serve the Lord Jesus Christ.
That testimony, Charles Finney abhorred.
He abhorred.
Instead, what you want is the testimony of a radical transgenderism.
A guy, you know, is wearing a three piece suit one day.
And the next day he walks in in a sundress with a purse and lipstick, right?
Night to day, right?
That's the kind of testimony that you want.
And so it's this inward decision.
It's all about sincerity.
How sincere were you?
It's emotionalism, decisionism, revivalism, that kind of thing.
Now, did that idea have something to do?
Not the primary cause or the only cause, but.
Is it a cause of this inward identity conversation that is going on in our nation that thinks that truth is subjective, that you could have your truth rather than transcendent universal truth, which plays into transgenderism directly?
Can we correlate all of that?
I think we can.
I think there's a point there.
I think we can.
And is it fair to say that Charles Finney has gotten a lot more playtime from the Baptists than the Presbyterians?
That also we can say.
But it's not credo baptism.
It's not the Baptist embrace of the credo Baptist position.
It's the Baptist compromise and sad embrace of Arminianism.
That it's all about an individual's decision.
Make a decision for Christ.
Choose this day whom you will serve.
You make an inward decision to shift inwardly in your identity from an enemy of God to a child of God, and then outwardly.
We'll do a demonstration that reflects that inward decision, namely baptism.
That is not so much about credo versus pedo baptism and when the signs and seals should be administered of the new covenant.
It has far more to do with simply the doctrines of grace and when a person becomes a Christian and how a person becomes a Christian.
Is it a choice of God or is it a choice of man?
Is it a work of God or is it a work of man?
Is it monergism?
That God reaches down and saves, and God alone, it's all of grace.
God gets all the glory because God does all the work.
Or is it Palladianism, man reaching up?
Or is it a mixture of both, synergism?
I think that is the underlining issue, and that is not a pedo or credo Baptist issue.
That is a salvation issue.
Not a debate between the pedo and credo Baptist positions, but a debate between Pelagianism and monergism and also synergism and monergism.
So it's not a Baptist Presbyterian conversation.
I think that's silly.
But there is something to be said for an Arminian Calvinist conversation.
How much weight does an individual have for determining their identity through their own personal choice?
There is something to be said for that.
And it is true that Baptists embraced Arminianism in a way that Presbyterians did not.
And yet, here's the irony, though.
Here's the irony.
The PCA still has revoice.
And I'm not sure if you guys remember this one, but remember the PCUSA?
They're gay.
They're all about transgenderism.
And they're not Baptist.
That's a Presbyterian group.
Now, they've denied the faith.
They've gone apostate.
So, I mean, really, they're a pagan group, but they came from Presbyterianism.
All right.
So, I can show anecdotal evidence on either side.
But really, if I'm just trying to straw man and make an argument, I can come up with more anecdotal evidence, at least recently, from Presbyterians embracing LGBT stuff than I can Baptist.
Now, that said, I can come up with more evidence of Baptists embracing critical race theory than I can Presbyterians.
In a nutshell, you could say the SBC, Resolution 9.
The SBC is racist and the PCA is gay.
But that's a huge generalization that's not particularly helpful.
There's a ton of PCA guys who would say, We hate Revoice.
And there's a ton of guys, well, about half of the SBC guys who would say, We hate critical race theory and Resolution 9.
Okay, so my point in all that is to say I don't think it's credo or pedo baptism that is a cause of transgenderism.
But I do think that deeper than baptism, the signs and seals, salvation itself, soteriology itself, how does God save?
Is it something that man chooses or is it something that God sovereignly ordains?
I think that that does have a role in the way that we view a person's identity, what level of free will and choice a person has.
The nature of truth, our epistemology, these kinds of things, and that does play into this new crazy, you know, live your truth, transgender, LGBT kind of thing.
So, those are my thoughts on Cross Politic.
And that being said, I think, I don't think they worded it quite like I did.
And I like to think that I worded it better.
But Cross Politic has come out and clarified after the fact, saying, yeah, it's less to do with baptism.
And it's more to do with what I've just articulated decisionism, revivalism.
This, you know, man is the master of his own fate.
That epistemology has far more to do with our current cultural moment and its insanity versus the timing of the signs and seals of baptism and when they're applied.
So, cross-policy, everything that I just said, if they listen to this, I was, you know, I texted them this morning.
Let them know that I appreciate them and that I love them.
I'm praying for them.
If they do end up listening to this, I think that they would agree with 98% of the stuff I said, other than the stuff that I said that was explicitly Baptist, because they're not Baptists and they think I'm wrong about that.
But in terms of what they actually meant, I think what they meant was decisionism, not credo baptism.
That said, then it would help next time, brothers, if you say it that way.
And I know it was your guest, but even that, it's the pros and cons, right?
The pros of having.
Four guys at a table together at the same time is you get rowdy fight laugh feast Christianity, which we need.
We need a masculine, rough and tumble, we're going to spar with each other kind of Christianity, and we need that.
But that's the pro.
The con is that sometimes you have to put out some fires because as we're doing the rough and tumble, you know, sparring with our rowdy fight laugh feast Christianity, sometimes, you know, somebody accidentally gets an elbow to the eye.
And right now, a bunch of Baptists.
Feel like they got a black eye from cross-politic and they're upset.
So, I guess the very last thing I'll say is this: to my Baptist brothers and sisters, as we're talking about transgenderism and the whole world becoming gay, let me just give you a pastoral charge.
You also don't be gay.
Seriously, don't be so effeminate.
Don't.
Like, just get over it.
It's not what they meant.
They have clarified.
I'm sure they could apologize better.
I'm sure their clarifications could use clarifications.
But these are good guys.
And right now, what we have going on is a very unique moment where we're finally, after decades, I mean, it's been decades, after decades, we have some reformed Christians who want to apply their theology.
Not just progressives like Tim Keller, and not just pietists like Westminster Escondido, but guys who actually have faithful theology, but also.
Don't want to be pietists and have a privatized lordship of Christ, just, you know, Christianity for the home and the church.
But no, they actually want to apply all of Christ to all of life.
They actually want to have a Christian political understanding, like a doctrine of Christian politics, a doctrine of Christian economics.
They want to take faith, the Christian faith, into the public square and actually disciple not just individuals privately, but nations publicly.
I think that's a good thing.
I'm on that team.
There's a lot of splinters and subdivisions on this team.
I'm not federal vision.
I'm not Presbyterian.
I have plenty of disagreements.
So there are different spots on this team.
We're not all aligned with everything.
But the broad team right now, it's not a Presbyterian team.
It's not a Baptist team.
Presbyterians want to say you can only be on this team.
Like if you were consistent, you would see that a Westminster view of the covenants is absolutely necessary for theonomic thought and blah, blah, blah.
I get it.
I understand what you're saying.
I've looked into it, I'm not persuaded.
Okay.
But here I am.
You may think I'm being inconsistent, but okay, let's view it through your lens.
Here I am inconsistent in my foundational doctrines, but in my life, I want to be obedient to Christ in every single realm of society.
Will you have me on the team?
I think the team's too small to say no.
I think you want me on the team.
And you just made fun of me and every other Baptist.
But I'm not effeminate and gay.
I'm a man.
I can handle it.
And the team's too small.
I think I still want you on the team.
You helped me get on this team.
I learned a ton from you, and I'm not going to be so sensitive.
So we're a small team, guys.
The team of all of Christ for all of life, the team that wants to have public theology, that wants to disciple nations, and the team that believes we can be successful, that the Great Commission will work, this theonomic, post millennial, reformed team.
A lot of people don't like it.
They're not on the team.
That's fine.
They think our team is horrible, blah, blah, blah.
Time will tell.
But for those who are on the team, who are like, yes, reformed, yes, post millennial, yes, theonomic, all of Christ for all of life.
Yeah, there's a sliding scale of how theonomic, and I get that general equity all the way to Rush Dooney.
But in general, I'm on this team of I want to apply all of Christ to all of life, and I think we can be successful post millennial.
I'm reformed, deeply reformed, and covenantal.
This team is a good team, and it's a small team.
And I think the devil would love for this small but very needed team to have a civil war.
And to be at each other's throats.
So, as Doug Wilson would say, don't take the bait.
Jason Farley gave the Baptists some bait.
Baptists, don't take the bait.
Jason Farley, what he said is, well, that's, I don't know, it was dumb.
It was dumb.
But don't take the bait.
They're good guys.
They've clarified what they meant.
I agree with what they meant.
And maybe they'll say it better next time.
Big news, really big news.
Don't Take the Bait00:00:36
Our next Right Response Conference is in the works.
We've got a number of things already lined up.
And organized.
This is what we got so far the whole conference, three days long on post millennialism and theonomy.
And the speakers Dr. James White, Dr. Joseph Boot, Gary DeMar, and of course, yours truly, Pastor Joel Webbin.
We've got a great lineup.
We've got great topics.
If you want to find out dates and location and registration and anything else, go and visit our website, rightresponseconference.com.