A Stand in the Gap Transcript
Host: Hon. Sam Rohrer
Co-host: Dr. Gary Dull
Click HERE for PDF version.
Segment 1:
Sam Rohrer:
Well, today is program number three in our series of 10 programs devoted to identifying God’s roadmap for national blessing. We’re calling this series The 10 Principles to National Renewal, to the renewal of our nation. For our founders, these 10 principles were for a new nation, a vision of a new nation called a shining city on a hill by Governor Bradford in 1631, and in 1682, a holy experiment in self-government by William Penn here in Pennsylvania.
Sam Rohrer:
Our goal in this Monday series is to present both God’s original plan for a blessed nation and a historical review of our founders’ values and convictions regarding God’s principles for national blessing. And with that, I welcome you to Stand in the Gap Today. I’m Sam Rohrer, and I’ll be joined in just a moment by Dr. Gary Dull and evangelist Dave Kistler, both members of our Stand in the Gap Today team and our American Pastors Network leadership team as we today focus on principle number three, the nature of man.
Sam Rohrer:
Now, principle number one, as a bit of review, was the principle of integrity. God says and our founders believed that a just government that led to freedom, life, liberty, and private property, as the signed declaration stated, they said it had to be laid down on the concept of integrity, which by definition means whole or complete based on God’s definition of truth. Integrity, they said, would lead to virtue, which by definition means the voluntary obedience to truth. That’s the Bible.
Sam Rohrer:
Now, starting with this foundation and then building upon it, they believed a new nation could rise and be blessed of God. They cited three pillars of integrity and virtue. The first was that nothing of enduring significance could ever be established without God’s blessing and his direct aid. I took that from the Book of Psalms. Two, They said there had to be a national vision that could pull people altogether, but had to be built on biblical principles and thereby building crew unity.
Sam Rohrer:
And then third, they said there had to be an acknowledgement and an understanding in action with and under a God’s ultimate authority. Now, that was integrity. Now, principle number two, we talked about a week ago in this program was understand the nature and the role of God. The founders believed that there were three pillars of this principle. One, God is sovereign and his will supersedes any design or intent of man. Two, God is creator and sustainer of all things. And then thirdly, God is Supreme authority with government being his idea.
Sam Rohrer:
And then there actually was another one I’ll throw in, God delegated mankind his overseer of creation. Now, that’s principle number two. Together, these two principles lay down the foundation and the premise for building a government of integrity and a government and a nation able to be blessed of God. That’s what our founders wanted. Isn’t that what you and I want it today? Well, that brings us to principle number three, the nature of man.
Sam Rohrer:
Now, from a historical look back, I’d like to read a short portion from William Penn’s Frame of Government in 1682 from which these 10 principles really are embedded. They really describe what is in essence a biblical worldview. There is God. There was a creation, an act of God. There was a fall where sin entered the world precipitated by the devil. And then there is redemption secured by Jesus Christ.
Sam Rohrer:
Let me read, if I could, just a portion from this preamble to Penn’s Frame of Government, which says this, “When the great and wise God had made the world, of all his creatures, it pleased him to choose man as his Deputy to rule it: and to equip him for so great a charge and trust, he did not only qualify him with skill and power, but with integrity to use those skills justly.
Sam Rohrer:
But lust prevailing against duty, made a lamentable breach upon it; and then the law, that before had no power over him, took place upon him, and his disobedient posterity, that such as would not live comfortably with the holy law of God written within, should fall under the proof and the correction of the just law without.”
Sam Rohrer:
And that’s where government comes into the picture. That came from Penn’s Frame of Government from which the other founders referred when other documents of law came about. Now here’s something I want to read to you from Penn’s argument for religious freedom. This was an address that he wrote to Protestants of all persuasions. Interesting. Let me read this quickly for you, and then we’ll get into the balance of the program. These are Penn’s words. “In Christ’s own words, they do plainly teach,” he says, “the son of man is to come to save that which was lost.
Sam Rohrer:
And upon another occasion, he expressed himself to the same purpose in almost the same words, for the son of man has come to seek and to save those who were lost.” Now, Penn says, “Who is this that is lost, but man. And in what sense can man be said to be lost except by sin and disobedience?” He said, “It was the sin and disobedience what’s cast him out of the presence in the garden of God and put him in a condition of eternal misery.” Penn says, “If Christ then came to save lost man, he must be understood to save him from that which puts him in a lost condition.
Sam Rohrer:
And that is sin, for the wages of sin is death, and the servant of sin is a son of perdition.” Penn said, “We must faithfully tell people that he that commits sin is the servant of sin, from which servitude Christ came to save his people and he is called the Savior and the Redeemer.” Penn says to conclude, “Nothing can be more apparent than that freedom from actual sinning and giving newness of life to the souls of men was the great reason for Christ coming. For which he has given us his fullness of grace and truth, grace for grace.
Sam Rohrer:
And that to be under grace and not under the law is not to have the liberty to do which we ought not to have done before or to be excused from former obligations, but to be freed from the condemnation of the law, first through the remission of sins that are passed based on faith and repentance, and next freeing us from that weakness by which we were disabled from keeping God’s law, and in fulfilling the righteousness of it by receiving and obeying the light and the grace that comes through Jesus Christ.”
Sam Rohrer:
Wow! Ladies and gentlemen, did the founders believe in the word of God? Did they understand who God was in his sovereign power? Did they understand the nature of man and that sin came into the world? And did they understand that there was hope through redemption and Jesus Christ who then gives the ability for mankind through integrity to lay down plans and thinking based on God’s word that could possibly lead to a new nation under God, self-government under God, a shining city on a hill, a holy experiment in freedom. All right.
Sam Rohrer:
What I just shared there, you probably heard nowhere else, but this is where the strength comes, part of the 10 principle. When we come back, we’re going to beginning into principle number three, and I’ll bring in Dave and Gary, as we consider that man is a sinner from birth. Yes. The concept of understanding the nature of man.
Segment 2:
Sam Rohrer:
Well, welcome back to Stand in the Gap Today. I’m Sam Rohrer and accompanied today by Gary Dull and Dave Kistler, and this is our third in the series of 10 Principles to National Renewal. You and I both know that in this nation today, this is a nation that’s being ripped apart at its core. Lawlessness is on the streets. Injustice we see in government, as government at all levels attempts to declare to be evil that which is good and to take God’s definition of truth and to define it into something totally opposite. What do we do in days like this?
Sam Rohrer:
Well, that’s what we’re trying to do here and lay out by these 10 principles is really it’s about time to sit down and go back to the basics. When our founders came, there was nothing really to compare against. There was Israel, histories of the world, more of examples of what not to do, but they had God’s word that really said what to do.
Sam Rohrer:
And they said, “We believe what God says. And if we do that, we believe that if we implement principles that God lays out, that possibly we could experience a new nation blessed of God, build on his principles to become a shining city on a hill, a holy experiment in freedom.” But what were those principles? Well, they’re actually contained in a number of places, but I like to go to William Penn’s Frame of Government of 1682 because most are actually found within it. And if not, within his other writings, some of which I’ve laid out today.
Sam Rohrer:
And that’s why our founders, Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson, even referred to Penn as the Father of the Founders, and it was because he really went to the core, to the foundation. We’re talking about 10 principles. Today is number three, the nature of man. Now, following up on the creation of mankind, Adam and Eve, when that happened, the devil we know came enticingly to Eve. He did then just as he does now, he questioned the authority of God and he deceived Eve into thinking that she could become God.
Sam Rohrer:
Well, through the yielding to sin by Adam and Eve, we are told in Romans 5:12 by the Apostle Paul, “Wherefore, as by one man, Adam, sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.” Nevertheless, death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them who had not sinned after the likeness of Adam’s transgression. That’s a little bit from verse 14.
Sam Rohrer:
Well, the understanding of this reality, this truth, is essential to understanding the obstacles to any effort to establish a government of integrity and virtue based on God’s interpretation of truth and justice and mankind’s voluntary submission to God’s laws governing justice and redemption and authority and/or government. Gary, I want to go to you first because this is an astounding thing. Our founders understood it. This is almost a foreign thought today. But in a normal state, mankind’s the center.
Sam Rohrer:
Now, William Penn said this, Gary, and I’ll give one more quote, just a short one, William Penn said this, “He therefore who lives in sin denies Christ by denying the purpose of his coming.” He said, “The fool did not say with his mouth, but he said in his heart, “There is no God.” Can you explain a bit further, Gary, what it means that death passed upon all men for that all have sinned? And what’s it really mean to be a sinner and to have the sentence of death on him as explained in this verse and by Penn and by our founders?
Gary Dull:
Well, Sam, I think that’s a very, very good question. And of course, we’re talking about the study of sin. Hamartiology, I guess, would be the official title that we would give it. The word of God teaches us in Romans 3:23 that all have sinned and come short to the glory of God. In fact, that’s one of the verses that the Lord used through a pastor, Robert Jennings, to preach a message the day that I got saved, July the 17th, 1964, just about 57 years ago now as it were.
Gary Dull:
The fact of the matter is, if we were to go back to Genesis 2-3, we find that God told Adam and Eve that they could partake of all the fruit of all the trees in the garden, except the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. And if they ate at that, they would die. Well, they did partake at that, Eve, and then Adam, and death came upon them. Now, death means separation. And when you study the scripture, you’ll find that there are three aspects of death. Number one, there is the physical death, which is the separation of the body, soul, and spirit.
Gary Dull:
Then there is the spiritual death, which is separation from God in this life. And then there is the eternal death or the second death, which is a separation from God throughout all of eternity. And that death came upon Adam and Eve simply because of the fact that they had violated God’s law. They violated God’s word. They sinned, and they partook of the forbidden fruit. Now, the Bible says, and you quoted Romans 5:12, I’ll read it again, “Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for all have sinned.”
Gary Dull:
The fact of the matter is, Sam, when Adam sinned, we as the human race were in his loins, as it were. He was the human race. When he sinned, he brought sin into the human race. And from that point on, sin has been imputed or placed upon the account of every person who has ever been born. We’re not talking about individual sins, but we are simply talking about the sin nature. Everybody who is born and has been born since the time of Adam and Eve have been born with that sin nature simply because of the fact that when Adam sinned, we were in his loins.
Gary Dull:
And so as a human race, we have taken on that sin nature. That’s what we call imputation. Sin has been placed upon our account, and that’s why it says in Romans 3:23, all have sinned and have come short to the glory of God. But there’s not only what you would call imputation or the fact that sin has been placed upon our account, but there is also a transmission of sin or transmitted sin. And that means that the sin nature is a part of us at the point of birth, but that sin is passed down to us from one generation to another, to another, to another.
Gary Dull:
And that’s what we call transmitted sin. You see, we are all sinners by birth because of that nature of sin, and then we commit individual sins simply because of the fact that we are sinners by nature. I think of what it says over in the Book of Ephesians 2:1. It says, “And you did he quicken or made alive who were dead in trespasses and sins.” And it goes on in verse three and tells us that through our birth, we were by nature the children of wrath even as others simply through that imputation of sin and the transmission of sin from one generation to another.
Sam Rohrer:
Gary, thank you so much. David, it’s a perfect transition to you because I want you to take that, what Gary said, all man sinned. There’s no exception. Everybody’s in this category. Our founders said, “If you don’t understand this fact, this nature of man, there’s no way that you can go ahead and put together anything.” I’m going to ask you at this point why is it critical to understand that since men are all sinners and without redemption incapable of making laws or administering true justice or establishing or maintaining any nation of freedom.
Sam Rohrer:
Put that together about why it’s important that our founders said, “We can’t even get off the ground with a new government, unless we take this into account,” and compare this for instance, to mankind and civilizations generally who don’t believe anything about God or about sin and address it that way. Put some of those together.
Dave Kistler:
Sure, Sam. What Gary was sharing is powerful. I’ve used this illustration many, many times. A dog does not bark and become… A dog barks because it is a dog. It’s characteristic of a dog to bark. Well, we don’t sin, and then that makes us sinners. We sin because we already are a sinner. We were born with a sinful nature. And as Gary so appropriately and powerfully and theologically said, the sin of Adam was passed down to all future generations. Every person born is born with a sinful nature.
Dave Kistler:
Because of that sinful nature, Sam, Jeremiah 17:9 says this, “The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately woefully wicked, who can know it.” Well, if we can’t even know our own hearts, then how under heaven are we going to come up with a frame of government or a system of government from our own minds and from our own hearts that’s going to work, because we’re depraved creatures? Proverbs 14:12 says, “There’s a way that seems right unto a man. But the end thereof are the ways of death.”
Dave Kistler:
And a lot of what we’re watching going on right now in our country, this Marxist push, this Marxist shift, it is an approach that is devoid of God. Because it’s devoid of God, it’s devoid of this component that we’re all sinners, depraved, incapable of coming up with ways that are going to work and that are going to be legitimate justice. We’re left to our own devices. And because our hearts are depraved, those devices are just going to be further and further pushing us toward depravity. We need something outside of us.
Dave Kistler:
It’s called the word of God. The framers and the founders of this country so vehemently believed, William Penn being one of the chief ones. They went to the word of God because he knew God could prescribe an answer and give us the basis for a system of government that would work. But apart from that, Sam, we would be doomed.
Sam Rohrer:
David, apart from that, when it comes to frame of government, what possible frame of government could possibly there be if it’s not built on God’s principles? What are the options?
Dave Kistler:
Well, Sam, we’re watching the options as they unfold right before our very eyes. Marxism is certainly an option, communism is an option, but they’re devoid of God. It is going to be the destruction of our nation if we forget what the founders taught us. Sam, I read a phenomenal article this morning. What you’re doing this morning is so appropriate by talking about these 10 principles, this being principle number three, the nature of man.
Dave Kistler:
There are people that deny, deny that the framers of the constitution and the founders in this country believed the things that you have so clearly laid out. The fact of matter is, they did believe them, and we believe the answer for renewal is what they believed would be the birth of this country to begin with.
Sam Rohrer:
Thank you, Dave and Gary. Ladies and gentlemen, we’re going to continue on in this. When we come back, we’re going to go on another step that the founders did understand. Not only is man a sinner from birth, which is what Gary said, but man is morally corrupt. And that makes a big difference. We have to understand that also.
Segment 3:
As we continue with our focus here today on principle number three, the nature of man, if you’re just joining us, we are in this midst of an 11… Actually it’s 10 principles.
Sam Rohrer:
There’ll be an 11th program that we’ll deal with that’s a part of this series. You can go to our website, standinthegapradio.com, or on your app. You can look it up and you can find it. You’ll find them all under 10 Principles to National Renewal. And then you can easily see there principle number one, two, three, and so forth. These principles, ladies and gentlemen, are principles that our founders identified, discussed, worked through, and carefully applied to their sense of a new nation never having yet been established, what became the United States of America.
Sam Rohrer:
We now sit with challenges to this foundation. Tyranny erupting before our eyes like never before. What do we do? Going to keep running to government for answers? They don’t have it. Where are we going to run? Education doesn’t have it. Most pulpits aren’t preaching it. Where do we go? We better go back to God’s word, and our intention here in this set of these 10 principles is to lay down and identify the foundation identified by our Founding Fathers, our founding pulpits, who preached these principles and were incorporated into what became our very law that we have thrown to the side to our own hurt.
Sam Rohrer:
But if this nation is to be renewed, we better know these 10… That’s why we’re doing this. I encourage you to consider looking at these and looking at these together. It’s quite an education that we’re trying to put out here and information that if it were preached, it would change America. All right, let’s go on here. Man is not only a sinner from birth, but man is morally corrupt. According to the Bible and a biblical worldview, there was a preexistent eternal God, that’s one, then this God created the world and all that’s in it, that’s two.
Sam Rohrer:
Then there was a fall where sin entered the world precipitated by the devil. We’re talking about that aspect of it now. And then finally, there was redemption, a plan for restoration secured by Jesus Christ, and we’ll build that out in the next segment. And while the penalty of sin can be paid through faith in Jesus Christ, we do live in bodies yet unredeemed in an unredeemed world where sin and evil thrives. And we’re the devil like a wolf and like a roaring lion walks about aided by his minions, his demons to attack and work against God’s plan.
Sam Rohrer:
Now, Dave, let me start with you on this regard. Because while people can be redeemed, we know that in born again, that’s what we’re talking about, we still live in the flesh and the flesh is a major problem. I’d like you to build out a little bit about the nature of man in regard to sin and what God says about the heart of man in regard to sin and how this actually sets up a continual battle regardless. Whether we trust Christ as our savior or not, it does set up a continual battle against what God says to do. Can you lay this out a little bit?
Dave Kistler:
Well, yes, Sam, I’ll be glad to. And again, I’m so thankful that you’re dealing with this because this information that was so firmly believed by William Penn, the framers of the constitution, many of the Founding Fathers of our nation is all but lost in the modern world. In fact, the complete antithesis of this truth is being taught in public schools, in colleges, all across the nation that we were founded as a secular nation, when, Sam, that was really not the case. Again, Jeremiah 17:9 says this about the heart of man. The heart is deceitful above all things.
Dave Kistler:
Now the scripture says there’s a lot of things that are deceitful. Favor is deceitful. Beauty is deceitful. Riches are deceitful. But above any of those things, the human heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked, woefully sick or woefully corrupt. And then in Matthew 15, Jesus was conversing with his disciples and some were saying, “Hey, Jesus, why do your disciples not wash their hands appropriately ceremonially before they eat?” And Jesus addressed that and said, “Look, it’s not what a man takes from outside that corrupts him.”
Dave Kistler:
He says, “Corruption comes from the inside.” And according to Matthew 15:19, Jesus said, “For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornication, thefts, false witness, blasphemies, and on and on.” The problem, Sam, even though we can be forgiven of our sin and redeemed, we still live in a sinful body that is plagued and pulled down constantly by the sin that affects it and the sin that affects our world. We’re dealing all the time with all of these things that the flesh wants to do.
Dave Kistler:
In Romans 7, Paul said, “Look, I know what is the right thing to do, and I know what I should do, but sin that is present with me in my sinful flesh constantly wars against the law of my mind and is trying to bring me into captivity to sin, which is in my members, my physical members.” Sam, that is the struggle that we all have. The framers of our constitution, the founders of our country understood it. William Penn encapsulated it in a powerful way.
Dave Kistler:
We understood that once again today, it we changed everything as far as how we approach government and the function of government.
Sam Rohrer:
Well, it absolutely does, Dave, and we’ll talk about that, ladies and gentlemen, more because, see, this concept and what I’m going to go to Gary with next about what do we do, how do we handle this, even if we trust Christ as our savior and become redeemed. As Dave just said, we still struggle with sin and it’s deceiving. And don’t we live in a deceptive world today. Wow! This is a battle that’s going on. We see it battling out itself in matters of policy and laws, but the battle starts within our heart. We have to understand this or we can not survive or live victoriously.
Sam Rohrer:
But, Gary, everybody want to go to you, because we’ll talk about the law and the purpose of government, because God links these and he puts them in place for our benefit, but it’s because we’ve got this thing called sin that’s in our hearts and it’s competing against the holiness of God. Gary, I’d like you to explain here in this segment a little bit more here, if you could, that even though we have a redeemed heart, we trust Jesus Christ as our savior, as Dave said in the verses he gave, we still battle the flesh in our hearts.
Sam Rohrer:
Everybody listening to me right now knows exactly what I’m talking about. We’re tempted all the time to sin, because we’re in an evil world. We have an evil heart. It comes out of our heart. But God does give us a prescription for victory, does he not, Gary? And we’ll talk about the redemption part next segment, but build it out a little bit. Assuming a person has trusted Christ as their savior and we’re in this battle, lay out what the scripture tells us is the way for a successful, victorious living where we don’t have to be giving in and controlled by sin.
Gary Dull:
Sam, this is good stuff as it relates both to the government, to the society, and to the individual Christian. I would encourage everybody in light of what we are talking about the day to do some studies from Romans 3-7 and, of course, Brother Dave mentioned Romans 7. Paul was struggling with the flesh and he said there in verse 24, “Oh, wretched man that I am. Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” In other words, we look at Paul as being a super spiritual Christian probably, but he fought temptation.
Gary Dull:
He thought sin, just like you and I do. Earlier on though, in Romans 6, for instance, the Apostle Paul laid down for us what I believe to be one of the keys in overcoming sin in our lives, where he says in verses 12 and 13, “Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof. Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God.” What he was saying there is basically this, don’t yield over to sinful ways, sinful actions, sinful temptations in your life.
Gary Dull:
Don’t yield the instruments of your body to those things. Yield your body to the Lord. Now, somebody is going to say, “How in the world do we do that?” Well, follow with me here, folks, and listen carefully. When you go to the Book of Titus 2:11-12, it says, For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, teaching us that, look at us, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world.”
Gary Dull:
Here’s the point, even though we have that sin nature that we need to deal with, because it will never be completely eradicated until we see the Lord, it is there. It’s that law that Paul talked about in Romans 7 that is working within us to get us to go against the will of God. Well, in light of that, God has given us his grace. So often we sing about God’s grace, we talk about God’s grace, but you see, Titus 2 teaches us basically that through the grace of God, salvation is extended to all people.
Gary Dull:
Through the grace of God, all people can be saved, but also it is the grace of God that teaches us how, as it says there in verse 12, to live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world. God has given us his grace, not only for salvation, but for sanctification and service. How is it then that we become recipients of that grace after we’ve been saved in our individual Christian life so that we might have victory over sin? Well, that goes back to the Book of Galatians, Galatians 5.
Gary Dull:
By God’s grace, he has given to us his Holy Spirit that we might be able to live a victorious life. In Galatians 5:16, he says, “This I say then, walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lust against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would.” There is that battle that is going on in our lives day by day, sometimes moment by moment. By God’s grace, we can overcome that if we yield ourselves to the spirit of God.
Gary Dull:
Walk in the spirit. What does that mean? It means to say yes to God’s word, no to sin. When we do that, God’s grace strengthens us to have victory over sin.
Sam Rohrer:
Gary and Dave, thank you so much. But ladies and gentlemen, when’s the last time you heard some clear teaching like that? You never hear it in their public schools. Dave talked about that. It’s not on our universities. It’s not coming from positions of government. Sadly, it’s not even coming from most pulpits of America, yet this is exactly what God says. Understood and responded to, God can renew our nation.
Segment 4:
Sam Rohrer:
In this final segment, we’re going to go more into detail on what is, in fact, the fourth leg or the fourth piece of what is, in fact, a true biblical worldview. All of what we have shared today comes right off the pages, all of these elements can be identified within a singular place that I’m pulling a lot from is William Penn’s Frame of Government of 1682.
Sam Rohrer:
But because of the nature of that document and the impact upon the broader breadth of founders and those who came thereafter and became the 56 signers of the declaration, a couple of whom referred to Penn as the Father of the Founders, it was because of the work that he had done in laying down this foundation. There is God. There was creation, an act of God. Then there was a fall where sin entered the world precipitated by the devil. That’s our focus today, understand the nature of man.
Sam Rohrer:
Because if that is not understood, if you think that man is naturally good, you’ll end up in tyranny. You’ll never end up with a representative republic such as ours or our constitution or our declaration of independence. It is impossible. You end up in tyranny. You end up with Marxism, socialism, or the Caesarism of the years gone by, or whatever it may be, but it’s certainly not liberty and freedom. The last step is redemption.
Sam Rohrer:
One distinctive about a biblical worldview in Christianity is that even though there is great evil all around us and from within our heart comes sin that is a continual battle, and we’ve talked about that, there is victory. There is redemption. In Genesis 3:15, God promised justice in his plan of redemption immediately following the fall, where sin entered the world and death passed upon all men. And he said then, in 3:15, “I will put enmity between the Satan.” He said, “All right, I’m going to do this. You came and you tempted Eve and Adam and trying to mess up my creation.
Sam Rohrer:
I’m going to put enmity, a division between you, Satan, and the woman, Eve. And it shall bruise thy head and thou shall bruise his heel.” That’s referring to Jesus Christ. Dave, let me come back and ask you to build this out. Explain in simple terms, if you could, Dave, what is meant by redemption? I described it a little bit, but what is meant by redemption? And why and how did God provide it?
Sam Rohrer:
And why when we understand this, that the prayers and the efforts of our founders and us today, that there could actually be a nation blessed of God that could be started from nothing, as our founders did? And why even now, if we re-embrace these principles, our nation actually can be renewed?
Dave Kistler:
Well, Sam, let me start with the definition of redemption. If you were to look up the word redeem or redemption in a dictionary, you would get something like this, the act of saving or being saved from sin, error, or evil. That’s a good definition, but that’s a dictionary definition. The word redemption in the scripture actually refers to the regaining or the gaining possession of something in exchange for payment. Kind of a thumbnail definition of redemption is to buy back. Why is redemption a buying back?
Dave Kistler:
Well, it goes back to an understanding of what you just cited in Genesis 3:15. Adam and Eve, the first two of God’s creation, the human beings created, they made a deliberate choice to disobey God. They took a forbidden fruit and they sinned against the Almighty God. As a result of that, they plunged the entire human race into sin. To provide a way out, for man to be bought back, if you will, from the slave market of sin, then one who was sinless had to come as our substitute. And that person was Jesus Christ. The sinless one died for us sinners, that he might make payment for us.
Dave Kistler:
And there comes the concept of redemption. That is found very clearly, 1 Corinthians 15:22, where the scripture says, “For as in Adam, all die.” Adam and Eve plunged us into sin. Even so in Christ shall all be made alive. In various places in the New Testament, Jesus Christ is referred to as the second Adam. Adam, the first Adam, plunged us into sin. Jesus, the second Adam, dying in a sinless state for our sin, taking our sin upon himself, provided redemption and bought us back from the bondage of sin and death and hell and all that was associated with it.
Dave Kistler:
Sam, if we once again understood this in the United States of America, again, you’ve said it so powerfully, it would affect everything. You cannot come to any other conclusion other than tyranny if you expel God and these fundamental elements of a biblical worldview, which the founders of this country understood. If you take that out, you’re going to end up at an incredibly bad place, and that’s where we’re headed right now.
Sam Rohrer:
Ladies and gentlemen, again, we’re laying out what God says, what our founders identified. We got to take the time to think it through. They did, and so must we, because every one of us have a choice. We can choose. Well, I believe what I’m hearing today on this program, or you’re going to say, “This is nonsense.” Well, if you say it’s nonsense, then you’re telling God that he’s a liar. I don’t want to do that. I hope you don’t either. I’m going to finish with a quote here from William Penn.
Sam Rohrer:
Again, this document, this treatise he sent out to all Protestants, as he termed it, in the defense of religious liberty. Listen to this. Penn said this, “Would to God that people consider what they pray for. They ask and neglect and revile the substance of their own prayers. That prayer being thy kingdom come, thy will be done.” Penn said, “They actually don’t believe either one of them.” He said, “It was the office God designed his son to, what he designed him to do.” He said, “The thief, Christ says, does not come, but to kill and to steal and to destroy.
Sam Rohrer:
And that is to steal away the heart from God and to kill and destroy all good desires and inclinations of the soul, for the devil is the thief and the destroyer. But I am come, says Christ,” this is Penn saying this, “that you might have life and that you might have it more abundantly. Again, oh, death. I will be the death. I will kill you which killed the soul of man. I will breathe the breath of life into it again. And by my spirit and grace, I will beget holy motions and kindle heavenly desires after God, after the kingdom of God and the righteousness thereof.”
Sam Rohrer:
And Penn goes on and said, “This is the newness of life. And I will not only restore that life the soul has lost, but I will increase it. I will add to it that it may have life more abundantly, more power and strength to resist evil, and embrace and delight in that which is of good. Indeed, Jesus was anointed of God for this purpose and is therefore called the restorer of paths, the repairer of breaches, and the builder up of waste places. That is he, Jesus Christ, ordained of God for the recovery of man from his fallen and disobedient state.
Sam Rohrer:
This is the reason for his name. Thou shalt call his name Jesus, said the angel, for he shall save his people from their sins.” Ladies and gentlemen, do you think our founders were secular individuals who had no respect for God? I think our founders were some of the best preachers that we probably have today. Gary, I’d like you to close the program in learning moments, any comment you may have, and then close this in prayer please today.
Gary Dull:
Well, I’m just certainly thankful for redemption. It was interesting. As Brother Dave was talking and brought up versus, those same verses came into my mind. I’m thankful for Ephesians 1:7 as it relates to Christ in whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our sins according to the riches of his grace. Our founders recognized that, they knew that. That’s why our nation is a nation that preaches and teaches freedom. And Father, I thank you for the fact that we have been founded on biblical truth in this country.
Gary Dull:
It’s up to us to live out that biblical truth today, Lord. Give us the strength to do it. In Jesus name, amen.
Sam Rohrer:
Amen. Amen. Thank you, Gary and Dave. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for being with us today. I hope that this program and in continuation with the others can be used of God to really revive your hearts and to restore your faith in God. If it’s not there, place it there. But then after that, that we’re more than conquerors through him who loved us. Let’s get out there and stand in the gap for truth. See you here tomorrow.
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