Are we going to have a question and answer session now? Yeah, we are. OK. I guess I'll stay up here then. Yeah. If we don't have a mic to put down. All right. We're going to take a few moments to do some questions and answers. Sir, catch that? Thank you. Good. Do some questions and answers for our two guest speakers today. And any questions you've got, if you've got a big, booming voice, We'll get it on tape if they come to the microphone. So we prefer if you come to the microphone. If you don't want to, you can stay in the seat and ask a question. You can direct either of these two gentlemen, or if you have a question for Dr. Walker, who's here, you can ask him as well. Yes. Yeah, I can probably, Michael probably picked me up from here. In regard to the themes we've been talking about, what do you see as the duties of a congregation which is oriented around foreign language services. There are many such congregations now in America, and probably more than a few that might regard maintenance of their ethnic identity as part of their mission, although they might not admit that. that certain people would say, well, they should just learn English. That, of course, seems to exclude diversity as well, so there's a little conundrum there. I'll try to speak to that. I did an internship when I was in seminary at a Chinese church. And it was a great experience because I got a chance to see what some of the issues were in that community. And it was issues, intergenerational issues, issues of culture, and perception that the function of the gospel was part and parcel to preserve that particular culture, especially here in American soil against American evils. And it was interesting and helpful for me to see that. I think that, in my view, language really is probably one of the only things that justifies a monocultural ministry. But I say that this way, that obviously if you are segregated from those around you by language, then you're going to have a certain dynamic that creeps into your worship, into the ethos of your church. Yes. But does that mean that the gospel message itself, the great commission, the great themes of the Bible about God's heart from the nation should be any less prominent just because your service happens to be in another language? And to that I say no. And so what has to happen is, even though you may end up on American soil or in any other country speaking another language, and that poses some difficulties, you still have an obligation to preach the gospel the way it actually is. And that is that God has a heart for the nations. He has commissioned his people to go to the nations. And he is relentless in bringing the nations to himself. And so the question becomes, is it legitimate to communicate anything less than that? And I would say that we never have any justification for that. So that the gospel should be able to run into a culture that speaks another language and it should produce a missions movement, a church planning ethos in that culture too that should take shape along their own travel lines, their own sort of. lines of affiliation to various cultures that they happen to be in contact with. And that leaves the church free, really, to spread in places where maybe American Christianity, because of historical accidents or political accidents, might have difficulty going. Countries like Saudi Arabia and Pakistan and places like those. Yes. Particularly in black churches, do you find it difficult to use the term Calvinism versus Arminianism or dispensationalism in your congregations, is that a real turn off to most of the members of the people that are participants in your church? It sure isn't white churches. I mean particularly because that's a term that they are perhaps not familiar with. Let me see if I can speak to that issue. Most of the students who come to my classes in New York that I teach when the semesters start out, come in, or many are dispensationalists. And what I do is challenge them on the basis of the scriptures. I don't mention Calvinism. I don't mention Reformed theology. I open up the Bible to them. When someone comes in who is having a problem with election What I do is try to explain to them biblically that God is sovereign over everything. And if he is sovereign over everything, then election is one of the most glorious doctrines in the Bible. But I don't do it from the context of the five points of Calvinism or mentioning Reformed theology. I just teach what's in the Bible. And that's all Calvinism and Reformed theology is. Just a follow-up to that, if I may. I have to answer it in two ways. One, I agree. I mean, that's the starting place. I don't think that in any circumstance is necessary helpful to take terms outside of the Bible. I used to teach classes at Augusta School of Biblical Studies in Augusta. And most of the pastors that attended, they were not people with you know, high-level educational background. There were people who were, you know, storefront churches. And I remember, I used to be putting concepts on the board and I'd get someone who'd say, is that Calvinism? You know, like it was a bad thing. And I used to just say to him, I said, I had him trained after a while. I said, class, what is he really asking? He's asking, is it biblical? Is that what you're asking? Yeah, is it biblical? Yes, it's biblical. Now, now, now, now, having said that, having said that though, Audemey wants to say this, that, you know, from the church's perspective, I mean, I think we have to recognize that nobody knows any of the terms that relate to Christianity walking through the door. They never have, whether you're black or white or anything else. It's always been the church's responsibility to teach them that. In that context, having set a sort of expectation that what we're doing is biblical, I don't start with Calvinism, Arminianism, dispensationalism, covenant theology. I start with the doctrines of the Bible. I take words that relate to themes of sovereignty, themes of justification, sanctification, put those concepts out there so they see that I'm getting from the Bible. Then in that context, I think they love, really, now, for you to take it and put it into a historical context to say, well, here's how this has actually worked itself out in the history of the church. Here's varying views and why they hold them. And here's why, personally, I don't hold that view, and you'll never catch me teaching that view. And I have found that if you do it that way, it's not a problem, that they appreciate somebody who actually is going to care enough about them to really want to give them not just a sort of pigeonhole approach to theology, but to really try to develop them and educate them. I think there's no resistance to that. There's none. There's a great appreciation for it if we take the right approach, is what I would say. One question that came to my mind as you were speaking is how can we translate this into practice? And when you start with an integrated church, which I believe is what you did from the beginning, seems to be a workable situation. But when you start with a white church or a black church and you try to integrate from that standpoint, it's very difficult and challenging. So I guess the question that I have is maybe the steps that we need to take is further along the lines at least of cooperation, that maybe that's something at least we can attain to right now. What would you speak to? Do you have to start with an integrated church? How can you move from a non-integrated church to an integrated church? Maybe that's too big of a question. Or what are steps of cooperation? In other words, what do you do if you start a group of 50 uptight white people? Exactly. I can tell you what I have done about that, and my brother can respond also. We have, in our church, a worship format that is biblical. And from time to time, I explain why we are doing what we are doing. And that is a tremendous help to people. I remember when I was on the radio, I used to get people calling me, asking me, why did we recite the Apostles' Creed and say that we believe in the Catholic Church? Well, many people did not know that we are not professing belief in the Roman Catholic Church, but in the Catholic Church. The word means universal. It does not mean that, you know, because the Roman Catholics have taken the word, that it means Roman Catholic. It just means universal. And I used to explain that over and over again. I also explain to the people why our worship format is the way it is. And that, I found that to be very helpful too. And even now, from time to time, I go back and re-explain what we are doing in our worship service and why. I'll probably take some aspects of different approach, but let me just say this. First of all, I don't really view myself as having started with an integrated church. We had a couple of African American families, but when they called me, the church was predominantly Anglo to the tune of probably 90-95% in reality. That was the situation. I do have some, I think, fairly developed thoughts in terms of where you go once you are sort of down the road and you've got what appears to everyone to be cement poured around you. I would say this, first of all, you have to raise, and this was one of the things I think I was really trying to communicate today in the lecture, raise the themes that the Bible raises. You want to be biblical. So don't permit yourself to preach an ah, cultural gospel, but preach the gospel inseparable from God's heart for the nations. That, I mean, that's first and foremost, so that you really delight to grab those themes and it's not a stretch for you to do it because you really are seeing them everywhere. And let me tell you, they are everywhere. They're everywhere. The problem's not finding them. It's an embarrassment of riches. They are everywhere in the Old Testament and in the New Testament. Once you make that linkage with the Abrahamic covenant, it's everywhere. And you don't find it being mentioned apart from the nation, so that gives you all of the biblical warrant you could ever want. And then I think what you have to do is you've got to teach and communicate to people that it is not something that is complex. It is not. People want to make it complex, but it is not complex. It is a very simple sociological factor that comes to play here, i.e., the church on Sunday morning looks exactly like the lives of the people Monday through Saturday. It's not more complex than that. Sometimes people say, well, do we have to change our style of worship? Do we have to change the songs we sing? Do we have to change the musical instruments we use? And I would probably differ from my colleague here by saying, I think that you ought to consider doing some of that. But is that really the answer? No. I'll tell you what it is. It is when the gospel grips your heart and you see that that's what God actually wants. And you begin to cross those lines as individual members of the congregation because you personally take it. You're friends with somebody, they eat at your house, your kids play together, you care about them, they care about you. They don't care what kind of song you sing because if they're not converted, they don't know what you sing anyway. They don't have any expectations. They don't know contemporary, traditional, white, black, Hispanic, they don't know any of it. They learn it all when they come. And so they will come if you're in their life at a personal level. And they won't bring that kind of baggage to the church. They won't. They won't care. So what you've got to do is preach the gospel in a way that grips the people's hearts. You've got to persuade them of their need now really to believe the gospel on that level and then to take it into their daily lives. Help them do that. And it won't happen overnight, but it will begin to happen. And then what I think you ought to do is you have to really take the plunge and diversify your leadership as soon as you possibly can. I'll tell you why I say that. I say that because if you're from another culture, let's just say in your church it's all one culture. If you don't diversify the front of the room, the leadership, When another culture stands in the back, here's what they're forced to conclude. These are nice people. They're certainly kind enough. But they'll never let me be a leader here. They'll never let me actually exercise my gifts here. They won't sing my songs. And so you diversify the front of the room as soon as you can, and you get rid of that. You just remove that barrier. And I could say a couple of other things, but I'll stop there because I don't want to talk forever. But those are some things I think that you do that, concrete steps anybody can take. And you look a year down the road, two years down the road, and you'll be well on your way. The church will look very, very different. I'm convinced that that's the case. I appreciate both their experiences and observations. San Francisco area. I'm a pastor in San Francisco. 11 years and a start of work. We are a Reformed Baptist construct. We are a multi-ethnic church as well. We have about 300 people. I'm a pastor. We started off with 35 people. 90% were Caucasian. And we went through all of the struggles as people came in with whether or not we would change music styles and all of that. And it was a real tense issue because you can make some horrible mistakes if you do that. It didn't change anything. If you guys came to our church, we worship just like this. And it's multi-ethnic. Where I have been very much concerned is with my past colleagues who are primarily Caucasian in the East Bay who have recognized this concern of you know, segregation, or their churches being primarily Caucasian. And we talked about the need for their churches to experience integration since it's a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural area. I was very saddened after a period of discussions with about 15 pastors that when I gave them the opportunity as congregations to join me in a conference time, I sent out invitations to about 15 pastors. I think one pastor showed up with his congregation, and it dawned on me that there was a great fear possibly for those congregations to tell parts of their congregation to come and be involved in an integrated work on a multi-congregation level. So for me, one of the thoughts I've been concerned with is, How do you, not so far as a local church is concerned, where you have the blessing, as Pastor Cameron was saying, of a multi-ethnic church, but how do you get many churches to relate to each other in order to affect this multi-ethnic dynamic when in those churches it's mono-ethnic? What kind of agenda would you implement to help and churches of the same theological reform Calvinist persuasion? Well, I think in response to the issue that you raise, we should insist on the members of our churches getting active and carrying out the Great Commission to preach the gospel across the board. And I think that that's the solution to the problem. That may seem like a simplistic answer, but it's a biblical answer. Go ye therefore into all the world and preach the gospel. And if you're doing that faithfully and consistently, then these barriers will start to fall down, I think. I was thinking President Bush talked about a coalition of the willing. And I think that you have to work with people who really have a mind and heart for it. I mean, I can tell you in my own life, I have conversations with tons and tons of people, but once I discern that there really is not a will to do it, I'm not going to spend a lot of energy, because I've got things to do. But having said that, if you've got 300 people, I would say to you, you could zero in on some of those zip codes, take maybe two groups of 75 and plant them somewhere else. with the goal of them planning a church a couple of years down the road and before you know it that uh... fellowship that you have now becomes five churches in a month. Well our intention is to multiply in that fashion for us locally but I've been concerned about the constituent of pastors that I associate in Whitfield fraternities and just fellowships in general who are caucasian have a primarily caucasian reform situation and yet they have not been able to break the barrier within their own ranks to experience the multi-ethnic diversity. And what I would say there is two things. One, there are some who will work with them. And then I would say that you're free always to create a fellowship of your own. I mean, I've been a part of some of those things and, you know, I mean, I go once or twice. And if I discern that there is no will, really, to have an agenda that's impacted by people who are not from that group, I'm moving on. I'm not going to waste my time. I love them in the Lord. I'll encourage them. And I talk about what I talk about when I'm around. But I'm not going to kill myself now while you've got your own congregation and people that need your love and time and attention and prayers. I'm not gonna kill myself over that issue with people who ain't gonna do it anyway.