Why the Reformation Must Be Remembered

Why the Reformation must be remembered. That is a topic we'll discuss today right here on the Christian Worldview radio program, where the mission is to sharpen the biblical worldview of Christians and to proclaim the good news of Jesus Christ. I'm David Wheaton, the host, and our website is thechristianworldview.org. Thanks for joining us today, and also a thank you to our national sponsor Samaritan Ministries, who provide a biblical solution to healthcare as a community of Christians of which we are members pay one another's medical bills. Again, you can find out more at our website thechristianworldview.org. Now, we know the darkness the world celebrates each year on October 31st.

You know what that day is. But it's disconcerting that the day passes with most Protestant churches generally, and evangelical churches specifically, devoting little or no time commemorating and teaching about something far more momentous, which took place on that day in the year 1517. That's when Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses document on the door of All Saints Church in Wittenberg, Germany, to protest errant doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church. That document ignited a fire that became the Protestant Reformation, an era lasting more than 100 years and impacting, well, everything from clarifying biblical doctrines to reforming the church to the future of nations, all the way to the formation of our own country, the United States of America. It would be hard to overstate the importance of the Reformation. So, this weekend on The Christian Real View, we will hear a portion of a message by Dr. Stephen Lawson about the Reformation and also speak with Mike Gendron of proclaiming the gospel ministry about the current Pope Francis, his beliefs, and his recent meeting with President Biden. Now, we wanted to spend some time last week on the Reformation over the weekend when October 31st occurred, but we had part two of the program getting a COVID exemption. We felt an urgency to do that, as many listeners needed information about submitting a vaccine exemption letter with deadlines coming up with their companies.

But we didn't want to forget what took place on October 31st in the year 1517. Now, Stephen Lawson, I call him a preacher to preachers. He was a former pastor, but now he really focuses on teaching expository preaching to pastors through his ministry, One Passion Ministries. He is, in my opinion, one of the world's foremost experts on the Reformation. He's written many books on the key figures of the Reformation, and he gave the message that we're about to hear—this is just a portion of it—to a weekly Bible study that he does on Thursday mornings in Dallas, Texas.

It's both an in-person Bible study, and you can also watch it online as well by going to Steve Lawson's Facebook page. He gives a brief overview of what the Reformation was and how it started and its impact. So if you know nothing or very little about the Reformation, this will be extremely helpful. And if you know a lot about it, this will be a good reminder, because the Bible is full of reminders. We forget and need to be reminded of this momentous era in human history.

We chose about 19 minutes of this message by Steve Lawson. So I'd like you to listen carefully and consider how seriously these Reformers revered God's Word and the resulting impact that these men, over this period of time, made on not only history then, but the future that we're living in now. And then think about whether your local church gave ample treatment to the Reformation, and if they didn't, I would encourage you to ask them to do that. Here is Pastor Stephen Lawson speaking about the Reformation. Because it was on that day, October 31st, 1517, that a Bible professor in Wittenberg, Germany, named Martin Luther, nailed to the front door of the Castle Church 95 theses. They were statements of protest against the Roman Catholic Church for the direction it was headed away from the Word of God. There had been a man going through Saxony, which is Germany, named Tetzel, who was selling indulgences. And indulgence is pardon for sin. And he had been sent out by the Pope to raise as much money as he could to pad their coffers in Rome and to upgrade the Vatican and to build bigger barns.

And so Tetzel was going through Germany in a grand triumph into cities. There was a wagon that had stacked up indulgences. There would be a trumpet that would be blown. There was a cross that would precede it. And on a velvet, purple velvet cushion would be some of these indulgences.

They would go into a town, they would set up a platform, and they would gather as many people around them as possible. And Tetzel would say, can you not hear the groans and the moans of your parents in purgatory? Purgatory was, in the minds of the Roman Catholic Church, a halfway house between heaven and hell.

It has no basis in reality, has no basis in Scripture, zero. A person would go to purgatory because they weren't quite yet there all the way to working their way to heaven. And so they would be in purgatory, and they'd have to be there and suffer and have certain sins burned out of them, purged out of them.

So Tetzel would say, can you not hear the groans and the moans of your parents, your loved ones, in purgatory? Think about what all they did for you. They brought you into this world. They cared for you. They loved you.

They clothed you. And yet you care not for them. You hear their suffering, and yet you choose to keep your money to yourself. This is an opportunity for you to buy their deliverance out of purgatory, and you could put your parents into heaven now. Who's first to stand in line and buy forgiveness of sin?

Just going to jump in here for a second. You're listening to the Christian Reel of your radio program and Steve Lawson talking about the Reformation. And what he was just talking about there sounds like the health, wealth, and prosperity movement today. Just send your money and you will be healed or you will be successful and prosperous. Well, back then they were saying, give your money and we will get your dead relatives out of purgatory and get them to heaven. What a lie based on the false doctrine of purgatory. And these were poor people at this time.

There's basically no middle class. You were either royalty and at the top, or you were just in lower class and you would be a blacksmith. You would raise oxen, you would make shoes, and they would dig down deep in their pocket and give their last scent to Tetzel. And he had a famous saying, as soon as the coin drops into the coffer, a soul from purgatory springs. Well, Luther got word of this and it infuriated him. Luther was not yet converted. He was still a part of this Roman Catholic monolithic system of a works righteousness, that you have to work your way to heaven.

But Luther could smell a rat a mile off. And when he heard of this, he really went into a righteous indignation. And he wrote out these 95 theses. He did not yet understand the gospel, but yet theses number 62 was the only true treasure of the church is the one holy gospel of Jesus Christ.

And others said that the Pope has no authority to forgive sin. So when he nailed those 95 theses, he meant to have a public debate. He meant simply, he was a professor of Bible at the University of Wittenberg. He simply wanted others to enter into a public debate to expose the fallacies of selling forgiveness of sin for money on the open market.

Well, his students took it down, took down the 95 theses and went to a printer and had hundreds of copies made. And these began to be distributed throughout Germany and unknown to Luther, the battle has been joined. It would be two years later in 1519 in the very same church, it's called the Castle Church. Luther principally preached at another church, which is only like two blocks away. But the Castle Church is the larger, more visible, imposing church. And to this day, he's buried, Luther is buried under that pulpit.

I've been there many times. There's a tower that goes up in the Castle Church. And Luther was there by himself in this tower, in this tower, meditating and studying the Bible. He was professor of Bible.

And he had taught through Psalms, Romans, Galatians, and Hebrews over the course of four, five, six years. And he's meditating on Romans 1, verse 17. Let me back up to verse 16.

For I'm not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. Now, verse 17, this is the pivotal text. For in it, and the it refers to the gospel, the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith. For it is written, the righteous man shall live by faith.

Luther, towards the end of his life, reflected upon what took place in that tower. And he said, I hated that word righteousness. And I hated the God of righteousness because I cannot meet the standard. And there is an aspect of the righteousness of God that punishes sin.

There is a positive side that rewards obedience. Luther was locked in on the retribution side of righteousness, the justice of God. And he was in turmoil, and he actually said, my soul is in turmoil because of the righteousness of God. Why can't God just let me go to hell and peace? Why does he have to torment me throughout this whole life knowing I cannot meet the standard and that I am justly to be damned?

Just another quick interjection. This is the point one needs to be to be saved, though, to realize one is a sinner and that one can't do enough righteousness to be made right with God. The Christian Worldview with David Wheaton returns in just a moment. Psalm 46 starts, God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore, we will not fear, though the earth should change. The earth is changing.

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Now, back to today's program with host David Wheaton. Luther is in a helpless state here, and it's at this point, this low point, that God saves him. And then it was like a ray of light came shining into that tower that suddenly illumined his understanding of the text that he was reading. And Luther said, I suddenly see it.

I see it now. The righteousness of God is not the righteousness that God requires of me. It is the righteousness that God provides for me, that this righteousness is what Christ secured in his sinless life and substitutionary death. It is this righteousness that God gives freely, that what God requires, God provides. And that's the very essence of the gospel.

It is the bad news that makes the good news such glorious news, that what we cannot provide, what God requires, God provides in his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. And in his sinless life, Jesus perfectly obeyed the law of God in our place. We break the law of God every day. Jesus perfectly obeyed the law of God that we have disobeyed. He obeyed it in our place. And by his obedience, he secured our perfect standing before God under the law. And in justification by faith, it is that obedience that is credited to our account as though we have perfectly lived, as though we have perfectly obeyed the law of God. And then at the cross was the final act of obedience to fulfill the requirement of God the Father on our behalf. And on the cross, Jesus offered himself up as the great high priest and became our sacrifice for sin. And in that defining pivotal moment, it was like a eureka moment, Luther said, it was as though I was born again, to use his exact words.

That the gates of paradise were suddenly swung open and I entered into the kingdom of God by faith. That was really the lighting of the fuse that led to the explosion of the Reformation. And what the Reformation was, was the greatest back to the Bible movement in the history of the world that can only be rivaled by the apostolic age. It was a recovery of the gospel that had been lost for a thousand years. The Roman Catholic Church kept adding works, adding works, adding works, adding works, adding works, until there were seven things that you had to do. And still, no one knew if they had done enough of those seven things to be in the kingdom.

And they kept adding more, like the Pharisees did. And the pure, the simplicity of the gospel had been lost. That salvation is by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. Rome said salvation was by grace and works, by faith and works in Christ and the saints and indulgences and treasure merit and Mary, and, and, and, and there is no end to it.

Just a brief interjection again. You're listening to Steve Lawson today on the Christian Real View radio program and a recent message that he gave about the Reformation. And what he just described is the difference between true biblical Christianity that God justifies a sinner based on faith alone in Christ alone, by God's grace alone, and all other religions including Roman Catholicism and any non-Christian religions are all based on, yes, probably faith, but also adding our good works to it in order to make ourselves right with a God.

Let's continue. That's why the Reformation was such an extraordinary movement that swept into England, an extraordinary movement that swept into England. William Tyndale and the English Reformers really penetrated England beginning with Tyndale translating the Bible into the English language. He said so that a plow boy in the field will know more of the word of God than the Pope in Rome.

And he fulfilled his mission. And then it spread through Switzerland, Zwingli in Zurich, and then the Reformer of all the Reformers, John Calvin in Geneva as he preached through the Bible, as he lectured through the Bible, as he wrote the Christian institutes, the institutes of the Christian religion, the greatest Christian book ever to be written. And then it was carried to Scotland by John Knox. And the aftershock led to the Puritan age in England.

And the afterflow of that, it swept across the Atlantic Ocean. And it was the pilgrims who brought the Reformation theology with them and established really a reformed worldview in New England and up and down the Atlantic seacoast in the colonies. And the Reformation reformed the church. Think of it this way, Christ and the apostles formed the church. The church fathers, that was in the first century. Second through the fifth century, the church fathers leading up to Augustine conformed the church as best they could in the manner that Christ and the apostles had formed it.

From the sixth through the 16th century, Rome deformed the church and concocted their own imaginations and created a Pope and created cardinals and created things that are nowhere found in the Bible. And so created a maze that you would have to navigate your way through to get to heaven. But no one, even on their deathbed knew if they were going to heaven or purgatory or hell. And there was no grace, zero grace in the Catholic church. And that is why even administering last rites on the deathbed is so necessary. Like we still don't even know where you are.

Whatever we can add as you breathe your last breath, we're just trying to get more into you of whatever this is. And then when the Reformation came in the 16th century, it shattered the religious superstition of the Roman Catholic church. And so the Reformation was a huge deal, not a small deal. It was a massive deal that began in the church and then swept through the culture and swept through society. And it radically altered education and schools, the work ethic, the economy, politics, caring for people, hospitals, on and on and on and on.

It was a top to bottom, across the board effect. Before the Reformation, there was a very low work ethic. There were trade guilds and trade unions and people did as little as they possibly could just to get by.

There was no incentive to work hard. And then Calvin begins to preach, you must do your work as unto the Lord, that you must give your best effort. And the care now, as people put their shoulder to the plow and began to work hard, because I'm doing this for the glory of God. And they believed that on the last day, there would be an inspection of their work by God.

And that mediocrity would be a cause for shame on the last day, that they must give themselves to study and to hard labor and work. And it just literally turned the Western world upside down. Men now began to invest resources into businesses and projects because they believe that by faith, if we invest our money, and they saw the banking parables in the gospels, that it would help others and yield a return for their family.

And there began to be this boom. Even in New England, Harvard, Yale, Princeton, etc., etc., they were all started, every single one of them, to train Calvinistic preachers of the Word of God. And obviously, they hit the slippery slope before they could hardly get moving forward. Harvard fell to liberalism and Yale was raised up. Yale fell to liberalism and Princeton was raised up.

And it's just been this domino effect. But initially, it was the after effect of the Reformation. It has been said the true founding father of America was John Calvin, because it was his worldview, it was his ideology, it was his understanding of the church, of the economy, of government that really laid the foundation that became the genius of America.

The checks and balances in power, the three different branches of the government, executive, judicial, legislative, that no one person would tower over the nation. All of this is flowing out of the Reformation. So, all that's to say, you need to know about the Reformation.

We are Protestants. And the word Protestant means protest. And 500 years ago, there was a massive protest. There was a massive protest.

And we have floated downstream from that protest. We are Protestants. We have protested against the heresies of the Roman Catholic Church, the false gospel of the Roman Catholic Church.

Okay, I hope you found that very helpful from Steve Lawson today. You're listening to the Christian Real View Radio program as he spoke about the Reformation, what started it, what was the debate over justification by faith alone was one of the doctrines that was hotly contested, and how the results of the Reformation had ramifications all over Western civilization, basically, for hundreds of years. And we're still feeling it today. As a matter of fact, what is going on in America today is a pushback, a resentment of the values and ethics and doctrines that started this country that were based on the Protestant Reformation. So let's get quickly to now an interview with Mike Gendron. He was a former Roman Catholic for 35 years. He studied and understands Roman Catholicism better than most anyone. He's a courageous truth teller. He contends for the faith as the Reformers did. As a matter of fact, he loves Roman Catholics so much that he left a successful business career to start a ministry to reach out to Catholics and really anyone, any unbeliever, with the true gospel of Jesus Christ.

Here's the interview with Mike Gendron. Mike, it's so good to have you back on the Christian Real View Radio program. Let's start out with what occurred this past Sunday, 500 and some years ago, when Martin Luther, a Catholic monk in Germany, posted his 95 Theses on the door of the church at Wittenberg in Germany, and how Reformation Day has been completely overshadowed by Halloween here in America and around the world. But let's talk about that, because it was such an influential moment in not only the history of Christianity, of course, but also in the history of America and what will become America. Let's say there's someone listening today, Mike, who doesn't know much about Reformation Day and why that's so important.

What would you say to them? Well, it really was encouraging to see God raise up so many Reformers 504 years ago to begin protesting the Roman Catholic view of salvation. That's the reason Martin Luther defiantly nailed his 95 Theses on the church door in Wittenberg, Germany.

He was protesting the selling of God's forgiveness through indulgences, and he was outraged that salvation was being bought and sold like any other commodity in the marketplace. It was the selling of indulgences that really sparked the Reformation. That's why Martin Luther chose to nail his 95 Theses on the church door in Wittenberg. He did it strategically because the next day was November 1, which is All Saints Day. That's when Catholics would be going into the church to generate all the different relics.

In fact, there was 1900 relics of dead Catholic saints on display, and Catholics were said to receive a plenary indulgence by venerating these indulgences. So Martin Luther nailed it the day before so that people would be noticing it as they went in to receive their indulgences. Martin Luther would be the first to say that he didn't really start the Reformation. In fact, he gives all the credit to God in his Word. Luther said, All I've done is put forth and preach and write the Word of God.

Apart from this, I have done nothing. The Word has achieved everything. And David, it's so important for our listeners to know that it is the devil who holds unbelievers captive to do his will. We see that in 2 Timothy 2, verse 24 to 26. The only way captives can be set free from the bondage of the devil is by abiding in God's Word.

Jesus said, That's a true disciple of mine. When they abide in my word, they will know the truth, and that truth will set them free from religious deception and from the bondage of Satan. Yeah, Mike, and of course, the ramifications of the Reformation, which started in the early 1500s, here we are over 500 years later, had an incomprehensible effect on Christianity in starting Protestantism, of course, and the key doctrine that was really debated and debated over and died over, let's say over the next hundred years or so, was the doctrine of justification by faith. This is the core doctrine of the Bible on how one is saved. Explain that, why that particular doctrine was so critical in being the one that emerged out amongst others, but that one was the key one that really launched the Reformation and really changed everything in Europe and then eventually in America.

Well, you're right, David. In fact, Martin Luther said that the doctrine of justification is the doctrine, it's the hinge that opens and closes the gates of heaven. If you get justification wrong, you get the whole gospel wrong, and so it's very important. In fact, the doctrine of justification declares the inflexible righteousness of God as the judge who must punish every sin that's ever been committed by everyone who has ever lived. The doctrine of justification states that the only way condemned sinners can be justified is through faith in the sin-bearing, substitutionary death and resurrection of Christ alone, who satisfied divine justice. When you look at how different the doctrine of justification is in the Roman Catholic Church, it's really, I think, more important to recognize if we didn't have the Reformers abiding in God's Word to study this doctrine, that we'd still be under the influence of Roman Catholicism. But first and foremost, the doctrine of justification is a change of one's legal status before God, whereby a condemned sinner has been acquitted and declared righteous. Rome says, no, justification is not a change in one's legal status. It's the change in the inner man, and the man becomes more and more righteous before God as he receives sacraments and does good works. The Bible says justification is instantaneous, but Rome says, no, it's a process.

And then, David, here's the real key. Justification in the Catholic Church is through water baptism, and that normally occurs when you're a seven-day-old infant. And we know from the Bible that justification is by faith in what God accomplished in Christ, and we know that a seven-day-old infant has no capacity to believe anything. So the doctrine of justification in the Catholic Church begins at water baptism, but then through sin, mortal sin, they are de-justified and they need to be re-justified by receiving sacraments and doing good works and meriting enough credit to get them to heaven. And we know from the Bible that justification is permanent. It's never lost by sin. One of my favorite verses is Hebrews 10.14, where we read, by one offering, he has made perfect forever those who are being sanctified. So you can see that the doctrine of justification in the Catholic Church is diametrically opposed to what the Bible has revealed, and that's the reason the Reformers had these five solos. We're saved and justified by grace alone, through faith alone, and Christ alone, according to Scripture alone.

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Thank you for your support. Mike, you were a Roman Catholic, I believe, for 35 years, so you understand the Roman Catholic Church very, very intimately. You just spoke about one of the key doctrines that came out of as a result of the Protestant Reformation and how that impacted the world. It's not that it was never seen in the Bible before, just that there was a period of time when the Roman Catholic Church was so dominant with another gospel that this gospel of justification by faith alone and Christ alone wasn't known on a broad scale because people weren't able to read the Bible, they didn't have the Bible and so forth, but the Reformation changed all of that, the printing press and so forth. You would think today that evangelicals who are part of the Protestant wing of Christianity—a Protestant, you have Roman Catholic, you have Orthodox, those three big branches, evangelicals being part of the Protestant branch—would be able to clearly see the clear distinctions between the doctrines, really the unbiblical doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church. And we don't say that to disparage Catholics individually on that, it's just their official doctrines and the Catholic catechism and so forth just do not line up with what Scripture teaches. You would think that evangelicals, notable evangelicals, would still have this same perspective that the Reformers had as they protested the doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church, but in many cases today prominent ones, even more conservative evangelicals, just seem to not think it's that important to draw these distinctions and put a stake in the ground as to what the Bible says about, like we just discussed, justification by faith. Can you talk about how some evangelicals today are really diminishing the very important and distinct differences between Roman Catholicism and biblical Christianity?

Well sure, David, that's a really good question to consider because right after the Reformation started, the Catholic Church had the Council of Trent, which was the Counter-Reformation, and it was during the Council of Trent that they issued over 100 anathemas that condemned born-again Christians because they do not believe the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church regarding justification and also salvation. And so what's happened now is we've got the ecumenical movement that started by the Roman Catholic Church at Vatican Council II, and now they have many willing partners in the evangelical community that are signing unity accords with Catholics, daring to say that we share a common faith in the gospel of Jesus Christ. And it's heartbreaking to see some of our most influential, most visible, and most powerful evangelicals are signing unity accords and making very bizarre statements.

I want to give you just a couple of quotes just to show you the severity of this. When Pope Benedict resigned, Robert Jeffers, who's the pastor of First Baptist Church in Dallas, said on our TV program that the pope was a wonderful, dedicated Christian man, and we celebrate the ministry he's had. And I know Robert Jeffers personally, I've done conferences with him, and so I immediately sent him an email questioning how we could celebrate the ministry of a pope who was a false teacher who shut the gates of heaven to Roman Catholics who wanted to enter it with a false and fatal gospel. And he emailed me back, and he said, whenever I'm on public TV, I cannot bash Roman Catholics. And I said, that wasn't my question.

I said, you could have done one of three things. You could have told the truth, which you chose not to do, or you could have remained neutral, which you chose not to do, or you could have misled people by promoting this false teacher as a wonderful, dedicated Christian man. And then just recently, Al Mohler, speaking about Pope Benedict, he said, he was one of the most brilliant theological minds of our times.

And that's a direct quote. And this is very troubling, David, because Pope Benedict, when he was a cardinal, he authored the Catechism of the Catholic Church that presents a false and fatal gospel that is under divine condemnation, based on Galatians chapter one, verses six to nine. So for Al Mohler to declare this man, who's under divine condemnation, one of the most brilliant theological minds of our times, is very troubling. Because what's happening now is you've got these evangelical leaders that are uniting with the Roman Catholic Church and making these statements. It's putting the Roman Catholic religion off limits to evangelism, because the average person in the evangelical pew today is confused as to whether or not the Catholic Church represents a mission field, or that they are brothers and sisters in Christ, like these two prominent pastors have said. Louis Palau is another prominent evangelical. He said, Pope Francis is a very Bible-centered and Jesus Christ-centered man. He's really centered on the pure gospel. He's a friend of evangelicals. And this is very troubling because, again, I know Louis Palau personally, he used to take our gospel tracts down to South America in Spanish, because he knew the Roman Catholic Church was a mission field. But now his buddy from Argentina gets elected Pope, and all of a sudden, he's befriending Roman Catholicism and treating it as a valid expression of Christianity. Mike, I appreciate you're telling us about these comments these men have made, not to cut them down at the knees, nor call them heretics, or not to dismiss them as saying they don't teach any truth. It reminds me of what the Apostle Paul did with Peter, when Peter hypocritically didn't eat with Gentiles when the Judaizers were around town. And Paul pointed out his hypocrisy on this. And it's a lesson for all of us, including these men, that we cannot compromise what we say, especially when it comes to affirming those who are teaching a false gospel. Let's transition from the Reformation and the incredible importance of that particular era in history to Pope Francis, the current Pope.

Nationallife.com publication, this in October, wrote this. He said, Pope Francis released a video message to reassure the world that Catholicism is on the side of social justice. The Pope, Pope Francis, praised deceased felon George Washington and George Floyd.

Of course, he was the black man who was killed here at the hands of a police officer in Minneapolis in May of 2020 now. He praised deceased felon George Floyd as a good Samaritan, and he provided a moral endorsement, this is the Pope, of violent Black Lives Matters rioters. He said this, quote, this is the Pope. Do you know what comes to mind now when, together with popular movements, I think of the good Samaritan, the Pope declared? In that protest against this death, there was the collective Samaritan.

This movement did not pass by on the other side of the road when it saw the injury to human dignity caused by an abuse of power, the Pope said. The popular movements are not only social poets, but also collective Samaritans, unquote. Of course, he's referring to the story of the Samaritan, the Bible, where the man gets robbed and injured, and the priest walks by, and the scribe walks by, and they don't want to get their hands dirty helping this man.

But the Samaritan, one of the hated people in the land of Israel, that were apart from the temple worship and part Jewish, part non-Jew, he's the one that comes and helps the man and brings him to a hotel, so to speak, pays for his medical care. And so this is what Pope Francis is saying, that these protests are like, these are collective Samaritans helping against the injustice caused to George Floyd. So now Black Lives Matter, Mike, is founded by, as they call themselves, trained Marxists. The organization has a Marxist unbiblical belief. They believe in the oppressor-oppressed paradigm of Marxism.

They're against the nuclear family, you know, mother and father raising kids. They orchestrated the protests, the violence that led to many deaths, even. Is Pope Francis an actual Marxist, and how would that manifest itself if indeed he is? Yes, when you look at the seven and a half year history of him in the papacy, he has definitely demonstrated the fact that he is a Marxist with left-wing politics. A lot of people don't realize he's not only the religious leader of 1.3 billion Roman Catholics, but he's also a political head. Vatican City is a sovereign nation, and the Pope is the head of that sovereign nation. That's why you have different political leaders and ambassadors always coming to the Vatican City to meet with the Pope, because he's very instrumental in world politics. And we know that's the movement right now for a global government.

And he's right in the middle of that, encouraging people in his Marxist left-wing politics. But we also know there'll be a global religion in the end times. And I really believe that if we're in the season of our Lord's return, that Pope Francis would be instrumental in bringing about the global religion. The previous popes have all been ecumenically minded, but not so aggressively as Pope Francis. I really believe that as a Jesuit, you know, the Jesuits were founded to eliminate any opposition to Roman Catholicism. And so Pope Francis is the first Jesuit pope, and he's doing everything he can to unite all the professing Christianity under the power and influence of the papacy. And not just Christians, but also he's making inroads into the Muslim religion, too, with common bonds of unity with them. Mike Jenrin with us today here on The Christian Real View. He's the founder and evangelist at Proclaiming the Gospel Ministry, a ministry that we write a ministry that we recommend you get in contact with and subscribe to their free email.

Proclaimingthegospel.org is a website. You look at the pope's beliefs, and you mentioned in your last answer that he's much more radical. Previous ones, you're right, have been into the ecumenical movements and so forth. But this one, Pope Francis not only believes those things and pushes for those, but he's politically very much on the left. That's not necessarily common with typical Roman Catholics. Many Roman Catholics are quite conservative politically, pro-life, pro-limited government, pro-nationalism.

They believe in a country with borders and so forth. So how does the pope, even though he's venerated so much by Catholics, how does he get away with these type of political views that he clearly talks about and doesn't try to hide? Well, it's really perplexing because this pope is not only very left-wing, but he's also made very bizarre statements. I've often wondered how Roman Catholics can continue to be a part of a religion where there's so much corruption at the top. You mentioned Marxism, but some of the statements he's made, I recently put some of them together in my newsletter that went out November 1st, but he makes statements like there is no hell and there's no punishment for the lost soul. What happens after you die is you're annihilated.

There's no punishment in store for those who die. See, this goes against historic Roman Catholicism as well as the Bible, and so there's many conservative cardinals now that are saying, we need to do something about this pope because he doesn't represent Roman Catholicism. He even said that he'd be willing to baptize aliens if they came to the Vatican.

Who are we to close the doors to anyone, even Martians? See, the pope doesn't even realize that the reason Jesus became a man was so that he could die for mankind. He was the eternal son of God who became man, born of the virgin, to live a sinless life and to die on Calvary's cross, and those who put their faith in him will have eternal life. But this pope is so bizarre that it's very troubling for Roman Catholics to continue to become involved in his left-wing politics as well as his anti-Catholic and anti-biblical stance. And David, you know my heart is to reach Roman Catholics. We dedicated our 31 years of ministry to equip the body of Christ to reach out to Catholics, and right now they don't know who to trust because they know they can't trust their pope. He goes against Catholicism as well as the Bible, so it's a great opportunity to point people to the Lord Jesus Christ who is the personification of truth. His word is truth. He came to testify to the truth, and everybody on the side of truth listens to him. So I hope your listening audience takes advantage of this opportunity to engage Roman Catholics in conversations about truth.

Well, we hope you gained from listening to the program today, hearing from both Steve Lawson and Mike Gendron. You can find links to their ministries by going to our website, thechristianworldview.org. The big takeaway is that God and his word are the final authority, and we need to accurately handle his word of truth. So remember, in a changing and challenging world, Jesus Christ and his word are the same yesterday, and today, and forever. Until next time, think biblically, live accordingly, and stand firm.

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