Dial In with Jonny Ardavanis - Costi Hinn - Speaking Truth in love

Episode Date: July 21, 2022

Jonny Ardavanis is the Dean of Campus Life at The Master’s University and hosts the podcast Dial In with Jonny Ardavanis. He is passionate about the Gospel and God’s Word and desires to see people understand and obey it. Dial In with Jonny Ardavanis: Big Questions, Biblical Answers, is a series that seeks to provide biblical answers to some of the most prominent and fundamental questions regarding God, the Gospel, and the BibleIn this episode Costi Hinn from For the Gospel and Shepherd's House Bible church answers the question: “How can we speak truth in love?”Subscribe to stay up to date with each episode! Watch on YouTubeFollow on InstagramVisit Our Website

Hey guys, my name is Johnny Artavanis, and this is Dial In. In this episode, I sit down with Kosti Hinn, the pastor of Shepherd's House Bible Church in Chandler, Arizona, and the founder of For the Gospel Ministries, and I ask him about speaking the truth in love. Let's dial in. Kosti, thanks for sitting down. I wanted to talk to you about something I've been thinking about more and more. I think we live in a world where conviction is celebrated. You know, let's live and stand firm for the truth and on the authority and sufficiency

of Scripture. And then there's another environment that says, let's just be loving to everyone. And sometimes what gets compromised on that side of things is speaking truth. But then when you flip to the other side of the spectrum, when you just proclaim the truth, proclaim the truth, no compromise, sometimes what gets missed in that realm of things is communicating that truth in a winsome fashion. And even that idea of winsomeness almost connects with it, this idea that you're compromising if you are being winsome in communicating the truth. And so I wanted to talk to you about, and would love your input on, just how do we speak the truth in love? I know that's a familiar phrase, but much less understood and far less applied in the way that many Christians live.

So how do we do that? What does that mean? Yeah. As hardline guys, we love firm theology and clarity. I think we both would agree the goal is not to crush people and to win arguments. What makes me think of Colossians 4, let me read this to you. Verse 5, conduct yourselves with wisdom towards outsiders. So we're talking about people that may not, they're not insiders. These are outsiders. Making the most of the opportunity. Think of it. I'm trying to win a heart, a soul. I'm trying to reach somebody. This is an opportunity to reach them with truth, not to hammer them, not to show that I'm right, not to boast in my superiority or what I think I am or what I know.

Verse six, your speech must always be with grace. That's convicting. Not just truth, not just, hey, here's what it is. Take it or leave it. You need to change. You need to do it with grace. The same grace that transformed you and me is the grace that can transform someone else. The same God who had mercy on me and mercy on you can have mercy on them. I'm not judge and jury. I'm the minister of the truth. He's judge and jury. He's also kind, merciful, loving, and many people just like us get the new verdict, not guilty, no longer condemned, like Romans 8, 1 talks about. Your speech also seasoned with salt, so that you will know how you should respond to each person. Paul is so helpful here for the church. There are situations in which you and I may come on a little stronger with somebody who is obstinate, resistant to the truth. They're aggressive towards

the truth. And we may dial it up a little more strongly and say, brother, you need to repent. And right now you're wrong. And that's blasphemy. And I'm not going to allow that. I'm not going to stand for it. I'm not going to stay silent. Right now I'm going to speak the truth. This is what God's word says. A little more of a push. But sometimes I need to know how to respond to other kinds of people. Remember Jude in Jude 17 to 23. You don't use a chapter because Jude's just a bunch of verses. He says, have mercy on some who are doubting. Mercy. There are doubters, wavering people that one week they're going, yeah, I think this guy's all right. Or I was reading this book or I this or I that. Then there's another day where they're

like, man, everything you said made sense. I'm all in. Let's go. And you're like, yes, we got them. And I've often made the joke, you know, doubting people we're told to be merciful with because maybe they're the ones that are the most tempting for us to whack over the head with our, you know, John MacArthur study Bible type of idea. And they're the ones we need to be the most patient with. They're wavering. We need to be merciful. We were that way. They are learning. Let's ask questions. Let's guide them. Jude also references save others, snatching them out of the fire. A little more of a coming in like the Coast Guard, drop the rope. Hey, you're in danger. I want to help you. But all of this is done in context in our day and age of relationship. This is the idea of going to coffee with someone, saying, I love you.

I care for you. I want the best for you. Here's my concern. HMU, help me understand. Do you see what I'm saying? And then there's another category. Jude says, have mercy on others with fear, hating even the garment stained by or polluted by the flesh. What he's saying, he's saying, still be merciful. There are dangerous people. They're not doubting. They're not necessarily just deceived and sort of buying it. They are dangerous. They're teaching it. They're propagating it. You get around them too much. They're going to rub off on you. Their garments, if you will, are stained. They'll stain yours. But still, Jude says,

have mercy. We want to be very careful playing judge and jury with those who are preaching dangerous things and saying, yeah, they're just going to hell or they're going to this or that. We want to be careful. What a fool or what an idiot. Jesus can save. Jesus can win that heart and that soul. Jesus may do it at a time where we least expect it with the people we least expect to be saved in order to show off and say, hey, look, I can change anyone. I changed Paul.

I changed Johnny. I changed Kosti. I change every single person he's changed. So what if we took on the approach of, I want to win some. I want to save more, like Paul says to the church at Corinth. I'm going on a rescue mission with this. I'm not looking to just rail on everybody about how right I am. You're lost. You're lost. Yeah. And that's convicting. We all do this erroneously, terribly. We fail at it at times. But the standard of God's word is for us too.

It's for all of us. So we are called back to a grace-filled, salty, seasoned way of being, flavoring the world and the relationships around us with the goal of using wisdom. I'm trying to reach their heart and reach their mind. And I'll be the first to say, I've not always done this well. I've failed at it, but, well, I'm still only 36. There's a lot of years left if the Lord lets me live. I get to grow in it.

You get to grow in it. We can do it better and better as we're being, quote, sanctified, made more like Jesus. And unfortunately, I don't like it either. You probably don't either. We learn best through failure, and God kind of lets us fall on our face. We get up, stand up, and try to do it better and more faithfully. And then assuming that if we're doing it with wisdom and with mercy, that assumes we're doing it prayerfully.

Real quick then, how does, let's say there's a pushback on what Paul says in Galatians that if they present to you a different gospel that they would mutilate themselves. How has that been, how can that even be taken out of context to use that as like the hall pass to be a jerk. That's a great question.

I still think Paul was the greatest example of saying, I wish some of my own kinsmen would be saved and I could lose my salvation for their behalf. Paul was a passionate, strong guy. He didn't like when false teachers were raiding the church. What was his goal? Yeah, just mutilate yourselves. Get out of here, you bunch of heretics. No, no. He cared so much about people that once in a while he would look at the leaders who were abusing them and exploiting them and leading them towards

the doctrines of demons and of things that would carry you to hell if you died in them unrepentantly and being strong with people. I wish it wasn't this way. I wish they were this. I wish that. It still doesn't ever negate Paul's heart to win souls. He also says in Galatians 1, 6 through 12, there at the end, that if anyone preaches another gospel to you, let him be accursed. He's saying there's a curse laid upon that individual. There is a big difference.

At least I think, based on what the New Testament teaches, between going hard at a known, blatant, unrepentant heritage. Belligerent. I'm talking the H word used in the right sense. False gospel, false Jesus, abusive, attacking the church, assaulting precious saints and people. Paul goes strong. A monster. It's such a small category.

That is not your grandma who watches Joel Osteen. That is not your cousin. Or someone that still listens to a certain type of music. This is not the same thing. So we just want to use a lot of wisdom. Paul was talking about a very specific group, and most certainly would be the first to say, as a former physical assaulter and persecutor of the church, he was not advocating to do the same thing, nor did he ever. He took beatings at that point. He didn't give them. So yeah, that's a little bit of a twist on what Paul's trying to say. No, I think that's helpful, because I think that is sometimes used as the free ride to be,

you know, what an idiot, you know, quote, tweet, what a clown or fool. And it's like, man, I think if some of these people, if our goal is to win them to Christ and to solid biblical conviction, I hope it is, as you read,

seasoned with salt and grace and mercy Knowing just any and praying that even for some of them that the Lord would save them and that the Lord would restore them to Even like a more solid and firm view of Scripture and Christ and so that's super helpful Kosti. Thank you for your time Thankful for your brother. Keep up the great work. Thanks