Barry Meguiar 00:03
Hi everybody. Welcome back to ignite. Have a great show for you today. The great rod Martin, a man that you may or may not know, he’s kind of new to me somehow. Rod, you just showed up on my computer. I don’t know you got some amazing ways of doing that. Also there’s there’s rod and written word. I didn’t see you, but I heard you, and I felt like I knew you through your through your words. And I’m always looking for, you know, at any given time, people that are speaking truth, and we get all these feeds, don’t we? And Amen, it doesn’t take but a few moments. No block that one block that one block that one there’s not a lot of great voices that are that are solid, that are the that are God’s word, and even in the secular arena, because it’s all God’s world. And you struck me with several things you said, on a on a political level, that were very astute. Didn’t shout Christian yet I knew their Christian thoughts and so that. But that caught me in in in looking, perceiving, peeling back the pages and and seeing what’s really going on in this world of politics. And I’m a kind of a political junkie, to some extent, although I don’t it has nothing to do with my faith. I kind of watch it for amusement. Some cases, we do know what, what’s going on in this world, and how lost our world is, and what we need to do to fix it. And then all sudden, you hit me with one that was on a totally different side. It was just blatantly, he’s out there. Okay, this guy’s got game. I told our team. I said, we need to meet this guy. Made someday, maybe we’ve got a podcast and and here we are. And I answered you, you actually had a thing where I can, I could message you. I thought I could actually message this guy. So I let you know my thoughts and excitement and and use message back. Let’s talk really. So folks, that’s how we kind of get this relationship going over the last few months. And Ron, I love your heart, man, I really do. I just love your heart, your mind. I’m I’m gonna say, folks, I just say, right now, I’m a metal digit, okay? I pedal car wax, okay? And I got this guy who’s not true, and I’m just running trying to keep up and get some of the pieces. You know, I don’t know if I can comprehend at all, but that’s kind of my mindset of what’s going on now, I can’t, I’m not going to be able to keep up with you, but, but I do love your heart. I love your heart. And so talk about a little bit, even educate me a little bit of how did you get to where you are now, spiritually, what, what has been your journey to get to where you you understand what you really do understand as best we can as humans, what God is up to these days. Well,
Speaker 1 02:51
like most Southern Baptists, I was a Southern Baptist before I was a Christian. So, so there’s that. And the Southern Baptist part stuck. As you’re probably aware, I’m a recent former officer of the executive committee of the Southern Baptist Convention. I served a couple terms on the executive committee of the Florida Baptist Convention, very, very concerned about the lostness in this country, and of course, 51% of our real quick,
Barry Meguiar 03:18
I haven’t done anything is lofty, but I having served in church boards for 30 years and been all kinds of ecclesiastical and college boards or whatever, I often ask. Somebody tells me, and you’re still Christian.
Speaker 1 03:33
Well, people do get disillusioned, and I understand it, because they’re not used to seeing the sausage get made, but they need to understand we have chosen, certainly as Southern Baptists, but non denominational churches are the same way. You know, we’ve chosen to rule ourselves. We don’t have an Episcopacy. We don’t have, you know, all these, all these hierarchical aspects that define many denominations. We’ve chosen basically, to have rule through business meeting. And you know, I personally think churches do better when they have plural elders. And you know, an elder led congregation can be better in a number of ways, certainly with regard to church discipline, but as far as actually deciding who our preacher is, or where our missions money should go, or all those things. You have committees for those things, and if you have a committee, you have an argument. There’s no getting around that. You’re going to take votes, you’re going to organize, you’re going to get people on your side. And that’s political, and it really offends a lot of Christians. It certainly offends a lot of pastors. They need to think through their own, their own ecclesiology. The truth is, this is what we’ve chosen. We’ve chosen again, to rule ourselves, and you do that by majority vote.
Barry Meguiar 04:56
Well, it’s so true, and I’ve been in some of those discussions. And I wonder, even in some Christian environment, so these guys, these guys know what the Lord the will, the Lord what Scripture says. I mean, we’re kind of the arguments, the point of what we’re here about,
Speaker 1 05:15
yeah. But anyway, I have been a Southern Baptist my whole life, and have been very active in that, because I became a Christian, and the Lord very generously and miraculously saved me when I was about 13, and kind of in bad shape. I was I was definitely intellectually excelling, but I was emotionally bereft. We were having family problems. I was just kind of at the end of my rope, and the Lord stepped in and changed everything. And so I’ve been a believer now, my goodness, 42 years, I believe, and that’s a little while and and that has to define everything we do, we have a master. He is our king. He’s also our father. He’s also our you know, the best friend we’ll ever have in our life. He’s also our judge. He’s all these different things, but first and foremost, he’s the creator and the king of all that is and our work needs to serve his ends.
Barry Meguiar 06:22
Yeah. How do we comprehend a God who always was, always will be, who speaks the universe into existence, who creates it, he can do anything. How do you understand a God that then I mean, when I was when I was a kid, I remember back to a moment when I was like 10 years old. I was looking at an ant hill, and the ants were so industrious that they’re carrying things several times bigger than them, and they all knew where they were going, total organization. And I sat there, and I thought to myself, as a 10 year old, I wonder what it’s like to be in their mind, to understand things like they see them and as that 10 year old, it went to me. I said, That’s what God did.
07:18
Yes, exactly. The difference
Barry Meguiar 07:19
between me and that Aunt is nothing compared to the difference between me and God. How did this God create me out of nothing, for eternity. He created me for eternity, us for eternity, and he created us with this opportunity to make decisions and allowing Satan to be there, and giving us the free choice, knowing that most of us would make the wrong choice.
07:47
Oh, absolutely. And then
Barry Meguiar 07:49
sending His Son, his own son, to be, to be tortured and crucified for the very man he created he could have just, I mean, it’s, it’s, outrageous to shed his blood as a sacrifice for our sins so that we could actually enter the purity of heaven as being sinless. It’s the only way. It’s just amazing. How’s that possible? He’s done all that for us, and then he says that will reign with His Son, Jesus, is CO heirs. I mean, how can we even comprehend that? How is this possible? It’s
Speaker 1 08:31
absolutely and, and, you know, speaking of the crucifixion, you know, a lot of people struggle with the idea of a substitutionary atonement, which is, you know, fancy words for he died in my place. And people look at their lives and they just don’t believe that they could possibly be bad enough to deserve such a thing. So this Christian thing doesn’t make a lot of sense, but, Oh, you’re so completely wrong, because the issue isn’t the specific sin you may have committed, and I’m sure you’ve committed many, whoever might be watching this, I certainly have. But it’s not about the specific sin. It’s the it’s what that sin represents. I just said, he is a king. Our sin is treason against the king, and you execute traitors. That’s what’s happening there. But the God of the universe sends His only begotten Son, the second person of the Trinity, to die on a cross, a thief’s death, you know, a humiliating, terrible thing from a Jewish perspective, and and he dies in place of all of us, which he’s qualified to do because he lived a perfect life. He never sinned in 33 years, and then he goes to die on the cross that pays the price for anybody who chooses to the scripture says that that if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord. Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you shall be saved. And of course, he was. He did raise from rise from the dead on the third day and ascended to the right hand of God, the Father, where he’s reigning over all creation now, yeah,
Barry Meguiar 10:15
if all the people that raised their hands in churches that you and I have been in all these years, had really received the Lord, maybe a Christian nation. Oh, one question that prayer is so minimized today, and I preached all this about this subject, and then you have two minutes to make and then you’re going to go to heaven after that. And no, you have to believe in your heart, or really believe and confess with your mouth. You tell people about Jesus and that could just
Speaker 1 10:47
you have to actually believe and and in doing so, you honor the God who created us, you honor the Savior who died for us, and you’re enabled to live for him. It’s called regeneration. Yeah, you brought to New Life and and in the process of that, you know, given a new heart, you still have this body of flesh. You’re still prone to sin, but God sanctifies you, which is to say, makes you more and more like him, all through your life and and walks with you and gives you peace. And it’s truly extraordinary. And the other thing you mentioned about the ants is spot on to every aspect of creation. Speaking of someone who has made a living on science, that’s that’s my career. I’m not a clergyman, but, you know, I was one of the early guys at PayPal, at Martin capital, we invest in technology ventures. That’s what we’ve always done. And so I make a living from physics and from electronics and from space. That’s what I do. And speaking from that perspective, I can tell you, the more we learn about the world, the more we see design. There is design. There is not randomness. There is a shocking degree of design, and it just testifies to the truth of everything God has to say.
Barry Meguiar 12:17
Well, you We come from different schools of thought. Obviously we’re at the same point as we come closer to God, we become like one. But we asked you to be on this podcast sometime back, so many articles and things you’ve said have struck me, but then you brought out an article on Sunday that just threw me back in my chair, and it’s on the subject of adoption, which I understand. I guess I kind of sort of already understood what you said in that article. I did. I didn’t. And you if you could explain right quick how, in Paul’s mind, reconciled with or applied to the Roman law. What does this term adoption really mean? I mean, it’s mind boggling. Well, some people
Speaker 1 13:14
have the idea that the Jews didn’t have any concept of adoption, and that is plainly false. It’s not addressed directly in the Law of Moses, but Jewish culture had adoption from very early, even before they were called Jews. So it’s not that Paul couldn’t have been speaking from that point of view when he talked about adoption, but in the epistles, which are letters to the Romans and the Galatians and to the Ephesians. He speaks of adoption to a Roman audience in terms of Roman law. And the Roman law of adoption wasn’t used the way we think of, oh, a couple of parents want a cute little baby, okay, well, they didn’t really need to do that a lot, and there wasn’t really a way to do that most of the time. If, you know, if somebody dies and they leave a child behind, somebody probably adopts them. But that wasn’t the primary use.
Barry Meguiar 14:14
Unfortunately, sometimes an adopted son is not seen as the real son. He’s my son, but he’s, he’s, there’s the sons, and there’s the adopted center there. This is exactly the opposite of that. Actually,
Speaker 1 14:28
Scripture is exactly the opposite, as was Roman law. And this is the point, I mean, Paul is speaking to people who are familiar with Roman law. They live under it. So the analogy is to that it’s not to Jewish law, and even though it’s consistent with Jewish law, but the Roman law on this made you adopt, in some ways,
Barry Meguiar 14:54
adoption, really, when you’re adopted to Roman law, the the the the. The the fact of that, the fact that it can’t be changed, it’s amazing. Well,
Speaker 1 15:06
the logic, the logic is exactly that you don’t know what you’re gonna get when you conceive a child. It might be anybody. I mean, maybe you have Hitler, who knows? But if you adopt a child, you’re making a deliberate choice for that child. So under Roman law, such a such person, was not capable of being disowned. You could disown a natural son. You could not disown an adopted son.
Barry Meguiar 15:37
It’s so important say Say it again, because adopted status is forever. It’s best
Speaker 1 15:46
because the father has chosen that specific person. Again, when you have a baby, you you don’t know what you’re going to get, but if you’re adopting a person who is already in the world, doing things you know exactly who they are. And Roman law reflected that, but also it did so, for the reason I was getting at a minute ago, which is this usually wasn’t used for children under Roman law, it was usually used for inheritance, so that the primary example of adoption that we have today in Roman times is Julius Caesar adopting his nephew, Octavian, who, of course, became Caesar Augustus, the first emperor of Rome. Why did he do that? Well, Caesar, if he had children, they weren’t legitimate, and he didn’t want any of them to be his political heir. He had also amassed an insane fortune during his time in Spain and then in Gaul. And, I mean, it’s just an extraordinary number, and he wanted it to go to the right person to subsidize that person’s political success. And he had this genius nephew, Octavian, who really one of the most brilliant men of history, regardless of whether you agree with how he used his brilliance at times, and, and Julius Caesar wanted him to be the heir, so he adopts him. That’s normal in Roman law and, and that’s normally how it was done. So that has a couple more implications. First of all, it’s permanent. You don’t enter into it lightly. They don’t want anybody doing this without really meaning it. Second, the legal effect of it was you are now legally a new person, a completely new person. Your debts are wiped out. If you had a mortgage, it’s gone. If you had a car note, it’s gone. You are a new person in front of law, which is why they couldn’t do it privately. It had to be done in front of a Roman court. And you have a new name and a new father, and you’re completely severed from the old family. It’s not that you can’t go speak to them, but you are no longer part of and that is the picture of the gospel. That’s exactly it. We are God’s permanently, you know, none shall pluck you from his hand. We are a new creation, a new person, a new name, a new father and and we are, of course, doing all of this. Our debts are wiped out, obviously, our debts to God in this case. But above all, you are actually a child of the king, a co heir with Christ. You know, not in the sense that God’s going to die, but in the sense that you know, Prince Charles, all those decades, was the heir to the throne in Great Britain. Well, he has a special status. He has a special legal position. He has special rights and privileges because He’s the heir. Christ has those because he’s the only begotten, which means natural child, and we are his. He is the first fruits of many brothers. The Scripture says we are the adopted children grafted into the vine.
Barry Meguiar 19:10
It’s so simple and so profound, backed up by by Roman law. I mean, it’s just amazing. So here we are at an amazing time in history, and we haven’t had a lot of time to talk about this together, but I want to hear your heart on it. But as I see it, God’s given us a bit of a reprieve, a bit a huge reprieve, and we’re rushing about claiming victory and doing all kinds of stuff politically and sometimes in the name of Jesus, it seems like the world has been provoked to the point where they’re all looking where God is. God’s up to something. People are lost regularly. To me, what’s God up to? They know this is epic, but the church. It seems to be unstirred, and those that are stirred are working on issues and politics that are not necessarily their God honoring, but they’re not salvation motivated. And we have this moment, and then our ministry, of course, is ignite Christians and get off the bench and into the game, we have this moment. Can you, can you speak to, I mean, you know it far better than me, what’s going on today. But can you, can you, can you give us some perspective of where God is in the midst of all of our seeming euphoria and and and crazy world that’s that we’re experiencing right now? Well,
Speaker 1 20:41
not only can I, but I do so every single day@rodmartin.org I encourage all your your viewers, to go to rodmartin.org Please sign up for a subscription to our daily in depth analysis and also for my for my x feed, I’ve got about 180,000 followers on x, and it was about 20,001st of the year. So we’re doing pretty well, but every day, we’re talking about all these issues, and we’re doing so from a Christian worldview, you know, talking about the demographic collapse in China and some of the rest of East Asia. We’re talking about the economic and military consequences of that. We’re talking about, you know, inequities within the NATO alliance and in our trade deals and all these different things. And, of course, as you know, on Sunday, I published my article about adoption and Roman law and how that applies in Scripture to our salvation. So, so, yes, absolutely. And what I would say in answer to your question, after all that preamble, is that I absolutely believe that we have a short but meaningful reprieve. It may be enough, it may not be enough, but the Lord has provided it. And I think we saw the same thing in 2016 you know. And God just loves to raise up the foolish things of the world to confound the wise. And of course, he means by that, foolish by the world’s view and wise in their own eyes. Donald Trump is anything but foolish. And you might think, well, he’s not as good as I want him to be on this or that or the other, yeah, but he keeps promises better than any politician I ever met, and he did an incredible job in the first term. And I’ll just give you one example he promised when he got elected. Hold
Barry Meguiar 22:33
that thought. Hold that thought, we’re out of time. Okay, so you’re going to keep that thought. Gotta keep. Can I bring you back for another podcast. Yes, absolutely love our podcast. Hold that thought we’re going to talk about that in a whole lot more. I mean, we’re going to get some really fun stuff, listening to a scientist talking about the Almighty God and the opportunity we have to represent him in these days. It’s amazing come back and see us in the next podcast. Okay, see you later. Bye.
