From the Archive: Charlie on Keeping Our Country Christlike

00:00:03 Speaker 1: My name is Charlie Kirk. I run the largest pro-American student organization in the country, fighting for the future of our republic. My call is to fight evil and to proclaim truth. If the most important thing for you is just feeling good, you're going to end up miserable. But if the most important thing is doing good, you will end up purposeful. College is a scam, everybody. You got to stop sending your kids to college. You should get married as young as possible and have as many kids as possible. Go start a Turning Point USA college chapter. Go start a Turning Point USA high school chapter. Go find out how your church can get involved. Sign up and become an activist. I gave my life to the Lord in fifth grade. Most important decision I ever made in my life. And I encourage you to do the same. Here I am. Lord, use me. Buckle up, everybody. Here we go. Noble Gold Investments is the official gold sponsor of The Charlie Kirk Show, a company that specializes in gold IRAs and physical delivery of precious metals. Learn how you could protect your wealth with Noble Gold Investments at noblegoldinvestments.com. That is noblegoldinvestments.com. 00:01:24 Speaker 2: Oh, what a blessing. Thank you so much for coming, Charlie. We're blessed to have you here. And last time we were together, it was in 2020. And we were there in San Juan. And let's face it, a lot has happened since 2020. And first of all, the last time we were together, you had just got married, but now you are a father. And my question to you is how has being a father changed your life and impacted the work that you're doing with Turning Point USA? 00:01:55 Speaker 1: Well, thank you, John. And how great is Pastor John, by the way? Does he not do a great job? I'll tell you. And I love this church and I can see you guys have big, big plans to keep on growing. I remember the old spot you have and I just love it. I love this church and Michelle, you guys do such a great job. And yeah, I mean, it's changed everything. You know, the best way I could analogize it is it's kind of like the Old Testament and the New Testament of your life, like B.C. and A.D. It's like you don't even you don't even it's like a different chapter of your life before you have a child. Getting married is, of course, the most important thing besides giving your life to Jesus Christ. I will say, though, that the transformation that occurs when you hold your child, you get exactly what I mean. And if you don't, then get married and have kids because it's good for you and good for society. But also, I mean, I will say this. It radicalizes me in the best possible ways. And I inherently have difficulty, and I pray for forgiveness over this, for the kind of bitterness I have towards like the childless that are trying to ruin our society, people that don't have children and people that don't want us to have children. And they're telling you that we shouldn't have kids because of climate change or, you know, we should just have more abortions in our country. It's the greatest gift from the Lord to have children. And we should celebrate that every single day. It's not easy. You worry about things you've never thought you'd worry about before. And I mean, but you realize that life is not about you. And that is the Christian calling is that it's the unraveling of you. And it's focusing on Christ and focusing on the cross, focusing on duty and obligation and obedience. And you realize that you want to try to pass that down to somebody else or a different generation. And then not as if I needed more urgency, but it created a, let's say a higher level of a sense of urgency that, And I was like, wow, we're handing down an increasingly awful place to live for my daughter. We're destroying the greatest nation ever to exist in the history of the world. We're doing it to ourselves. And I'm not going to be able to look her in the eyes when she's 10 years old or 15 years old. And she'll say, like, what was America like when we didn't have, you know, like all the different, you know, open borders or what? Did we just have a country that was considered to be great? Yeah. 00:04:21 Speaker 3: And. 00:04:22 Speaker 1: I wouldn't be able to live with myself. And I think you feel the same way because that's why we're in this fight. We're in this fight for our children and, God willing, our grandchildren. And so it's blessed Erica and I immeasurably. And if you think you've seen Charlie Kirk work hard, we're going to a whole other level. That's what fatherhood does for you. 00:04:42 Speaker 2: I love that. You know, Charlie, I recently saw an interview that you had with Russell Brand. It's been seen by over a million people. I mean, this thing is just, and he asked you a question, and I thought it was a great question, and the way that you answered it was excellent. Can you share about how important your relationship with Jesus Christ is as your Savior? 00:05:04 Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, it's everything, and we must always keep our eyes focused on the cross, and You know, when I visit these college campuses, by the way, keep us in prayer. Tomorrow, I'm going to San Diego State University for two events. And so somebody recently said, Charlie, would you like to go on a mission trip for me? I'm good. I love the mission work. I do my mission work here domestically. On college campuses. So when I go to San Diego State University, they'll ask me, what makes Christianity different? There's all these different religions, and who's to say that yours is correct or right? And appealing to reason usually doesn't always work in that moment. It has to be a soul thing. It has to have transformation from within. But it needs to be expressed that Christianity is the only faith that expresses where the divine took the temporal form not out of any sort of, the only explanation could be love. It's the greatest love story ever told, which is, and this is why John 1 is so incredibly important. And the book of John is transformational because it is the clearest about Christ's divinity. Christ's divinity is expressed in all gospels, but it is by far the clearest in John, the seven I am statements. And then just John 1, that in the beginning was the word and the word became flesh. That is so deep and heavy in If you think about it, the word in Greek is logos, and I'm sure Pastor John has walked you through this multiple times, but understanding what that meant in ancient Greek was that it was the idea that the universe has an infinite component to it. All of the stars, all of the constellations, the logos is the idea that we have gravity and physics, and it's the power that made that all come together from our DNA, from how you are perfectly and wonderfully made. The Greeks said the Logos is the mind of the universe, if you will. The best way I could put it is the designer. And what John says so clearly is that the Logos then became human. And so let's contrast that with Buddhism. So in Buddhism, it is all about how dirty you as a human being are and that you must shed your dirtiness as a human being to reach nirvana. If you talk to a true Buddhist... They think it is incomprehensible that the divine or the eternal would ever take human form. Like why would the perfect ever become the dirty human? They just, they don't get it. They said that we're supposed to become eternal by... not talking. And by literally in Buddhism, not talking is one of the highest levels of climbing towards nirvana. And only the Buddha in their belief system did that. Christianity flips it all over. It's that, that God loved you so much that he took human form. And that, that, that is a, that is a truth that resonates to all people. And we, we are joking around about John three, you know, backstage, but it said right there when Nicodemus is basically questioning Jesus and This is where we get the idea of being born again, where Nicodemus is like, what do you mean you're born again? Aren't you already, you're born once at your mother's womb? And Jesus is like, no, you must be born both by water and spirit. Water being baptism, spirit being by accepting Christ as your Lord and Savior. And only those will then come into the kingdom of God. And Nicodemus is like, what are you talking about? Like, God bless this guy, right? He's trying to figure this out. And that's where we get the most famous verse in all of Christianity, for God so loved the world. that he gave him his one only son, that whoever believed in him shall not perish, but he have eternal life. And the next verse, that he did not send his son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world. And so this is a rescue mission. Understand that we are in peril because of our own broken, selfish nature. God gave us the ability to choose, and we messed it up since the garden. And we have not done very well since. War, famine, destruction, disease, self-interest, murder, rape. And God sees all of humanity. And he says, I love humanity so much. I'm going to give them one last eternal chance. And I'm going to take their form. Not just broadcast it on billboards and say, give all your money to me and all this. But I'm going to walk alongside of you and among you. And so Jesus Christ is the most important thing in my life. And it's transformed me from within. 00:09:14 Speaker 3: I wanna ask you something. How long have you been putting off plans to buy a home because of mortgage rates? I understand why you might be hesitant, but what if the opportunity you're waiting for looks different than you expect? When other buyers see obstacles, there may be opportunities to negotiate, explore different financing options, and find a way forward. That's why I wanna talk to you about Andrew and Todd. Their experience and access to programs and solutions We'll be right back. And as rates change in the future, they'll keep an eye out to refinance into even lower payments. Please don't look back months from now and wonder if you missed an opportunity. All it takes is one phone call to find out the truth for you. Call 888-888-1172. That's 888-888-1172. Or visit andrewandtodd.com. Take a few minutes. Find out what's possible. Your next chapter may be closer than you think. 00:10:19 Speaker 1: And I get the amazing opportunity to dialogue with people of all different faiths. And without picking on different religions, let's just say like the new age Eastern religions, they're always grappling with this idea of like, I have to strip myself of all the earthly things. And if I just kind of get my chakra right, then I'll be able to get to enlightenment. Like you're thinking way too much about this. Like this is Jesus is the answer. That's it. It's accepting Jesus into your soul. That is the answer. In your life. And then the Greeks had a word for this, which is metamoufe, which is to metamorphosize you. And I know you guys have a men's conference coming up in Romans 12 too, which is do not conform to the ways of this world, but instead be transformed by the renewing of your mind. It's the same word renewal or revitalization or metamorphosis, which metamorphosis, we think of kind of a caterpillar into a butterfly. That's what happens with Jesus, is that you don't even remember who you once were. And then it's not that you don't sin, but for real Christians, you know what I mean? It's that when you sin, you feel differently. And that's my number one mark of how I know someone's an actual Christian. It's how do you feel? Like, let's, for example, you might have really been a big drinker. Then you give your life to Christ. And then you try to be a big drinker again. You're like, you just feel like you're taking Jesus drinking along with you. Like you feel different. You're like. It's not as if you don't do it, but you just have something almost that you're trying to reconcile with it. That is fruit that you've been born new. And we don't give our lives to Christ, or let me say this, we don't do good things just to try to win favor with Christ. And that's what makes everything so different in Christianity, is that other religions are trying to win points on the scoreboard, It's a free gift right there for you. And we don't do good things to get saved. We do good things because we are saved. It's completely different. We do it out of an act of worship and celebration. And I can say this. I'm not an expert in world religions, but I am an expert in American paganism. I am. Because I fight it every single day. And by the way, I love these pastors. Like, I don't want to be political. You don't realize we're fighting the pagan gods of the Old Testament every day. We are fighting the pagan god of Molech. We're fighting the pagan god of Jezebel. We are fighting the pagan gods that God's chosen people were up against all the time. When I go to these college campuses, they are broken. They are suffering. They're looking for eternal hope. And only Jesus is that hope. And If I can bring just one person to Christ, I know there's one person I met earlier that was just an amazing testimonial, then it's a life well lived. And you get life eternal. It's the greatest thing you can give to other people. And so praise God that we get the chance to know Jesus Christ. And if you don't, you should make that decision here tonight. It's the most important decision you can make. 00:12:58 Speaker 2: There you go. It's the best information you could have. And I often say, listen, you can be conservative and still on your way to hell. You need Christ. You need to be born again. That's what matters. You know, Charlie, I want to talk for a moment, just talking about our involvement in in the church. And, you know, there's something lately that I've heard more. It's some titles that get thrown around, some things that the church is being called. It's the word Christian nationalist and dominionist. Can you help us understand? You can't get involved in anything civically because you're a Christian nationalist. Can you break that down for us and help us to understand what is that about? 00:13:40 Speaker 1: I'm so glad you bring this up, John. This is now the number one narrative that will be pushed forward by a secular pagan regime to try to get the church not involved in politics. They have now broadcasted it. They've done a movie. People that I grew up really respecting, I'm saddened by this, John, and people like Russell Moore, who I end up reading a lot of his stuff, he's going in movies saying that Christian nationalism is this huge threat, and he's partnering with secular pagan, I was going to say satanic, but that's probably true too, but secular pagans and making these films, you know, warning and cautioning about the growing threat of Christian nationalism. And I always joke around. I said, I've spoken over 150 churches across the country. Like what exactly are you afraid of? Are you afraid of all the poor people that they're helping or all the hungry people that they're feeding or all the marriages that they're saving, right? Are you afraid of all the people that are lost that now have direction because of the church? And what they're really afraid of is they're terrified that the Christian church might unite its political power and might be the no against the regime. And it is the conscious of the nation. And so, you know, I get asked all the time, are you a Christian nationalist? And I say, I don't like that term. I don't. I am a Christian and I am a nationalist. So I'm not afraid of that. But what you're trying to do is you're trying to call me a Nazi. Okay, so let's just be as, I'm a blunt guy, if you don't know that. You're trying to call me a Nazi. Okay. And so I find that to be reprehensible and repulsive. I want a restoration of the Constitution. And that's what you want too. I want, I'm a constitutionalist. I'm a Bible-believing Christian constitutionalist. You know who else was? James Madison and George Washington and John Jay and Alexander Hamilton. If I went around to everyone in this room, if I said, if we can restore the promise of the Constitution, would you be happy? You'd say, absolutely. And the bad guys say, well, what are you so afraid of? Oh, I don't know. The church being deemed non-essential? when strip clubs and marijuana dispensaries and liquor stores could remain open and the church has to close forcibly and Easter and Pentecost are taken from us? Or, I don't know, they go after our children and they try to chemically castrate them against their will? Did you shout them out earlier, the ballot referendum? That's so important, by the way. Everyone's got a side in that ballot referendum. It's incredibly important here. And so I go back to the Bible and to Scripture for all authority and for all guidance. If it's not in the Bible... then we got a problem, okay? So let's go to a couple of verses. Jeremiah 29, 7. Seek or demand, it's the word badrash in Hebrew, the welfare of the nation that you are in, because your welfare is tied to your nation's welfare. It is a commandment from the Lord, as the prophet Jeremiah writes in the 29th book, that you need to care about your nation. Daniel fasted and prayed for his nation. Esther cared for her nation. Mordecai cared for his nation. Jeremiah, Not to mention Elijah, who didn't just care about his nation. He confronted King Ahab and was like, let's throw this down on Mount Carmel and see who the real God actually is. They would call him, Elijah, you're being too political. Elijah, how dare you confront the pagan forces? Why don't you just preach the gospel, Elijah? Why are you trying to throw it down on Mount Carmel? You're too confrontational. He did even more than that. You could check it out. I think you guys are studying 1 Kings. You'll get to that later. Pretty soon. It wasn't politically correct. But they're using this as a way to try to make you feel radical and afraid. Okay? You must reject the premise in that sense. Kind of laugh at it and scoff at it and say, oh, you think I'm a Christian nationalist? Well, you're a pagan globalist. 00:17:22 Speaker 2: That's interesting. 00:17:25 Speaker 1: You worship the fake pagan gods of child sacrifice and of child mutilation. You worship at the golden calf of money and pride and fame. and social acceptance. Jesus Christ is my Lord and Savior. And I want a restoration of what unites all different tribes of this country, believing tribes and non-believing tribes. One thing that we can all agree on is that the promise of the Declaration of the Constitution is one that is biblical. It is based largely and primarily on the book of Deuteronomy. It is one that is eternal. It hearkens back to even the supreme judge of the world, which you know in Revelation is Jesus Christ, who sits on the throne and judges. You read the last paragraph of the Declaration of Independence. It is a prayer. Many people have not told you this before. There is a prayer in our founding documents. Oh, Charlie, don't you know the founding fathers were all secular? Well, okay, 55 out of 56 of the founding fathers were Bible-believing church-attending Christians. But yes, maybe one of them was not a Christian. Not to mention 9 out of 13 of the original colonies at the American founding had Christians. a requirement that you were a Bible-believing Christian, even serve in political office in 9 out of 13 of those original colonies. 00:18:39 Speaker 3: By the end of the year, more than 60,000 babies will have been saved by pre-born centers. Just this year, 60,000 babies. And for every baby who's saved, there's a mom who's saved from a lifetime of pain and regret. Take a stand for life by providing an ultrasound for a young woman. 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I'd be so honored if you'd prayerfully consider joining us. 00:19:44 Speaker 1: However, going back out of that, what we want at this time is for the Constitution to be restored, the church to never be deemed non-essential again for our children to be off limits that the separation between adult and child is firm and is non-negotiable and we will never waver on that that the distinctions between male and female will never be blurred yeah And let me just reiterate what I said earlier. The biblical role for a Christian in the church is not to make politics your everything. It surprises my critics when I say that because they don't listen to what I say. They put words in my mouth. I have never said that politics should be the only business of the church. I said you should care about it. Jesus needs to be the center of your church. But if you don't ever mention politics, if you don't ever mention what happens in your city, if you don't ever mention morality, you are failing your flock. And unfortunately, in today's time, the political band is growing and growing and growing because government is growing and growing and growing. So the threat to the church is growing. And are we going to be like the Christians in Nazi Germany that just sat idly by when the great horrors were continuing and the trains were bringing Jews to concentration camps? Well, we don't want to be political because of Romans 13. That's not who we as Christians are in this country. So they're going to try to silence us. They're going to try to make us seem as if you're bad or you're some sort of fascist because you want a restoration of the American promise. Reject the premise, keep scripture as the core. And I know the one thing that will unite us as a free society, which is a biblical society is the constitution and getting back to a constitutional Republic. 00:21:20 Speaker 2: Love it. 00:21:21 Speaker 1: Great word. 00:21:21 Speaker 2: You know, being, being a church leader and serving in a local congregation here in a community is, Why do you suppose that some church leaders, and you touched on it, are hesitant to take a stand against this flood tide of evil that we see coming in? What is it that stops them from being more bold about these things? 00:21:48 Speaker 1: John, I have to brag on you. I'm very touched that you would continue to have me back to this church. It's not a joke. I mean, there are pastors that have to resign because they get found out that they're fans of Turning Point and Charlie Kirk. There's one pastor in particular who In Kansas, he was fired because he wanted to screen Letter to the American Church, one of the movies that we did. So I want to applaud you, John. You're a courageous person, and it really is great. And I mean that. And again, I don't consider what I say to be controversial. The world considers it to be controversial. I consider what I say to be biblical and factional and reasonable and rational. But Look, John, let's be honest. The vast majority of people that call themselves pastors are not actually pastors. And I know that's a controversial thing to say. I believe a pastor is someone that has full spectrum involvement in the ales of the world to try to bring Christ and the truth of the scriptures to wherever it's needed. That means to youth ministry, to prison ministries, to marriage ministries, whatever it is. And that also means to the public square. They look at being a pastor as kind of a mixture between a motivational speaker and a TED Talk. And their churches have kind of become Like, I don't know, five ways to improve your happiness with good coffee and organized parking. And, and, and I, again, I'm not trying to overly insult. I'm trying to be a more, I, I get these emails from these sweet people. Charlie, you shouldn't pick on pastors so much. It's just, I'll be honest guys. I mean, I hope this is where I disagree with it. I have three different things of how I hold you to account. And the word judgment gets thrown around a lot. We are supposed to judge within the body just so we're clear. Okay. Okay. The world I have a lot of, I have a heart for the lost. But here's the thing. On campus, if someone comes up to me and they say, I'm a Marxist atheist, I hold them to a much lower standard than someone who comes up to me and says, I'm a believer. When they say I'm a believer, I say, okay, now we're talking. And here's one of the reasons why. And then the third is that if you say you're a pastor, you're at a much, much, much higher standard. And don't take my word for it. I'll give you multiple biblical examples. The entire book of Titus is all about church governance. And if you're in the administration of the holy, you're held to a higher standard. Paul wrote extensively about those in the head of the church have different rules, different customs, different accountability measures if you are going to be in charge of an ecclesia or a body. The entire book of Leviticus is about if you are a priest, if you are in the handling of the holy, different rules, different customs, different clothes, different garments. And so throughout the scriptures, it is screaming at us, That if you're a pastor, it's just you're held to a higher standard. And let's go back to the Ten Commandments. Do not take the Lord's name in vain. Now that means verbally we should never say, I don't like when people throw around, oh my, you know, I don't like it. I believe that to be a sin. But I believe it actually is deeper than that. And it's not reading into it exegetically. The word is do not carry the Lord's name in vain. Which you could interpret that in a lot of different ways. it is not too far to say, and the original rabbis would say this back 2,000, 3,000 years ago, which is that if you are going to do evil in the name of God, that is one of the most, that is the unforgivable thing you do. And if you really wrestle with that, it makes sense. Because, for example, if every pastor was an adulterer, it would destroy the faith. If every single pastor, think about it, they pick one pastor out of a thousand And it makes us all look bad, right? Just think about one. They're able to misrepresent the entire body of Christ. And so when you are in the role and you say, I am a pastor. By the way, I never say I'm a pastor. I'm not a theologian. I'm a Christian. I'm a believer. And I love the word, okay? But when someone says they're a pastor, we immediately need to hold them to higher account. Because they're now telling you that I am a spokesperson, an interlocutor, a, dare I say, mediator. for the scriptures. Now, Christ is the ultimate mediator, but they say that I'm here to help you understand this, and if they say something as blasphemous and as heretical, that, well, we don't do politics around here, we just do the gospel, then I believe you're going to be judged for that kind of heresy. I don't think you should only talk about politics, but you're trying to tell me God is indifferent to the one million abortions happening in this country every single year, and that he wants his church just to kind of you know, sit around and talk about how, you know, they read Live, Eat, and Pray, or whatever that silly book is that, you know, more women would know than men, or whatever. Pray, Live, and Eat, I always get it wrong, whatever it is. 00:26:29 Speaker 2: I haven't read it, I don't know about it. 00:26:31 Speaker 1: And I look at some of these pastors, and I will say, I break them into different categories. Some of them, you know, they obviously have a much bigger wardrobe budget than a book budget, and I say, these guys have got to resign from the ministry. They're not doing serious study or scholarship, but some, I think, are afraid. Mm-hmm. And I'll be honest, I've lost patience with them. I had patience with them for like during COVID. And now I say, if you are afraid as a pastor, go sell insurance. Stop being a pastor. You have no business. Only God, you should. By the way, nothing against insurance salesmen. We need you, please. I mean, I love you guys to death, okay? But I'm sure we have a couple here tonight that they aren't laughing at all at what I'm saying. 00:27:10 Speaker 2: It's not funny. 00:27:12 Speaker 1: But I'll throw it back to you, John, with this. If you're going to step into the arena, right now at the very consequential times we're living in, the signs of the times all around us, and you're going to say, I'm a pastor, and you want that because of the lifestyle or the Instagram clicks, or you think that it's like a cool job, I highly recommend you get out of the arena because you're doing more harm than good. 00:27:38 Speaker 3: I talk about jobs and industries on this show all the time, but I didn't expect to find an entire skills trade community on TikTok. plumbers, electricians, builders, and contractors sharing the work they do every day. And it went way beyond tips and tricks. People were sharing their craft, connecting with local contractors, and talking about how they were building their businesses and growing their teams. It opened my eyes to how people in the trades are using TikTok to share their skills, make connections, and find new opportunities. I remember thinking, this is exactly what we need more of, people sharing what they know and creating opportunities for others. And I never expected to find a community like this That's the thing about TikTok. You start with something you know, and suddenly you're finding a whole new side of it that surprises you and leaves you wanting to know more. Your next discovery is waiting for you on TikTok. Learn more at TikTok.com slash discover more. 00:28:30 Speaker 2: You know, I wonder as you, and just to kind of capitalize on that a little bit more, and I do agree with you. I think when you read through scripture, there were times when God would call prophets to confront kings and And would put a word in their mouth. And it wasn't an easy word to deliver. And they weren't always applauded. And most times they were either imprisoned or they were put to death. They were hated. And I think there's the fear of man has taken above really the fear of God. And if you fear God, you don't have to fear anything. I mean, that's really what it comes down to, the fear of man. The Bible says the fear of man brings a snare. And I think it's important to have a greater reverence for God. I also would like to add, and maybe ask you this, Charlie, do you think it's possible, because as a pastor, either, and it works in a couple different ways. You have people that say, hey, you are too political. And then you have others that say, you're not political enough. 00:29:27 Speaker 1: And so you, as a pastor. 00:29:28 Speaker 2: You're, you know, you're, let's say you're ministering and you're doing all this, but people say, you don't say enough. I'm saying stuff like I'm, you know, it's not every week I'm going to like open the constitution to, I've opened the Bible, but if it comes up, you know, if issues come up, we're going to talk about it. 00:29:43 Speaker 1: We can't be afraid of it. But I wonder, is it possible? 00:29:46 Speaker 2: Do you think it's possible to be too one side? Is there, where's the, this is my question. And I really try to strike this and you who attend here, you know, my heart on this. I really try to strike the balance. 00:29:57 Speaker 1: That's how I find the balance. John, if people say you aren't political enough, they're wrong. Well, I feel better now. Thank you. I just, I felt like maybe. No, but I mean, look, I mean, having me buys you like two years, okay? That's like you bought like two years of inventory. But John, I mean, I watch you periodically. You're always speaking very morally clearly. I think Pastor Jack Hibbs does a great job of being biblical and being outspoken. I think he does. 00:30:26 Speaker 3: Yeah. 00:30:27 Speaker 1: And I try to watch Jack. I watch him almost every single week. But yes, of course you could become too political. 00:30:32 Speaker 2: So you watch Jack every week and me like once in a while? 00:30:36 Speaker 1: I'm sorry. I'll try to wrap that up. 00:30:40 Speaker 2: It's only cool. 00:30:42 Speaker 1: There's only so much time in a day. 00:30:44 Speaker 2: Sorry, go ahead. 00:30:45 Speaker 1: You were saying? I'm never going to be invited back, so now I'm really going to turn it up. We love you, Jack. That's right. I, of course... I will say this. Thanks, Mom. I appreciate. 00:31:03 Speaker 2: It. 00:31:05 Speaker 1: I'm sorry. You were saying it. No, it's okay. I digress. So I, of course, you could become too political. And this is, a friend of mine wrote a book, and I'm not going to say who he did because he has a great heart, and I met with him. He's a well-known theologian, and he became a friend through the book because I thought the book was totally off the mark. And he said one of the biggest problems is this rise of Christian nationalism. And the way he defines it, I actually tend to agree if that was the term, which was like, okay, the nation comes more important than Jesus. Okay, I said fine. But he thinks it's this widespread contagion. And I said, no, it's not. You are way misdiagnosing. There might be a fringe of the fringe. And I will tell you, again, I've spoke at churches across the country. We have now had over 3,000 pastors. pass through our training at TPUSA faith. I have not, I have not come. It's amazing. I have not come across a pastor that I believe is too political. I have not, and I could, the evidence is this because I asked them, I say, tell me about the most important metric. How many souls are going to heaven? And they'll say, well, we've tripled our baptisms or quadrupled, you know, our attendance here in Eastern. Okay. So I mean that, so I don't find it that way. I will say though, John, Okay, I grant you, there might be a church somewhere. And again, I will say, if they are too political, how have I not heard of them? I just, you know, how have they not invited me to speak, right? Like, I just, I want to find these people. Yeah, right. I'm sure they exist somewhere. The much bigger problem, though, John, is churches that are not political enough or not political at all. And let's stop this word political. Let me fix my language. They're not biblical enough or they're not biblical at all. That's the true problem, right? And so, look, there's a season for everything, as it says in Ecclesiastes, right? So they're ramping things up in politics. It makes sense to have me speak here, right? But you've got to keep Jesus at the center. And, John, I've known you for a little while, and you always ask this question so well. And God will give you wisdom, and he'll give it to you generously, right? And you're going through the scriptures, and it speaks clearly to a moral topic. 00:33:14 Speaker 2: Hit it. 00:33:15 Speaker 1: And, hey, if there's a breaking news item and you feel led, then you just dive into it, right? And that is what it means to lead the ecclesia and the public square, which is what church actually means in the original Greek. But the biggest problem right now in American Christianity, let's not fool ourselves, are pastors that do not dive into the current events. And better yet, they do not equip their flock to be able to read the news items and understand what does the Bible say about trans surgeries? What does the Bible say about immigration? What does the Bible say about politicians? What does it say about government? Should we submit to government all the time? Is there ever a right time to rebel against government? And so what I have found is if the church, the flock, are not getting that kind of guidance from their church, they will go get it from a secular authority. And the tragedy of modern Christianity is you have millions of people going to church every single day, not being equipped with a biblical worldview. 00:34:18 Speaker 4: Right. 00:34:19 Speaker 1: See, a biblical worldview, the best way I could put it is it is the color of which you see everything. So once you get a biblical worldview taught by a good pastor like Pastor John and so on and so forth, is then you see a news item on CNN. Like, well, that doesn't harmonize with my worldview. And you're trained then in the way so you no longer need the pastor to guide you through every news item. And that kind of training takes time and you have to spend time in the scriptures and you have to read the Bible every day. and you have to listen to Christian music, and you have to pray to God, and you develop that. It's a muscle set, really. And for new Christians, it might take a year or two or three or four or five, because you might still be looking at it through the secular old worldview. And sometimes you need to kind of get those muscles back into action, because sometimes you might be falling into kind of a secular way of thinking. But so many pastors will then do something even worse than that, is they'll take a secular new age worldview and bring it into the church. Mm-hmm. 00:35:17 Speaker 2: That's right. 00:35:18 Speaker 1: So let me give you an example. Yeah, please. Is they'll come up and they'll say, I don't like Donald Trump because he's not nice. And so then I say, find the word nice anywhere in the Bible. And I will concede the point. It's nowhere in the 66 books of the Bible is the word nice. The word nice is from the 1900s in Latin. It means stupid. And so, you know, it really does. It means ignorant, stupid, you know, and like, you know, oh, that person's really nice. You know, like, and how it metamorphosized into what we, you know, mean now. Now you're supposed to be kind, loving, compassion, compassionate, long-suffering, truthful. All those things are correct. But they will say that, you know, I can't vote for this person or I can't support this. I'm not here to make it all about Trump, but I'm just using an example, right? Or because, you know, I don't like the way that, you know, they say certain things. Okay. So you're trying to tell me that somebody's tone bothers you so much that you do not want Roe versus Wade to be repealed. Because if enough people thought the way you did in the 2016 presidential election with Hillary Clinton, we don't get Amy Coney Barrett, Kavanaugh, and Gorsuch, and Roe versus Wade is still law of the land, and we would not have hundreds of thousands of lives be saved. So I praise God we didn't think that way. By the way, the embassy would never have been moved to Jerusalem and Israel. We wouldn't have had relative peace. We had a border for a short period of time. I could go on and on and on for other examples, right? And so I... I want to make sure that pastors are not bringing these kind of secular prisms into the pulpit. 00:36:47 Speaker 2: I love that. Great word, Charlie. 00:36:49 Speaker 3: I love that. 00:36:49 Speaker 1: It's excellent.