Ep 1082 ｜ Pastors Invoke Toxic Empathy to Endorse Harris
Episode Stats
Length
1 hour and 3 minutes
Words per Minute
158.84811
Summary
Pastor Ray Orlund endorses Kamala Harris. Is there ever a reason for a Christian to vote for Harris? But other pastors are giving their congregations biblical clarity on this election. And so we are going to be talking about the good, the bad, and the ugly in the evangelical world when it comes to this election and politics on today s episode of Relatable.
Transcript
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Nashville pastor Ray Ortlund endorses Kamala Harris.
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Is there ever a reason for a Christian to vote for Harris?
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But other pastors are giving their congregations what they need, biblical clarity on this election.
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And so we are going to be talking about the good, the bad, and the ugly in the evangelical
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world when it comes to this election and politics on today's episode of Relatable.
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It's brought to you by our friends at Good Ranchers.
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Hope everyone is having a wonderful week so far.
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Of course, you can go ahead and pre-order right now.
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That makes sure that your copy gets there as soon as possible.
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Toxic Empathy, How Progressives Exploit, Christian Compassion.
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We've got that Rosaria Butterfield endorsement right there.
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Al Mohler, Katie Faust, Lisa Childers, Hilary Morgan Ferrer, just awesome people.
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I'm very grateful, honored, humbled by those endorsements.
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It helps me out a lot if you can pre-order now or you can go ahead and purchase tomorrow.
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Amazon has the majority of the copies of really any book that sold, including this book.
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If you purchase from Amazon, you purchase as soon as you can.
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if you could leave me a five-star review on Amazon, that would be super helpful.
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We'll be talking a little bit more about Toxic Empathy today as we get into the pastor response to the election
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and how they are shepherding their congregations in this season.
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Also, if you love this podcast, if you appreciate it,
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if you could please leave us a five-star review on Apple Podcasts, on Spotify, I would be so grateful for that.
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All right, we've got a lot to get into, so let's go ahead and get into it.
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I've been meaning to talk about this story, this post that I saw a couple weeks ago for a while,
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There's always so much competing for our attention,
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but I also know you guys really appreciate it when we talk about pastors
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and pastors who are taking a stand one way or another publicly, particularly when it comes to politics.
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So it's always of interest to me when we've got an evangelical pastor who is making a political statement.
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He is an author and pastor of a church outside of Nashville or in Nashville,
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and he recently posted an endorsement of Vice President Harris,
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and he also said that he would never vote for Donald Trump,
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then it seemed like he was supporting his position by saying that he believes in Jesus.
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I originally thought it was on X and I couldn't find it,
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so I thought, okay, maybe it's photoshopped, but it was on threads.
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I'm not on threads, but I saw this screenshot circulating.
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It has been confirmed that this was really him.
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It says, never Trump, this time Harris, always Jesus.
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And then, of course, David French responded to this post and said, this is the way.
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So a little bit more about Ray Ortlund, because some people might be thinking,
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Maybe he's just a far-left progressive, one of these churches that's waving the pride flag,
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However, also, if you've been paying attention to the things that he's been saying over the years,
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particularly since 2020, this doesn't come as that much of a surprise.
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So he's the president of Renewal Ministries and a council member of the Gospel Coalition.
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We've talked about what I believe to be a leftward drift of the Gospel Coalition a few times.
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Doesn't mean every author, every piece there should be dismissed outright by any means,
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but certainly the direction that it tends to lean, especially when it comes to political and cultural issues,
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He now calls himself a pastor to pastors, Ray Ortlund, and other staff members include Russell Moore.
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He's a minister-in-residence at the church, Gavin Ortlund.
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On September 29th is when Ortlund posted his fateful statement.
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And I assume also that Ray Ortlund probably voted for Joe Biden back in 2020.
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Forgive me if I'm wrong, but based on statements he made about BLM racism at the time,
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But right after George Floyd died under the kneeling pressure of the police officer,
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he posted this along with the picture of George Floyd and Derek Chauvin.
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Don't you understand yet that I identify with the man on the pavement, not the man in power?
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So if you're going to keep behaving in your racist ways, then come after me too.
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If we all take our stand together, well, they can't kill us all.
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We'll still be here when racism's power is exhausted and spent forever.
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Now, I will remind you that there is no evidence whatsoever that there was
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any racial prejudice when it comes to the death of George Floyd.
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Now, you can say that maybe the tactic of Derek Chauvin wasn't really one that you agree with.
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You can talk about maybe the policies of police forces in America.
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But there is no evidence whatsoever that there was racial animus involved in the death of George Floyd.
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And of course, much has come out since the death of George Floyd that has made this a much more controversial situation.
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Now, it's always sad when an image bearer of God dies, but there are many factors at play in this situation.
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And to immediately say that this was caused by systemic racism, systemic discrimination.
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Well, that is not a discerning judgment because Christians are called not just to relate to someone,
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but to be rooted and grounded in love, which is inextricably intertwined with truth.
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As 1 Corinthians 13, 6 says, love rejoices with the truth.
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And this is a really great example, actually, of toxic empathy, because when we feel how someone feels,
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Well, when it comes to justice, when it comes to policy, when it comes to these big statements
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that can inform policy, that has an effect on people's lives, it really doesn't matter whom
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And Christians who are supposed to love justice and mercy have to define justice as God defines
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And one of the key qualities, qualifications of justice that we see throughout Scripture,
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from the law giving to Israel all the way through the New Testament, is impartiality.
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We don't show partiality to someone because they're rich, because they're poor, because
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they're influential, because they have no influence, white or black, because we perceive that they
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are on the side of the oppressed, or we perceive that they're on the side of the oppressor.
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That is not the truthful, proportionate, and impartial justice that God doles out and that
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That's the problem with toxic empathy, is that when we feel how someone feels so strongly,
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we become blinded to both reality and morality, and we no longer are able to make right judgments.
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We can't test objective reality, and therefore we can't actually be judicious in the things
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I have an entire chapter dedicated to social justice.
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It was one of the most difficult to write because I understand this is a tricky subject,
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and there is some gray and some nuance in this conversation.
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And yet, how many evangelicals approached the issue of race, approached the issue of justice
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in 2020 was just flat out unbiblical, wrong, and I think damaging and maliciously divisive.
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I'm not saying necessarily that every single person who said something like Ray Ortlund was
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deliberately malicious, but there ended up being a lot of malintended actors, I would say,
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who kind of exploited Christian compassion for their own personal political gain.
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So the fifth lie that we dissect in toxic empathy is social justice is justice.
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And we take you through the gut-wrenching, heart-wrenching stories that would make you
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believe that these statements are true, but then we zoom out and we say, what is the moral
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and human cost on the other side of this calculation, on the other side of this problem?
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And then we ask the most important question, not, okay, who gets us to feel a certain way,
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but what is actually true, what is factually true, what is logically true, and what is biblically
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And we do it with all the most controversial subjects, and social justice is really the
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one that I see tripping Christians up the most.
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And as I explain in the book, I completely understand that because I've been there before.
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So let's get into a little bit more about Ray Ortlund and his politics and kind of the
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In April of 2021, Ray Ortlund said this, and this got a lot of blowback.
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I rejoiced at the decline of Bible Belt religion.
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Now, may we actually believe in him so that our churches stand out with both the truth
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of gospel doctrine and the beauty of gospel culture.
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I mean, I agree in some ways that Christianity can thrive on the margins.
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It can thrive in the darkness, just like a candle seems to shine brightly when it is dark.
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But the goal of the candle is to illuminate, right?
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And you want enough candles so that a room can be navigated clearly.
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A space can be navigated so it's no longer dark and people are no longer fumbling around,
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tripping over themselves, but they can actually see rightly.
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And so the goal of Christianity is to infuse, one of the goals of Christianity is to infuse
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goodness and rightness and truth and beauty in every space and sphere that we occupy.
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Would it not be better if more people believed in God's ways?
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Would it not be better if more people believed that God's truth is the best basis on which
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And so the Bible Belt got its name because of the proliferation of churches, the availability
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of the Bible, just kind of like the background Christian culture.
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I could see in some ways what he means that it can create or allow for nominal Christians
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that you're just kind of someone who says they're a Christian because everyone is a Christian
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and you never feel conviction to dig into your faith because it's convenient and comfortable,
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whereas it's not convenient and comfortable to be a Christian in, say, Los Angeles.
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And so for you to say you're a Christian, you have to really believe it.
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But there are great benefits to having a generally Christian culture.
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There's a great benefit to how we conduct our lives and the policies that we influence or
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that we vote for, because if we believe God's ways are better, there's no way that we can
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check that belief at the door before we vote, before we engage in culture.
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It just doesn't make sense to believe that God is the creator and the authority over all
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But we only believe that in this compartment over there, and then we don't try to infuse that
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reality into every space that we enter in every sphere that we occupy, including the public
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school system, including our job, including our worldview and how we vote.
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And if that's the case, like if we are champions of God's authority and his ways and his rightness,
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then it should be seen as a good thing when the culture becomes more Christian.
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There are great benefits to a generally Christian culture and how our country orders its lives
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and orders its priorities and the laws that are passed that better protect children and
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that don't incentivize things like homelessness and drug use and public sexual degeneracy, the
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breakdown of the family, having a background of a Christian ethos, which in many ways the
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Bible Belt does, is a great benefit to people no matter what your faith is.
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And it's really only when you live in the Bible Belt that you can take that kind of thing
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for granted and you can kind of say, oh no, I'm celebrating Christianity going to the margins.
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You should never celebrate Christianity going to the margins.
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Sure, the gates of hell will not prevail against the church.
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God is going to protect his people, shepherd his flock well, and we will be able to preach
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But you lose a lot when you lose the Christian worldview as the main, as the keystone of a
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Charity is a distinctly Christian idea, at least at its foundations.
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So when you lose Christianity, you lose all of that.
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And I just don't think that people do a good enough job of connecting so much of what protects
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the most vulnerable in the United States to our Christian culture and to our Christian
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And so I would just say he's wrong about that, but it makes a lot of sense that he would join
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ranks with this organization called the After Party.
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And you've heard about the After Party from Megan Basham.
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She wrote the book Shepherds for Sale, and she talks about the history of the After Party.
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It's a nonprofit that says that they aim to address the underlying theological problems,
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driving chaos and confusion in our current world.
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And it basically has an approach that says, you know what, I'm neither Republican or Democrat,
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but we are outside of that dichotomy, and we're going to be confusing to both sides, so
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And we're going to basically transcend party politics and talk about how Christians should
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But I don't think it's a coincidence that virtually every person that seems to represent the After
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Party hates Donald Trump and may tickle left, but definitely punches right.
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And I think David French and Russell Moore are great examples of that.
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In May of 2022, the Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, very left-wing organization, announced
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that the After Party would be one of the 32 beneficiaries of their new pluralist project, which was investing
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$10 million to, quote-unquote, address divisive forces.
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By the way, Shepherds for Sale was a New York Times bestseller.
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She said, Ray Ortlund participating in an event with the After Party, a political Bible study
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program exclusively funded by hard-left secular foundations that also promote abortion and
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She's not saying the After Party does, but where they're getting their funding from, the foundations
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that support them do support those things, those issues.
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She says, this is a curriculum that implies white conservative Christians lack sympathy and
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And one of its creators, David French, admitted in an interview that the After Party's purpose
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Uh, she said, this is an incredibly political project designed to influence election outcomes,
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And she posted a screenshot of a picture of something the After Party says.
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It says, wondering how you can shepherd your flock this election year.
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And so he kind of falls in line with much of what the, um, the After Party said.
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You look at his Instagram of Black Lives Matter and there, maybe he feels differently about Black
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I think that they have realized just the ugly underbelly of Black Lives Matter ideology
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Um, I think that they realize that critical race theory wasn't just this boogeyman, but
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that it actually is intertwined and even a lot of, uh, professing Christians ideas about
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But I really wish more of them would be public about that and would say, you know, I got this
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wrong and I caused a lot of unfair guilt among people with a lower melanin count and a lot
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of unjustified resentment and grievance among people with a higher melanin count.
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And I, you know, that was a betrayal of the biblical definitions of justice and, and gospel
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Um, I'm not sure that we should be holding our breath on that, but I do wish that there
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would be some pastors who supported BLM then who would stand up and say, you know, I, I
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We're going to get to those in just a second and who are extremely courageous and standing
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And I think guiding their flocks in a way that is, uh, extremely discerning and I think
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But I've got one more thing to say about this, uh, this Ray Ortlund post.
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And of course it's my actual response to what he said in just a second, but let me go ahead
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So Ray Orland says that he is voting for Kamala Harris.
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Let's think for a second about who Kamala Harris is.
00:22:40.900
And if you listen to my show, you know very well who Kamala Harris is.
00:22:44.720
She is a far-left, lawfare-waging foot soldier of the most radically progressive organizations
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Since she was in politics in California, I wish that were hyperbole.
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I wish that weren't an accurate description of her.
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All you have to do is look at her history in her political career, and you can see that
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she is a power-hungry, bloodthirsty woman who will stop at nothing to protect two things,
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and that is abortion funded by the taxpayer through all nine months and institutionalized
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That is what she probably personally, ideologically really believes, and that's what her political
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If we go all the way back to when she was in her 20s, of course, she had an affair with
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a married man who had three children, Willie Brown, to get into power.
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And look, I know Trump's got his personal stuff too.
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So I'm just trying to say that, look, she has her personal sexual past as well that
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I hear a lot that, oh yeah, Trump's policies are fine, but his character is terrible.
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And I hear Christians say this, and the left's policies might not be great, but at least their
00:24:25.700
You've got two people whose pasts are riddled with all kinds of sexual scandals, all kinds
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You've got Kamala Harris, who right now is married to a man who has just been accused, and we've
00:24:44.080
got corroborating witnesses who are substantiating these claims, has just been accused of abusing
00:24:51.640
Of course, he got his children's nanny pregnant while he was married to his wife.
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We don't know exactly what happened to that baby.
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Apparently, there was some kind of mysterious miscarriage that went on there.
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So we already have that in the White House with Vice President Harris and then her husband,
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who would be, I guess, the first gentleman if she won.
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And she has her own past that is riddled with absolute corruption and immorality.
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When she was district attorney of San Francisco, when she was attorney general of California,
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she went after people's constitutional rights if they either got in the way of funding.
00:25:37.380
So, for example, there is a story that was published a few years ago by the Huffington
00:25:42.080
Post about this poor mother that was punished, that was prosecuted because of Kamala Harris's
00:25:51.760
truancy policies, anti-truancy policies in the state of California.
00:25:57.160
Her poor daughter was stuck in the hospital because she had sickle cell anemia, and so she
00:26:04.320
But this mother, of course, tried to get an exception when it came to the attendance rules
00:26:11.320
But because Kamala Harris found out that the state was losing like over a billion dollars
00:26:16.700
because parents weren't sending their kids to school faithfully enough, she cracked down
00:26:22.040
hard on what she saw as truancy, including on this poor mother who was just trying to take
00:26:29.920
And she is still, this mother is still dealing with the effects of being prosecuted because
00:26:35.360
she couldn't send her child to school while she was in the hospital dealing with the effects
00:26:51.220
Of course, she tried to force pregnancy centers in the state of California through the FACT Act
00:27:00.620
The FACT Act was overturned because it was overturned by the Supreme Court because it's
00:27:07.880
She tried to compel the speech of pro-life pregnancy centers, many of them led by Christians,
00:27:12.860
of course, to advertise for abortion and abortion clinics.
00:27:20.080
Thank the Lord for the First Amendment, which Kamala Harris clearly doesn't care about.
00:27:23.540
She is the only attorney general that I know of, you can correct me if I'm wrong, to prosecute
00:27:30.280
A journalist, David Daleiden, pro-lifer, who went undercover investigating Planned Parenthood,
00:27:36.280
seems to have uncovered an alleged pay-for-play scheme where they were selling baby potty parts
00:27:43.620
Did Kamala Harris investigate Planned Parenthood just to see if there was any illegal activity?
00:27:51.520
Authorities raided his home on her order, and he is still, nine years later, dealing
00:28:01.540
Of course, under the Harris-Biden administration, we have multiple pro-lifers who have been placed
00:28:06.820
in prison because of the obscure law that is very rarely actually executed.
00:28:14.760
The consequences of violating these laws are very rarely implemented, and that is the FACE
00:28:22.140
And so under the Harris-Biden DOJ, there have been multiple pro-lifers, including 74-year-old
00:28:28.000
Joan Bell, imprisoned because they blocked an entrance to an abortion clinic.
00:28:32.440
Now, you know you live in a Romans 1 upside-down culture, a good-is-evil, evil-is-good culture
00:28:40.900
when abortion clinics have the full support of our government, are not investigated for
00:28:48.220
wrongdoing, are actually supported fully by the people in power, but those who are trying
00:28:54.180
to stop the vicious slaughter of babies are put in prison.
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And I'm not painting you some future possible dystopian picture.
00:29:03.780
I am painting you the picture of what it is like right now for Christian pro-lifers who
00:29:10.520
take a stand under the Harris-Biden administration and under Harris's power in California.
00:29:16.720
I just don't see how voting for Harris just this time is what a Christian has to do to save
00:29:25.040
Like, in what world is Kamala Harris a champion of democracy?
00:29:29.860
Because the only thing I see is her trampling upon people's First Amendment rights because
00:29:39.700
Of course, she signed off on the Equality Act, which thankfully has not passed Congress,
00:29:44.460
but if it does pass Congress, she will be very quick to sign it.
00:29:46.980
The Equality Act tramples on your freedom as a Christian individual, certainly a Christian
00:29:52.620
business owner, certainly a Christian doctor or nurse, a Christian employee, a Christian
00:29:58.640
church, even a synagogue or even a mosque that has natural marriage definitions between a man
00:30:10.200
and a woman, the definition of gender as male and female.
00:30:14.160
The Equality Act violates your rights, your rights to exercise in accordance with your beliefs
00:30:22.380
about gender and marriage, to speak in a way that actually exemplifies what we believe about
00:30:33.980
Well, I have seen no evidence whatsoever that Kamala Harris cares about the Constitution at
00:30:40.080
And again, she voted against the Born Alive Infant Survivors Protection Act in 2019 that
00:30:44.780
just guaranteed babies who survived abortion a right to life.
00:30:47.620
She voted against that as the furthest left senator in the Senate.
00:30:51.460
You're telling me that Christians have an obligation to vote for that woman?
00:31:02.880
You're going to have to make a more solid case than that.
00:31:06.460
I think there is a better case, even though I don't agree with this and I would never encourage
00:31:09.900
someone to do this, there's a much better case for not voting or voting third party or
00:31:13.980
voting for a right-in candidate than voting for Kamala Harris.
00:31:17.740
Now, again, I don't think that case is compelling enough.
00:31:21.020
You're still giving half your vote to Kamala Harris.
00:31:22.980
But I would say this, even if you are just voting against Kamala Harris, it is worth it.
00:31:31.280
For all of the reasons I listed in Moore, she's anti-fracking, which would be absolutely
00:31:37.980
She has been in the White House for the past three and a half years.
00:31:42.120
She has overseen the economic policies that have exacerbated inflation so much, made it so
00:31:48.620
She is ideologically far left when it comes to immigration policy.
00:31:53.460
She has said many times over the years, as we have played on this podcast, that crossing
00:32:01.760
That means she doesn't believe in the deportation of illegal aliens.
00:32:06.100
And that is why Laken Riley, as one example, was murdered under her border czar watch.
00:32:13.780
She was also ahead of the border, in charge of the border of California in 2015 when Kate
00:32:21.820
Steinle was murdered by an illegal alien because she has always supported sanctuary city policies.
00:32:27.840
She has allowed this open borders chaos that has resulted in, for example, the raping of
00:32:43.080
All she had to do was ensure that the law was enforced.
00:32:46.360
Instead, under her direction, we have seen the Biden administration remove any efforts,
00:32:52.440
any mitigation tactics, buoys, barbed wire that Texas has put in place.
00:32:58.660
And right now, under the Harris-Biden administration, the DOJ is suing states that are throwing non-citizens
00:33:11.940
The Commonwealth of Virginia is actually sounding an alarm about this, that they are currently
00:33:16.700
getting sued by our Department of Justice under the direction of the Harris-Biden administration
00:33:25.320
In Harris's state of California, it is now illegal to require a voter, or not just a voter
00:33:39.860
I mean, I don't know how else to interpret her actions and her policy history except to
00:33:52.000
She doesn't care at all about your rights as a citizen.
00:33:58.200
She has voted for every measure to expand abortion through all nine months.
00:34:11.640
And I just hear so, I hear so many pastors, many of them well-meaning.
00:34:17.060
And these are like pastors that would say that they're conservative.
00:34:25.060
Yeah, this side over here on the left, they've got really bad policies.
00:34:29.860
But, you know, Trump personally is just, just stop.
00:34:38.160
It is not your obligation as a pastor to say both sides are bad.
00:34:45.940
Your responsibility as a pastor is to properly exegete the word of God, to, you know, shepherd
00:34:58.300
And I'm not saying that a pastor has to explicitly endorse a candidate.
00:35:02.200
I'm not saying that you have to shape your sermons based on the news cycle.
00:35:09.760
I don't expect a pastor to talk about politics as much as a political commentator does or
00:35:16.260
But I do expect you to preach the word of God and what scripture says on the issues that
00:35:26.340
Abortion, gender, marriage, even justice, even to an extent, immigration.
00:35:33.440
Immigration in the sense that God is a God of order.
00:35:41.160
We have languages, all of these things, for order, for goodness, in the same way that
00:35:48.560
We have human rights that flow from the idea that we are made in the image of God.
00:35:54.860
They are gifts of common grace that Christians have to steward.
00:36:02.840
We have to be ambassadors of these things because we love our neighbors.
00:36:06.860
So, no, I am not going to vote for the candidate that believes in unmitigated abortion through
00:36:13.120
And, yes, Republicans are not where I want them to be on that.
00:36:15.800
But I also don't have to, like, shut my brain down and convince myself that both sides are
00:36:20.720
the same on abortion just because Republicans aren't as pro-life as I want them to be.
00:36:28.040
And, no, it's not just Democrats have bad policies, but Donald Trump is really bad as
00:36:36.520
Donald Trump has children and grandchildren that love him and admire him very much.
00:36:41.100
If I want to look at, okay, whose life looks more orderly and looks more like what God intended
00:36:50.320
when you look at their family setup, when you look at the legacy that they're leaving, it's
00:37:02.300
Her life, her politics are characterized by disorder, by chaos.
00:37:08.500
Chaos and lawlessness, according to scripture, is bad.
00:37:12.220
So I think that we should be voting for the candidate whose set of policies best mitigates
00:37:20.340
evil, best protects the vulnerable, best creates order and peace, and it's not even close.
00:37:30.300
Pastors, it is not godly to say both sides are bad and leave it at that.
00:37:41.460
But every election is a choice between the lesser of two evils.
00:37:48.020
And Republicans and their candidates have almost always been too pro-choice, okay?
00:37:53.040
And everyone has a past that is sorted to some degree.
00:38:01.660
But let's speak very clearly about the policies that are very clearly theological.
00:38:07.200
And I'm just asking you to help your congregants clearly navigate those.
00:38:14.420
Because if not, they're going to go somewhere, okay?
00:38:17.720
I know that pastors think, well, I'm just going to preach the Bible and avoid the political
00:38:22.800
topics and hope that my audience can deduce that.
00:38:26.120
They're listening to podcasts, they're going on TikTok, they're going on Instagram.
00:38:32.260
But if you want to help shape your congregation's worldview, which I think that you should, then
00:38:37.000
you need to be really clear on abortion, on gender, on marriage, on justice, on these issues
00:38:46.140
And thankfully, there are some pastors that are being really clear about that, and I'm
00:38:51.220
So I'm going to highlight them because I love highlighting courage in just one second.
00:38:55.360
But let me pause and tell you about our next sponsor.
00:38:57.560
And speaking of courage, y'all, I absolutely love this organization.
00:39:03.760
And right now, the future of the Supreme Court is on the ballot.
00:39:07.080
We have heard progressive activists, we've heard progressive politicians say that they want
00:39:13.180
That means expanding the Supreme Court, filling it with left-wing activists, because they don't
00:39:18.200
like the check and balance of the Supreme Court.
00:39:20.220
They believe every branch of government and every bureaucrat and ultimately every person
00:39:27.120
These are the people that claim to be the guardians of democracy.
00:39:31.120
Even President Biden has gotten into the act by making, reforming the court one of his final
00:39:42.520
At First Liberty, they call this assault on the court what it really is, a Supreme Court
00:39:48.840
And that's why they're sounding the alarm about this.
00:39:51.540
First Liberty protects their clients' First Amendment rights, and they are so good at it.
00:39:58.380
They protected those who didn't want to get the vaccine because of religious reasons.
00:40:05.740
And they are championing the constitutional rights of the people who need it most.
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So go to SupremeCoup.com slash Stuckey to see how you can help stop the radical lefts take
00:40:26.780
Also, one more thing on that, because I forgot I put this tweet out that made a lot of people
00:40:35.100
mad, a lot of so-called progressive Christians mad, because I said, you know, the least of
00:40:42.920
these people say that they're voting Democrat to protect the least of these.
00:40:46.820
And that, of course, is a reference to Matthew when Jesus says, you know, whoever serves the
00:40:57.100
least of these, whatever you do to the least of these, you do unto me.
00:41:02.980
And that is very, it's a very misinterpreted passage.
00:41:07.720
And it's taken to mean by many people, the poor in general, that the least of these is the
00:41:14.580
world's poor, and people justify that to vote Democrat.
00:41:17.900
Well, first of all, even if that is what least of these was referring to, voting Democrat
00:41:29.980
Show me how Democrats have helped the poor, not how they've intended to help the poor, but
00:41:40.040
A lot of people vote Democrat based on the stated intentions of the Democrat Party, which
00:41:47.880
You don't get to judge a policy by its stated intentions.
00:41:53.660
And the outcomes of progressive policy are chaos.
00:41:58.020
But that's actually not what the passage means.
00:42:00.820
The passage is actually talking specifically about persecuted and suffering Christians.
00:42:08.020
I said this on Acts, and people got really mad.
00:42:10.760
People were like, oh my God, the worst interpretation ever.
00:42:13.720
And I think that it is really interesting how almost everyone who said that has pronouns in
00:42:20.560
So you think that I'm interpreting Matthew 25 incorrectly, but you couldn't even interpret
00:42:36.440
And you think that stating your pronouns as if gender is something to be declared rather
00:42:41.660
than something that is just biologically observed.
00:42:44.680
You think that you have the authority to criticize my interpretation of the passage.
00:42:53.900
Of course, I didn't come up with this interpretation on my own.
00:42:57.360
This is a very mainstream interpretation that least of these is primarily speaking at least
00:43:03.780
of persecuted and suffering and suffering Christians.
00:43:09.300
And so it would be much more accurate to say that Jack Phillips is a part of the least
00:43:14.560
of these, that Lori Smith is a part of the least of these.
00:43:17.380
These are Christians who decided not to violate their sincerely held beliefs about the definition
00:43:24.180
of gender and marriage when it came to the products that they would create.
00:43:28.540
And progressive activists, in Jack Phillips's case, an attorney, waged lawfare against them.
00:43:35.840
And for Jack Phillips, it has been over a decade with Alliance Defending Freedom supporting him
00:43:42.080
and defending him all the way up to the Supreme Court.
00:43:44.460
But every time they would win, another activist would try to sue him.
00:43:48.660
But thankfully, the Colorado court vote, or they decided in his favor.
00:43:55.920
But he has sacrificed a lot standing up for his faith.
00:43:59.860
I mean, the guy wouldn't even make Halloween cakes.
00:44:04.100
But because the left genuinely, in general, does not care about the First Amendment, does
00:44:09.280
not care about any freedom other than abortion and sexual immorality, they tried to
00:44:15.620
Jack Phillips is much more the least of these than the world's poor is, because that's not
00:44:25.260
And I said that, and I actually had never read, before I tweeted that, about Jack Phillips.
00:44:29.920
I never read Denny Burke's article on this, and I'll link it in the description.
00:44:34.700
But Denny Burke made that exact argument several years ago, not only just about the least of these
00:44:41.120
an interpretation, which I'll get into, but that Jack Phillips is actually a better example of that.
00:44:52.040
Matthew 25, 40 is not talking generically about our obligation to care for the poor and needy.
00:44:56.600
We know this because the terms least of these and my brothers appear elsewhere in Matthew's
00:45:01.760
And in each case, the terms specifically refer to Jesus's disciples who have been sent out
00:45:08.880
For example, do you remember what Jesus said when his mother and brothers came to visit him?
00:45:15.720
And stretching out his hand towards his disciples, he said,
00:45:17.940
Behold, my mother and my brothers, for whoever does the will of my father who is in heaven,
00:45:25.740
There's a lot that we could unpack there, but we'll keep going.
00:45:29.060
In this text, brothers is not a generic description of people created in the image of God.
00:45:33.700
Jesus reserves the term brothers for those who are his disciples,
00:45:42.880
In Matthew 10, 7, Jesus sends his disciples out to preach the gospel of the kingdom of heaven.
00:45:48.420
They are supposed to preach from house to house.
00:45:51.460
They are supposed to give a greeting of peace to anyone who receives them.
00:45:56.120
People who, when people receive Jesus's messengers, it's a sign that they are receiving Jesus's
00:46:03.060
He who receives you receives me, Jesus says, and he who receives me receives him who sent me.
00:46:09.880
And whoever in the name of a disciple gives to one of these little ones, even a cup of cold
00:46:15.660
water to drink, so truly I say to you, he shall not lose his reward.
00:46:25.080
And so when Jesus is talking in Matthew 25, when he says the least of these, my brothers,
00:46:30.720
he is actually talking about Christians, his followers who are suffering.
00:46:38.760
However, the Bible does give us direction on that, but here's where the left really gets
00:46:51.380
Though we are supposed to care for the poor, that's Galatians 2.10, we are not supposed to
00:47:00.480
So voting Democrat in the name of helping the poor is not altruistic.
00:47:05.260
You will literally go to jail if you don't pay taxes.
00:47:10.300
We are called to give not under compulsion, but through a generous and happy heart.
00:47:18.860
That doesn't mean that you can't vote for someone who vows to channel our taxes towards
00:47:27.160
There is a role of the government, but that doesn't get to count as your charity.
00:47:35.820
The early church is not a picture of communism because communism is forced.
00:47:42.280
It is forcing you to give up your stuff or else you die.
00:47:45.660
The early church gave each other what they needed out of generosity and a compelling of
00:47:52.960
And these are the same people, by the way, who say, oh, we need to vote Democrat to care
00:47:56.860
for the least of these who say you can't use a Bible verse to justify your vote because
00:48:06.100
The truth is that Christian nationalism is a manipulation tactic to get you and you only
00:48:11.400
conservative Christian to compartmentalize your faith before you vote.
00:48:18.340
A worldview, by definition, is all-encompassing.
00:48:21.880
The progressive so-called Christian, the progressive atheist, the Muslim, any kind of person is bringing
00:48:30.560
the entirety of their belief system into the voting booth.
00:48:37.200
But Christians, you are obligated to do that as well.
00:48:42.640
And I saw two pastors over the past couple weeks give sermons that I saw circulating on
00:48:49.160
Instagram that were just so strong and so clear on this subject.
00:49:08.060
And I wish I could play the whole thing, but I'm just going to play part of it.
00:49:12.120
And he just, he appears to be so humble and so kind, but tells it exactly like it is.
00:49:22.380
I am a preacher of the Bible, but certain things politically are more theological than
00:49:28.080
The Democratic Party is a demonic death cult under the power and influence of Satan.
00:49:33.340
To vote for the Democrats is to vote for a platform that is building their platform upon
00:49:40.760
The mutilation of bodies, the annihilation of babies in the womb, and the sexualization
00:49:52.700
They have abortion facilities outside of the Democratic Convention.
00:49:57.040
It's the most radical party in our country's history.
00:50:00.260
So I don't see how you could be a Christian and vote for a party who promotes everything
00:50:11.860
He said this, and I thought that this was a very great point, a good way to say it.
00:50:16.040
You have a responsibility as a Christian to vote for the option that best stems the tide
00:50:22.300
Both candidates are broken people, but one of them presents a far better option of the
00:50:28.060
preservation of life and the upholding of the family than the other.
00:50:31.540
A failure to vote is a failure to obey the calling we have to uphold righteousness in our
00:50:40.020
And we are going to have Pastor Johnny on as soon as we can.
00:50:44.520
I will just give a shout out to his book because I don't know when he's going to be able to come
00:50:48.480
on, but I do know that his book came out this week and it's called Consider the Lilies and it's
00:50:58.760
We can put the description in this episode, but I hope to have him on soon because I love
00:51:08.420
I love sharing courage because courage is contagious.
00:51:13.020
And he might not feel that he's being courageous.
00:51:24.060
Clarity is a blessing to the flock, is a blessing to the congregation.
00:51:29.420
And I do know at least his family are in their relatable audience because I've gotten a lot
00:51:38.040
I don't know if Pastor Johnny listens to Relatable, but I do know his family does.
00:51:43.840
And then we've got this awesome sermon from Josh Howerton.
00:51:46.980
He is the pastor of Lake Point Church, which is outside of Dallas.
00:51:52.300
And I watched this whole sermon and it was so good.
00:51:57.640
I mean, the guy is so incredibly incisive and articulate.
00:52:03.840
And he says this, he says this before I play you the first clip.
00:52:07.380
He said, it is not biblical for pastors to not talk about politics.
00:52:10.900
If the church won't disciple people, the world will.
00:52:24.080
In the book of 1 Samuel, the Lord said to Samuel,
00:52:26.540
do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him.
00:52:30.160
People look at the outward appearance, but God looks at the heart.
00:52:34.800
Mature Christians do not vote on superficial things.
00:52:40.660
We shouldn't vote on, he's got the same skin color as me,
00:52:43.380
or she'd be the first woman president, or I've always wanted an orange leader.
00:52:46.860
Some people right now, they're looking at the candidates and they're going,
00:52:51.220
Hey, listen, hey guys, personalities come and go.
00:52:57.880
And that last point I thought was one of the best points that he made in the sermon.
00:53:02.560
And you might say, well, it's not just personality with Trump,
00:53:07.520
But again, I would say the person of Trump will fade away,
00:53:15.740
And we're talking about very consequential policies.
00:53:18.000
We're not talking about just some slight disagreements on tax policy.
00:53:22.760
We're talking about whether or not you think pro-lifers should go to jail
00:53:25.920
for trying to rescue babies that are being slaughtered.
00:53:31.140
We're talking about if you believe in the existence of the Supreme Court
00:53:35.080
as a check and balance on power, do you believe in the First Amendment?
00:53:44.120
He says, we are obligated to vote for the best available path forward.
00:53:51.920
And we should ask this question, whose policies are most likely to slow societal decay?
00:54:05.040
I thought that he was also extremely clear on illegal immigration.
00:54:15.100
just explains that there are many immigrants in his church that he loves.
00:54:25.120
This is a pro-order, pro-lawfulness, pro-peace, pro-sovereignty, pro-citizenship argument.
00:54:35.420
Of the illegal immigrants in the United States right now,
00:54:39.000
425,000 of them are known to have criminal records.
00:54:45.040
16,000 of them entered our nation as convicted rapists.
00:54:51.320
13,000 of them entered our nation as convicted murderers.
00:55:05.100
You need to ask yourself the question, which candidate will best protect our national security?
00:55:16.420
And he's not blind to the problems with Republicans.
00:55:20.420
He says Republicans now think abortion should be safe, legal, and rare, which I think is unfortunate.
00:55:24.760
And he says, and Democrats think it should be celebrated.
00:55:30.140
Kamala Harris will not name a single restriction for abortion.
00:55:32.760
So he says we should ask which candidate will best limit the taking of unborn lives.
00:55:38.300
Just because both sides have not good stances on abortion doesn't mean that both sides have the same stance on abortion.
00:55:48.980
And let's not pretend there's no moral daylight between the two stances.
00:55:53.840
We're also going to have Pastor Josh on the podcast because, again, I like to platform courage.
00:56:00.040
And I like to reward courage, not that my podcast is a reward, but I know that when these pastors come on, that you guys are going to share the arrows with them.
00:56:11.980
Because you know they're also getting a lot of hate for this, right?
00:56:14.320
Like, you know the evil and the cruelty that is in their messages, the messages that are being sent to their families.
00:56:20.400
Even sometimes they may get protesters, and so they need your prayer.
00:56:26.380
Not just these pastors, because these are just a few pastors, a couple pastors of the many, many, many that are being clear and courageous.
00:56:36.920
They need us to share the arrows as the body of Christ to say, yes, Pastor, we want that clarity and courage.
00:56:45.560
And I'm not saying that all pastors are people pleasers.
00:56:48.400
Pleasers, of course, they're supposed to be pleasing God, but all of us benefit from being edified and encouraged.
00:56:55.040
So when your pastor says something that is clear and bold, make sure that they know that you notice it, that you appreciate it.
00:57:03.860
All right, we've just got one more quick thing to talk about, but let me tell you about our last sponsor for the day.
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This is a financial institution that was founded by pastors for the benefit of its members.
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A financial institution that actually agrees with us, that aligns with our values, is a very precarious situation when more institutions that used to be neutral are now political and not on the same side that we are.
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And so you worry about the company that is handling your earthly treasure being against everything you believe in and possibly punishing you or no longer doing business with you because of the values you hold dear.
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They have 5,000 shared branches, 30,000 ATMs nationwide.
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America's Christian Credit Union is federally insured by the NCUA.
00:58:18.360
And Dr. George Barna, he's been on the show before.
00:58:20.700
He has a team at the Cultural Research Center at Arizona Christian University, and they just released a study on October 10th showing that as many as 104 million people of faith, including 32 million self-identified Christians who regularly attend church.
00:58:37.420
Okay, so we're not even just talking about the nominal Christians who maybe like they grew up in the church, but they're not affiliated anymore.
00:58:44.580
We're talking about Christians who regularly go to church, are unlikely to vote in the upcoming 2024 presidential election, mainly due to lack of interest.
00:58:53.800
Here are some takeaways by the president of Arizona Christian University.
00:58:59.520
One, Christians could be the deciding factor in a bunch of federal and state races and are choosing not to be.
00:59:06.880
Two, they are longing for their local church to instruct them on how to think biblically about policy and politics.
00:59:16.320
Researchers found that voter enthusiasm in 2024 is significantly lower than what it was in 2020.
00:59:21.540
The research asked people who indicated they were not likely to vote to explain the reasons for that choice.
00:59:28.060
The most common reason, offered by 68%, was a lack of interest in politics and elections.
00:59:34.800
Over 57% of the respondents in the study said they dislike all the major candidates, while 55% felt none of the candidates reflect their most important views.
00:59:47.300
Researchers believe that if the findings hold true up to election day, former President Donald Trump's re-election is less likely.
00:59:53.620
And Democratic presidential nominee and Vice President Kamala Harris' campaign is more likely to come away victorious.
01:00:01.080
Which I'm sorry, but Satan is happy about that.
01:00:08.300
They will enable and exacerbate evil at a far greater rate than Donald Trump's will.
01:00:17.420
He loves rewarding the most evil actors in the world, the terroristic regimes that the Harris-Biden administration has helped fund and empower during its tenure.
01:00:31.180
He loves the chaos and the trafficking that goes on because of open border policies.
01:00:38.000
He loves the lawlessness that is allowed by the progressive prosecutors and judges and the policies that are pushed by the Democrat Party.
01:00:49.140
He loves the open drug use, the incentivized homelessness and mass poverty.
01:00:56.980
He loves the lack of safety and security because he is an author of chaos and anarchy and moral degeneracy.
01:01:07.240
And he loves child sacrifice and gender confusion.
01:01:10.820
All of these things he has been using since the beginning to come after the Imago Dei.
01:01:16.560
And so, of course, he loves the candidates whose policies will best represent that.
01:01:25.680
Your lack of interest is not a good justification for a lack of stewardship, of the citizenship that God has providentially given you.
01:01:40.120
Politics matter because policy matters because people matter.
01:01:48.040
People matter to God, so they should matter to us.
01:01:56.480
But one important way to love your neighbor is to vote.
01:02:00.920
Is to advocate for policies that will best encourage their flourishing, their safety, and their protection.
01:02:22.740
If you've got to hold your nose to vote Donald Trump, do it.
01:02:26.380
The future of the country that God has providentially placed you in depends on that.
01:02:38.520
If you feel like, wow, I don't really know what's going on in politics and culture right now.
01:02:46.840
I start tripping over my words, and I'm not able to come up with the facts and the arguments that I want to when I'm in conversations with friends.
01:02:55.900
It's specifically for the Christian woman, but it's really for anyone.
01:03:00.440
You can go to ToxicEmpathy.com, but we will link the Amazon link.
01:03:05.120
Really encourage you to get this before the election.