Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 346 ｜ In Jesus' Name ... A-Woman？

00:00:00.000 Hey guys, welcome to Relatable. Happy Tuesday. So if you guys did not get the memo on Instagram,

00:00:17.340 this podcast is now four days a week. So Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and it is going to

00:00:23.720 come out in the afternoon now. So a little bit different. I did explain on Instagram live,

00:00:28.440 but a lot of you didn't catch that. And so the reason that we're doing this is obviously because

00:00:34.720 you guys are awesome and you wanted more content. And so we are giving you that. But also this helps

00:00:41.680 me be able to talk about all of the things that I want to talk about in a more organized way.

00:00:47.140 What was happening is that with the three episodes, there was so much that I wanted to say that the

00:00:53.840 episodes ended up being really long. Really, this podcast is only supposed to be about a 30 to 40

00:00:59.740 minute podcast. But because I felt like I had so much to say, especially since May with all that's

00:01:06.560 been going on in the news, they got really long. So it's actually making a lot more kind of unnecessary

00:01:13.280 work for everyone involved. We are going to try to make these episodes shorter. Hopefully I'll be able

00:01:19.580 to do that. I still have a lot to say. More organized and more segmented to be able to talk

00:01:25.220 about all of the things that I want to talk about. We're still going to have interviews. We're still

00:01:29.900 going to be talking about theology. We're still going to be talking about these big evergreen topics

00:01:34.500 a lot. And that's what I know you guys love about the podcast. And so we're not changing it radically.

00:01:39.980 This is not becoming like a daily news show. It's still relatable. Like we're still talking about

00:01:44.900 the things that we have always talked about. But let me tell you how we're going to organize it

00:01:48.720 and then how today is going to go. So I'm going to talk to you about a big news story or politics.

00:01:55.640 And then I'm going to talk to you about a cultural story or a cultural issue or topic. And then we're

00:02:00.780 going to talk about a theological or theological issue or a news or happening that's going on

00:02:06.440 inside the church. And so today we are going to talk about this Trump phone call, the audio

00:02:12.080 that was leaked between the Georgia Secretary of State and Donald Trump and what all of that

00:02:17.800 craziness means and also the senators, Congress people that say that they are going to object

00:02:23.820 to the results of the election tomorrow. And then we're going to talk about the changes

00:02:29.660 to the House of Representatives, their rules to remove gender language and that a Methodist

00:02:35.180 minister who prayed on the House floor ending with a man and a woman. I kid you not. And then

00:02:42.300 I'm going to talk to my friend Virgil Walker of the Just Thinking podcast. And we are going

00:02:46.460 to talk about this fissure that's happening within the Southern Baptist Convention over

00:02:50.760 critical race theory. You might not know, but this is a huge denomination within evangelical

00:02:56.000 Christianity. And so it really kind of affects everyone, the conversations and the debates

00:03:00.320 and the division that is going on within that denomination over intersectionality and critical

00:03:07.100 race theory. So that's what we're going to cover today. I'm going to try to make it

00:03:11.860 as concise as possible. But you guys know, I am very verbose. That's just how I am. And

00:03:17.900 then I'm going to try to always end with like an encouraging segment. So if I have time today,

00:03:23.660 I am also going to end with that. Okay, that's what we are talking about today. Let's go ahead

00:03:31.240 and get into it. Okay, today is the day for the Georgia election. You guys know I have been talking

00:03:41.980 about this for a long time. Our constitutional rights rest on Georgia. I did an episode a couple

00:03:49.120 weeks ago about the Equality Act, this huge piece of legislation which Joe Biden said that he is going

00:03:54.300 to prioritize. Congress is going to prioritize. I mean, there is absolutely nothing aside from the

00:04:00.620 Supreme Court if they don't pack the Supreme Court that would stop Democrats from pushing a very

00:04:05.340 radical, and I don't mean that hyperbolically, literally a radical far left agenda that will

00:04:11.820 affect every area of your life if Democrats control the Senate. And so we are all eyes on Georgia.

00:04:19.660 We're looking at these two Senate races between Warnock and Loeffler, Warnock being the radical leftist

00:04:26.000 Democrat candidate, and then we've got Loeffler, the Republican candidate, and then we've got

00:04:31.040 Ossoff, basically the trust fund baby. Not that there's anything wrong with having a trust fund,

00:04:38.720 but for a guy who talks about privilege and fighting for the little man, I'm not sure that he has a whole

00:04:47.080 lot of empathy or relatability in that arena, and he is going against Purdue. And so we are looking at

00:04:52.820 Georgia. We are going to be watching the election as it comes in. Now, we might not know the results

00:04:58.760 of the election. Georgia is a little bit of a mess, as you guys know, in some ways, not in every way,

00:05:04.560 but in some ways right now, because there's so much pressure on this, and Democrats have been working

00:05:10.000 so hard. Stacey Abrams has been working so hard to make sure that Georgia truly does turn blue

00:05:16.180 and gets these two Democratic candidates elected. And so there may not be results tonight or tomorrow.

00:05:25.300 That's the unfortunate truth, which is just crazy, crazy, crazy. So we'll talk about that more tomorrow.

00:05:30.120 Polls close in Georgia today, January 5th at 7 p.m. Eastern. So if you are in Georgia and you're

00:05:36.680 listening to this, get your tail to the voting booth. Do not listen to the crazy people that are telling you

00:05:43.800 not to vote. One way to make sure that Republicans lose this election, whether or not you think that

00:05:49.400 there's integrity in the system or not, which I understand the concerns, one way to ensure the

00:05:53.600 Republicans lose is not to vote. And I have already promised that if you do not vote, I will show up

00:05:58.680 at your house. I will fly to Hartsfield, Hartsfield, Jackson Airport right now, and I will show up at your

00:06:07.120 house. I will find you and I will throw frozen Brussels sprouts at your head until you get up and you go to

00:06:13.100 the voting booth and you vote in the Senate elections. That is how important it is. Thank

00:06:18.320 you to all of you who early voted. Make sure that you go out and vote today. OK, now we're going to

00:06:23.080 talk about this Trump call. So a lot of you probably were following this. You probably know what happened

00:06:30.200 and there's already been a lot of back and forth. And it's not a coincidence, by the way, that this

00:06:34.320 story came out, that this story came out right before the Georgia election. Of course, this is strategic.

00:06:42.000 This is what the media does. The media not only hates Donald Trump, but hates Republicans and wants

00:06:46.540 very much for Democrats to be in control of every branch of government possible. So here's what

00:06:53.500 happened. The audio of a January 2nd call between Trump and Georgia's Secretary of State, Brad

00:06:59.200 Raffensperger, and other law enforcement officials in Georgia was leaked to the Washington Post.

00:07:07.140 First, Raffensperger apparently recorded the call. He said he wanted to do it to protect himself in

00:07:12.200 case Trump attacked him or said something that wasn't true. And then apparently it was released

00:07:17.840 to the press, which is a pretty crummy thing to do. That's not a very honorable thing to do. But

00:07:24.280 nevertheless, let's get into the actual content of the call. So here's what the Washington Post

00:07:29.100 reported just the other day. President Trump urged fellow Republican Brad Raffensperger,

00:07:34.820 the Georgia Secretary of State, to, quote, find enough votes to overturn his defeat in an

00:07:40.080 extraordinary one hour phone call Saturday that legal scholars described as a flagrant abuse of

00:07:45.100 power and a potential criminal act. The Washington Post obtained a recording of the conversation in

00:07:50.740 which Trump alternately berated Raffensperger, then tried to flatter him, begged him to act and

00:07:56.580 threatened him with vague criminal consequences if the Secretary of State refused to pursue his false

00:08:01.780 claims. At one point, warning that Raffensperger was taking, quote, a big risk. So if you remember,

00:08:10.040 there's been a lot of conflict over Georgia and whether there was voter fraud, if there was a

00:08:14.620 problem with the Dominion voter machines, there's been a lot of criticism by Republicans towards the

00:08:20.540 Secretary of State of Georgia and towards Governor Kemp saying that they haven't done enough to verify all

00:08:27.440 of the votes to make sure that all of the votes that were cast were legally cast to make sure that

00:08:31.840 there were no illegally cast votes. There have been a lot of anecdotes, a lot of testimonies coming out

00:08:37.100 of Georgia saying this was an unfair process. My vote didn't count and things like that. And so

00:08:43.060 there's been a lot of allegations. There's been litigation going on and eyes have been on Georgia.

00:08:48.260 The spotlight has been on Georgia. And Trump himself has been very critical of Georgia and the

00:08:52.580 Republican officials there for not doing enough to ensure the integrity of the presidential election.

00:08:57.480 So it's really been it's been weird. It's been like this back and forth of people saying, oh,

00:09:04.960 we really have to vote in this election because the constitutional rights of the entire country

00:09:10.200 rest on Republicans winning at least one of these Senate seats. And also, oh, the election is rigged in

00:09:17.080 Georgia and we shouldn't be any part of it. So that's been very difficult and conflicting

00:09:22.400 messaging. And you can bet the Democrats have taken advantage of that and have loved to see this

00:09:28.120 conflict play out in Georgia where they really, really want to win. So the claims that the Washington

00:09:34.380 Post is making that President Trump made wanted to make Raffensperger just find votes that he could

00:09:40.980 win, telling him that he was taking a big risk. That is true. I do think it's important for us to look

00:09:46.740 at these claims in context, though. Thankfully, the Washington Post did release the full

00:09:51.340 transcript. So I encourage you. I always you. I encourage you to look at the source, not just listen

00:09:56.940 to me to go read the transcript for yourself and to see what you think. Don't just take my word for

00:10:01.820 it. We don't have time, obviously, to read the entire transcript. So I'm going to read you a couple

00:10:05.980 excerpts that I think are especially relevant. So here here is what Donald Trump said in this call.

00:10:13.380 Part of what he said, we have at least two or three anywhere from 250 to 300,000 ballots were dropped

00:10:18.640 mysteriously into the rolls. This is the claim that he is making. Much of that had to do with

00:10:22.860 Fulton County. We think if you check the signatures, you'll find at least a couple of hundred of

00:10:27.120 thousands of forged signatures of people who have been forged. And we are quite sure that's going to

00:10:32.900 happen. And so he thinks that there are hundreds of thousands of fraudulent ballots. And that is why

00:10:38.380 he was unable to he was unable to officially win Georgia. But he obviously believes that he is the

00:10:46.740 legitimate winner of Georgia. He said, we're going to have an accurate number over the next two days

00:10:52.920 with certified accountants, but an accurate number will be given. But it's in the fifties of thousands.

00:10:57.520 And that's people that went to vote and they were told they can't vote because they've already been

00:11:02.820 voted for. It's a very sad thing. And then he said, it's much more than the number of 11,779.

00:11:12.180 That's the current margin is only 11,779. And then he says, you know, we need you to find 11,780.

00:11:22.460 He said, I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have, because we won the state.

00:11:28.700 That's all I want to do. All I want to do is this. So that part doesn't sound

00:11:32.720 good. OK, he's saying that there are claims of fraud and he wants to make sure that they are

00:11:37.580 looking into it. He wants to make sure that they're investigating, that they know about all of

00:11:41.140 the problems that he alleges are there, that a lot of people have alleged are there. And

00:11:45.440 Raffensperger and the other officials on the call were saying, look, we've looked into all of this.

00:11:49.660 It's not exactly what you're saying. That's not actually what we're seeing. But we are looking

00:11:55.060 into all of these claims of voter fraud. And then Trump says, but I just want you to find

00:12:01.700 11,780 votes after saying he thinks there are hundreds of thousands of votes that are actually

00:12:06.220 fraudulent. And so the problem with saying that is that it looks like he doesn't actually care about

00:12:11.060 the fraud and the integrity of the elections, which is something that I very much care about,

00:12:14.900 no matter what the results are. But he actually just cares about winning, which is which is not

00:12:21.760 really a good look. Like if you have been claiming, no, I really care about the honor and the honesty

00:12:28.420 of our elections. But then you say, you know, I think I I think I won by hundreds of thousands

00:12:33.040 of votes, but really, I only want you to find enough votes for me to win the state. That's not

00:12:37.540 that's not good. That's not ensuring anything. That's not making sure that we have integrity in

00:12:41.400 our elections. And then he goes on. I got to get I have to find 12,000 votes, Trump says,

00:12:46.600 and I have them times a lot. And therefore, I won the state. I only need 11,000 votes, 12,000,

00:12:51.780 11,000. Fellas, I need 11,000 votes. Give me a break. You know, we have that in spades already. So it

00:12:57.620 sounds like he is saying and maybe I'm taking a leap here. And I know some people aren't going

00:13:02.020 to like to hear me say this. But it sounds like he's saying, look, no matter what you really find,

00:13:06.940 no matter what you really find, I want you to find enough votes for me to win. So that means,

00:13:15.220 again, that he's not really concerned about the integrity of the election. He is concerned about

00:13:19.360 winning the state, period. I am concerned about the integrity of the election, whether or not that

00:13:24.720 changes the results in favor of Trump or whether that means that Biden is the legitimate winner.

00:13:29.040 I am very I am concerned about election fraud. I am concerned about the transparency of our

00:13:33.740 processes. Absolutely. And I am very glad that Georgia is looking into all of these. I think

00:13:37.900 that we should have the necessary litigation. I think that we should have the necessary legal battles

00:13:42.740 and the necessary critiques of our system to make sure that everything is working fairly as it

00:13:49.540 should. But I am unconcerned with whether or not that changes the results of the election in the

00:13:55.340 direction that I want it to. I care much more about fairness than I do the particular outcome

00:14:01.840 of this election, even though I wish that Trump had won, even though I think that he is obviously a much

00:14:07.240 better man for the job, especially with the current problems that we are facing right now.

00:14:12.980 I care much more about the process because the process lasts a lot longer than four years.

00:14:19.480 But it doesn't seem from this call that that is what Trump's concern is. He is just concerned with

00:14:25.000 this temporal current victory. And I think that I made a leap too early on when I first heard about

00:14:32.520 the story. I said on Instagram Live that he probably did something illegal here. He probably didn't do

00:14:38.560 anything illegal here. There's a lot of different ways that you could interpret this and look at this.

00:14:42.980 I probably jumped the gun in saying that. And so I do apologize for that. It's not a great look.

00:14:48.740 Some of what he says, OK, totally legitimate, like you can bring up your allegations and your concerns.

00:14:53.700 But then saying I just need you to find the exact number of votes, just the one vote,

00:15:00.540 one more vote that is needed for me to win. That's not that that's not great. OK, so the that was the

00:15:08.460 Trump call. The allegations of fraud are still alive and well. Several federal and state lawsuits have

00:15:14.080 been filed and dismissed. Lin Wood tried to block Georgia's election from being certified. Sidney

00:15:18.700 Powell tried to argue the Dominion voting machines were changing votes from Trump to Biden. So that's

00:15:23.640 what's been happening in Georgia in particular. But a lot of the cases have been dismissed for not

00:15:28.780 following the proper procedure. And so those probably are not going to, again, change the

00:15:35.620 results of the presidential the presidential election. Now, tomorrow, January 6th, something

00:15:44.060 big is happening. Actually, it's not typically anything that's big. It's typically a very standard

00:15:48.960 process. But there's been some drama around Congress verifying the election results. So what does this

00:15:56.740 mean? You probably didn't even know this was something that happened. I wasn't really aware of what this

00:16:01.120 was because it typically goes on without a whole lot of hoopla. So verifying the election results in

00:16:06.820 Congress. This is the last step in the electoral process. Both the Senate and the House will meet on

00:16:13.060 January 6th, Wednesday at 1 p.m. Eastern time to unseal certified documents from each state and read the

00:16:19.600 results of the election. Here's how AP News describes it. The congressional meeting on January 6th is the

00:16:25.240 final step in reaffirming Biden's win after the Electoral College officially elected him in

00:16:30.760 December. This is the federal law that Congress must meet on January 6th to open sealed certificates

00:16:36.400 from each state that contain a record of the electoral votes. The votes are brought into the

00:16:40.260 chamber in special mahogany boxes used for the occasion. Bipartisan representatives of both chambers

00:16:46.000 read the results out loud and do an official count. The president of the Senate, Vice President Mike

00:16:51.040 Pence, the vice president, is always the president of the Senate. So Kamala Harris, if Biden, you know,

00:16:57.200 officially takes the White House, will be president of the Senate. So Mike Pence presides over the

00:17:03.780 session happening tomorrow and declares the winner. There are some congressmen saying that they will

00:17:09.040 object to the results of the election publicly. So that is Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, Senator Josh Hawley

00:17:16.140 of Missouri. So Ted Cruz's plan is that he and other 10 other Republican senators are going to announce

00:17:23.900 that or they're going to object to the January 6th tomorrow's confirmation of the results of the

00:17:31.940 election. And he says this for his reasoning. Congress should immediately appoint an electoral

00:17:37.120 commission with full investigatory and fact-finding authority to conduct an emergency 10-day audit of the

00:17:42.680 election returns in the disputed states. Once completed, individual states would evaluate the

00:17:47.140 commission's findings and could convene a special legislative session to certify a change in their

00:17:52.840 vote. There are the, like I said, 10 other senators that are joining Cruz's effort, Ron Johnson, James

00:17:59.060 Lankford, John Kennedy, Marsha Blackburn, among others. I mean, this isn't necessarily a bad idea.

00:18:05.640 He's just saying, hey, we should do an audit. We should do a further investigation to make sure that

00:18:10.280 these claims of voter fraud that they don't change the outcome of the election. Josh Hawley is also

00:18:17.540 going to object because he says Pennsylvania failed to follow their own election laws. He takes issue

00:18:24.080 with big tech, Facebook and Twitter interfering in support of Joe Biden. So he said in a statement,

00:18:29.740 I cannot vote to certify the Electoral College results on January 6th without raising the fact that

00:18:34.100 some states failed to follow their own state election laws. I can't vote to certify without pointing

00:18:40.140 out the unprecedented effort of megacorporations to interfere in this election in support of

00:18:45.080 Joe Biden. At the very least, Congress should investigate allegations of voter fraud and adopt

00:18:49.760 measures to secure the integrity of our election. So him and Ted Cruz are not part of the same

00:18:54.480 movement within the Senate necessarily, but they're kind of saying the same thing. They're saying,

00:18:59.740 look, there's allegations of voter fraud. There looks to be some funny business,

00:19:02.880 some sketchy things going on. And so I let's let's at least look into these things before we actually

00:19:10.060 verify, certify the results. There are several Republican representatives. So in the House saying

00:19:18.420 that they will also object to election results basically for the same thing. So they will object

00:19:23.500 and they will present their case before their colleagues in an effort to try to convince the

00:19:29.460 majority in both chambers that we should not verify. We should not accept the results of the

00:19:35.000 presidential election. So here's what CBS says will happen in this scenario. After the certificate from

00:19:41.740 each state or the District of Columbia is read, the presiding officer will call for objections if there

00:19:46.560 are any. An objection must be made in writing and signed by at least one member of the Senate and one

00:19:51.800 member of the House. It also must state clearly and concisely and without argument the ground thereof.

00:19:56.640 If an objection is properly made, the joint session suspends and each chamber of Congress

00:20:02.040 meets separately to consider it. Debate is limited to no more than two hours and each member can speak

00:20:07.080 only once and for a maximum of five minutes. And so the state and the House have to vote on whether

00:20:12.340 or not they agree with the objection. Something similar kind of happened in 2005. There were people

00:20:19.480 who objected to the results in Ohio, for example, but it didn't work out because the majority

00:20:26.340 in both houses did not agree with the objections and that's probably what's going to happen here.

00:20:31.320 They're not going to get a majority in both chambers to agree with these objections and to hold off on

00:20:35.480 certifying these results because it's not just going to be Republicans versus Democrats.

00:20:40.700 There are Republicans, not rhinos, conservative Republicans that are against what Ted Cruz and

00:20:46.660 Josh Hawley and representatives in the House are doing to try to object to the results of the election.

00:20:52.620 Tom Cotton, a senator from Arkansas, for example, says that basically, look, this is this is not

00:20:59.820 Congress's job to decide the results of the election. The Constitution is clear that the states decide

00:21:05.560 the Electoral College decides based on, you know, the will of the states. And if we try to usurp that,

00:21:14.020 if we try to upend that process and then we are setting we're setting a very dangerous precedent.

00:21:19.280 That means whoever controls both the House and the Senate is basically going to control the results

00:21:24.500 of the election from here on out because they can always just then object to the results of the

00:21:30.080 election and say, no, no, no, we don't. For example, if Democrats control both the Senate and the House

00:21:35.520 in 2024 and they don't like the results of the election, well, they can say, oh, no, no, we're just

00:21:40.960 going to object to the results of the election and actually we're going to go this direction.

00:21:44.400 So Tom Cotton is saying, look, this is not constitutionally sound and this is not wise

00:21:50.100 for the future. Republican senator from Utah, Mike Lee, also refuses to object to the results

00:21:55.520 of the election. They don't really think that there's enough evidence of fraud that would actually

00:22:01.580 change the outcome of the election, which is also why they are they're not making they're not making

00:22:08.460 the sand that people like Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley are. Republican representative from Texas,

00:22:14.960 Chip Roy, also disagrees with objecting to the election, and he did so in, I think, a really

00:22:19.280 interesting way. According to Dallas Morning News Sunday night, he objected to the seating of his

00:22:24.320 House colleagues elected in the six states where President Donald Trump disputes the results. So

00:22:29.520 Chip Roy's point was that if anyone is claiming that the presidential election in Arizona or Georgia or

00:22:36.900 Michigan and Nevada or Pennsylvania or Wisconsin, if anyone is claiming, if any representative that

00:22:43.220 is now elected to Congress is claiming that there was fraud in those states when it comes to the

00:22:46.820 presidential election, well, that means necessarily that there was also fraud in their election.

00:22:52.320 So he is saying this in a kind of tongue in cheek way. He's saying, whoa, whoa, whoa. OK,

00:22:56.420 if we're worried about fraud in these particular states where Trump did not win,

00:23:00.380 then we need to worry about fraud electing these Republican representatives from these states who

00:23:07.320 are claiming that they're going to object to the results of the presidential election,

00:23:10.540 but are not objecting to the results of their own election in the states where they say was

00:23:15.200 widespread fraud. So he's doing this is kind of like a tactic. He's doing this in a kind of like

00:23:21.960 sarcastic way. Like, look, if we care about the Constitution, we care about the integrity of our

00:23:25.960 election. Then these Republican representatives who are claiming that there's fraud also shouldn't

00:23:30.780 shouldn't be seated because they're from these states where they're saying that there were widespread

00:23:35.840 problems. So bottom line is the results are very unlikely to change. I'm just going to I'm just

00:23:41.980 going to be perfectly honest on that. Joe Biden is based on everything that we now know is going to

00:23:47.380 be inaugurated in a couple of weeks. Trump is probably not going to concede. He's not going to give

00:23:52.340 up this fight. I mean, yes, he's going to leave the White House peacefully, but he's not going to want

00:23:58.280 to. He's not a guy that accepts defeat easily. And that's actually one thing that makes him really

00:24:03.200 great. In this case, there has to be a peaceful transition of power. That is what has thankfully

00:24:08.220 marked the the the the strength of our republic and the perseverance of our republic for hundreds of

00:24:17.620 years. And so there will be a transfer of power. It will be a peaceful transfer of power, even if

00:24:23.860 Trump isn't happy about it, which I understand why he's not happy about it. That does not mean that

00:24:28.540 these Republican congressmen are secretly liberals or secretly supportive of Biden. Of course, I wish

00:24:36.680 that Biden didn't win this election. Of course, I do. I spent weeks, if not months on this podcast

00:24:40.660 talking about why Biden is literally the worst man for this moment. He's going to be a terrible

00:24:46.020 president, terrible president. And Kamala Harris will be an even worse president when she takes

00:24:50.520 over. And so I did everything I could in my tiny corner of the world to explain to you the difference

00:24:56.440 policy wise between the two candidates. But unfortunately, this is where we are. And so

00:25:04.000 we have to realize that this is coming, that the inauguration is coming and that we are going to

00:25:12.180 have to whether we like it or not. I don't like it. We're going to have to accept this change in the

00:25:17.740 political winds and hope. I'm hoping today that at least Republicans keep the Senate so there can be

00:25:25.220 some kind of protection for our constitutional rights. OK, speaking of Congress, the House of

00:25:33.780 Representatives has changed the rules. So you can no longer just say amen. You have to say amen

00:25:39.680 and a woman. So we're going to talk about that in just one second.

00:25:47.840 All right. I want to play you this clip from Representative Emmanuel Cleaver. He is a Methodist

00:25:53.600 minister. He ended his opening prayer of the 117th Congress on the House floor by saying this.

00:26:01.420 We ask it in the name of the monotheistic God,

00:26:04.140 Brahman and God known by many names, by many different faiths. A man and a woman.

00:26:15.620 Oh, man. So I am personally most offended that he did not list the 47 other genders at the end of

00:26:22.680 his prayer. Everyone knows that the prayer is not legitimate. And last you list all of the dozens of

00:26:29.260 genders that exist. I am most offended that he reaffirmed a gender binary by saying amen and a

00:26:35.340 woman. So any of you who know what amen actually means, it means let it be as you say. It means so

00:26:41.540 be it. It's not a gendered term. And so now we're supposed to think that any time there is an M-E-N or

00:26:48.460 M-A-N in any word that it is supposed to reference, like a male. This is insane. This is insane.

00:26:56.740 Also, the actual, like not sarcastic, the actual offensive part of that was when he was talking

00:27:03.020 about his horrible theology, Brahma, the God worshiped by people of many faiths. No, we don't

00:27:10.280 worship the same gods. We just don't. Yes, Muslims, Jews, and Christians are all Abrahamic religions.

00:27:16.340 That is true. But we don't worship the same God because Christians uniquely serve a triune God. That

00:27:21.360 is God, the Father, the Holy Spirit, and then his son, Jesus Christ, the Godhead three in one. That

00:27:26.760 is not the same God that Jews and Muslims worship. So I just want to clarify that. When you have that

00:27:32.480 kind of theological confusion, though, you're going to have cultural and political confusion as well.

00:27:38.500 And that's exactly what we're seeing here because politics is downstream from culture, which is

00:27:42.680 downstream from theology. Always, without condition, whether or not you're an atheist or agnostic,

00:27:47.000 whatever belief you have in God will affect what you think about cultural issues, will affect what

00:27:52.360 you think about political issues. Confusion is exactly what's going on in our halls of power.

00:27:57.640 It might as well be the Tower of Babel. I certainly don't speak the same language as some of these

00:28:01.920 people. The people who are coming up with American laws are so-called intellectuals and elites, do not

00:28:09.060 even understand what most toddlers understand, which is that there are boys and there are girls. Boys are he

00:28:13.980 and girls are she. This wasn't complicated until like five minutes ago, but now is apparently so

00:28:20.420 controversial and so complex that our House of Representatives cannot even bring themselves to

00:28:26.120 affirm it. And this is how fast the train of progressivism goes. Think about the fact that

00:28:31.880 only five years ago, only about five years ago, gay marriage became legal or the Supreme Court said,

00:28:39.040 yes, this is a constitutional right that people have. Most people, six years ago, this is according

00:28:43.800 to Pew Research, most people six years ago actually believed that the definition of marriage was

00:28:48.340 between a man and a woman six years ago, not 60 years ago, not 16 years ago, six years ago. And now, of

00:28:54.900 course, public opinion has shifted. The vast majority reject that notion and don't just reject the

00:29:00.780 definition of marriage that has been around for millennia, but now reject the biological reality of gender

00:29:05.860 that has existed across all cultures from the beginning of time, from the beginning of human existence.

00:29:11.920 Just in the past five years, all of this has changed. And this is not just fringe groups where this is

00:29:19.740 happening. This is in Congress. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Rules Committee Chairman James McGovern,

00:29:25.700 Democrat from Massachusetts, are bringing this to the House. The Blaze.com reports the proposed changes

00:29:31.860 would establish gender inclusive language in the House rules by eliminating gendered language. Instead of

00:29:38.420 words like father, mother, son, daughter, brother, sister, uncle, aunt, first, first cousin. What? Is that

00:29:46.580 gendered? Nephew, niece, husband, wife, father-in-law, mother-in-law, son-in-law, stepdaughter, stepbrother, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah,

00:29:52.280 blah, grandmother, granddaughter. They have to all be replaced by these gender neutral terms. Parent, child, sibling,

00:29:59.180 parents, sibling. What? This is so cumbersome. Like this is so just our lexicon, our language is becoming so

00:30:07.660 burdensome with political correctness. The proposed rules also demand the following changes. Seafarers, instead of

00:30:14.840 seamen, chair instead of chairmen, resign instead of submit his or her resignation. What? Such member delegate or

00:30:26.480 resident commissioner serves instead of he or she serves. And so we can't have gendered language at all. We have to

00:30:32.080 actually add words and longer words into our language in order to be polite. House Minority Leader Kevin

00:30:39.180 McCarthy has already mocked the proposal. He said this is stupid. Signed, a father, son, and brother. And yes, I

00:30:44.960 happen to agree with Kevin McCarthy on that, but it is beyond leftist idiocy on gender. This is an attempt

00:30:51.620 to obfuscate reality, to officially and legally subvert biological truth, which is that there are two

00:30:58.900 genders, men and women, and we are fundamentally different. We're the same in a lot of ways.

00:31:03.740 Doesn't mean that we have to fit into all of the standard gender stereotypes that culture has

00:31:10.280 propagated. I'm not saying that, but we're talking biology. Men and women are different. And so this is

00:31:17.320 an attempt to officially and legally abolish this natural dichotomy that has been around forever.

00:31:24.200 And it also takes steps to delegitimize not just our natural functions as human beings,

00:31:31.620 but also the natural nuclear family, mom, dad, kids. It is an effort to atomize us, to isolate us

00:31:37.960 from what connects us from our biological identity, but also the natural institutions from which all of

00:31:45.360 us have come, which is from a family with some kind of mom and a dad, at least biologically.

00:31:51.520 And it's an attempt to make us as flimsy and as undefined and as unimportant and as amorphous as

00:32:00.020 humanly possible and to try to minimize the institutions like family that have held us

00:32:08.340 together and have given us identity and meaning for so long. This is the disintegration of the

00:32:14.640 natural family. I don't want to hear anyone say that this is a slippery slope argument. If I would

00:32:19.120 have told you five years ago that in five years, we're not going to be able to say he or she,

00:32:24.140 male or female, that we wouldn't even be able to define what a woman is, you would have told me

00:32:28.300 that I was crazy fearmonger and that I had no idea what I was talking about. And then I was on a

00:32:33.260 slippery slope fallacy. There's no such thing as a slippery slope fallacy if you can actually see

00:32:38.080 what's ahead. Like if you can actually see the steps that are being taken. I mean, there is such a

00:32:43.520 slippery slope fallacy, but not when it comes to the craziness of progressivism. Nothing is too

00:32:48.060 crazy to assert that is going to happen because we're already seeing the craziness unfold right

00:32:54.200 now. So this is an effort to disintegrate the natural family that has been part and parcel,

00:32:59.320 this disintegration of every totalitarian collectivist regime, far left and far right,

00:33:04.420 communist, socialist, fascist, which are really not far from each other at all, for at least the

00:33:08.860 past century. You take away the institutions from which all humans derive value, morality,

00:33:13.920 purpose, and belonging. So family, friendship, church, faith, enterprise, and then you replace

00:33:19.360 it with the state. So the state becomes your mom, your dad, your friend, your caretaker, your moral

00:33:23.560 arbiter. As Mussolini described totalitarianism, everything for the state, nothing outside the

00:33:30.380 state, nothing against the state. Hannah Arendt writes this in her 1951 book, The Origins of

00:33:36.400 Totalitarianism. Terror can rule absolutely only over men who are isolated against each other.

00:33:42.900 Therefore, one of the primary concerns of all tyrannical government is to bring this isolation

00:33:47.420 about. Isolation may be the beginning of terror. It certainly is its most fertile ground. It always

00:33:53.720 is its result. Totalitarianism bases itself on loneliness, on the experience of not belonging to

00:34:00.580 the world at all, which is among the most radical and desperate experiences of man. You'll probably

00:34:06.260 remember in 1984 as well, how men and women were also not given any kind of distinction. They even

00:34:13.040 wore the same clothes. They called each other comrade. And so that is where this goes. Now, I don't think

00:34:19.340 the architects of these roles necessarily are thinking that. They probably don't even realize that this is

00:34:24.520 the ideology that they espouse and that that is where this leads, but it is nevertheless where it

00:34:30.140 leads. For the Christian, I mean, we know that this is nonsense. It's very hard to be a post-millennialist,

00:34:36.640 by the way, right now. Like, when we see the world devolving into more and more craziness,

00:34:41.120 you're like, how more depraved and confused can we possibly get? But this is like a Genesis—this is

00:34:47.160 Genesis 1 issue, okay? And so I've said before the most radical verse in the Bible—I actually heard

00:34:51.800 someone else say this. I don't remember. The most radical verse in the Bible is Genesis 1.1.

00:34:55.640 God created the heavens and the earth. He is the authority over all of it. He says what is and

00:34:59.800 what isn't, what's right and what's wrong, what's male and what's female. So Christians, we might be

00:35:03.920 confused and disagree on a lot of things. This should not be confusing for us. This is in the first

00:35:08.900 chapter of our Bible. Let us make man in our image after our likeness and let them—this is the

00:35:16.140 triune God—and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over

00:35:20.920 the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.

00:35:25.200 So God created man in his own image. In the image of God, he created them. Male and female,

00:35:30.860 he created them. And God blessed them. And God said to them, be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth

00:35:36.140 and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over

00:35:40.460 every living thing that moves on the earth. This is reiterated by Jesus himself in Matthew 19.

00:35:46.440 We have talked a lot about this before. I recommend the episodes Biblical Marriage. That's the title.

00:35:52.420 You can just type that in wherever you get your podcast with the word relatable. And then also

00:35:57.960 Biblical Telos of Gender, an episode that we did at the beginning of December. If you haven't listened

00:36:04.700 to those, I highly recommend that you do. So this might be hard for the Christian to hold to and to hold

00:36:11.040 fast too in the sense that there's a lot of pressure against this very basic scientific

00:36:17.260 and theological reality. But it is not confusing for us because the Bible is graciously so clear

00:36:23.300 on this issue. The world is insane. They no longer know basic truths that people of all different

00:36:30.040 faiths, once accepted. Postmodernism makes hearts of stone and brains of mush. And that is certainly what

00:36:36.560 is happening even in our halls of power. So we have the privilege of being able to hold fast to

00:36:41.620 the truth, which is unchanging and as clear as ever in God's word. Speaking of truth and speaking of

00:36:49.780 clarity, I am now going to talk to my friend, Virgil Walker, about the critical race theory that is

00:36:56.000 seeping into the Southern Baptist Convention, what is going on there between the few sides that are in

00:37:02.720 conflict and what this means for believers and how we push back against it with the gospel.

00:37:12.480 Virgil, thank you so much for joining me. Can you tell everyone quickly who may not know,

00:37:17.780 although I think most people do listening to this, who you are and what you do?

00:37:21.140 Virgil Walker. I'm a co-host of the Just Thinking podcast with my buddy, Darrell Harrison. And

00:37:30.220 recently, I've just become the Executive Director of Operations for G3 Ministries, which hosts G3

00:37:37.900 conferences under Dr. Josh By. So I'm excited. I'm here. I'm actually here in some of your stomping

00:37:43.860 grounds, Allie, here in Georgia. Oh, yeah. And today is a crazy day in Georgia. So I want to talk to

00:37:50.480 you about what's going on in the Southern Baptist Convention. I'm a Southern Baptist, have been my

00:37:55.120 whole life. I'm sure there's a lot of people listening to this who have gone to Southern

00:37:59.700 Baptist churches, and yet they don't realize there's actually a conflict that's happening

00:38:04.580 internally within the denomination over critical race theory. So can you talk about what's happening

00:38:11.880 and why there are two sides that are kind of butting heads over this issue?

00:38:17.260 Yeah. Well, what we're seeing bubble up that most rank and file had no idea about was the issue

00:38:24.820 of critical race theory. What happened at the Southern Baptist Convention in 2019 was this

00:38:31.660 Resolution 9 was brought to the floor and it was voted on. And what happened as a result is we're now

00:38:38.560 able, the SBC has now adopted CRT as a useful analytical tool to examine issues within its

00:38:46.880 convention. That's problematic. The reality is rank and file have no idea what critical race theory CRT

00:38:53.720 is. You've, over the course of the last year, you've been educating your, you know, your audience. I've

00:38:59.700 been educating the folks that I'm in front of. Men like Tom Askell, the founders, has been doing that

00:39:04.320 kind of work. Josh Bias of G3. And we've been sharing this information as to why CRT is so dangerous.

00:39:10.900 Well, because of, I think, folks beginning to pick up the ideas around the danger, the backdrop of where

00:39:18.700 this, where these, where these ideologies come from and their danger, SBC presidents have finally

00:39:24.800 kind of taken notice. And what happened in December 1st of this year, or rather December 1st of 2020,

00:39:32.820 a brand new year, was the SBC presidents came together for what they normally do by way of meeting.

00:39:38.440 And when they did, they affirmed the Southern Baptist faith and message, or the Baptist faith

00:39:45.660 and message 2000. And as they affirmed it, they made something very clear. And so I want to quote

00:39:50.700 what they said, because it's important to hear. They said this, quote, we stand together on the

00:39:56.040 historic Southern Baptist condemnations of racism in any form. And we also declare that affirmation of

00:40:03.380 critical race theory, intersectionality, and any version of critical theory is incompatible,

00:40:10.140 incompatible with the Baptist faith and message, end quote. So that happened on December 1st.

00:40:16.820 As a result of that statement coming out again at the time, all six presidents of SBC seminaries

00:40:23.120 affirmed this statement. Right after that, something happened on December the 18th. There were two

00:40:29.920 key leaders. I would call them Charlie Dates. He's a senior pastor of Progressive Baptist Church in

00:40:37.940 Chicago, as well as Ralph West. He is the senior pastor. He's a founding pastor of Church Without

00:40:45.620 Walls in Houston. Both of them came out with a statement, and their statement was one of absolute

00:40:51.620 denunciation of the statement. I want to read you something that I thought was very compelling that

00:40:58.820 Charlie Dates stated in his statement. He's actually made a decision to leave the SBC as a result of this

00:41:06.460 statement that was made that condemned critical race theory. He said this, quote, when did the

00:41:11.940 theological architects of American slavery develop the moral character to tell the church how it should

00:41:19.440 discuss and discern racism, end quote. He goes on further in his statement to really just take to

00:41:28.480 task the men who gathered together, stating that there was no black person who was actually in their

00:41:34.500 midst in an effort to invalidate this statement. And so as a result, he rejects the statement, and he's

00:41:41.560 walking away from the SBC. Ralph D. West of Houston, he was a little bit more kind in his statement,

00:41:49.060 but he's pushing forward something that I'm, a term I'm coining called CRT light. It's less filling and

00:41:57.100 doesn't taste great, I can tell you that much. But CRT light is this idea that, well, we don't,

00:42:03.600 they recognize, they being those who are proponents, those who are advocates for critical race theory,

00:42:10.100 they recognize that, and if they're going to push this idea forward, they can't swallow this,

00:42:15.460 the idea is hook, line, and sinker. And as a result, what they're doing is they're saying, well,

00:42:19.900 we don't advocate everything that CRT states and discusses, but there are components of it that we

00:42:25.860 want to adopt. When, when biblically speaking, we recognize that a good, a good tree bears good

00:42:32.380 fruit and a bad tree bears bad fruit. And the root of the tree of CRT is, is, is bad fruit. And we,

00:42:39.160 we absolutely don't need it. Right. Last, last thing, last thing that happened was as, as a result,

00:42:46.500 Ronnie Floyd, who is the president of the executive committee has came out and said, you know what,

00:42:53.120 let's bring everybody together. So he's called a meeting of the African American fellowship

00:42:58.600 of believers. These are, these are key black leaders who are going to gather together alongside

00:43:04.600 the presidents of these seminaries. And they're going to have a conversation that's supposed to

00:43:09.640 take place in January. That's the, that's the long story short of all of what's happening. I mean,

00:43:14.640 there's a lot of stuff in social media that you can kind of follow the trail, so to speak,

00:43:18.840 of what's going on. Yeah. You did an excellent job of, of summing that up. So if I'm understanding

00:43:23.720 correctly, because even as someone who is in the midst of all of this and does follow this stuff,

00:43:28.340 it can be very confusing. So resolution nine was something that happened in 2019 when Southern

00:43:35.240 Baptists convened together, they vote upon these resolutions. Resolution nine basically said, you

00:43:40.320 know, critical race theory, which as you said, we've talked about on this podcast, it is a worldview

00:43:45.740 that views the world through the lens of the oppressed versus the oppressor and assigns those

00:43:51.180 categories based on race. So, uh, people who are black or Brown are irrevocably oppressed. People

00:43:58.820 who are white are irrevocably oppressors. And the only way to rectify that critical race theory says

00:44:05.460 is through leftism is through socialism is through social justice is through a critical race theory. So

00:44:12.320 for those who are kind of unfamiliar with that term, that's a very crude and short explanation of what

00:44:18.160 it is. So basically resolution nine back in 2019 said, okay, you know what? It's not all bad. We

00:44:24.840 can kind of use it as this analytical tool intersectionality, which kind of does the same

00:44:28.960 thing. It identifies people and places value on people based on their, uh, race, based on their

00:44:34.860 sexual orientation, their so-called gender identity and all of that. Um, so it's a way of identifying

00:44:41.100 people. It's a way of looking at justice. It's a way of looking at the world, even a way of looking at

00:44:46.860 sin and salvation and sanctification through a lens that is not biblical, but is actually

00:44:52.620 extremely, uh, worldly. And of course you and I believe is, uh, is completely anti anti-biblical

00:45:01.020 and destructive. So it's evil. Go ahead. Yes. Absolutely evil. Let's call it what it is. This

00:45:08.280 is, this is an evil ideology to, to have the presupposition that racism is ingrained in the fabric

00:45:14.760 of, of American society, that racism is ingrained in you based upon the level of melanin in your skin.

00:45:21.340 And, and because of that, the power structures like white privilege and white supremacy, not only do

00:45:26.580 they exist, but they, but they require to be overthrown. And that, that's, that's the, those are the

00:45:32.700 presuppositions behind critical race theory. So to identify that, to bring that into a Christian

00:45:38.320 culture, believing that that can be a valid lens by which to examine things within the SBC or any,

00:45:45.240 any religious organization that holds to the Judeo-Christian ethic is, is absolutely evil.

00:45:51.440 I'm just going to, I'm going to call it what it is. Absolutely. And that is what was affirmed

00:45:57.160 basically probably in softer terms, uh, in 2020 in December by SBC president saying, okay, look,

00:46:04.620 you know, we know that racism exists, that we've got history of that. We know discrimination exists,

00:46:09.440 but we're not going to use critical race theory and intersectionality as analytical tools. So kind

00:46:14.040 of going against resolution nine. And then as a response to that statement, you had people like

00:46:19.860 Charlie dates, like you said, um, in other, um, in other, yes. In other leaders in the SBC saying,

00:46:27.680 well, we don't like that statement. We actually think that CRT is something to be used. And basically,

00:46:33.440 especially Charlie dates accused the SBC presidents who said, look, we're not going to use CRT because

00:46:39.760 we believe that it's unbiblical, anti-biblical accused them of not dealing with racism, or he

00:46:45.940 might've not said, Hey, these people are racist, but in poetic terms, uh, he basically did. I mean,

00:46:53.160 he, he basically did. Um, he called, he called Ali, he called them the theological architects

00:47:00.180 of American slavery. I don't know how that down. What, what, what do you think that means?

00:47:06.260 I, well, I, I get what he's trying to do. Listen, dates is an orator and, and, and, and orators are,

00:47:13.280 are great when they're, when they're anchored in truth, but when they're anchored in emotion,

00:47:17.840 as this is, uh, they can be incredibly dangerous because they rally the people to a cause that is

00:47:24.780 ill-informed, that's ill-structured. I get what he's, what he's doing is he's looking at his,

00:47:29.880 the historic nature of the forming of the SBC, which was on the basis of slavery. They, they,

00:47:34.640 the Southern slaves wanted Southern, uh, slave owners wanted to keep their slaves. And so they

00:47:39.080 separated from Northern, uh, Baptist, Southern Baptist separated from Northern Baptist and said,

00:47:44.500 we're going to form the SBC. Now, from that time, the SBC has done everything to bend it,

00:47:51.560 you know, bent over backwards to acknowledge the horrors of the past, to, uh, to, to, to, uh,

00:47:57.260 repent for the, for the poor, you know, choices that were made all along the lines. I mean,

00:48:01.660 you know, Fred Luter, who, who actually signs a statement later, and I, I, I'm definitely need

00:48:07.340 to mention that because on the 18th, another statement also came out, but let me stick with this.

00:48:12.040 First of all, he claims that they are those presidents who made the decision to sign this

00:48:17.460 document affirming, um, the Baptist faith and message and saying critical race theory will

00:48:22.740 not be a part of it. He accuses them of having the same ill intention of those slave, of those

00:48:29.260 Baptists who were slave owners back in history. Yes, he did indeed call them the theological architects

00:48:35.700 of American slavery. He connected the dots, historically speaking from current day to the,

00:48:42.560 to, to the historic past. And that is exactly what CRT does. That is what people who don't

00:48:47.380 profess to be Christians do with CRT too. They say, Hey, I mean, it's some kind of, as we've probably

00:48:53.040 talked about a Kafka trap of saying, Hey, if you are against CRT, if you're against what I want you

00:49:00.060 to do to be so-called, as Ebron X. Kendi says, anti-racist, that's because you're actually fragile.

00:49:06.020 That's because you are racist. It couldn't be that, Hey, some Christians say, you know,

00:49:11.420 that's an unbiblical way to look at things. Obviously racism is a sin. You can't love God

00:49:16.840 and hate your brother for any reason, whatever it is. But let's look at a gospel centered way to

00:49:23.380 enact that and preach that it has to be, no, you are either for CRT or you are a racist and you're

00:49:31.340 not even just a racist, but for slavery. But these are the same people who are talking about racial

00:49:36.520 reconciliation. So I, and also already we are seeing, like you said, in the beginning, a bad

00:49:42.860 tree bears bad fruit. And so it is already bearing the fruit of division. Don't you think?

00:49:50.160 Absolutely. That's, that's its intention. Remember at the beginning, I told you about

00:49:54.780 the presuppositions connected with CRT. The whole purpose of it is to overturn structures, overturn

00:50:01.720 power structures. And so its interest has nothing to do with reconciliation of any kind. Its interest

00:50:08.060 has to do with, you're seeing a white power structure. In this instance, it's the SBC and

00:50:13.020 the desire is to overturn it. That's, that's the point. They, those who, who advocate this position

00:50:18.880 will not stop until that takes place. Okay. Let's end on, if you could sum up,

00:50:24.760 and I know that we could spend two hours talking about this. You have to spend two hours talking

00:50:29.240 about this, but why critical race theory is counter to the gospel and why the gospel is better.

00:50:39.040 Right. Right. Well, CRT is, is a lens by which to divide peoples. Again, it has a faulty

00:50:45.160 anthropology. It's, it's, it's categorized people on the basis of melanin in their skin,

00:50:50.980 rather than the fact that they are image bearers of the, of the, of the living God. And so it doesn't

00:50:56.100 unite us under the banner of God's truth. It separates us and divides us through the lens of

00:51:01.980 critical race theory. And once that division has taken place, you can tell each group who and what

00:51:07.460 they are, not on the basis of what scripture says about sin and sin's condition, but on the basis of

00:51:12.640 oppressed and oppressor groups. And then what that does is that allows certain groups to be devoid

00:51:17.540 of sin. In other words, their ethnicity attributes to them a form of righteousness. It's, it's

00:51:23.180 pharisaicalism. They can now look through the lens of their ethnicity and say, see, I'm good and you're

00:51:28.940 bad on the basis of the categories that have been set up. That's why this is unbiblical and needs to be

00:51:33.720 rejected in full. I, I, what needs to be embraced is the gospel. The gospel unites Ephesians chapter two,

00:51:40.140 what we see there in, in, in verses 12 and following is that those who were once divided,

00:51:46.220 who were once a God ordained division between Jew and Gentile are brought together. How? Not through

00:51:51.360 CRT, not through Black Lives Matter, but are brought together through, through the power of the gospel,

00:51:56.880 through what Jesus Christ did on a cross. My, my, my encouragement would be to those SBC presidents who

00:52:02.020 I know are, are feeling a measure of weight to capitulate, right? What they're feeling is that

00:52:08.720 the, the, the, the idea around unity, hey, let's be brought together. It's on the false basis of, of,

00:52:15.220 of, of something superficial and not on the basis of truth. And that's not true unity. You and I both

00:52:19.980 know that. And so my, my encouragement to them is to, is to stand strong and to hold on to truth,

00:52:25.680 the biblical truth, the message of the gospel that we must proclaim. That's what's going to,

00:52:29.800 that's, what's going to help things. That's, what's going to save us at the end of the day.

00:52:33.400 Yes. And amen. And actually, as you were speaking before you went to Ephesians two,

00:52:37.520 you, something that you said reminded me of Ephesians two, and I pulled it up. So just to read,

00:52:42.480 just to read this. And like you said, it's talking about the Jews and the Gentiles,

00:52:45.900 but the fact of the matter is it's Jesus Christ who brings groups together that otherwise would have

00:52:51.940 been hostile toward each other. So 13 through 15 of Ephesians two, but now in Christ Jesus,

00:52:57.460 you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ for he himself is our peace

00:53:03.140 who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh, the dividing wall of hostility.

00:53:09.780 CRT raises a dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances

00:53:15.520 that he himself might create, or that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two.

00:53:22.820 So making peace. Jesus is a peacemaker among all believers in between us in the world,

00:53:31.320 but peace among believers. CRT looks to create tension and division among the body of Christ.

00:53:38.500 So they cannot coexist. Thank you so much. Can you remind people where they can find you?

00:53:44.160 Uh, they can definitely find me on just thinking, uh, just thinking.me. Also check out the conference

00:53:51.340 G3, G3, uh, min, M I N dot O R G where we've got the conference happening at the end of September,

00:53:58.560 first part of October. We'd love for you to be a part, but you can catch me there. I'm blogging

00:54:02.060 there as well. So I've been having a great time with the folks at G3. Awesome. Thank you so much,

00:54:06.780 Virgil. Thanks again, Allie. Okay guys. So definitely did not accomplish this episode

00:54:17.240 being 30 minutes, but I had a lot to catch up on today. I think that I will be able to make it

00:54:22.760 shorter, uh, make it shorter for the future episodes. But, um, I just want to end with this

00:54:29.360 positive note and I'm sure you were encouraged by that conversation with Virgil Walker. So I said this

00:54:33.900 on, um, I said this on Instagram and I just want to say it here. You're going to see, and you have

00:54:39.360 seen a lot of different posts and tweets, whatever, of people saying, um, oh, finally we finished 2020.

00:54:46.000 2021 has good things in store for us. There's no way that things could get worse. So I'm going to be

00:54:51.780 a Debbie Downer for a second, and then I'm going to lift you up with some, with some edifying truth.

00:54:57.620 Things could always get worse. Okay. 2021 could definitely get worse. Now for you,

00:55:02.360 I don't know what you personally went through. You literally could have had the worst year of

00:55:06.620 your life. You could have lost everyone and everything. And really there might be nowhere

00:55:12.080 to go, but up for you. So I'm not discounting that. And I'm not discounting that a lot of people

00:55:16.360 had a terrible year this year. They either lost loved ones or they lost their job. They lost their

00:55:22.060 livelihood. You're struggling mentally, spiritually, whatever it is. So I'm not discounting that 2020

00:55:27.340 could have been really hard, but it might not have been the hardest year of your life so far.

00:55:31.440 And it's probably not going to be the hardest year of your life going forward. Like 2021,

00:55:36.240 we have no idea what it has in store. If 2020 taught us anything, it's that we're not in control

00:55:40.640 and that we can't predict what's going to happen. That is true in 2021 as well.

00:55:45.340 There is, of course we can set goals and we can have, um, we can say that we want to,

00:55:50.700 you know, do certain things and we want to change certain things and we can have, um, an optimistic

00:55:55.680 outlook, but our optimism should not be based on the potential of better circumstances,

00:56:00.680 but on the God who doesn't change. So where our joy is derived from is not in this kind of superstition

00:56:07.480 that the new year promises better times for us because it doesn't necessarily. Um, it is in our

00:56:15.520 Messiah, in our King of Kings, who says that he's not going anywhere, that he's not going to leave us

00:56:21.160 forsake us. And even when our circumstances change, even when we face the unknown that he

00:56:26.120 is steadfast, you guys know, I've been clinging to Hebrews 13, eight, especially over the past year.

00:56:31.340 Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. So we don't know what 2021 brings,

00:56:36.720 where our anchor is, where our hope is, where our optimism and our joy comes from is in this God

00:56:42.900 who does not change. His promises do not fail. Like God's eternal plan of redemption

00:56:47.760 redemption is still going off without a hitch. I've said this a million times on this podcast in

00:56:52.140 the past year, but he is not thrown off by anything that's happened. He's not shocked. He's

00:56:56.740 not taken aback. He's not thrown for a loop. He has not had to take a detour. He hasn't put anything

00:57:02.400 on pause. Everything is going to, according to what he absolutely, uh, is in charge of. Uh, he doesn't

00:57:12.980 remove his control. He doesn't remove his sovereignty even for one second. And all of it is working

00:57:18.840 towards his glory and the ultimate good of believers. We know this and we trust in this.

00:57:24.420 And that is where our happiness and our positivity comes from. Uh, Lamentations 3.23 tells us that his

00:57:33.120 mercies are new every morning. Great is his faithfulness. So we look forward to newness

00:57:38.800 every morning, not just in the new year, but every morning we have the hope and the joy that comes

00:57:44.500 from his renewed mercies that wake up with us. And so I just want to encourage you, um, uh, to take

00:57:52.140 the pressure off of yourself, to take the pressure off of an unknown future, to bring you happiness and

00:57:58.020 to bring you joy, take the pressure off of circumstances that you can't control to bring

00:58:02.280 you happiness and put all of that hope, put all of that so-called pressure on God who promises

00:58:08.500 to deliver those things for you. He doesn't promise ease. He doesn't promise that things are going to

00:58:13.000 necessarily always go smoothly or look smoothly here in this life, but he does promise to keep

00:58:18.220 his promises. He does promise to be faithful. He does promise to be with you. He promises that you

00:58:23.760 can do all things through him who strengthens you, not decontextualizing that verse, but he promises

00:58:28.800 that you can persevere through all circumstances, uh, because of him, because of him who loves you.

00:58:34.460 Um, and so the gospel will always be enough for our joy and for our optimism. So let that be where

00:58:40.680 our vision, um, goes, where our eyes are set and, uh, let that be where our joy and our optimism comes

00:58:48.100 from. Okay. That's all I got for today. I know a long episode, but, uh, we will be back here tomorrow

00:58:54.180 with more good stuff.

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - January 05, 2021

Ep 346 ｜ In Jesus' Name ... A-Woman？

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