Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - July 13, 2021


Ep 453 ｜ 'God Bless Abortion'？


Episode Stats

Length

40 minutes

Words per Minute

174.90117

Word Count

7,152

Sentence Count

388

Misogynist Sentences

12

Hate Speech Sentences

28


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.000 Hey guys, welcome to Relatable. Happy Tuesday. As you can probably tell, I am not in my fancy
00:00:16.000 studio with my nice set and my fancy microphone. It sounds different. It looks different. If
00:00:21.160 you are watching on YouTube, that's because I am a little under the weather and I'm feeling
00:00:26.980 a lot better than I was yesterday, but I still wanted to play it safe and record from the
00:00:33.480 comfort of my room. And so that is what I'm doing, but hopefully I'll be back in the studio
00:00:40.060 tomorrow. Now, do not feel bad for me. I always get messages from you guys, you very compassionate
00:00:46.660 listeners who say, Oh, Allie, you just need to rest. You need to, you know, not worry about getting
00:00:53.300 content out. And I really appreciate that. But I'm recording this episode rather than
00:00:57.240 recording like a replay episode, because I want to, we're talking about very important
00:01:02.500 things today. And I really wanted to make sure that we got this episode out for you guys.
00:01:07.940 But it does remind me, I don't know if you guys have seen that meme going around, or maybe
00:01:12.980 it was a tweet that kind of turned into a meme. What does meme even mean anymore? I don't know.
00:01:16.980 But there was this tweet going around that was like, European out of office is like,
00:01:24.400 hello, thank you for your email. I am on vacation until September and will not be returning your
00:01:31.040 messages. And then the American out of office is like, hi, just out of the office for two hours
00:01:36.540 for kidney surgery, but I'll be available by myself. That is very accurate. I've only really ever worked
00:01:42.920 in like small business or in some kind of entrepreneurial setting. So that meme really
00:01:50.780 hit me hard because that is very true. Non-corporate life, especially in the United States, freelancer
00:01:55.500 life, entrepreneur life, business owner life is very much nonstop. But it's also part of what makes
00:02:04.440 this country the best in the world. And I wouldn't trade it for anything. All right. That was an aside.
00:02:09.160 Um, the episodes that I will be recording tomorrow, hopefully, if I'm feeling better in studio,
00:02:15.080 one of them will be an interview with my dad. And I'm really excited about that. My dad is involved
00:02:21.980 in Texas politics. That's where I grew up. He is going to talk to us about the voting bill that Texas
00:02:28.700 Democrats are currently protesting by fleeing the state. They literally got on a private flight to DC,
00:02:36.700 and they're trying to get help from democratic politicians in DC to stop the voting integrity
00:02:42.320 bill in Texas. My dad's going to talk to us about that. But a lot of you also asked me questions
00:02:47.500 about my parents, like how I grew up, what parenting choices my parents made, how I was raised, what they
00:02:53.120 did to kind of encourage me to pursue the things that I wanted to pursue. So if you guys are interested
00:02:58.160 in that, I will ask him some of those questions. He's also a great person to get advice from.
00:03:03.100 I told their story before I wrote about it a little bit in my book, too, you're not enough,
00:03:08.260 and that's okay. They started from very little, they worked really, really hard to give my brothers
00:03:15.060 and me a better life than the one that they had. Growing up, my dad took every opportunity to make
00:03:21.140 that possible. He ended up being very successful in his pursuits of trying to give us a better life.
00:03:29.040 So if you need business advice, if you need political insight, if you need some parenting tips,
00:03:38.780 he would probably be willing to give answers to all of those kinds of questions. So if you have any of
00:03:44.420 those, just shoot me a DM on Instagram, and I'll add it to the list of things to ask him. I also
00:03:50.960 interviewed my mom back in 2019. We talked about how to share the gospel on Halloween, and we also
00:03:57.500 answered some personal questions about parenting and things like that, so you can go back and listen
00:04:01.940 to that episode if that's something that you're interested in. But today, you are going to listen
00:04:07.400 to an interview I actually recorded yesterday in studio with the head of a non-profit organization,
00:04:13.440 a Christian non-profit organization, that was originally denied 501c3 status by the IRS because
00:04:20.000 they actually said in writing, in their response, in their reasoning for why they denied 501c3 status
00:04:26.860 this organization, that biblical values are typically associated with the Republican Party. I can't
00:04:33.060 believe they actually said that. So Bunny Pounds, the head of the organization, is going to be talking
00:04:38.020 to us about that whole ordeal and the actually very surprising and I think kind of encouraging outcome
00:04:44.400 that this whole ordeal ended in. But first, we are going to talk about this very disturbing story
00:04:53.720 that some of you guys sent me on Instagram, a story coming out of Arkansas, an organization which
00:04:59.760 I don't think that I will actually name. And we might even like blur out their Instagram account
00:05:06.220 handle when we put the picture up for those of you watching on YouTube because they're obviously doing
00:05:11.440 what they're doing for attention and I'm not sure that I want to gratify them in that way.
00:05:17.220 They decided that they were going to hoist a huge sign up on a seven-story statue of Jesus that stands
00:05:26.400 in Eureka Springs, Arkansas. This is an organization that apparently raises support for abortion and
00:05:33.240 abortion funding, especially in the South where they see what they would probably call an attack on abortion
00:05:39.280 rights, so-called abortion rights. On Instagram, the organization posted a picture and said,
00:05:45.520 this, in Arkansas, there's only one 65-foot statue of Jesus. There's also only one abortion clinic.
00:05:53.140 Just a bunch of angry men with no outlets writing outrageous laws about vaginas. That and the second
00:05:59.480 highest rate by state of infant mortality. It's hard to see how pro-life can be so myopic in its vision
00:06:05.580 of what life is. In Arkansas, there are ridiculous statutes based on cheap performative morality
00:06:15.520 and their eyes. Mary Magdalene was a whore, not a favored disciple. That's just how they see a
00:06:20.980 woman's place in the world and her body is a place too. Private property to be legislated by a group of
00:06:26.520 landlords. I will give credit. That last line is pretty poetic. And then here we go. Here's another
00:06:31.880 part of this long Instagram caption. We think Jesus would understand the concept of a difficult decision.
00:06:38.240 He supposedly had to make a few of them, but understood sacrifice intimately. We just think
00:06:44.180 abortion is a, I won't say it, a GD miracle worth celebrating. It saves lives, but those lives are
00:06:51.740 usually female. Usually female. When people have strong beliefs about decisions that don't affect them,
00:07:00.920 those beliefs are worth questioning. So obviously I have a lot to respond to. First, I just want to
00:07:09.240 mention that last line. When people have strong beliefs about decisions that don't affect them,
00:07:14.600 those beliefs are worth questioning. Like let's take that logic to its conclusion. Does that mean
00:07:20.960 that we're not allowed to care about decisions that don't affect us? Does that mean that men aren't
00:07:25.880 allowed to care about abortion? Does that mean that if you're straight decisions that are made
00:07:30.980 about gay people shouldn't affect you? Or if you're white, um, and decisions made about black people
00:07:37.800 that you shouldn't care about those. I thought that was having empathy. And these are the same kinds
00:07:42.780 of people that are always telling us that empathy is paramount. So we're not allowed to care about
00:07:48.260 causes that don't directly affect us. Cause there were a lot of people that would probably agree with
00:07:53.200 this post who really cared about what was going on. And for example, Israel and Palestine. I mean,
00:07:58.960 a part of having compassion is caring about things that don't directly affect you, especially
00:08:03.760 if these decisions are affecting a group of people that don't have a voice themselves. Of course,
00:08:10.080 like that is what activism is. That's what compassion is speaking up for the voiceless. That's
00:08:16.340 what people who are against abortion are doing. And I want to also correct a couple
00:08:23.020 other things and respond to the logic and some of the claims made in this post. And I hope it's
00:08:28.960 helpful for you. We do this every few months and talking about abortion. I really want to equip you
00:08:33.500 guys to be able to confront these kinds of statements and arguments and discussions and
00:08:38.080 conversations, um, about abortion, especially with people who call themselves pro-choice. First,
00:08:44.140 I think it's important to know just to be factual, not that it really makes that much of a difference to
00:08:48.700 their post. But according to the CDC, Arkansas is actually 11th for infant mortality rates. Just
00:08:55.140 to clarify that, that's still not great. But like I said, it's probably important to be accurate. The
00:09:00.740 post said that they're second, they're actually 11th. So just FYI. Second, abortion laws are not about
00:09:07.800 vaginas. There are so many different ways that pro-choice, pro-abortion people, which I would say
00:09:13.300 these people, I mean, is there really anything, uh, is it, is it even possible to be pro-choice
00:09:21.280 without being pro-abortion? I'm not really sure when it comes down to it, but these people are
00:09:25.840 obviously pro-abortion. I don't think that you hang a sign on a statue of Jesus that says God bless
00:09:30.800 abortion, unless you are pro-abortion. But there are all kinds of tactics that pro-abortion people try
00:09:38.340 to employ to make abortion be as trivial as possible or, um, strictly about regulating and
00:09:48.440 policing women's anatomy. And so they're not even saying that this is about regulating a woman's
00:09:54.600 uterus. They're saying that this is about regulating someone's vagina. I'm just going to just tell,
00:09:59.520 I'm, this is good news. I hope that you feel relieved feminist after I say this. No one,
00:10:04.880 there's no law on the books that is regulating your vagina and do what you want with it. What
00:10:11.380 we're talking about here is babies. These are babies. Abortion kills a human being. Now you can
00:10:17.480 call that human being if you want to, if it helps sanitize it in your mind to make you feel better
00:10:22.240 about this, you can call them a club of cells, or you can say that he or she isn't really a person
00:10:26.700 yet. It doesn't have value yet. You can keep perpetuating some mystical nonsense about human
00:10:33.800 beings only gaining worth and rights, uh, when they exit the birth canal. But the fact is at the
00:10:40.020 moment of conception, sperm meets egg, there is unique human DNA, sex, eye color, and all the
00:10:46.560 child's attributes are already determined in that moment. All it takes from then on, which is where we
00:10:51.660 all started, by the way, it's time and nourishment, but there is no moment after conception when, when a
00:10:57.540 zygote or embryo or fetus suddenly becomes a person that is unscientific, arbitrary nonsense, fertilized
00:11:05.340 egg, zygote, embryo, fetus in relation to human pregnancy. They're all words for different stages
00:11:11.860 of human development in the same way that a baby is still a child. So a fetus is still a baby in the
00:11:18.640 same way that a baby isn't any less of a person than a teenager. So a zygote isn't any less of a person
00:11:24.020 than an out of the womb baby. So let's go back to the basics on this. What is the justification
00:11:30.340 for killing a human being inside the womb? Is it because of location in a woman's body? So you're
00:11:37.200 telling me that location is your determinant for killing someone? Is it stage of development? So
00:11:43.420 you're telling me the younger a person is, the less developed the person is, the more okay it is to kill
00:11:47.880 them. Is it because of size? So you're telling me that a, that the smaller a person is killing them
00:11:54.000 is more justified? Is it dependency on the mother that justifies it? So you're telling me that the
00:11:59.900 more dependent a person is, the more acceptable it is to kill them? Because there's a lot of people
00:12:05.960 outside the womb that are very dependent on other people, on their caretakers, on even machines in
00:12:12.220 order to live. So are you saying that those people are disposable? Is it because the baby in the womb
00:12:18.580 might grow up and have a hard life or be poor or be abused or be unwanted? There are millions of
00:12:24.180 people around the world right now that meet that criteria. Should we kill them? Is it because the
00:12:30.920 child has been diagnosed with some kind of disorder? There are lots of people with life-threatening
00:12:35.300 disorders today. Is it okay to kill them? The fact is there is no justification for abortion that
00:12:42.700 would not logically apply to people outside the womb too. If you think killing a baby in the womb
00:12:49.000 is okay, then you are admitting that based on some totally arbitrary criteria that some humans are
00:12:56.480 expendable, some humans are disposable. And you might say, no, no, no, no, it's none of those things.
00:13:02.720 And I think a lot of people just kind of push those questions out of their mind because it's too hard to
00:13:07.140 really think about. You might just say, no, it's just because I believe in women's choice. Like I
00:13:13.360 believe in bodily autonomy, except it's not just her body. It's not just her body. There's another
00:13:18.940 person's body inside of her. And I'm just asking, why don't you think that human being has rights?
00:13:24.440 If it's based on any of the criteria that we just listed, it's totally arbitrary. And you're going to
00:13:29.320 have to tell me your logic for not applying those criteria to people outside of the womb and denying
00:13:34.220 their right to life. Abortion poisons the baby, starves the baby, or forces the baby into a heart
00:13:41.140 attack using the same combination of chemicals used for lethal injection for death row murderers
00:13:45.640 so that the baby twitches in pain and rise in pain and actually physically shrinks back from the prick
00:13:52.580 of the needle. And then after the baby is forced into cardiac arrest and then dies, it is pulled apart
00:13:58.500 limb by limb with forceps and removed from the mother. So that's what you're defending when you are
00:14:03.500 defending abortion, whether you say that you're pro-choice or whether you are hanging up a sign
00:14:07.580 on the statue of Jesus that says, God bless abortion. That's what you're defending.
00:14:12.340 What about the life of the mother? A lot of people say if the life of the mother is at risk anytime
00:14:17.100 after about 23 weeks, maybe even 22 weeks, I think that there's at least one case I know of a
00:14:23.660 of a 21 week old baby, not 21 week old baby, but I'm talking in gestation actually survived outside
00:14:32.440 of the womb and has grown up and is totally healthy. I think that's the youngest possible
00:14:36.940 week of gestation where a baby could actually survive outside the womb with a lot of medical
00:14:41.280 intervention and help. But really anytime after 23 weeks, second trimester, the option, if the life
00:14:48.320 of the mother is at risk is delivery, it's delivery. Either way, the baby is coming out, whether through
00:14:54.320 abortion or whether through delivery, both are different kinds of birth of the baby. You're just
00:15:00.980 deciding whether or not you're going to birth a dead baby or whether or not you are going to birth
00:15:05.180 a living baby. And so if a woman's life would be saved by getting the baby out, then the option
00:15:11.880 is delivery. There's no reason to kill the baby in the process. Now, just to clarify, pro-lifers also
00:15:20.280 believe that if there is an emergency situation in which the life of the baby and the life of the
00:15:24.840 mother are competing against one another, that every effort should be made to try to save both the baby
00:15:30.480 and the mother. But if in an effort to save the mother, the baby happens to die while that is tragic,
00:15:36.580 it's not wrong because it's not the intentional killing of the baby. We oppose pro-lifers the
00:15:43.980 intentional killing of babies in the womb, period. And don't come at me with, you're not pro-life,
00:15:50.480 you're pro-birth. When is the last time, anyone who says that, when is the last time you donated
00:15:55.620 your time, your money, and your energy to help pregnant moms and families in crisis? Because
00:16:00.820 every pro-lifer I know, without judgment, without condemnation, or hesitation, has helped
00:16:06.480 women, either financially or otherwise, who are in crisis. I would encourage you, if you consider
00:16:12.040 yourself pro-choice or pro-abortion, to visit a pro-life pregnancy center. I know the Planned
00:16:17.500 Parenthood propaganda wants to tell you that these are places that are lying to women about what
00:16:25.280 abortion is. The fact of the matter is, it's Planned Parenthood who lies to women. Planned Parenthood who
00:16:30.140 won't show you the ultrasound, won't allow you to hear the heartbeat, won't actually tell you what
00:16:34.520 happens in an abortion, but just uses euphemism to tell you that it's going to be, you know, no more
00:16:40.000 important than just pulling a tooth. These pro-life pregnancy centers, they don't have, they don't
00:16:46.500 have any reason not to tell you the truth, because the truth about abortion is brutal. Like, it's
00:16:51.740 convincing in itself. The science is convincing in itself. Pro-life pregnancy centers are not places
00:16:58.520 that shame women into keeping their kids. They offer all kinds of free services, education programs,
00:17:04.080 adoption help, help with employment, help with filing for benefits, help with immigration, refuge from
00:17:12.060 abusive situations, free or affordable diapers, cribs, car seats. Does Planned Parenthood offer any of these
00:17:18.380 things for women who decide to keep their babies? Not that I know of. It is a myth that pro-lifers
00:17:25.280 don't care about babies after they're born just because we don't agree with every leftist policy
00:17:31.600 proposal that they say is supposed to solve the problems for poor families. Now, I agree that
00:17:38.120 Arkansas and other poor southern states that top the list for maternal and infant mortality should
00:17:43.460 absolutely focus on solutions to that atrocity. But does acknowledging that mean that I also have to
00:17:52.340 accept the killing of babies in the womb? I don't think so. I think pro-lifers should be advocating
00:17:57.840 for policies that reduce as much as possible the infant and maternal mortality rate. If that's
00:18:03.780 something that pro-choicers and pro-lifers can agree on, come together and try to solve that crisis,
00:18:10.520 more power to people who can reach across the aisle and do that. But I am not going to use that as a
00:18:16.920 justification for killing babies in the womb. It just doesn't make any sense. It's a red herring
00:18:23.460 to distract from the main question, which is, why do you believe it's okay to kill some defenseless,
00:18:29.960 innocent human beings? So whenever you're in a conversation or a debate with someone who is
00:18:34.660 pro-abortion or who says they're pro-choice, always bring it back to the baby. Now, they will try to
00:18:40.520 distract you with all kinds of other points that may be worthy to talk about at some point, like I
00:18:48.020 said, like talking about these different kinds of policy solutions that could lower the rates of
00:18:52.020 infant and maternal mortality. But talking about these things still don't address the only question
00:18:58.880 when it comes to abortion that matters. Why do you think it's okay to kill innocent, defenseless
00:19:04.660 humans? Like, what's the justification? What's the excuse for that? Now, the person that you're
00:19:09.660 talking to typically will then answer. They'll kind of divert again and say, well, babies in the womb
00:19:16.980 aren't really babies. It's a fetus, as if fetus isn't just a Latin word for offspring, human offspring.
00:19:25.000 Or they'll say it's not a person yet. They're just clumps of cells. And then you can point out what we
00:19:30.160 discussed earlier, which is the very basic embryology about gestation, about life inside the womb. You can
00:19:40.460 just point out, well, that's just not scientifically true. We got to agree on the fact that this is a human
00:19:44.900 being at every stage of development from the moment of conception on. So tell me at what stage you think
00:19:50.300 it's okay to kill a human being and why. And tell me why you think that's a good justification for babies inside the
00:19:56.400 womb to be killed, but not babies or people outside the womb to be killed. And that, it sounds like a
00:20:02.660 slippery slope, but that's because it is actually a slippery slope. I wish it were a fallacy, but
00:20:07.580 there are already academics and philosophers and bioethicists in the collegiate sphere that advocate
00:20:19.660 for the option to kill a child after birth, even up until two years, if that's what the parents
00:20:27.040 desire. And so that's because the logic is very slippery. Anytime that you decide that worth is
00:20:34.660 ascribed to a person sometime after conception, and therefore there's a right to kill them, you are
00:20:41.860 sliding down a very slippery moral and logical slope. And I've never heard someone be able to defend
00:20:47.980 that. The only honest argument for abortion that I've ever heard is when people say that it's okay
00:20:56.460 to kill some innocent humans based on whatever their standard is. They just kind of admit that they
00:21:02.920 don't use the euphemisms. They don't try to say that it's not killing. They don't try to say that
00:21:07.240 it's just a clump of cells. They'll admit exactly what abortion is. And they face the facts and they say,
00:21:13.300 yes, it's justified because I actually think that women having that choice trumps any right that a
00:21:22.240 baby has to life. And it is killing. And they would say, it's okay. It's still morally repugnant,
00:21:29.700 but at least they're honest about it. At least they're not being unscientific. At least they're
00:21:34.680 not trying to say that somehow it's not killing and magically the baby just disappears. Or like I've
00:21:40.020 heard a lot of pro abortion people say it's terminating a pregnancy. What's a pregnancy? What's a
00:21:46.300 pregnancy guys? So when you're on the side that cannot be specific about the thing that you are
00:21:52.820 defending, like about the side that you're on and what abortion actually is, then that tells you
00:22:00.220 probably that you're on the wrong side. I have debated people in Congress about this and I have yet
00:22:06.640 to hear a single pro abortion, pro choice or mainstream at least in Congress or otherwise
00:22:13.320 give me an actual compelling or morally not reprehensible argument for why killing babies
00:22:22.580 in the womb is okay. I've never heard it. I have never heard it. Now, last response to this post
00:22:27.600 about saying, you know, Jesus, he would understand. He understands hard decisions and he would understand
00:22:35.340 abortion and, you know, he's pro choice, whatever. God hates abortion, period. Why? Because he hates
00:22:42.600 murder. That's what he makes clear from Genesis onward. God hates the shedding of blood of innocent
00:22:49.040 people. It is an injustice that will incur his wrath. We see in the Old Testament how much God
00:22:54.920 detested child sacrifice that was and still is a pagan ritual, only now it's been given the Americanized
00:23:01.660 name, which is reproductive rights. Jesus says, let the little children come to me when the disciples
00:23:07.380 were trying to shoo them away. Everywhere in the Bible that we see pregnancy discussed, it's mentioned
00:23:12.800 as a blessing from God. Psalm 139, Jeremiah 1, both talk about the formation of babies in the womb
00:23:19.140 and God knowing us even as we're growing in our mom's bodies. That makes it clear that we don't suddenly
00:23:24.820 become a person when we're born, that we were already a person made in the image of God when we were in our
00:23:31.020 mother's wombs. And that goes for all babies in their mother's wombs. Now, hear me. I want to be
00:23:35.900 super, super clear about this. That is not me, that God hates women who have had abortion. If you have
00:23:42.940 had an abortion, God loves you so much. He can forgive you. He can pour out mercy and grace upon you. He can
00:23:49.800 absolutely use your story for his glory to help other people and to tell of his faithfulness. We see in
00:23:55.480 scripture that God forgives the people that we would probably deem unforgivable, the sins that we would
00:24:01.900 probably not even want to utter out loud. The most hard-hearted people God forgives when they repent in
00:24:07.100 faith and turn to him. Jesus, the same Jesus that was desecrated by these people who love abortion and
00:24:13.160 clearly hate God, died for you. He died for you so that your sins could be forgiven forever and you could
00:24:18.660 experience joy and freedom for all of eternity. God is holy. We are not. And we have to be made holy
00:24:24.940 and reconciled to God. And that's what Jesus' sacrifice does for us. It makes us new. It gives
00:24:30.600 us a soft heart. He gives us his righteousness and his holiness, no matter what we've done, so that we
00:24:37.000 are a friend of God forever and ever. And that's what happens when you, by grace, through faith, come to
00:24:44.280 the Lord through Christ. And this leads me to my final point on this, that God can, he doesn't just
00:24:52.060 use the terror and the horribleness of abortion for his glory and the good of other people. He will
00:24:59.300 also use this desecration of this statue for good. More people are now hearing about the statue than
00:25:05.580 ever before. The passion of Jesus is actually performed as a play at this statue. And now more
00:25:11.100 people will hear about it and go see the gospel of Jesus played out. So go tell people about it.
00:25:16.840 Take your family. If you're close by, support the people who put on the great passion play. It's
00:25:21.660 actually an organization called the great passion play. Um, and here's what the organization said
00:25:26.780 in response to this whole thing. They said, we wanted to acknowledge and give notice of the 45 foot
00:25:32.920 drop cloth to be used in our mission trip program. Uh, the email to, uh, to the people who put up the
00:25:40.200 sign, uh, read, you trespassed on our property and hung this drop cloth from the Christ of the
00:25:45.560 Ozarks Memorial statue and put your lives at risk as well as the people's lives. You took it down.
00:25:50.580 You used our statue to further your platform, but we are thankful for the opportunity to share our
00:25:55.620 mission. The passion play is a 501c3 nonprofit organization dedicated to lifting up the miraculous
00:26:01.300 life, sacrificial death, burial, and ultimately the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
00:26:05.540 We pray those who hung this banner are able to come and see Jesus hung on the cross and a
00:26:10.800 production that has been seen by over 8 million people. Now the email continued performances are
00:26:15.840 on Tuesdays, Fridays, and Saturday nights through the end of October. Security is now stationed
00:26:21.580 overnight and the cry to the Ozarks as well. We will not accept additional donations from your
00:26:27.360 organization. Um, so I'm not really sure what that last line means. This was reported by the
00:26:34.560 Christian post, by the way. So I love the attitude of the people who run this organization. And I feel
00:26:40.260 the same way that God is absolutely going to use this to further the mission of this organization
00:26:47.080 of people who are trying to share Christ at this statue. So let's pray for that. Like let's pray for
00:26:52.840 the people who hung this banner, that they would come to know Christ, that their hearts would be made
00:26:56.780 soft, that they would repent, uh, repent, and that many people would hear the gospel and come to know
00:27:01.880 Christ through this. Uh, we know that what Satan means for evil, God can always use for good because
00:27:07.620 God is relentlessly committed to his own glory and people's grandest efforts to thwart that will always
00:27:13.980 fail. So let's pray for his glory. Let's pray for the gospel to go out through this and thwart any
00:27:20.120 attempts to try to, to try to inhibit the gospel going out. They will ultimately fail. Those efforts will
00:27:27.400 always be futile because God is sovereign and thank goodness, uh, we are not. Um, all right,
00:27:34.080 we're about to transition into, um, into my interview with the bunny pounds. This is another
00:27:39.740 great example of how God can use bad situations or what seem like bad situations for, um, our good and
00:27:47.580 for his glory. Buddy, thank you so much for joining me. Can you tell everyone who you are and what you
00:27:57.440 do? Well, it's great to be here, Ali. Huge respect for you and everything you bring to the conservative
00:28:02.620 movement, knowing theology and political education. It's so important. Thank you so much. Um, I lead
00:28:08.260 Christians Engage. We're a nonpartisan Christian ministry, uh, mostly focused on the state of Texas,
00:28:13.320 but you know, now looking our eyes around America, but our goal is to help people build habits of
00:28:20.200 prayer, voting and engagement for the sake of America. And we do that through simple education
00:28:25.460 on the importance of prayer for our city, state nation, our elected officials, the importance of
00:28:30.200 voting in every election and taking our civic duties, uh, that has been given to us by our founding fathers
00:28:36.120 as important, uh, sacred trust that we have as we, the people, and also as believers in Jesus.
00:28:41.920 And then also to help people engage in basic, uh, civic engagement education, how to understand how
00:28:48.980 the sausage is made, how to respond to God as it relates to the pre-born human trafficking,
00:28:54.900 whatever initiatives or issues that they want to get involved with. So we're kind of like the
00:28:58.880 on-ramp, the beginning place for Christians to get active. Well, sounds like something that's
00:29:03.180 super necessary. I know that there are a lot of Christians that are asking the questions that you
00:29:07.280 guys are answering. What does God have to say about abortion? What does God have to say about the
00:29:11.620 family? And what is the biblical definition of justice? All these things that the secular world
00:29:16.160 seems to be trying to answer, but Christians want to know, like, what does God's word say?
00:29:20.580 And you guys really help Christians understand that. Now tell me what happened between your
00:29:25.680 organization, Christians Engaged, and the IRS. Well, we applied for our tax exempt status,
00:29:30.700 like every organization does, when we launched back in December, 2019. Uh, and 18 months later in May,
00:29:37.780 we received a letter from the IRS pretty much denying our, um, tax exempt status. And they did
00:29:44.580 that. And they said in writing that biblical teachings are quote, affiliated with the Republican
00:29:50.000 party, which is interesting because I always felt like the Bible was a kingdom document,
00:29:55.320 kingdom document, not a partisan document. Right. So, you know, they pretty much violated their own
00:30:01.160 rules. Um, and we do everything that any other organization does, which is educate people on their
00:30:07.040 civic duties, um, educate people from a biblical perspective. Um, so the situation here with the
00:30:13.340 IRS is that if that decision was meant to stand, then that could affect really every Christian
00:30:19.500 organization that teaches the Bible around America. Right. Because they could say that this
00:30:23.760 is a partisan organization when it's not simply because they're espousing biblical values. So what
00:30:29.960 happened after that? Obviously you tried to, um, you tried to reverse the decision or appeal the
00:30:35.260 decision. So what happened? Yeah, we had an amazing friends at first Liberty Institute,
00:30:40.360 Kelly Shackelford and his team, Leah Patterson is my attorney and they appealed, uh, for us a 12 page
00:30:46.920 appeal is beautiful to the IRS laying out that they violated their own rules and violated, um, what they
00:30:53.740 should have done with our case. And 22 days later by a miracle, they repealed this decision. Um, it was
00:31:00.920 such a big miracle because we had so many people around the country that stood up and prayed for us
00:31:07.880 that wrote letters to the IRS that took this as a personal, uh, affront even to their own biblical
00:31:14.140 beliefs. And it was such a powerful movement to see people stand up. And then we had members of
00:31:19.240 Congress, uh, Senator Mike Lee, Senator Ted Cruz, uh, uh, Chip Roy from Texas that led a letter to the
00:31:26.580 IRS commissioner. And then another letter was written from Jim Jordan and Kevin Brady to the
00:31:31.520 treasury commissioner to lay out the egregiousness of this case. And that encourages me a lot.
00:31:37.660 Obviously I'm troubled, disturbed by their original decision, but that there is still power in people
00:31:45.040 speaking up and Christians standing up and saying, or just people who care about fairness, people who
00:31:50.520 care about Liberty standing up and saying, okay, this is not right. That actually has the power
00:31:55.840 to affect change. I think there's a lot of people out there that think that their voice doesn't
00:32:00.660 matter, that they, um, that they don't have the power to influence our elected officials or bureaucrats
00:32:08.080 because that's so often the case. Now, what do you think is the implication for other organizations
00:32:16.360 or even individuals? If for example, the IRS decides, okay, you know, we decided to reverse our
00:32:22.340 decision there about going forward. We're still going to hold to this principle that anyone who
00:32:26.360 tries to hold to biblical principles is partisan and Republican, and we're going to kind of discriminate
00:32:31.380 against them. What would that look like? I think we have to be diligent as believers. And when I saw
00:32:36.560 the letter and I thought, did they just put that in writing? Yeah. You know, we, we had a choice even
00:32:42.460 within our board of directors. Do we just go on and create a 501c4 or are we within the law?
00:32:49.480 Right. And so thankfully we made the decision to stand up. And of course, with our friends at First
00:32:55.440 Liberty, get great counsel to help us in this endeavor, but it's a wake up call for believers
00:33:00.620 that, you know, government is the only thing that can encroach upon our liberties. Right. And so we
00:33:07.280 have politics in our schools and our churches all throughout America. We're dealing with politics,
00:33:13.640 but government and why it's so important to involve ourselves in our civic duties is because
00:33:18.900 government can encroach upon our rights and our liberties. So all of us have a responsibility to
00:33:26.000 stand up and make sure our voices are heard when we see any kind of encroachment on that. And that's
00:33:30.800 what our friends at First Liberty does to help defend people around all the country on our First
00:33:37.220 Amendment rights. But we all have to be diligent to find that wherever we find it in our communities.
00:33:42.400 Right. Yeah, definitely. I think what bothers a lot of people is the clear double standard that it seems
00:33:48.240 like that IRS has shown towards Republican organizations, not that yours is Republican, but
00:33:54.760 organizations that it sees as Republican or partisan and versus how they treat, for example,
00:34:02.820 like an organization started by someone like Michelle Obama that they see as more neutral.
00:34:08.780 And so and we've seen that in the past with Lois Lerner under the Obama administration and people
00:34:15.480 are troubled by it. But I think your story, it goes to show that when Christians are engaged,
00:34:20.540 when they're praying, when they're speaking up, when they're reaching out to our representatives,
00:34:24.900 that positive change can happen. And hopefully it can change. It can affect positive change on an even
00:34:31.060 larger scale as well. Do you have a hopeful view of the country and that if Christians are engaged like
00:34:37.380 you guys want them to be, they do speak up and stand up for the things that matter, vote in accordance
00:34:42.760 with their biblical values that and that things can change for the better? I do. I think this is a great
00:34:51.500 story of hope for a lot of people. We hear a lot of bad news, right? We're constantly feeling like
00:34:56.440 we're under attack as believers. But this is a great example of how if we stand up, our Republic
00:35:03.200 works. The Founding Fathers gave us a gift in this nation. We undervalue it so many times and we
00:35:10.140 discredit what the gift we've been given as Americans. And so if we do that, if we take
00:35:16.440 responsibility for our cities and our communities and our chamber of commerces and our state and our
00:35:22.340 nation, things can change. And God is raising up the church right now to be stronger lights than ever
00:35:30.940 before. In darkness, we know that in the midst of darkness, as it gets darker, the light shines
00:35:36.780 brighter. And that's what's happening in our nation right now. And it gives me so much hope because we
00:35:41.580 are seeing people are waking up, they're feeling a burden for America, and they're trying to respond.
00:35:46.900 And that's what we do at Christians Engage is plug them into simple steps to respond to what the
00:35:51.520 Lord is saying as it relates to their call to the nation.
00:35:54.580 That's awesome. A lot of people are looking for tangible steps to take. And I'm glad you guys
00:35:59.480 are providing that. Can you tell everyone how they can support you, how they can find
00:36:03.400 more information about this?
00:36:05.500 Absolutely. ChristiansEngage.org is our website. We've got hundreds of articles, podcasts, videos
00:36:11.140 on there. Take our pledge to pray, vote, and engage. And we'll remind you to pray with thousands
00:36:16.740 of other people on Mondays at 555. Remind you to vote. Remind you to be engaged. And everybody
00:36:22.940 lives very busy lives. We understand that. This is just one of the parts of your Christian walk.
00:36:27.740 But we want to help support you as a parachurch ministry to help you pray, vote, and engage
00:36:32.500 regularly.
00:36:33.300 Awesome. Well, Bunny, thank you so much. This really was a huge story that I think all Christians
00:36:38.660 really need to pay attention to. We've got to be diligent. We've got to be watching for this
00:36:42.760 kind of stuff because it's slowly and silently that freedoms are encroached upon. But like
00:36:48.180 you said, when Christians, when Americans stand up, when we start caring about these things,
00:36:52.540 praying about these things, doing something about these things, things can change for the
00:36:56.400 better. So thank you for being such a pioneer in that. I really appreciate it. And I encourage
00:37:00.180 everyone as well to support you and to support Christians Engaged. Thank you for joining me.
00:37:04.040 Well, thank you for everything you do. And let's just keep standing up.
00:37:07.400 Definitely. Thank you.
00:37:12.760 All right. So just a quick outro to say, to remind you guys that God is completely in control
00:37:25.980 of the things that seem like they are spiraling out of control. When bad things happen, when
00:37:31.460 it seems like every single institution is against what is good and right and true, God is not
00:37:37.860 going to allow his plan to be thwarted. He's just not. Like I said, he is relentlessly committed to
00:37:45.620 his own glory and he is perfectly sovereign. Everything will unfold according to his perfect
00:37:53.840 will. And he will one day exact justice. And we have hope in that, but we also have hope in today
00:37:59.920 that when we push back against what we know to be dark, what we know to be wrong, what we know to be
00:38:05.400 unjust, that differences can be made. Not just when it comes to organizations rejecting 501c3 status
00:38:12.060 of a Christian organization, but also when it comes to people trying to advertise for abortion
00:38:18.500 in the name of Jesus Christ, God can use all of these things for his glory. And we as ambassadors
00:38:23.640 of Christ, as salt and light in this world, get to be a part of that. We get to be his hands and feet
00:38:31.720 and continue to use bad and seemingly hopeless situations to remind people of hope and goodness
00:38:38.380 and truth and the faithfulness of God that was ultimately displayed in the sacrifice and
00:38:43.320 resurrection of Jesus Christ. That is our privilege to go into dark spaces, to go to dark places and to
00:38:50.920 be light. When light enters, darkness scatters. That is what the Holy Spirit is in us. So don't be
00:38:57.200 discouraged. Don't despair. You've got a responsibility though. Don't just sit on your
00:39:02.060 hands. Don't not say something or not do something that God is calling you to do because it might be
00:39:08.940 scary. I was talking to someone who messaged me that said, you know, if I try to stand up against
00:39:15.800 abortion or if I try to stand up against the divisiveness of a lot of the racial rhetoric that
00:39:23.860 we are hearing today, if I try to stand up for biblical marriage and a biblical scientific
00:39:29.260 understanding of gender and sexuality, I'm going to be called a bigot. And I don't know what to do
00:39:34.980 with that. And my advice is to, I don't want to sound, I don't want to sound flippant at all because
00:39:41.900 I'm telling this to myself too, that we have to get over that fear and we have to accept the fact
00:39:47.940 that we will get pushback. Like we will get insults. We will be called names. Like there's no way to
00:39:54.080 avoid that unless you want to completely capitulate to secularism in every way. Um, but if you want to
00:40:01.520 stand for anything that is worth standing for it, yeah, you're going to get people who call you names
00:40:07.520 and who are going to say things about you that you know are not true. And we've got to get over that
00:40:12.420 fear, push past it, and then double down on the things that we know to be good and right and true,
00:40:17.600 raising a respectful ruckus when everyone is telling us that we should just be quiet and not
00:40:22.120 care, that we should just look the other way and not care as vulnerable people are being exploited by,
00:40:28.360 um, secular progressivism. So I just wanted to encourage you in that, that it is always worth
00:40:35.320 doing and saying something and that God will use you and your efforts for his glory, because that's
00:40:41.380 what he does. Hope is never completely lost because our hope is in Christ and he's eternal and he
00:40:47.560 promises to come back and make everything right. All right, that's all I've got for today. I will see
00:40:52.460 you guys here tomorrow.