The Charlie Kirk Show - February 16, 2025


A God-Shaped Hole in the Lives of College Students ft. Cliffe and Stuart Knechtle


Episode Stats


Length

24 minutes

Words per minute

192.79085

Word count

4,778

Sentence count

354

Harmful content

Misogyny

3

sentences flagged

Hate speech

6

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Cliff and Stacey Connectly are two of the founders of Turning Point USA, a youth organization that has been on campuses across the country for over 40 years. They are a great example of the power of the open-air dialogue method and the impact it can have on the minds of college students.

Transcript

Transcripts from "The Charlie Kirk Show" are sourced from the Knowledge Fight Interactive Search Tool. Explore them interactively here.
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 Hey, everybody.
00:00:00.000 My conversation with Cliff and Stuart Connectly in studio.
00:00:04.000 It's an exclusive conversation.
00:00:05.000 You'll love it.
00:00:06.000 If you want to listen to this conversation and more, become a member today at members.charliekirk.com.
00:00:10.000 That is members.charliekirk.com.
00:00:13.000 Also, get involved with Turning Point USA at tpusa.com.
00:00:17.000 That is tpusa.com.
00:00:20.000 Email us, as always, freedom at charliekirk.com.
00:00:24.000 Buckle up, everybody.
00:00:24.000 Here we go.
00:00:26.000 Charlie, what you've done is incredible here.
00:00:27.000 Maybe Charlie Kirk is on the college campus.
00:00:29.000 I want you to know we are lucky to have Charlie Kirk.
00:00:33.000 Charlie Kirk's running the White House, folks.
00:00:36.000 I want to thank Charlie.
00:00:37.000 He's an incredible guy.
00:00:38.000 His spirit, his love of this country, he's done an amazing job building one of the most powerful youth organizations ever created, Turning Point USA. We will not embrace the ideas that have destroyed countries, destroyed lives, and we are going to fight for freedom on campuses across the country.
00:00:55.000 That's why we are here.
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00:01:08.000 Learn how you can protect your wealth with Noble Gold Investments at noblegoldinvestments.com.
00:01:15.000 That is noblegoldinvestments.com.
00:01:17.000 It's where I buy all of my gold.
00:01:19.000 Go to noblegoldinvestments.com.
00:01:24.000 Okay, we are here with my friends Cliff and Stuart Connectly.
00:01:27.000 It's been a while, guys.
00:01:28.000 Good to see you both.
00:01:29.000 Good to see you, Charlie.
00:01:30.000 Yeah, and the world is different, I think, and a little bit of a better place than when we were meeting back in...
00:01:36.000 Why would that be, Charlie?
00:01:37.000 I have no idea.
00:01:38.000 The weather, that's why.
00:01:40.000 Christmas lights were brighter, yeah.
00:01:42.000 But really enjoyed spending time with you guys, and you both go to college campuses in a similar fashion that I do, and if the audience is not aware of it, you go and kind of hold court.
00:01:53.000 And you sometimes go for multiple days in a row.
00:01:55.000 Is that right?
00:01:57.000 You guys go for two, three, four days?
00:01:59.000 Yeah.
00:02:00.000 We're trying to shorten it now so we can get to more schools.
00:02:02.000 Is that right?
00:02:02.000 But it used to always be four.
00:02:03.000 And so just to remind the audience, how did you guys get into this?
00:02:07.000 I mean, obviously it started with you going on these campuses, speaking to students.
00:02:12.000 It's been multiple decades.
00:02:14.000 Well, I think that was probably before you were born.
00:02:16.000 That's right.
00:02:19.000 The first time I did open air was during an inter-varsity beach evangelism project in Fort Lauderdale, Florida in 1980. And stood up on the beach there with the inter-varsity students and began to preach.
00:02:31.000 And the people hopped off their towels.
00:02:32.000 And I found out real quickly they didn't want to hear a sermon.
00:02:35.000 But they wanted to show me what a fool I was for believing in Jesus.
00:02:39.000 And so we developed the dialogue method.
00:02:41.000 They just would fire questions and I would answer.
00:02:43.000 And then we started, I'll never forget, the first campus was SUNY Albany up in upstate New York.
00:02:48.000 And just haven't stopped since.
00:02:49.000 So this open air, I like that term.
00:02:52.000 And how did you get drug into this?
00:02:55.000 You were raised going to these?
00:02:56.000 Raised going to these.
00:02:58.000 Yeah, driving to school every morning in the car.
00:03:00.000 He would definitely put us in the hot seat, answer some of these tough questions, and then went to seminary and naturally just flowed.
00:03:06.000 Doing this for the last couple of years, what trends are you seeing on these campuses?
00:03:11.000 Good, bad, troubling, promising?
00:03:15.000 Very good.
00:03:17.000 Shockingly good.
00:03:18.000 Tell us more.
00:03:19.000 I wish I could.
00:03:20.000 I still can't figure it out.
00:03:22.000 Honestly, because I get that question a lot.
00:03:24.000 I think there's a meaning crisis.
00:03:26.000 A lot of these students don't know what their meaning and purpose in life is, objectively.
00:03:30.000 So when we ask them that, there's a lot of ooh, pauses.
00:03:35.000 And so a lot of these students are coming out.
00:03:37.000 They also see that there's something wrong.
00:03:39.000 There's been something wrong over the last...
00:03:41.000 However many years, whether it be political, whether it be their parents having divorce, whether it be a psychological health issue, I think they're just waking up to there's something wrong, there's been something wrong in our nation.
00:03:52.000 What is it?
00:03:52.000 And we think that God could potentially offer some answers.
00:03:56.000 The long period of time you've been seeing it, do you think things are more promising in the last couple of years, meaning more people are interested, more people are stopping, more people are asking questions?
00:04:06.000 A bit.
00:04:08.000 It fluctuates.
00:04:09.000 And over the past 44 years, I've seen a lot of ups and downs.
00:04:13.000 The questions have remained consistently the same, but the emotions, I think, is really what are different.
00:04:18.000 I think there's a big difference between my dad, who at the age of 18 held a gun in the Alps in Switzerland, part of the Swiss Army, as he watched Hitler's panzer divisions come up and stop right on the border of Switzerland.
00:04:30.000 A lot of difference emotionally between that versus people who have to go to a crying room to work through who won the last election.
00:04:37.000 That is a big shift emotionally.
00:04:39.000 So I'm very grateful for Stuart and for his emotional sensitivity and his counseling background because we have to be sharp in how we address people, not just intellectually but emotionally as well.
00:04:49.000 Do you see an increased amount of curiosity from these students trying to pursue truth and meaning?
00:04:57.000 I don't know.
00:04:59.000 I debated Madeline Murray O'Hare years ago at the University of Texas Austin. 0.97
00:05:04.000 And there was a lot of intellectual curiosity, and there was a lot of more intense back and forth.
00:05:09.000 And that's what I miss a bit.
00:05:11.000 I miss a bit of the post-Vietnam War, the hippie movement, the free speech movement in Berkeley, where there was a willingness to really go at it and to understand that even though we are going at it, we're not being disrespectful, but we are strongly disagreeing.
00:05:28.000 So I miss a little bit of that.
00:05:30.000 That's why I was alluding to the emotional sensitivity.
00:05:32.000 And the need to be more careful emotionally.
00:05:35.000 So that's been a bit of a change.
00:05:38.000 And so you're pinpointing something promising.
00:05:40.000 How do you quantify the promising or the uplifting elements that you're witnessing?
00:05:47.000 Yeah, a lot of these, you know, what is it?
00:05:50.000 The suicide and depression rates have risen exponentially.
00:05:54.000 You have divorce rates risen exponentially.
00:05:57.000 And so I would say we live in a therapeutic age.
00:06:00.000 And we need to make America think again more clearly because there's been so much emotionalism and looking inward.
00:06:08.000 And we know that the more you look inward, unfortunately, the more issues you have.
00:06:13.000 The more you look outward and upward, the healthier you are.
00:06:18.000 And so people are looking for a God, some type of God, and then they're looking outward to hopefully help.
00:06:24.000 Community in some kind of way.
00:06:25.000 And that's when they get the healthiest.
00:06:27.000 And we know traditionally, before this therapeutic age, over the last five to ten years, that's what our nation was all about.
00:06:32.000 Our nation was all about God first, nation second, and that brought great psychological health and gave people meaning versus now, they don't know who they are.
00:06:41.000 It is without a doubt the sickest generation, both mentally, physically, emotionally, nutritionally sick. 0.84
00:06:48.000 Has the church stepped up to try to offer Of course, the ultimate healing, which is in Jesus.
00:06:55.000 Do you think the Church has met the moment?
00:06:58.000 Yes, in many ways.
00:07:00.000 No, in other ways.
00:07:01.000 I am very, very grateful for the Church, for the emphasis on the intellect.
00:07:06.000 Let's think through this stuff honestly, for the emphasis on emotions.
00:07:10.000 Let's be thoughtful and careful the way we talk, and for the spiritual, obviously, that we need Christ to fill that God-shaped vacuum at the center of our being, and for the physical.
00:07:21.000 That we need to get off our backsides and start feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, visiting those sick and in prison.
00:07:27.000 And the growth in involvement with hurting people who are physically hurting, I think is a tremendous statement.
00:07:34.000 Preach Christ every day.
00:07:35.000 If necessary, use words.
00:07:37.000 And I think that there's a good, strong surge in that area.
00:07:41.000 So it's fair to say you guys are apologists.
00:07:44.000 Is that fair to say?
00:07:45.000 How would you describe even what you do?
00:07:47.000 To someone who doesn't know.
00:07:51.000 Defenders of the faith. 0.95
00:07:52.000 I try and, I don't know, steer clear of the word apologist because so many people don't know what it is.
00:07:56.000 It's such a Christianese kind of term.
00:07:58.000 That's why I steer clear of it.
00:07:59.000 I try and come at it from a psychologist as well as a pastor as well as some type of philosophical elements to my speaking.
00:08:10.000 So I try and bring it in from different angles.
00:08:12.000 So defender of the faith.
00:08:15.000 Doing this, how you've done it, what do you think?
00:08:17.000 What have you learned to make you better at defending the faith that you wish you would have known a decade ago?
00:08:23.000 Oh, I think people can become too myopic in just reading the scripture and having kind of carbon copy classical arguments on how to defend the faith.
00:08:32.000 I think a worldview takes an emotional angle, a cultural angle, an intellectual angle, an experiential angle, and...
00:08:41.000 You can get too myopic in just one of those.
00:08:43.000 It's just my emotional experience, and I believe in Christ, and this is how your needs can be met, just from an emotional experience.
00:08:49.000 Yes, that's part of it.
00:08:50.000 But you also have to answer the intellectual issues, and you also have to say, does the gospel meet the biggest cultural issues?
00:08:55.000 You know, the sociologist Christian Smith, one of my favorite sociologists out of Notre Dame, talked about the more they're studying the doctrine of sin, And how it's going away in a culture of relativism, the more you see the breakdown in so many of the greatest traditions, institutions, and the more that doctrine leaves, the more issues we're going to have at a cosmic, sociological, and psychological level.
00:09:19.000 You heard every argument under the sun.
00:09:22.000 They just get repurposed and repackaged.
00:09:24.000 But does every era and every age, I'm sure some arguments are surfaced more than others.
00:09:31.000 During the free love movement, it's like, you know, don't tell me what to do.
00:09:35.000 What age are we in?
00:09:37.000 What is the common denominator, one, two, or three arguments you hear the most?
00:09:41.000 For example, if I were to guess, it would be, who's to say that your religion is right? 0.97
00:09:46.000 Or why are you to tell me?
00:09:47.000 Is that more deconstructionist, more questioning?
00:09:53.000 What would you say is the common argument you're hearing in this era?
00:09:58.000 Either one of you.
00:09:59.000 Moral relativism has a grip on people's thinking.
00:10:03.000 Everything's relative.
00:10:03.000 Explain that to someone who doesn't know what moral relativism is.
00:10:06.000 There are no moral absolutes.
00:10:07.000 Is that absolutely true?
00:10:09.000 That's right.
00:10:10.000 It's a self-defeating principle.
00:10:12.000 It sure is.
00:10:13.000 I actually don't think moral relativism exists.
00:10:16.000 I think the concept can exist, but in practice it's not possible.
00:10:19.000 Exactly.
00:10:19.000 I agree totally.
00:10:21.000 You're going to have to make decisions whether you're going to pay your taxes or not.
00:10:24.000 Of course, by some standard, right?
00:10:25.000 Exactly.
00:10:26.000 Sorry to interrupt.
00:10:26.000 No, no problem.
00:10:28.000 So, moral relativism has a grip on people's thinking that's tragic, and I think you're right, it's self-contradictory.
00:10:35.000 Secondly, don't tell me what to do.
00:10:37.000 That's being judgmental and bigoted.
00:10:40.000 Instead, I'm going to do whatever I want to do and just back off.
00:10:43.000 And yet, Charlie, that's exactly what you read about in the Bible.
00:10:47.000 I mean, at the end of the book of Judges, every man did what was right in his own eyes.
00:10:52.000 I mean, that's moral relativism.
00:10:53.000 Just do whatever you think is right in your own eyes.
00:10:56.000 Then there's the whole issue of science and faith contradict each other.
00:10:59.000 That's baloney.
00:11:00.000 But that one's so easy.
00:11:02.000 I mean, that one...
00:11:03.000 There's no chemistry...
00:11:05.000 It's the opposite, actually.
00:11:06.000 Exactly.
00:11:06.000 It is the opposite.
00:11:07.000 There's no chemistry, no physics, no geology anywhere in the Bible.
00:11:11.000 So how can science contradict a book that doesn't have any science in it?
00:11:15.000 So it's ridiculous.
00:11:18.000 Then there's the whole issue of hope.
00:11:21.000 And I'm convinced that in America today, we don't want to think about death.
00:11:24.000 We want to take an anesthesia called apathy or perform an acting job worthy of an Academy Award.
00:11:31.000 That's the way we deal with death.
00:11:32.000 Just don't think.
00:11:33.000 And Jesus Christ, I find so refreshing in the way he says, Peace I leave with you.
00:11:37.000 My peace I give to you.
00:11:39.000 I do not give to you as the world gives.
00:11:40.000 Do not let your hearts be troubled.
00:11:42.000 Do not be afraid.
00:11:43.000 And I think fear comes from, I thought I was in control.
00:11:48.000 Oh no, I'm being confronted by my finiteness.
00:11:50.000 Now I'm beginning to be scared.
00:11:52.000 Yeah, that's true.
00:11:54.000 And that's why we need God, who's bigger than death, who's bigger than any power or force of evil or injustice.
00:12:01.000 So, yeah, people are really hurting and really need Christ in a desperate way.
00:12:06.000 The trajectory, the trend is not good.
00:12:09.000 The West is becoming less religious.
00:12:12.000 Europe is already done, unfortunately.
00:12:14.000 I mean, it's like a husk of its former self.
00:12:17.000 The question is, when are we going to see revival?
00:12:20.000 My opinion, of which is not shared by everyone, is that there is the greatest opportunity for revival in front of us.
00:12:27.000 The church is just not engaging.
00:12:28.000 And so I'm far more critical of the church than—you're much nicer than I am.
00:12:32.000 But, I mean, for example, we have millions of young men that we reach that are coming to conservatism, and they say, yeah, the church is irrelevant.
00:12:40.000 It is too open to the sins of the day.
00:12:44.000 It doesn't speak for me.
00:12:45.000 They have this feminine spirit. 0.88
00:12:47.000 They are socially relativist.
00:12:50.000 And so there's this incredible harvest.
00:12:52.000 I'm sure you see it, especially with young men.
00:12:54.000 And the church seems rather scared or uninterested in actually engaging in that.
00:12:59.000 So we are seeing a slight uptick in religious curiosity to get young people interested in the faith and give their life to Christ.
00:13:12.000 What can we do better in that regard and also to confront this malaise of moral relativism?
00:13:21.000 Meet people where they're at in their suffering.
00:13:24.000 I really think we need to do that.
00:13:25.000 In a culture that is more and more addicted to comfort every day, you see those that are addicted to comfort, those nations that are, you're going to have problems, tremendous breakdown.
00:13:36.000 And so for a revival, you've got to talk about meeting a God-shaped hole.
00:13:41.000 I'm not one of these pastors who likes to talk about numbers at their church, but I will say we have kids driving five, six hours Saturday nights and sleeping in their cars and coming to our church Sunday morning.
00:13:50.000 But that's a problem.
00:13:51.000 Why don't they have a church near them?
00:13:53.000 We tell them that, exactly.
00:13:54.000 First of all, you're doing a great job, but...
00:13:56.000 No, it could be way better, though.
00:13:58.000 No, no, no, no.
00:13:58.000 I'm saying that they should be...
00:14:00.000 There should be a hundred churches on the way to your church.
00:14:03.000 Yes, that's exactly right.
00:14:05.000 And so for us, we don't want to turn it into a social movement.
00:14:07.000 You could throw a rock from our building and hit about 20 buildings near us, and it's just a social club.
00:14:12.000 It's in Connecticut, right?
00:14:13.000 Yeah, in Connecticut, and they've got the rainbow flags, every single one of them.
00:14:16.000 And so it's dedication to truth first and foremost, and we believe that ultimately it's how to save souls, and then secondarily how to go about pushing for justice.
00:14:25.000 But if you lose...
00:14:26.000 The moral absolutes that we're talking about from the perspective of Judeo-Christian worldview, well then all these social justice movements, they're just going to peter out, break down, and what are they really after?
00:14:37.000 Yeah.
00:14:38.000 The moral relativism, do you see alternatively any sort of other competing worldview that is finding it?
00:14:49.000 For example, we're not seeing, I don't think, Islam grow amongst young students on campus.
00:14:56.000 Is it pagan?
00:14:57.000 Is it Buddhist?
00:14:59.000 Is it New Age?
00:15:00.000 Because I'm sure you've seen it all throughout the years, where students might have a more Buddhist perspective, or whatever, or the power of now.
00:15:08.000 But you're saying right now it is basically one of the darker ones, which is that there is no truth, don't tell me how to live.
00:15:15.000 If you were to anticipate the next move, where does that lead them if not towards Christ?
00:15:21.000 What fills that void?
00:15:23.000 Because eventually there will be a counterfeit worldview.
00:15:25.000 Moral relativism is not there to stay.
00:15:27.000 Eventually, they're going to want to find a golden calf to worship at.
00:15:33.000 What is that?
00:15:34.000 Well, let's be honest.
00:15:36.000 The golden calf of moral relativism is me, narcissism, self-absorption.
00:15:42.000 And when we live in a culture that so emphasizes comfort and feeling good, I mean, what's going to stop that?
00:15:51.000 I mean, I'll never forget speaking at a Korean church down in Dallas, Texas, and afterwards I said to the elders who invited me out for a meal, how's the church in Korea doing?
00:16:00.000 I mean, I've always been so impressed with the amount of missionaries that come out of the Korean church.
00:16:04.000 And they said, it's tragic.
00:16:05.000 It's fallen apart.
00:16:06.000 And I said, why?
00:16:08.000 He said, for the same reason that the church has fallen apart in the United States.
00:16:11.000 Money.
00:16:13.000 You get a lot of money, buddy, and you only need God.
00:16:16.000 And why be passionate about Christ?
00:16:18.000 And why be passionate about reaching people for Christ?
00:16:20.000 It's all about money.
00:16:21.000 I think that's exactly right.
00:16:22.000 And that brings a lethargy and a spiritual apathy that is scary.
00:16:29.000 So how do we combat materialism in a country that is so wedded to materialism?
00:16:34.000 That is a tremendous challenge.
00:16:36.000 And you're right.
00:16:37.000 I think Stuart put it well.
00:16:38.000 Suffering often is what drives us.
00:16:41.000 Our own mortality often drives us back to God, back to Christ.
00:16:45.000 But gosh, that's a challenge and a half.
00:16:47.000 Yeah.
00:16:48.000 And it's a...
00:16:50.000 It's an incredible situation where you have a generation that is the wealthiest ever.
00:16:54.000 I mean, they need and want for nothing.
00:16:56.000 You go to these campuses, they are Ritz-Carlton's, let's just be honest.
00:17:00.000 I mean, from the fitness centers to the clubs, they've got saunas.
00:17:03.000 I mean, it is every food you could imagine.
00:17:05.000 They've got cards, you know, and they're miserable.
00:17:08.000 And so I think that's definitionally an indictment of materialism.
00:17:12.000 I mean, they have everything materially that you could ever want.
00:17:16.000 And they are the most likely to kill themselves, most likely to drug overdose, most likely.
00:17:21.000 And they're just constantly pursuing the next dopamine hit.
00:17:25.000 And so, yeah, I mean, look, we're talking about very macro issues.
00:17:28.000 I want to try to get down, because I know you guys got to get back on campus here.
00:17:32.000 The sequence, if you were to train in five minutes or less somebody in the audience of how to present the gospel to a skeptic.
00:17:42.000 How would you communicate that?
00:17:43.000 What would you say if you were like, hey, I got five minutes to try to load you up before going on campus, what would you tell that person?
00:17:50.000 I would tell them, read Acts chapter 8. Three different ways to connect with three different people who are seeking, honestly.
00:17:57.000 These people have to be seeking, honestly.
00:17:59.000 There's way too many atheists who pretend to be seeking when they're truly just closed off cynics.
00:18:04.000 Can you tell pretty quickly, I'm sure?
00:18:07.000 Yeah, Acts chapter 10. Do you think it's a waste of time?
00:18:09.000 Oh, with the atheists? 0.99
00:18:10.000 Well, if someone's not seeking, should you keep engaging?
00:18:13.000 It depends if there's an audience.
00:18:14.000 Because people always say that to these celebrity atheists who are so closed off and they're just going to say, F you.
00:18:19.000 We're speaking over them to the hundreds of thousands of people.
00:18:22.000 I totally agree.
00:18:22.000 Sorry, but keep going.
00:18:23.000 Yeah, yeah.
00:18:23.000 No, exactly.
00:18:24.000 So it can be a fool's errand if it's one-on-one.
00:18:26.000 But for me, it's just right out of Acts chapter 10. Lydia, seller of purple, brilliant businesswoman.
00:18:33.000 What you have there is you have an encounter.
00:18:35.000 A Christian comes and says, let's read the Bible together and actually ask some of these good questions on, did the resurrection occur? 0.98
00:18:40.000 Then you have the jailer, and so the jailer needs actually a miracle.
00:18:45.000 We know tough guys typically need something supernatural to even start to ask the question.
00:18:49.000 And then you have the slave girl who needs justice done in order to actually come to even the point of saying, wow. 0.99
00:18:56.000 There could be a God, because finally I see some justice in my life.
00:18:59.000 So you have to meet the person where they're at, figure out what are the cracks, and how does God prevent the blue?
00:19:04.000 If I can interrupt, and I want to get back to your thought on this.
00:19:07.000 When some pastors say, well, you've got to meet them where they're at, that means you have to use their lingo or dress like they do.
00:19:17.000 All things, all people.
00:19:19.000 Can you clarify that we should never ever compromise God's standards or rules for our life?
00:19:25.000 I just think the Roman road or the Evangicube are kind of cheesy, cookie-cutter ways of doing it, and yet you do need to present the gospel.
00:19:32.000 Well, for example, I have to say an F word every other way in the world, which I think is outrageous.
00:19:37.000 Things of that nature.
00:19:38.000 I'm glad you did that.
00:19:39.000 No, no, I do, by the way.
00:19:40.000 I'm glad.
00:19:41.000 Yeah, I think it's not right.
00:19:43.000 That's an issue.
00:19:44.000 That's honestly an issue with a lot of Christian YouTubers right now. 0.99
00:19:47.000 No, I totally agree.
00:19:48.000 Yeah.
00:19:49.000 And so they've got to steer away from that, because I think there's a level of respect of a character of a person who doesn't need to curse to present it.
00:19:55.000 Well, of course, you should never sin to try to evangelize somebody.
00:19:57.000 That's for sure.
00:19:58.000 I mean, it seems so self-defeating, right?
00:20:01.000 It sure is.
00:20:03.000 If you're going to sin to try to win someone for Jesus, I think that's by definition.
00:20:10.000 Not correct.
00:20:11.000 What would you say if you were to train somebody up?
00:20:12.000 Do you guys do these kind of Defender of Faith academies where you train people on this?
00:20:16.000 Not really?
00:20:17.000 No.
00:20:17.000 We're asked too often, but we kind of back out.
00:20:19.000 I think the best way to train someone to share their faith is come out to the open air, watch how we dialogue with people, junk what you don't like that we do, embrace what you do like that we do, and then develop your own style.
00:20:32.000 What I get asked all the time, and I'd love your thoughts, is, Charlie, how do you remember all of this?
00:20:37.000 How seriously do both of you take scholarship and learning and reading, I imagine very much so, to stay sharp and be able to engage on the infinite topics that can come your way?
00:20:49.000 That's one of my greatest regrets, that I haven't studied more.
00:20:51.000 I like the preacher who said, when I preach, I'm first going to study as hard as I can.
00:20:59.000 I'm going to pray as hard as I can, and then I'm going to preach as hard as I can.
00:21:03.000 So we've got to study hard, we've got to pray hard, and then we've got to preach hard.
00:21:06.000 What does that look like in practice for you guys?
00:21:09.000 How many books a year, podcasts?
00:21:11.000 I mean, do you take intentional time to pursue scholarship?
00:21:17.000 Absolutely.
00:21:18.000 You've got to read as broad as you possibly can.
00:21:20.000 My favorite mentors are my dead mentors, so they can't hold me accountable on anything.
00:21:25.000 But one was in New York City, and he read 150 books a year, and he's written some national bestsellers, and he comes at it from every single angle, culturally speaking, in order to present the gospel, to make it relevant.
00:21:37.000 Because I don't think it's enough anymore to just present the main doctrines.
00:21:42.000 In the 1700s, when you had the Whitfields, when you had the Newtons, or Edwards, They could just come in and talk about...
00:21:49.000 Hey, look at you!
00:21:51.000 Enhanced an angry God.
00:21:52.000 Exactly, and you also have Whitfield down there.
00:21:55.000 Right, so you could just present the gospel, and it's the fire and brimstone, and people, there was revivals by the thousands who were just saying, oh gosh, I'm going to hell, I better check this out.
00:22:03.000 So it's out of fear that they considered God.
00:22:05.000 Well, you can't do that anymore for the average person.
00:22:08.000 So we have to read, we have to memorize.
00:22:10.000 I try and, you know, he had us memorizing scriptures since we were two, and he's doing it with all my daughters right now.
00:22:15.000 You know, they get a couple gummy bears every single time they're able to memorize a single verse.
00:22:18.000 And so that memorization...
00:22:20.000 Is huge, I think, when it comes to the intellect and really being able to hone that skill is important.
00:22:25.000 The question in front of a lot of other people, though, is also, and finally, I know this is a simple but it is a very important one, how do you both find the confidence and the courage to go cold into a campus, you don't know anybody, and break that ice?
00:22:40.000 Are you both naturally introverted or extroverted?
00:22:43.000 Well, the first bar that I preached in in inner-city Boston when I was in seminary, I picked out the bar and I parked my car, and I walked towards the bar door, and I walked right past the bar door, and I walked around the block for about 15 minutes, trying to get up the courage to go in there and tell those men on vacation about Christ.
00:23:01.000 Finally, I said, Cliff, you're defeated, so I went back to my car, was opening the car door to go back to the seminary, and the Holy Spirit brought to my mind the words of Hebrews chapter 11, 32 to 38. And what more shall I say?
00:23:13.000 I do not have time to tell about Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel, and the prophets, who through faith conquered kingdoms, administered justice, and gained what was promised, who shut the mouths of lions, quenched the fury of the flames, and escaped the edge of the sword, whose weakness was turned into strength.
00:23:29.000 So I began to realize, Cliff, you are the biggest wimp around.
00:23:34.000 These guys, these great men and women of faith, laid their lives down.
00:23:38.000 For God, for Christ.
00:23:39.000 And you can't even walk into a bar in inner-city Boston and tell men on vacation who are doing the wrong thing about Christ.
00:23:46.000 Convicted of my lack of faith, I turned around, walked into that bar, and stood up and said, Excuse me, guys.
00:23:51.000 John writes in 1 John 4.10, This is love, not that we loved God, but that God loved us and sent His Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.
00:23:59.000 And the bartender came running down the bar, cursing his head off at me.
00:24:03.000 I said, Excuse me, sir.
00:24:04.000 All I want to do is talk with these guys about what it means most in life, knowing God.
00:24:08.000 He said, buddy, you want to know what God is?
00:24:09.000 God is the cash register, and all I care about these guys is their money.
00:24:13.000 And then he came around the bar, grabbed my arm, and escorted me out.
00:24:17.000 So, fear is the opposite of faith.
00:24:19.000 And when I grow in faith and trust in God, understand what is true and right, then I will put a stake in the ground, and I don't care what happens, we're going to uncompromisingly stand for the truth of Jesus Christ.
00:24:32.000 Beautifully said.
00:24:33.000 We have more time tonight.
00:24:35.000 I'm excited for that.
00:24:36.000 Thank you guys so much.
00:24:37.000 Good luck on campus and God bless you both.
00:24:39.000 Thank you, Charlie.
00:24:40.000 God bless you.
00:24:40.000 Keep going, brother.
00:24:41.000 Thanks so much for listening, everybody.
00:24:43.000 Email us, as always, freedom at charliekirk.com.
00:24:45.000 Thanks so much for listening and God bless.