The NXR Podcast - THE SPECIAL - How JP Sears Became A Christian

00:00:00.000 I could honestly say I accidentally got more Christian.

00:00:02.980 I never woke up one day and said, I'm going to be a Christian.

00:00:08.560 I'm going to intentionally be devoted to this.

00:00:12.340 It's more intentional now, but the accidental part was, I like to use this analogy.

00:00:18.860 If someone walks into this room with really bad body odor, you're naturally going to be

00:00:25.580 leaning in the opposite direction.

00:00:27.780 So with evil, which just put a D on the word, it's devil, but with evil never being more obvious in our world, if you're not willing to do the bidding of the evil for whatever reasons that seduce you in, you're naturally going to go into the opposite direction of evil.

00:00:49.240 You're just, let's move away.

00:00:52.220 And what's in that opposite direction is God.

00:00:55.480 This is just one part of a five-part series with myself and J.P. Sears.

00:01:00.420 In this series, we're going to be discussing everything from how J.P. Sears became a Christian,

00:01:05.480 his personal testimony, why comedy is inherently transgressive. We'll also be talking about

00:01:10.880 MAGA, Israel, and what the future of politics here in America holds after Trump. This series

00:01:17.320 will slow drip out to the public with one episode airing each week on Wednesdays at 5 p.m. Eastern

00:01:23.600 time. But right now, you can actually binge the entire series ad-free by downloading our brand

00:01:30.740 new app, NXR Plus, so that you can watch the whole series without ads, listen to our exclusive

00:01:36.800 audiobooks, and much, much more. So find NXR Plus in the Apple and Google Play Store today.

00:01:53.600 radical Christian nationalist pastor,

00:01:57.520 Joel Webben.

00:01:58.300 Joel Webben?

00:01:59.120 Joel Webben.

00:01:59.680 I'm going to talk about Joel Webben.

00:02:01.480 Joel Webben is an accident.

00:02:21.580 All right, this is episode two.

00:02:23.600 Thank you so much for your time.

00:02:25.460 In the first episode, we focused like political, cultural, your evolution as a comedian, as

00:02:30.600 a human being, how you became more right-wing, all that kind of stuff, political, culturally

00:02:35.340 speaking.

00:02:36.760 But now I want to talk about religion because you, you know, you were always a fairly free

00:02:43.600 thinking individual, but, and maybe spiritually minded, but you wouldn't have to describe

00:02:50.980 yourself as being overtly Christian 10 years ago. Yeah, I would have probably tried to talk someone

00:02:57.900 out of describing me that way. I would have like, oh, that's kind of dogmatics. I'm not a Christian.

00:03:05.580 Right. Yeah, that's changed. But that's changed. So can you talk to us about that change?

00:03:09.980 Yeah. Give you a little bit of context to frame the change. I was raised, I like to say I was

00:03:17.920 raised pretend catholic so my mom's many such cases my mom's whole side you know very catholic

00:03:25.980 however growing up we we never went to church unless my grandfather on my mom's side was going

00:03:33.700 to be around then we'd pretend we'd go to church and it was pretend catholic my dad was and still

00:03:41.120 is an atheist. And I, I value that. Like, to me, there's just like this, wow, I kind of learning to

00:03:50.180 think for myself, understand what my dad thinks, what my mom thinks. But growing up, even though

00:03:55.940 we did the, I did the first communion kind of thing, it was just going through the motions as

00:04:01.260 a kid. None of any religion I experienced made any kind of sense to me, you know, all the details,

00:04:09.280 like it didn't feel meaningful whatsoever. And then in my young adulthood, you know,

00:04:15.700 starting when I was 18, started to get introduced to some books that were in the category of

00:04:22.060 new age, uh, spirituality. And over a decade, I went pretty deep into that. And, uh, I values

00:04:31.840 a lot of what I learned, just sort of taking my mind, my perspective of life and playing with it,

00:04:41.400 experimenting with it, an exercise of thinking for myself, even though there's plenty of dogma

00:04:46.880 and negatives in that world, very much valued what I was exposed to. And then fast forward,

00:04:55.760 you know, while thinking people who are religious are just dogmatic. They're not thinking for

00:05:05.320 themselves. They were just born into it. That doesn't make sense to me. But then in starting

00:05:12.820 2020 with what happened with, I think evil never being more obvious in our world, something 0.99

00:05:20.880 shifted inside of me where I could honestly say I accidentally got more Christian, right? I never 0.94

00:05:29.160 woke up one day and said, I'm going to be a Christian. I'm going to intentionally be devoted

00:05:35.980 to this. Uh, it's more intentional now, but the accidental part was, I like to use this analogy.

00:05:43.360 If someone walks into this room with really bad body odor, you're naturally going to be

00:05:50.560 leaning in the opposite direction. So with evil, which just put a D on the word, it's devil,

00:05:58.520 but with evil never being more obvious in our world, if you're not willing to do the bidding

00:06:04.720 of the evil for whatever reasons that seduce you in, you're naturally going to go into the

00:06:11.740 opposite direction of evil. You're just, let's move away. And what's in that opposite direction

00:06:19.240 is God. And combining that with that same time I found out I'm going to be a father,

00:06:27.360 and that wakes up so much inside of me. We talked about in the first episode other things that woke

00:06:34.520 up inside of me, but the world just, I was seeing it through a very different lens, now the father

00:06:42.360 lens. And Christian values, Christianity, it's like I was seeing it for the first time. It just

00:06:51.580 made sense to me. And to this day, I won't pretend to be a perfect Christian. Far from it. I won't

00:07:01.080 pretend to be the most practiced Christian. Yet, I will say I'm a Christian. Just becoming a father,

00:07:11.040 seeing evil. It just, wow, without even trying, it's like hero's journey kind of came back home

00:07:20.020 to it. And lastly, I'll share, you know, over, yeah, I'm not touring anymore, but I'd been

00:07:27.980 touring the country very regularly doing standup comedy. And after comedy shows, I'd have these

00:07:34.560 VIP meet and greet, Q&A conversation discussions, and I was really intrigued to learn I'm not the

00:07:43.440 only one that happened to, of getting accidentally more Christian. So many people would share their

00:07:50.740 stories with me where they found Christianity, they found Christ without trying, of course,

00:07:58.820 like eventually apply some effort that's probably a good thing but it it turns out i probably wasn't

00:08:05.420 the only one with this natural response to seeing evil and just like really being astonished like

00:08:14.040 there is more evil in the world than i could have imagined and this is just the evil i'm seeing

00:08:20.620 Right. There's so much more that you don't see. And like humans, people harbor evil without knowing it. So glad to say a lot of people have shared they had a similar sort of push into the field of being a newfound Christian since what started in COVID.

00:08:45.880 And I think the evil, the patterns of evil we saw in COVID, even though COVID's quote-unquote over, they never announced it's over. 0.76

00:08:55.780 But, you know, those patterns of evil, I think to this day, in 2026, they're only getting bigger and more intense.

00:09:06.240 Yes. Yeah, it's been said that one of the most persuasive proofs of God is the existence of a devil.

00:09:15.280 yeah and i i think your story is um it's indicative of a positive epidemic

00:09:24.280 where so many people were overcome uh where they they couldn't look away and they couldn't and it

00:09:32.700 couldn't be not only could you not look away you couldn't explain it away there was no because it

00:09:38.160 wasn't just the science or a logical conclusion it's like yeah but i can understand like there

00:09:44.480 was no rhyme or reason to be able to explain why so many people lockstep would do something

00:09:50.260 that was so directly correlated to the country's harm and to the harm of children you know some

00:09:58.200 of the most innocent in society you know that like why we would why we would take up voluntarily

00:10:07.400 certain policies that we knew we knew would uh set back um the next generation by years that

00:10:16.500 they wouldn't um they would develop speech impediments because they couldn't see their

00:10:21.200 mother and father speaking to them with their lips moving because of masks where uh they were

00:10:25.400 going to be out of school for a year or for two years and wouldn't learn how to read and like

00:10:29.440 and it was like the most visible um it was the most visible sign of um of the older generation

00:10:37.100 You always think instinctively that fathers and mothers would sacrifice for sons and daughters, you know, and the grandfathers and grandmothers would sacrifice for their children and especially even more so their grandchildren.

00:10:49.520 And it was the exact opposite.

00:10:51.220 It was godless.

00:10:52.440 It was godless.

00:10:53.520 It was truly the embodiment of evil.

00:10:56.060 It was 75-year-olds saying, but I've got to be able to squeak out five more cruises, you know, even if it means that my grandchildren can't speak or read or have any hope of a job or an economy left to speak of.

00:11:17.300 Screw them, you know, and the bumper stickers.

00:11:20.040 I mean, it sounds like hyperbole, like it's a joke.

00:11:22.540 But literally, still to this day, I'll drive in from time to time.

00:11:26.060 see a bumper sticker on a car on the highway that says, I'm spending my children's inheritance,

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00:12:52.200 feel good about feeding to your family i thank god for the boomers because uh the boomers prove 0.52

00:12:59.800 the existence of a devil yeah that caused millennials and gen z and alpha to believe 0.87

00:13:06.440 in the existence of a god and perhaps that's all the the greatest contribution that the boomers

00:13:11.080 make throughout their lifetime is is proving that the devil is real so that younger generations

00:13:16.100 might uh might run to god as a refuge but that happened and so many people it was so obvious

00:13:24.620 they couldn't look away they couldn't explain it away and they're like this is not normal human

00:13:29.800 behavior because there are vikings and nordic throughout all of human history there have been

00:13:34.320 plenty of pagan people that were not christian but but it was still normative that men go off

00:13:40.320 and fight in order to to defend and preserve their posterity yeah right pagans do that

00:13:48.380 the the the non-christian and and jesus says this in the bible he says um which of you if your son

00:13:56.300 asked for a loaf of bread would give him a stone or if he asked for a fish would give him a scorpion

00:14:01.040 if you then being evil know how to give good gifts to your children how much more will your heavenly

00:14:07.360 father give good gifts the gift of his holy spirit to those who ask and so like that's that's a

00:14:13.120 biblical principle that jesus is making an argument from the lesser to the greater he's saying pagans

00:14:18.220 are still decent parents right we find this in the animal kingdom right just on raw instinct 0.94

00:14:25.300 without rationale or a conscience or a sense of morals right you we know that even dumb animals 0.95

00:14:32.640 like that's my baby i love my baby there's enough god in them right there's some kind of grace 0.94

00:14:39.460 this this common grace undergirding just the whole system of creation and to see human beings

00:14:46.020 completely just literally just throw that out and and do the exact reverse like everybody has to

00:14:55.560 i don't care if it sets you behind five years academically i don't care if it puts millennials

00:15:01.480 just beginning their career puts them behind for life financially, their ability to save towards

00:15:07.000 retirement. I don't care if it hurts my kids. I don't care if it hurts my grandchildren. I don't

00:15:12.700 care. Everyone will cater to me and my sensibilities and my facade, not even objectively,

00:15:22.600 but the subjective feelings of safety. I have to be, and it's like, shoot, I don't know if I

00:15:30.860 believed in the devil before, but I do now. There it is. I think the easiest way to recognize

00:15:38.320 godless people, and in a second I'll make it about other people, but let's be real and take

00:15:46.260 some ownership. It's also the easiest way to recognize when we are living in a godless moment,

00:15:52.560 it's when us or we see other people making their lives just about them and their own gratification.

00:16:00.360 that that will usually, if not always, have an expense as a negative impact of those on those

00:16:07.360 around them could be their children, future generations. But it's easy to see in the quote

00:16:13.660 unquote elites, the the Bill Gates is the Fauci's, the Netanyahu's, the Ted Cruz's, the Lindsey

00:16:21.840 Graham's, these people that here's their agenda. And their agenda is nothing more than to gratify

00:16:29.040 their own insatiable appetite for power. And you look at the consequences, the lives that are

00:16:36.660 destroyed, and it's easy to see in these huge examples of like, well, okay, they shot another

00:16:43.940 school full of children and killed more children in Gaza. And look at these videos that Israel is 0.81

00:16:50.680 trying to suppressing this godlessness because they have this powerful, this agenda for more 0.79

00:16:57.240 power. It's all about me, me, me. Whereas I think on the flip side, recognizing people and when it's

00:17:06.300 us in the moment living with God, we're not making it about ourselves. We're making it about others.

00:17:14.660 And what I try to do, again, far from perfect. I think I do it some of the time. I have a heck

00:17:23.080 of a lot more I can do. But when I try to live by this sort of mantra, my life isn't for me.

00:17:31.240 My life is to be in service to those around me, and that's ultimately to be in service of God.

00:17:37.620 So before, I'd scan my day, and it's all about what's going to make me feel good.

00:17:45.560 egotistically whatever it's just all about me and hopefully that has some benefit or i'm seen

00:17:53.380 in a good light and now i can look at my day and be like you know there's not one thing on my

00:18:00.160 calendar and my duties that i'm just like yes this is this i'm stoked on this it's more like

00:18:09.240 the oh this is everything i should be doing and i i think the more we do that my experience is

00:18:17.960 the more i do that the more what i want kind of re or reorients yes because yeah just gratifying

00:18:26.640 myself that's a good dopamine hit and then it's empty yes i just need more and more of that

00:18:37.400 but when i'm making my life about other people to the best i can it can often suck in the moment

00:18:46.020 yeah it can be painful it can be a grind it can be frustrating it can be just not gratifying

00:18:53.900 but then the moments after the next day a month later looking back it's like

00:19:01.300 i feel pretty fulfilled like not gratified but something far greater yes i feel fulfilled

00:19:13.040 therefore what i want starts to reorient from what i want to what wants to live through me

00:19:21.420 what i want is to be more of service of what's needed so i can benefit other people and i think

00:19:28.960 that's ultimately nurturing God's creation. Nobody ever tells the power hungry, hey,

00:19:36.080 God's creation doesn't stop and end with you. So I think, long story short, I find the more I can

00:19:44.280 orient myself to that feeling of fulfillment, and yes, that's actually pleasurable long-term,

00:19:51.060 but it usually doesn't have that short-term pleasure. I find that's like a practical mindset

00:19:57.660 that that helps me hopefully uh serve god rather than living in a a godless way yeah well said so

00:20:09.500 one of my questions is so seeing the evil in the world and thinking man this is more than just

00:20:15.620 natural human behavior like it's it can't be explained it's as though there actually is

00:20:20.680 there's a physical reality certainly we could see it with our eyes but it seems as though it's more

00:20:26.700 than merely that there's some kind of spiritual reality that's that's moving and shaking and

00:20:31.720 shaping um these kinds of behaviors because they don't make logical sense there's something more

00:20:37.100 pernicious going on attributing that to some kind of spiritual entity that is evil a devil type

00:20:43.140 figure than that you know think well if the devil is real then then maybe god is too so all that

00:20:48.700 makes total sense and i've heard that testimony time and time again especially during that year

00:20:53.180 2020 and a few of the corresponding years, kind of the high watermark of the left where things

00:20:58.480 we forget. It feels like it was a lifetime ago. It was so recent. But it's almost like we want

00:21:04.020 to forget because it was so terrible. But the high watermark of the left where it was just,

00:21:11.000 like, it was really dark. It was a really dark time. But that pushed a lot of people into the

00:21:16.720 light. And so that explanation, I've heard that testimony from several individuals. It makes total

00:21:21.400 sense. I believe it. I've witnessed it. I've seen it with my own eyes, people coming to church,

00:21:26.100 that same kind of story. Here's my follow-up question that I ask everybody who has that

00:21:30.900 similar testimony, so I'll ask you as well. That experience certainly, I think, objectively pushes

00:21:37.460 someone into the belief of devil and God, but doesn't necessarily require someone to embrace

00:21:46.840 the truth of christianity specifically yeah so why christianity yeah that's a good question

00:21:55.900 um part of that conveniently could be the culture i live in correct here in the u.s

00:22:03.920 we're not in zimbabwe right i don't know what religions are mostly christian but but i hear

00:22:10.240 if we're in some muslim nation or something yeah right so it would be a different story and i don't

00:22:14.840 know what my answer would be there, but I can say being blessed to live in still the greatest

00:22:23.740 country on earth in spite of all of our problems. This is, I guess, by law, not a Christian nation 1.00

00:22:32.440 yet being real. It's a Christian nation. So here I am. And one of the questions I had to ask my 0.88

00:22:41.700 friend um still speaking to why christianity he and his father are um just great christians i love

00:22:51.420 talking with them and one of the things i asked them because it never made sense to me before is

00:22:56.940 like why why jesus like i believe this story but as a christian why do you worship jesus

00:23:05.780 and not just God. Like, no disrespect kind of seems like that's the middleman. What's the deal?

00:23:13.700 And just in kindergarten terms, they explained it, probably because they knew who they were

00:23:18.880 dealing with. They said, well, because Jesus was a human and he was God incarnated as a human,

00:23:26.760 therefore jesus is relatable yes as opposed to try to relate to infinity right it's it's just a

00:23:36.580 much harder thing to grasp so looking at jesus the human he's very relatable you can see how this

00:23:45.920 human lived what this human taught understand this human died for you which is the ultimate

00:23:54.020 sacrifice talk about parents that would do anything for their children versus parents

00:23:59.240 throw their children under the bus and and that clicked for me it's like that that makes sense

00:24:06.520 why jesus why jesus matters i know jesus matters but it made sense of like why jesus can matter

00:24:16.080 and should matter to me in my spiritual religious practice well said um i love how you said that

00:24:23.720 part of it, so you kind of gave two answers, but the first piece was, okay, so why these things

00:24:30.160 that happened providentially, you know, forced me to believe that there's some kind of religious

00:24:35.860 reality. Religion. Sold me on religion. Not just spirituality, but some kind of religion. But why

00:24:42.460 this religion? Well, part of it is because I'm here in America. And I actually think that that

00:24:47.100 is a great argument. I've done a lot of videos on this because in the church world, which is

00:24:55.360 like any religion, sadly, or like any political party or anything ever, there's a sliding scale,

00:25:04.700 there's a spectrum, there's factions, and everybody has their own isolated opinion and

00:25:11.680 disagreements and all that kind of stuff. So Christians, shocker, disagree with each other. 0.88

00:25:17.100 But, in my little neck of the woods, within the broader Christian scope, so I've been in the Reformed tradition. 0.99

00:25:30.700 So, that would be like, basically like your original Protestants.

00:25:35.940 So, like Martin Luther and John Calvin, some of these guys who initially came out of it.

00:25:42.320 now protestants devolved more and more and more and more to where like now it's like what does it

00:25:47.700 mean to be protestant well like 90 of the time it means to be a zionist you know like you know

00:25:53.960 what i mean you walk in you might see a cross but you'll definitely see an israeli flag you know

00:25:58.020 like which is a bummer um but um but some of the more old school protestants are like no i

00:26:05.360 i don't actually want to do the mega church thing and the fog machines and the laser lights and and

00:26:10.600 the Zionist rallies for Israel and blah, blah, blah. But no, I love Catholics, but I do disagree

00:26:19.920 with some of these things. And I think some of the original reformers, maybe they weren't right

00:26:25.820 about everything, but I think they had some legitimate criticisms. And that's kind of where

00:26:29.580 I am. So that's kind of where I am. In that neck of the woods, in the larger Christian scope,

00:26:35.420 one of the big arguments in a mural debate over the last few years was over, and I thought the 0.98

00:26:44.160 whole thing was stupid, and I said so multiple times, got myself in a bit of trouble, but 0.96

00:26:49.860 the whole debate was over whether or not Christian culture in America at large was a positive or 1.00

00:26:56.820 negative, and there was a whole lot of guys in my camp saying, well, it's really a negative because

00:27:02.220 really you want people you actually kind of want um you want this perfect religious neutrality

00:27:09.080 like the absence of religion and if you have a godless culture and a godless country and a

00:27:14.800 godless state that's actually really really good because then it's not going to influence people

00:27:19.680 so you won't have just cultural christians but um if you ever get a christian you'll probably get a

00:27:25.420 lot less of them but if you ever get one they'll really mean it you know and they'll be genuine

00:27:29.060 and this that and the other and i understand the argument on its face i i understand it i don't

00:27:33.460 think it's a stupid argument i just vehemently disagree um but but then there's there's all

00:27:39.540 these cases of um i forget who it was it might have been richard dawkins or stephen hawkins 0.99

00:27:45.240 hawkins one of the hawkins dawkins one of those known atheists yeah yeah that's the islander

00:27:51.300 atheist right yeah exactly it was one of those renowned atheist guys and he had like uh one of

00:27:57.240 his lead henchmen you know like one of his um premier assistants who would be you know on on

00:28:02.180 the show with him or helping him write a book or something like that um doing lectures and stuff

00:28:07.120 one of his main guys um he in 2020 because of covid was like i'm getting out of dodge you know

00:28:15.640 like they were in a deep blue city in a blue state you know all that kind of stuff with the most

00:28:19.460 stringent lockdowns and and most ridiculous tyrannical policies he was like forget that

00:28:26.040 So for just, for personal liberty's sake, nothing religious, but just for his own liberty and sanity, he's like, I'm going to a place that has the least of these draconian lockdowns, period, which just so happened to be, you know, a small podunk town in the deep red state, you know, and you know how that goes.

00:28:46.220 so he he did that and then again it wasn't really religion guiding him but he and his wife were like

00:28:52.700 after they've been there for a few months six months or whatever you know and he gave this

00:28:56.840 whole story his personal testimony they just they were yeah we love our town and we've got a lot of

00:29:02.480 freedom we've got some land and we live in the good life but we're kind of lonely you know and

00:29:07.240 they're like where do people go in this town to make friends well in that town you go to church

00:29:12.520 you know that's that's what you do it's a older way of life and in that particular town you know

00:29:18.480 hicks from the sticks uh salt of the earth um blue collar like really just like the sweetest people

00:29:23.840 on god's green earth you know they don't just go to church in a town like that you go to a cowboy

00:29:29.600 church i don't know if you've ever heard of it cowboy church is just like um it's it's a subset

00:29:36.320 of evangelical churches where people like it's exactly what it sounds like people wear the

00:29:42.500 cowboy hats and their boots and spurs, might even ride their horse to church, and they're just

00:29:47.420 southern cowboys, you know. But theologically, it's not like they're preaching the gospel of

00:29:53.240 cowboys. Theologically, it's a Christian church that preaches the gospel of Jesus Christ

00:29:57.080 with a cowboy aesthetic, right? So it's more so just the style, not so much the beliefs.

00:30:02.840 So they go to the local cowboy church, literally just to make friends, just so that they're not

00:30:10.020 lonely and but in that they hear the gospel and they hear it again and they hear it again and lo

00:30:17.220 and behold shocker uh eventually they're like yeah i think we believe that and they become christians

00:30:22.660 and so my whole point is that um i actually think that's a really good argument you know so one of

00:30:29.320 the reasons i became a christian so i became wise to spiritual realities and religious realities

00:30:36.120 But why opting for this religion?

00:30:38.500 Because I wasn't raised in a Muslim nation or in Israel, you know, Judaism or a lot of

00:30:44.520 it's atheism in Israel or this, that, or the other.

00:30:47.680 I wasn't raised in India, you know, with this religion or that.

00:30:51.180 I was raised in the West.

00:30:52.560 I was raised in America.

00:30:54.060 The predominant cultural religion in America is Christianity. 0.99

00:30:58.040 And when I began to ask some of these, when I came of age and the SHIT hit the fan for 0.99

00:31:04.940 me, and I asked those existential questions, it was that programming, that background, that culture 0.98

00:31:13.400 that was most available. It was there. It was there. And that's why I actually think that's

00:31:19.560 a really good argument. That's why I advocate strongly for the fact that America, even though

00:31:26.920 so much of it has been eroded, but whatever we can keep intact of America having a cultural

00:31:34.580 christianity even if it doesn't mean true christianity for the majority of people just

00:31:41.000 to have the cultural bedrock and pieces the handles being present so that for each person

00:31:46.660 when they do have those tests of faith when they do have my my kid just died yeah or this disaster

00:31:55.540 just happened um and and the questions are there on the forefront of their mind that the most

00:32:00.640 prevalent nearby answer like even in the architecture the way that towns were designed

00:32:07.460 designed originally in our country was what do you put at the center of the town well a courthouse

00:32:13.260 and a church how do you build it well it has a bell tower and a steeple why so that wherever i

00:32:20.120 am in the town i can see i can physically see and locate the church so that when something happens

00:32:26.660 i know where to run yeah and i think that that's like actually beautiful and you can be 0.94

00:32:34.000 intellectual and sophisticated and mock it as primitive or stupid or like and uh i think it's 0.54

00:32:40.220 great i think it's really great that people in this country when all of a sudden they're asking 0.95

00:32:46.880 the deepest questions and they feel as though they have no hope there's this this underlining

00:32:53.680 culture of Christianity built into the fabric of every piece of our society that points towards

00:33:01.400 this. So if I'm thinking there must be a God, my first thought is it's probably Jesus and not

00:33:08.900 Buddha. And so I'm going to try that first. And I thank God for that. And the picture you paint,

00:33:15.940 it's very different than a tyrannical imposing of Christianity on Americans where it's like, 0.98

00:33:23.680 you go to this church or we're cutting your heads off. So, what I hear you describe is something 0.81

00:33:30.480 far more supportive than that. I know for me, one of my objections I had to work through was

00:33:41.260 It's unfortunately seen in some churches the same sort of corruption that's just power-hungry, child sex scandals, same thing we hear about in the government, all these other power-hungry entities, hearing about those in churches.

00:34:06.500 so that was like a bit of like with the catholicism it's like god help us with that

00:34:14.080 but being able to one acknowledge like this happens so like isn't it all like a bad thing

00:34:22.120 but understanding no like first off call corruption and evil out no matter where it's at

00:34:30.360 Even if it's a guy wearing a robe, even if it's in a church, those need to be called out because the devil masquerades as an angel in disguise.

00:34:39.380 Like, I think the devil's ultimate goal is to kill God.

00:34:43.960 And I don't think the devil can actually do that, but what he can do is kill our receptivity to God.

00:34:52.200 And a great way to do that, the devil might be evil, it's probably pretty intelligent, though, is to get people to worship the devil while thinking they're worshiping God.

00:35:05.320 So, of course, it makes sense that the devil would infect some churches.

00:35:12.900 That doesn't mean the religion's infected.

00:35:16.060 That's right.

00:35:16.800 So, I had to make that distinction.

00:35:19.200 And to me, it's similar to Mark Twain's quote, the wisdom he points to with a quote where he says, a patriot is someone who supports their country all the time and their government when they deserve it.

00:35:33.620 And looking at the churches, fairly literally, but very metaphorically, the government in this analogy and understanding like, yeah, the religion and the churches, they're separate and we all want a good government.

00:35:52.700 And there's good governments out there when it comes, I don't know about literal governments, but with churches, yes.

00:35:59.860 So, I had to work through that objection of, first off, it's okay to call corruption in a church.

00:36:07.000 It should be called out.

00:36:08.820 Absolutely. 0.95

00:36:10.880 And it's okay to make the distinction between the religion and the church.

00:36:17.300 And when you find a church that is great, wonderful.

00:36:23.000 When you find a church that isn't, don't pretend it is.

00:36:27.060 Right.

00:36:27.440 That's well said.

00:36:28.120 Um, yeah, separating the institution as we find it today, it's modern expression from the actual

00:36:36.780 beliefs, the theology, the doctrine, the religion itself. Um, because if, if the church

00:36:44.000 is synonymous, like one-to-one ratio with Christianity itself, then, um,

00:36:52.580 that's kind of depressing. It is. I'll tell you something that

00:36:57.120 pisses me off and it needs to be called out so i call it out but like have you seen any of these

00:37:03.380 clips of president trump's white house religious advisor paula white paula white is um i mean she 0.93

00:37:11.380 is objectively like theologically speaking she's objectively a heretic yeah she like there were

00:37:17.140 times i'm not saying this should happen but there were times within christian history that she would

00:37:22.380 she would be burned at the stake yeah she is she's a heretic i'd believe that and that might be the

00:37:31.480 devil masquerading as an angel in disguise i mean i've seen clips where she's doing kind of like an 0.95

00:37:38.400 infomercial on social media she's saying you send in a thousand dollars what you get in return is

00:37:44.340 i send you seven prayers and it's like yeah i don't i don't even think you're praying for me

00:37:52.020 And if you are, it's motivated by the wrong reasons as she's on the pulpit talking about, God told me I need a new private jet because that's going to serve God more.

00:38:01.620 It's like, well, what if you were honest and said, I want a private jet.

00:38:06.880 I'm going to pressure you people here to give me your money because I want that private jet.

00:38:12.460 It would be less corrupt because it would at least be honest.

00:38:17.320 Right.

00:38:18.140 But anyway, I. 0.67

00:38:19.480 Yeah, at that point, I mean, that's, see, that's the irony is like, you know, and Catholics aren't doing this today, but at the time, one of the big, you know, things was indulgences.

00:38:30.360 so like tetzel was a priest catholic priest that was going around he you know there were a few of

00:38:35.660 them but he was probably the most infamous going around um soliciting indulgences you know monetary

00:38:43.940 payment in order to get people people's loved ones who had passed away out of purgatory you know so

00:38:50.700 this interim place between heaven and hell where they had to you know jesus paid for your sin but

00:38:56.380 not really, or at least not completely. There's still an overhang of sin that you have to absolve

00:39:04.220 yourself, and you're going to do so by being purified in purgatory, absolved from your sin

00:39:09.520 as you suffer there. And you have a great aunt, and you have a grandma, and you have a mother,

00:39:14.260 and you have maybe a child who passed away. And he was literally preaching sermons, this Catholic

00:39:20.880 priests saying can you hear their screams can you hear you know that the clawing of your loved ones

00:39:27.640 screaming out in agony and if you would just you know give some money and these and these are the 0.60

00:39:33.500 poorest of poor people these are peasants and so they were making the decision will i feed my kids 0.76

00:39:38.240 tonight or will i get you know great aunt sally out of torment you know and that's the choice set 0.94

00:39:43.480 before him and so it's on that backdrop that like martin luther is like yeah and then you know fast

00:39:50.240 forward right because it's not like protestants i'm not going to say the protestants haven't made

00:39:55.160 their own mistakes because they absolutely have uh but the this stark irony is that now

00:40:00.660 um protestants are far more notorious commonly known for um emotionally

00:40:09.640 manipulative sermons to get people's cash yeah than catholics and that was one of the main

00:40:18.340 things that protestants even came into existence because of was that critique and here we are so 0.57

00:40:25.380 evil can take all shapes forms and sizes absolutely a hundred percent but i think being able to

00:40:32.700 bifurcate between um the person the man and the message right the um the religion and the religious

00:40:41.800 institution yeah you know the difference between the two because if it was just that going back

00:40:47.760 to covid the very thing that woke so many people up um here's the sad reality the most churches

00:40:57.060 were hand in glove i mean working with the government to push the vax on their congregants

00:41:05.480 um like so i was in california at the time now our church was meeting in a public school

00:41:11.120 and um because we didn't have a building and we were of course in california we were

00:41:17.240 in an instant kicked out and so we couldn't meet there and i remember calling other pastor friends

00:41:22.840 and stuff that own their own building that they voluntarily they weren't kicked out they shut

00:41:27.300 their doors and i'm saying you are not using your church could we maybe use it and them saying no

00:41:31.280 because maybe you know we get cooties on on the pews or something like that you know that would

00:41:36.440 hang over when they resumed meeting you know like seven years from then um you know but i mean it's

00:41:41.600 it sounds funny now but those are literally the conversations that you know that were being had

00:41:45.520 and so we couldn't meet um and you know and so it for us we i believe it was either four or five

00:41:53.640 weeks i can't remember but we missed four or five sundays um and and because we couldn't meet um

00:42:01.160 we couldn't meet but then but then when we could we did but i remember um my one of my first

00:42:09.060 thoughts was like this is this is going to be like a a moment in the sovereignty of god him

00:42:15.680 setting the stage setting like by um like contrast it's like god is setting the backdrop with like

00:42:23.140 this black velvet so that the church in this moment is going to shine like a brilliant diamond

00:42:30.340 like you go and purchase a diamond and you know they're not showcasing a diamond by putting it on

00:42:37.040 top of like a silver you know page of paper with glitter like no they they want the contrast so

00:42:43.760 it's you put this this sparkling diamond on the black velvet so that it shines more brightly

00:42:49.640 and so i you know i my one of my first thoughts was this is going to be this moment uh where the

00:42:56.060 church is going to be able to kind of for lack of a better phrase strut at stuff you know show off

00:43:02.540 and and uh and it did not turns out the church was uh basically just which way is the wind blowing

00:43:10.940 so what Fauci what did you say yeah okay we'll do we'll do even more of that you know we're

00:43:16.100 gonna make Fauci look like a liberal uh you know like or a moderate I should say and like we're

00:43:20.160 gonna and and it was so sad um but it was one of those things like we were talking about in our

00:43:26.340 first episode like room to apologize so we we were meeting within five weeks and this was in

00:43:33.260 california and at the time you uh gavin newsome new salimi was still saying that you know you

00:43:37.740 couldn't even have a drive-in service like you know like a drive-in movie theater where you're

00:43:42.440 listening you turn on the radio station to a certain dial and um you couldn't even do that

00:43:47.580 you couldn't even be in your car not even getting mind you he says that while he's at the french

00:43:52.160 laundry with other people no mass like right rules for the not for me yeah so that was literally the

00:43:58.260 law at the time so we we actually held our first church service i believe it was the last sunday

00:44:03.540 of april second or last sunday second to last or last sunday of april 2020 and and we were you know

00:44:11.820 some people we gave people the freedom to choose some people stayed in their car uh some people

00:44:16.480 got out in the grass but no church or institution would let the us use their buildings so this was

00:44:21.660 an outside service and simply to make people feel more comfortable because i wanted as many

00:44:26.380 of our people to come as possible and obviously there was a sliding scale some people were like

00:44:32.120 let's be bold and some people i'm kind of scared um but to accommodate as many people as possible

00:44:38.040 um we wore masks now i regret it on this you know but this for the record this was not april

00:44:46.400 2021 this was you know we're talking five weeks within lockdowns we're in california context

00:44:52.860 matters we're holding allegedly an illegal church service so you know it when you when you paint the

00:45:00.000 picture and everybody forgets what it was like in that moment but we were doing something um that

00:45:05.620 we were not allowed to do something that at the time really did require uh legitimate courage

00:45:11.740 the problem though is that nobody like it wasn't the paparazzi but like our own church members

00:45:18.460 took pictures and so there's a picture of me wearing a mask in an outdoor service now nobody

00:45:26.960 knows that like that's in california nobody knows that that's april 2020 um but it just

00:45:33.940 that picture so still to this day six years later um i'll say something on on the right

00:45:41.320 wing side of the equation whether it's something political or cultural or or theological and i

00:45:47.320 will still have critics and opponents who will post that picture you know say he's he's not

00:45:54.460 really courageous and it's like and so what i've had to do is like you can you know at first i

00:46:00.740 remember when this first started happening it's like well actually and you give all the caveats

00:46:06.460 and the disclaimers like i just did but eventually i got to a place where i realized you know going

00:46:12.680 back to our first episode i realized the easiest answer and probably the best and most compelling

00:46:18.080 is just to say yeah i was wrong yeah like i could i could say like well by comparison we were like

00:46:24.640 the only church that was even willing to do that you know but really i i can just say yeah like

00:46:30.860 comparison doesn't really matter because there's there's virtue and that's the bar yeah universally

00:46:38.720 objectively across the board it doesn't matter what everybody else is doing here's the standard

00:46:43.600 here's the bar if i had been a bigger man a better man a stronger man then we would have done even

00:46:50.260 more did we do more than our counterparts sure but could we have done more objectively period

00:46:57.000 yes so these days i just like yeah yeah i was wrong and and that endears people to yourself

00:47:04.860 but my point all that going back to the satan masquerading as an angel of light my point is

00:47:09.140 just to say um one of the ways that satan masquerades as an angel of light is by making

00:47:15.460 what should be angels of light the church satanic yeah we have like it's not just the synagogue of

00:47:22.840 satan turns out you know maybe maybe zionists don't have a monopoly on that title there's a 0.98

00:47:29.680 lot of christian churches that that are giving them a run for their money yeah man i i think

00:47:35.400 if you look at actual satanism people who are like yes i'll worship the devil because that

00:47:41.600 makes sense to me there's probably less satan in there than in some conniving churches because

00:47:50.440 that satan is it's not a very good hiding spot right for the devil most people aren't that

00:47:57.140 blatantly psychotic most people have a conscience and maybe they have some room on increase the

00:48:05.540 critical thinking increase how much you pay attention to your own heart your gut

00:48:10.140 and have the courage to act accordingly. Maybe they have some improvement they could make there,

00:48:15.940 but with a conscious, someone, you know, like, cool, worshiping God seems more

00:48:21.120 conscious-able than worshiping the devil. So, yeah, it makes sense there would be far more

00:48:27.460 devil in some churches. I mean, I've done some reaction videos to these where

00:48:35.840 you see inside of a church draped in LGBTQ, the latest flags, and there's just a sociopath 0.73

00:48:46.620 on the microphone giving a sermon, telling you they're a pastor, telling you that Jesus was 0.81

00:48:56.980 transgender telling you let your kids lead you yeah if your kid yep do what your kids say be a 0.99

00:49:06.740 good parent a good leader by obeying your kids they tell you they need to get their genitals cut 1.00

00:49:14.380 off well five-year-olds know best and one of my daughters um wants to be a horse yeah so you 0.97

00:49:21.060 should get her horse transition surgery, Joel. Is there anything more satanic than being encouraged

00:49:29.600 in the name of God to traumatize your child, literally mutilate your child? Is there anything

00:49:38.320 more satanic? I mentioned before what I think the devil's ultimate goal is to kill God. 0.99

00:49:46.600 mm-hmm i look at you know when my first son was born i watched him come out and i was like there

00:49:56.340 is no mystery i know there's a god it was just so visceral this is a droplet of god the the purity

00:50:03.440 the innocence of a baby let alone a newborn it was just look like i was looking at god

00:50:11.800 then you hear about the most evil things we can imagine stuff in the epstein files

00:50:18.360 pizza gate stuff and you'd say why why would they do that to children and babies yeah and

00:50:28.800 i don't think it's because they want to torture children and babies i think it's because they 0.95

00:50:36.280 want to torture and kill God. And these are the purest earthly expressions of God. 0.82

00:50:45.620 If you can't kill the infinite God. So Satan wants to kill God. You're absolutely right. 0.99

00:50:49.160 But he knows he can't kill the infinite God. So the next best thing is to kill 0.99

00:50:54.100 the image of God in his finite creatures. It's almost like, imagine if you're living in Rome

00:51:01.360 um in its heyday and there's some terrible draconian emperor uh that you hate so you can

00:51:11.980 never get to him you can get to his children right you can get to his children but but it's

00:51:17.920 like he's too powerful he has too much defense and militia and soldiers defending him at any

00:51:23.140 given moment um you you can't you can't harm him directly but um but he also has his image

00:51:31.160 um statues all over the empire um and in the middle of the night just because you hate him

00:51:38.660 you can go and deface his image in one of these and i think like god his image isn't in statues

00:51:47.200 it's in us and his most untarnished image, children.

00:51:56.080 And so to harm and deface the image of God where it's seen most purely

00:52:03.040 is perhaps the most direct, compelling proof of a Satan that you can possibly find.

00:52:15.880 i i would agree and i also think the all the innocent people in the epstein files which

00:52:24.460 apparently is a hundred percent of everybody in the files according to our government you're

00:52:30.080 insane if you question that and you're certainly not a trump supporter anymore if you question that

00:52:34.240 uh but the uh with with all the i forgot where i was going with that i distracted myself just

00:52:43.480 you were saying that innocence um all the people in the epstein files something with children

00:52:48.680 probably yeah it doesn't matter no way it doesn't matter it's gonna be a brilliant a brilliant point

00:52:55.320 and that's why people have to stay tuned yeah for the next episode where jp comes out of his

00:53:01.680 biden cognitive decline ladies and gentlemen but you're it's so funny but it like you know we've

00:53:08.400 been saying it for a while now but um it's just crazy that like uh wanting to release the epstein

00:53:15.180 files wanting no new war like that that now is being against maga it is yeah it the here's what

00:53:24.380 i was gonna say the people enabling the criminals yes innocent criminals and the epstein files where

00:53:30.140 they're doing the most godless thing violating children that's enough right then you extrapolate

00:53:37.780 that and realize, well, it's the devil actually violating God, for that to be enabled, it should

00:53:47.740 be a display of godlessness and Satanism that should make the hair on your arms stand up.

00:53:56.940 And I hope it does. And I know it does for you and I and so many people watching this.

00:54:02.400 But the fact that those criminals are not, they're not just not prosecuted, they're literally protected by our government.

00:54:13.840 I hate to say it.

00:54:15.400 I hate to sound like a paranoid guy.

00:54:19.460 That's how godless our government is.

00:54:22.560 And I think that's how run by the devil our government is.

00:54:27.480 And I don't say that out of a sense of doom. 0.86

00:54:30.420 I say that out of a sense of, that's a very painful, crappy reality to acknowledge, but

00:54:38.400 we got to acknowledge it or else nothing changes.

00:54:42.260 Can we ever vote our way out of this?

00:54:44.560 I don't know.

00:54:45.420 I hope so.

00:54:46.400 But voting our way out of it won't do it alone.

00:54:50.460 We have to be the change.

00:54:52.200 And I think that starts absolutely at home with mothers and fathers where we need to

00:54:58.900 realize like if if our school is like yeah we're so we did a drag show it's just it's fine if you're

00:55:08.440 not going to the school if you're not instantly taking your kids out of the school and going to

00:55:13.100 the school board meetings and representing yourself and representing your children you are 1.00

00:55:22.340 doing a micro expression of what our government is doing with protecting the epstein criminals 1.00

00:55:30.040 you're enabling godlessness that violates your children as a way of violating god 0.98

00:55:37.300 and we parents we need to be warriors like a warrior is a crusader of god for god that

00:55:47.640 protects God's children and your literal children are most in your domain. If you have more to give,

00:55:55.000 like, cool, let's give to the greater community. But let's start at home. Man, as parents, we have

00:56:02.500 to realize those are droplets of God. It's not just something that coasts through. Everywhere

00:56:09.800 where we look there are satanic influences on our children potential shows to watch things going on

00:56:18.060 at schools social media apps and hell even other friends and families that's right that family

00:56:25.760 might need to be off limits that's right so well said i'm encouraged to hear you say that there are

00:56:31.300 it doesn't mean we hate anybody but not yeah it's like my kids are too important um the man who

00:56:37.820 fights it's uh it's not out of hatred for what's in front of him before him but out of love for

00:56:42.260 what's behind him uh gk chesterton said that i'm paraphrasing um but that's it's it's not that um

00:56:49.360 when it comes to immigration these is like like uh you know i just see that night uh thinking about

00:56:54.220 how much i hate the country of haiti no but i love america yeah i love my kids and i want them to have

00:57:01.560 some semblance of the childhood and, and the country that, that I got to grow up in. I want

00:57:09.460 that for them. And so that family that I don't hate, I don't, I don't have any kind of hostility

00:57:16.100 or aversion towards, but, um, it's not that I hate them. It's that I love my kids so much. I'm,

00:57:21.500 I'm sorry, but I can't, I can't risk it. If I was, and I don't have authority, it's outside of my

00:57:27.320 jurisdiction so like if your kids were my kids then i could just say hey um we're not doing the

00:57:33.480 ipad or we're not you know but it's like but if your your seven-year-old has a phone an iphone

00:57:39.300 with access to the internet because it's your seven-year-old i i can't they're not my kid it

00:57:44.940 would be wrong of me to tell them what they're allowed to do yeah so then the only choice you're

00:57:48.740 leaving left to me to be able to have you know continue to have some kind of authority with my

00:57:54.400 children is i have to say that my children can't be with your children yeah and it's a weird it's

00:58:00.580 like but you're actually putting me into that position yeah and we have to be willing to be

00:58:07.240 perceived as that judgmental jerk of a parent because we are the immune systems of our child's 0.74

00:58:15.220 minds and hearts and let's not fall for the temptation of weaponized compassion right where 0.98

00:58:23.020 like are you saying that family is not good enough for your child have some compassion you know this

00:58:29.520 tough things going on the parents just want a break or let them do this and that no rules at

00:58:35.820 their house it's like um yeah i am saying that's not good enough for my children i can have

00:58:42.540 compassion and understanding and empathy for their situation uh that's fine but that doesn't

00:58:49.920 take the place of, and I protect my kids. It's not, well, you know, that teacher who's sexually

00:58:58.880 confused and knows other sexually confused dancers that do drag shows want to make $300 to the day

00:59:07.300 to bring this cultural enrichment to the school. Can't you have compassion for the teacher? Well, 0.99

00:59:13.880 whether i can or can't doesn't matter and even if i do level of protection still has i will not

00:59:22.080 compromise my child as a way of manipulating you to see me as more compassionate and more tolerant

00:59:29.380 that's right my immune discernment as a parent for my children's minds and hearts doesn't operate

00:59:39.100 on tolerance right nor do i want to keep my children in this bubble where i'm the helicopter

00:59:45.960 parent now we're suffocating the child so it's a balance but understanding there's some things

00:59:52.340 that are me as the immune system yeah i'm very intolerant too yep that gentleness towards the

00:59:59.420 wolves is cruelty towards the shoot a great way to say it yeah thanks for coming on the show

01:00:05.260 appreciate it and we will see the listener in the next episode thank you brother

01:00:10.300 america will either have christ or will have chaos for years conservatives believe that trump

01:00:19.600 could reverse america's decline but after trump the right is now fractured exhausted and losing

01:00:26.540 ground endless infighting and electoral losses have exposed a deeper problem that politics

01:00:33.740 alone cannot solve. A nation that rejects Christ cannot be restored by mere personalities,

01:00:42.200 grandstanding, or Christless conservatism. So NXR Studio's first annual conference,

01:00:48.900 America After Trump, brings together pastors, politicians, commentators, and Christians that

01:00:56.740 are committed to strength, cooperation, and a durable future for the American right,

01:01:02.500 complaining is not a strategy and despair cannot be an option christ is king let's live like it

01:01:10.960 use code sears to save 20 off your ticket that's sears all caps s-e-a-r-s

The NXR Podcast - June 17, 2026

THE SPECIAL - How JP Sears Became A Christian

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