Is Separation of Church And State a Myth?

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Welcome to Bible Bash, where we aim to equip the saints for the works of ministry by answering the questions you're not allowed to ask.

01:37

We're your hosts, Harrison Kerrig and Pastor Tim Mullett, and today we'll seek to answer the age -old question, is separation of church and state a myth?

01:45

And before we get into this episode, I thought it was pretty funny, I didn't realize this when we were talking about planning this episode, but we're actually putting this out on July 4th.

01:56

So I guess subconsciously, we're trying to scratch that old patriotic itch and talk about something that relates to all of us talking about the government and how we should view lawmaking on the anniversary of our country's birth.

02:13

And so in a way, I guess this is our tribute, if you want to call it that, to the founding fathers and the revolution.

02:25

But I didn't even really think about that until we were getting ready to record the episode.

02:32

But since this episode's coming out, we're not recording it on July 4th, but everyone, you're going to be hearing it on July 4th.

02:40

And so, Tim, what are some of your plans for July 4th?

02:45

Are you all shooting fireworks? Are you breaking out the Abrams tank? What are you all doing? Well, yeah, like good

02:52

Americans, we're going to be grilling out hamburgers and hot dogs, and we'll probably sit in the backyard and watch the neighborhood fireworks because they're having some at the clubhouse or whatever.

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So we'll do that. But maybe no guns. I think we might go to jail if we try that. But stay away from that.

03:11

But if we had a tank, we may shoot it. The guns are out, but the tank, if you had it, that would be on the table.

03:20

That would be on point, yep. Meat and explosions. That's right. That's your July 4th. That's the summary of your

03:26

July 4th. Yeah, ours is going to be something pretty similar. We're going to go eat with a bunch of our family for lunch, and then we might try and go watch some fireworks

03:37

We've had a pretty long weekend of different things that we've been going to, and so our daughter is pretty worn out at this point.

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I mean, she took a really long nap today, and so she's going to be out late tonight too.

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And so I really don't know if she's going to be able to keep this up tomorrow as well, so we might have to skip it.

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The good thing, though, is with the fireworks being loud, if she cries, you won't be able to hear it. I thought you were going to say something about the fireworks will keep her up, but instead you're talking about you won't have to hear her cry.

04:16

You've got to think these things through, man. Yeah, you're right. I'm obviously still a novice when it comes to being a parent, and you are the master.

04:25

But yeah, so that's what we're looking forward to. We'll see how things go, but it's been a fun weekend.

04:32

We got to hang out with a bunch of our church family as well, so that was really nice.

04:39

Hopefully, everyone who's listening has been having a pretty good July 4th and been able to celebrate with friends and family and remember a lot of the sacrifice that people made and the way they really did really risk their lives and their livelihood to be able to found our country.

04:58

With all that being said, the title question for today is the separation of church and state and whether or not it's a myth.

05:09

Is it real? Really, in my mind, the reason that we're talking about this is obviously

05:18

Roe v. Wade got overturned I guess two weeks ago, or I guess a week and a half ago, a week from this last

05:29

Friday. Weirdly enough, not everyone has been that happy about it.

05:37

That's right, man. Big shock there, but a lot of very vocal and violent people have made it plain that they are not okay with the ruling by the

05:50

Supreme Court. Well, what's amazing about that too, though, and this is something that I suspected would happen, but many of your big -name evangelical leaders who you would expect to be celebrating because they've apparently been champions of pro -life causes for their whole life, it seems like they're eerily, strangely silent with this new revelation.

06:14

I'm sure that it puts them in a bit of an awkward situation because now it's like they're in that kind of...

06:22

It's like a situation where you imagine that the woman's husband went off to war and he went

06:32

MIA or whatever, and everyone was praying for his safe return, and they give her the news that he's been found, right?

06:41

And then all of a sudden she gets quiet and still. Doesn't appear to be rejoicing.

06:51

I thought this was the rejoicing moment, but apparently you look like you've seen a ghost. What's going on?

06:56

And then you come to find out behind the scenes that they have been pursuing another man and were hoping that they were finally rid of the poor sucker, her whatever, but this is kind of like that moment for many of the evangelical leaders.

07:12

You should make that a scene in a movie. The wife's standing at the door.

07:17

She opens the door for the guys in the soldier's uniforms coming to give her the news, and she drops down to...

07:28

You don't hear what they say, and you see her just drop down to the floor crying, and then you look at the letter, and it's like he's alive or something.

07:37

It's just like that, man. It's painful to watch. They've been telling us that they're pro -life for years as they undermine the position at every single point, and now is the moment where it's time to celebrate, and they can't even muster up.

07:58

Hey, look, they can't anger their platform, man, the people that are supporting them.

08:04

Well, it's one of those things where it's like you really...

08:10

They're in a bit of an awkward situation because maybe we'll talk about this over the course of the episode, but it's one of those things where they've been trying to make this kind of argument that it's okay to be

08:22

Christian and be Democrat because nothing is ever going to happen with the Roe v. Wade thing anyways, and so now it's just a matter of promoting that kind of things that can actually make a difference, i .e.

08:34

socialism or whatever. And so they've been making that kind of case for years now, but now that it's actually overturned, then you're in a bit of a different spot because it's overturned at this point, and you vote

08:48

Democrat, and they're going to be actively trying to reinstate it, and so now you're arguing from a different kind of position.

08:55

It's no longer this impossible white rhino kind of situation where theoretically it can happen.

09:01

We all know it's not going to happen, so we can vote for the things we really want. Now it does bring it into focus and clarity that this is a live issue, and there are literal

09:11

Nazis that you're trying to support. Right. You're going to try to bring the killing fields back. Worse than Nazis.

09:17

Yeah. Worse than Nazis. Right, right. So certainly it's been a spectacle to watch the non -response, you know, or the response, you know, like don't celebrate the liberation of,

09:34

I guess, victory in Europe day, and you're not allowed to celebrate, you know, because it might offend the

09:39

Nazis. Right, right. It's just like, what in the world? Right. Come on. You know, and at the risk of getting off topic this early in the episode.

09:48

Who knows what topic it's for. Yeah. I was thinking about this. So I was working.

09:57

I guess it was Saturday. I was doing some work, and we're doing like a Bible reading plan as a church, and so I was going through Exodus, and it got to the part where Moses and the

10:13

Israelites, they just got delivered by God. They walked through the

10:18

Red Sea, and then the Red Sea, you know, it came back together, you know, and swallowed up the

10:27

Egyptians, right? And I was thinking about that. They didn't celebrate there, man.

10:34

They did not celebrate. It was a time of solemn, you know, grieving for the

10:41

Egyptians. Empathy. Empathy and compassion and nonjudgmental. It was very solemn.

10:46

Right, yeah. No, it wasn't that. I was listening, you know, I mean, I think,

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I guess it's Exodus 15 or 16 maybe. That might not be right.

10:57

I can't remember off the top of my head, but whatever chapter it is, it's literally like the whole chapter is just a song of celebration that the

11:06

Egyptians were destroyed by God, and then you compare that to what you're seeing now, and it's just a total,

11:13

I mean, you wonder if these guys are even reading their Bibles anymore, you know, and so, but anyways, back on track, back on track.

11:23

So, the reason we wanted to talk about separation of church and state is because, you know, a lot of people have been coming out, and one of the big arguments, one of the big talking points from pro -baby murderers is this idea that -

11:39

I like that way of putting it, Nick. Pro -baby murderers? Yeah, well, that's what they are. I mean, you know, you can't even argue that at this point.

11:47

It's a biological fact. You're killing babies. You're killing a human being. And so, they've been arguing, bringing up, hey, we are not a nation that is supposed to be mixing religion and politics, right?

12:03

We have this idea that we were founded on, which is the idea that the church and the state need to remain separate from one another, and in every single way, right?

12:15

And so, I thought it would be helpful on this July 4th to talk about, number one, is that even right?

12:23

Is that right? And then, number two, what exactly, you know, what does

12:28

God have to say about, you know, government and religion? And then, focus that in, too, on our specific country, the

12:39

United States of America, and talk about what were the Founding Fathers' ideas when it came to this subject as well?

12:47

Because I think a lot of people just really don't understand. Obviously, they don't understand the

12:56

Bible. They don't understand what God thinks. But then, even just the Founding Fathers and, you know, simple history, they don't really understand it.

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I mean, you can go online and watch video after video of people getting asked on the street, like, hey, what's the

13:11

First Amendment? What's it about? You know, and they're just kind of like, uh, uh, my history teacher would be so mad at me right now.

13:18

Uh, you know, and I think there's something, too. Like, you get caught in the moment, and maybe you just kind of freeze up. But, you know,

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I doubt there's, I'm sure there's a lot of people out there who, you know, if you asked them, they would have no idea.

13:30

So, with all that being said, Tim, is separation of church and state a myth?

13:37

Well, I mean, I think, essentially, yes. That's it.

13:42

That's the episode. That's it, yeah. I mean, it depends on what a person means by that, but what most people mean by that, yes, it's a myth, like, in the way that most people are thinking about it.

13:52

But, you know, as you think about that expression, there's a ball of separation between church and state.

13:58

That is, like, a historical expression that is not actually in the Constitution itself. So that was a letter written by Thomas Jefferson to the

14:06

Danbury Baptist Association, and it is elaborating on the meaning of what you find in the

14:13

First Amendment, and, you know, if you properly understand what he's saying, then,

14:19

I mean, obviously that's his explanation for what the

14:24

First Amendment actually means, but then, in the minds of many, they understand the

14:30

First Amendment to be saying something very different than what he's intending to communicate. And so, it is what many people now think of when they think of, like, a separation of church and state.

14:42

I would say, yes, that's a myth. Does that make sense? Mm -hmm, yeah. So that is, like, that's not what he meant or what the

14:51

First Amendment meant. So I would say that there's a profound confusion as to what is being actually communicated in the

14:58

First Amendment itself. But then the First Amendment, it's, like, pretty straightforward. Congregation, or Congress, shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press or of the right of the people to peaceably assemble and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

15:20

So if you want to understand, like, the statement in the Constitution itself, the First Amendment, related to, like, the issue of the relationship between the church and the state, that's essentially it.

15:31

And what you find there is that Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, but then they will also make no law prohibiting the free exercise of religion, if that makes sense.

15:44

But then that law, they shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion. Essentially what people think that is saying is that religion and politics have to be kept separate.

15:57

But then that really isn't at all what's being communicated. Like, that religion and politics need to be kept separate.

16:04

That's not what's being communicated. What's being communicated is that, you know, as you read through, like,

16:11

Thomas Jefferson's letters to the Danbury, or his letter to the Danbury Baptist Association and their letter to him, what they're making very clear, the

16:19

Danbury Baptist Association, they're making very clear that their concern is that there's going to be a federal church that's established.

16:28

So now at the time of, you know, producing of the Constitution, most of, you know, the states at that time, they had what you might describe as state churches.

16:40

So they didn't believe in, like, the separation of church and state, meaning, like, that having, you know, religion formalized within the government was a bad thing.

16:49

What they were afraid of was, like, the Baptist Association was afraid that the congregational churches would establish a federal congregational church over the entire nation, and that that would, like, influence and control how they were able to participate in their own religion at the state level.

17:08

And so they were concerned about a federal church. They weren't concerned about the idea of, like, even a state church.

17:14

Does that make sense? Right, yeah. So they were concerned about the idea of a federal church. Now, you know,

17:21

Thomas Jefferson, in his letter back to him, he says, believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his

17:26

God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only and not opinions.

17:35

I contemplate with sovereign reverence the act of the whole

17:41

American people which declared that their legislators shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or the prohibiting the free exercise thereof, thus building a wall of separation between church and state.

17:52

So adhering to this expression of the supreme will of the nation on behalf of the rights of conscience, I shall see with sincere satisfaction the progress of those sentiments which tend to restore man all his natural rights, convinced that he has no natural right in opposition to his social duties.

18:08

And, you know, all that's being communicated there is there's not gonna be the establishment of a federal church. But then, like, the idea that religion and politics should be kept absolutely separate is, essentially, it's nonsense.

18:19

And it's not something that they, you know, even thought about, you know, at that point. So, you know, if you think about, like, the

18:25

Declaration of Independence in itself, you know, the Declaration of Independence, you know, communicates that man is endowed with God, certain

18:33

God -given rights, right? Namely, the right to life, liberty. And Thomas Jefferson changed

18:40

Locke's formula, ownership of property, to the pursuit of happiness. But these rights were, essentially,

18:46

God -given rights. And you have to grant, like, the issue is you do have to ground your morality somewhere.

18:53

Like, morality doesn't just come from, like, any... Thin air. Yeah, it doesn't come from thin air.

18:59

It doesn't come from an evolutionary framework. It's not gonna, like, you have to have some objective grounding for your morality.

19:05

And their objective grounding was in, like, the belief in the God of the Bible. Essentially, they're grounding their morality in that.

19:13

And so, like, they weren't, they didn't think that religion and politics needed to be kept separate in the way that many people understand that today.

19:22

What they thought, what they were trying to, like, the issue is, at the time, like, the

19:27

Constitution was essentially advocating a limited form of government. And what they were concerned is that, you know, if there was a federal church, then that would run roughshod over the sincere religious practices at a state level.

19:40

And they wanted things to be kept local. They didn't want it to be run at a federal level, particularly as it relates to religion.

19:47

So they were concerned about that as a form of protection for the church. Not, like, it wasn't, like, the concern wasn't, like, that, you know, like, to protect, you know, the people from, like, the church itself.

20:01

They were concerned for, like, the government would encroach upon them and force them to do things that were against their conscience.

20:10

And so that's why it's an amendment in that way. But, like, the idea that religion and politics should be kept separate or that that has any basis in the

20:18

Constitution is just nonsense. Right. Yeah, and it's interesting that so many people in our day and age seem to think that you can even have politics without a religious worldview of some kind, right?

20:36

I mean, just like you said, so politics is basically, it's informed by our morality, right?

20:45

Right. And our morality is informed by our religious worldview. And so, in a certain sense, you have to have religion of some kind in order to have a government, right?

20:59

Yeah, I mean, you have to have some sort of objective grounding for your morality and apart from, like, apart from the scriptures, you don't have anything that's objective.

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Like, you can, you know, ground it in, you know, popular opinion, but it's not going to be objective at that point.

21:15

It's just going to change with shifting times. So, if you want some kind of objective moral grounding, you need an objective moral law given by an objective moral law giver at that point.

21:28

And what's really interesting, though, is that, like, you think about the founding of our nation and the laws of the colonies, you know, you might think to yourself, like, what would you do?

21:39

Like, and this is something that people are so, like, historically ignorant at this point, but, like, imagine yourself coming over to a new world and you have to form some sort of government, right?

21:49

Like, you have to figure out what you're going to do. And, like, as you look at, like, the governments that were actually produced by the, you know, the

21:56

American colonies at that point, what's really interesting is that they, they essentially did the kind of thing that,

22:03

I think, any kind of Bible -believing person would probably do at that point. So, meaning, like, you know, you can imagine that all of us, you know, are going on some trip somewhere at our church and, like, we get stranded on a, like, you know, our plane gets, you know, shot down or something like that and we all survive somehow and we're on, like, we're lost, we're on the island or whatever.

22:27

We're on the TV show. I mean, but we would have to form some sort of government and then you would, you have to think to yourself, like, what do you do at that point, right?

22:36

Like, how, now, like, if it's all on you and you can't just kind of, like, it's not just about what is, trying to sanctify what is, if you were to ask yourself, like, what do

22:46

I do now, right? So, you, like, you put yourself in the, like, deserted island scenario there.

22:52

What kind of government do you form? And, you know, as I've read through the old covenant law repeatedly again and again and again and again, like,

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I, like, over and over again, what you're going to find in the Bible is, like, particularly in Deuteronomy, that God says of His law that, like, what nation is there that has such rules that are so righteous and just as this and a

23:12

God so near to them that would give them such a, you know, wise law, essentially. And that's phrased over and over again.

23:19

And, like, what happened, like, with the American colonies is they, their impulse was to do, essentially, what my impulse would be to do.

23:27

Like, if I were in charge, right, you put me in charge and you say, hey, give us a government.

23:33

And I would say, well, okay, the only thing I know to do at that point is to go through the old covenant law.

23:39

This is a law that God actually, like, it has several elements in it that God actually produced. And at that point, the only thing

23:45

I would know to do is look at the criminal code that was put in the old covenant, right?

23:52

And to think about the things that are death penalty kind of issues under the old covenant. And I would say, well,

23:57

I guess, like, what we need to do is, you know, we need to produce a kind of law that mirrors the morality of the old covenant and trying to distinguish between sins and crimes at that point.

24:09

Well, what are the things that have criminal penalties attached to it?

24:15

And, you know, I would think you would need to adopt, like, the penology of the Old Testament, essentially, that's what you do.

24:22

But then, like, the colonies, that's essentially what they did, like, at a step -by -step level. If you look into the documents, they did exactly that, okay?

24:30

And that's why, you know, buggery or sodomy was considered, like, a capital offense, like, in the colony, in many of the colonies, is because they're just reading the old covenant, and they're doing what they find there.

24:43

That's what they're doing, you know? They're looking at it and say, hey, you know, these are pretty good. Well, I mean, and I don't know how you can improve upon them, right?

24:50

Right. But then the issue is, like, during the time, like, there were anti -sodomy laws, like, in America, in most states, up until very, very recently.

25:00

And the reason why is because they were there because they read the Old Testament, and that's what they did. And so no one at the time thought that, like, some sort of separation of church and state meant that, like, state, like, the

25:11

Bible and politics must be, like, kept absolutely separate. In fact, that's totally irrational.

25:16

You can't even do that. You have to have some objective grounding for your morality. Like, why is murder wrong, right?

25:23

Right. Like, why is stealing wrong? Why should murder and stealing be criminal? And you can't just say, because I don't like it, okay?

25:30

Right, yeah. Like, that is not sufficient moral reasoning to say, I dislike it, therefore, like, let's make it, like, illegal, right?

25:41

What you have to do is you have to have some objective moral grounding for the laws that you come up with, and if you don't appeal to the

25:49

Bible, what do you appeal to, okay? Right. Like, what are you going to appeal to?

25:54

And so, like, the issue at the time was not that they were saying, like, religion and politics need to be kept separate.

26:00

In fact, what they said was that, you know, the Constitution was, you know, given for a moral and a religious people, and it was wholly inadequate for any other kind of people.

26:09

They understood that, like, morality was intrinsically tied to the Scriptures, and they produced a legal system that was, in large measure, based on the morality of the

26:20

Bible, and, like, that's what they did. And so, like, the issue was not keeping religion and politics separate.

26:26

It had nothing to do with, you know, you can't pray at, you know, a football game or at a school or something like that.

26:32

Right. Although, I mean, we may not, we may want to wade into that topic at some point later, but, like, it had nothing to do with, you know, taking the

26:40

Ten Commandments out of the courthouse or anything like that, keeping these things separate. What it had to do was they were preventing the federal government from adopting a state church that would exercise authority over the religious practices of, you know, the entire nation at that point, and they wanted to keep these things at a local level.

26:58

And at a local level, they had state churches in almost all of them. So, like, that's the point.

27:03

Like, so, it had nothing to do with that, essentially. Yeah, and I think we've talked about this before, but essentially, you know, that's the crux of the issue in a lot of ways, is this idea that, you know, that you can have government without some sort of religion at all.

27:24

Right. There's a lot of people who really do think that you can have government without religion and then turn around and try and push their specific religion on the government they live under, right?

27:37

And then, you know, they try and pretend that they're objective with it, but then, you know, the reality is even the atheist is a deeply religious person.

27:48

The problem is they have no way to justify their religion, and so what they end up doing is they just steal from the

27:56

Christian worldview a lot of times in a lot of different ways and pretend that it's like some, you know, obvious common sense thing that any right -minded person would come to when the reality is there's plenty of people who don't come to, who don't agree with them, and we as Christians can say, hey, look, you know, when

28:18

Hitler kills six million people, when Stalin kills 20 million people, when Mao kills, like,

28:25

I don't even, I don't remember how many he killed. It was at least 20 million. I think it was a lot more than that, though.

28:31

When they do that, when we do, when they do that, we can say, yep, that's evil.

28:37

Why? Because God has told us that killing people is evil. The atheist can't say that.

28:42

The atheist can say, well, I don't like it. I don't, you know, I think it's bad, but then, okay, why?

28:50

It says who? But that's even, like, it's contradictory to Darwinism itself.

28:55

You know? Like, in that, you know, Darwinism is based on the idea of, like, survival of the fittest and might makes right.

29:03

Right, right. And so, like, it's formally contradictory to Darwinism, but not only is it formally contradictory, it's logically contradictory in the same kind of way.

29:13

And so, you know, it's not whether you're going to have some sort of morality. It's, like, what morality are you going to adopt?

29:19

But I think for many people, if I could maybe share my own kind of, you know, be a little autobiographical or something at that point, reaction to this kind of discussion,

29:34

I think for many people there is very much an ignorance about what the

29:40

Constitution is saying at that point and an ignorance about history. But then there's also what you might describe as, like, the common kind of, you know, as I've been a

29:50

Christian and interacted with these discussions over the years, there's the common kind of way that I think individuals have articulated this kind of thing is something that I, you know, when

30:02

I was growing up, I was never persuaded it was reasonable, but at the same time

30:08

I didn't know that I had a way of arguing with it. But, you know, it's the idea that, like, you, you know, you imagine yourself talking with, you know, an atheist or something like that and, like, you're trying to get them to, you know, adopt whatever political philosophy that you have, right?

30:30

And then, you know, essentially, like, what people are afraid of, and this is what people I knew growing up were afraid of, is they're afraid of, like, the response to the question, you know, so what, right?

30:41

So, like, meaning, like, if someone were to say, you know, if I were to say, hey, abortion's wrong, well, why do you think abortion's wrong?

30:50

Well, because the Bible says that. And then their response to that is, well, I don't believe the Bible, right?

30:56

And then there's a lot of Christians at that point who are deeply flummoxed by that response, right?

31:02

So... Right, yeah. Like, they don't know what to do with that, right? So it's just like, you know, I don't believe the

31:08

Bible, checkmate, you know, therefore, you know, you shouldn't be trying to impose your religion upon me.

31:15

So then, like, the response from many Christians at that point, and I remember that this is, like, I had many friends who, you know, felt like that was just some sort of absolute and overpowering objection they had nothing to do with.

31:25

And so because they were going to hear that response, that led them to think, well, the only way to interact with this and to argue with this at that point is just to try to appeal to common ground, essentially, right?

31:36

Mm -hmm. And so then it's just like, well, I can't use the Bible to argue with someone who doesn't believe the

31:43

Bible, therefore, the only thing I can do going forward is, the only thing that's left to me is just to try to appeal to common sense or common consensus.

31:54

But then the problem, though, is as you watch our culture decay, like, common sense isn't common sense, okay?

32:01

Right. It's not very common anymore. It's not very common anymore. But then there's no settled, agreed upon definition of what common sense is, and, like, that kind of idea, like, pretends, like, that there's some sort of neutral morality out there that everyone can agree upon.

32:19

Now, the problem is, like, because our country was founded on a Christian worldview, and you're living in the vestiges of that Christian worldview, yeah, you know what?

32:27

There's plenty of guys like, you know, James Lindsay, I think, is anti -abortion.

32:33

I don't know. I need to probably look that up. But there's plenty of, like, if he's not, at least he's anti -socialism, you know, so there's that.

32:41

But, like, the idea is, like, you can appeal to, you know, like this idea of property rights because we used to believe in that.

32:47

But the problem is that, you know, everything's up in the air at this point. You know, as you chuck God, you refuse to acknowledge

32:52

Him in our hearts, you know, almost everything's on the table, and there's no shared morality anymore.

32:58

And, like, you have women shouting their abortions and, you know, talking about, you know, getting pregnant with, like,

33:07

Republicans' babies just so that they can slaughter them, right? Like, there's no common ground there, okay?

33:13

And, like, the more that you chuck religion, the more, you know, paganism that you're going to see, and the less morality that you see.

33:22

And we don't even, like, we used to think that genital mutilation was a bad thing, and now we're praising it as a virtue.

33:29

Like, you know, praising, like, you know, castration of men and, you know, the breast removal surgeries for women.

33:40

Like, we're at a point now where, like, we are so far gone, and there is no, like, neutral, you know, shared

33:48

Christian worldview that you can appeal to with the pagans anymore. We don't even know the difference between a male and a female.

33:55

And so, and that, what that does, though, is it causes you to rethink that basic argument that, like, there's some sort of neutral common ground out there that you can appeal to.

34:04

And what you really do have to do is you have to say, thus says the Lord, and do it with conviction.

34:10

And that's the only thing you can say is that a guy, like, and that's the very thing that people are humiliated and embarrassed to say, and that's something that, you know, growing up,

34:18

I just, I didn't quite understand why they seemed to be so embarrassed to just say, God says it,

34:24

I believe it, that settles it, right? Mm -hmm. You know, God is the king above all other kings and authorities, and what he says goes, and he commands everyone everywhere to repent, and it's his world, and it doesn't matter whether or not you submit to him.

34:39

He makes the rules. And, you know, I have no argument with you other than God says it, and I'm not embarrassed by that.

34:47

And there's no reason to be embarrassed by that. Like, God says it, doesn't matter whether or not you like it, you know?

34:53

Yeah. And you can make that kind of case when you know that the Holy Spirit has been sent into the world to convict the world of sin and righteousness and judgment.

35:00

Like, you, when you, you know, speak what's right, like, the issue is you have heaven and earth behind you at that point, and you don't have to fear them.

35:10

And you don't have to be embarrassed about that. And, like, there's nothing embarrassing about standing on the words of God.

35:16

So. Right. Yeah, and, you know, that kind of, that kind of gets back to what

35:23

I was saying a few minutes ago. You know, if you are the person who is looking at government, and, you know, you look at things like Roe v.

35:32

Wade being overturned, which, by the way, doesn't even outlaw abortion. It just turns it back to the, it makes it a decision of the states again, right?

35:41

Right. So, it's not even a full -on outlaw. It's just a, you know, the discussion has moved now from a federal level to a state level.

35:51

yeah, it's a constitutional right. Now it's, like, no, it never was a constitutional right. It wasn't in the purview of the

35:57

Constitution. Right. Now the states can decide it, you know. Right. And so, you know, you look at this discussion, and we as Christians, we can look at this and say, hey, it's wrong to kill babies.

36:15

Why is it wrong to kill babies? Because God said it's wrong to murder people. Right. God has given each of us a right to life that can't be taken away unless we do something to forfeit that right.

36:30

So, like, you know, we kill someone else, or, you know, we rape someone, or, you know, something along those lines.

36:40

Those would be examples of we've given up that right to life, but someone can't just come and take it for no reason.

36:48

Now that's what God has said, and we can say because God said. If you're the atheist, you can't say you don't have an explanation.

37:00

You know, if you're wanting government to be, you know, quote -unquote neutral as it relates to religion, then you've basically thrown away any justification for any right that you think you have.

37:18

So, if you think you have a right to life as an atheist who rejects God, you're throwing away the founding father's justification for it, and you now need to prove yourself where your right to life comes from.

37:35

You know, we as Christians, obviously, we think you have that right, and so we don't want to violate it, but then someone else could come along who's stronger than you, who doesn't care that you think you have a right to your own life and say, hey,

37:48

I don't think you have a right to your life, and they could kill you, and you wouldn't even have a justification for it.

37:55

We can say God said, and then turn around and turn the question back to the atheist and say, where do you get your justification for your right to life?

38:05

Well, those are some of the most powerful moments in many of the atheist debates

38:10

I've ever watched is that when a Christian brings up that moral objection at that point, and what is the basis for your morality, and I've never seen an atheist actually have a good answer to that kind of question because there really isn't one.

38:24

Right, there's not. All they can do is just fumble around and say, hey, I don't like being killed.

38:29

Do you like being killed? And it's like, no, but so what, right? So how do you describe it as objectively right or objectively wrong?

38:39

And Christians at that point, they need to give up this myth, give up this nonsense view that there's some sort of common ground here and go on the offensive and essentially point out the contradiction, and Darwinism doesn't have an explanation for morality.

38:53

Atheism doesn't have an explanation for morality, and I think the more polarized our country gets, the stronger that objection actually is.

39:01

So no, I don't want to live in a cannibalistic society, but why is it wrong for individuals who are more advanced technologically than me to kill me and to eat me, right?

39:14

Right. Like who am I to say that's wrong? I mean, that happens in the animal kingdom all the time. Just observe the behavior of lions.

39:20

That's certainly natural and that's certainly normal and that's certainly common, so if I'm just an advanced animal, why can't

39:28

I kill people I don't like and eat them, right? Right. And there's no biological reason why that's wrong.

39:35

There's no shared social consensus throughout all time and all of history to say that that's wrong.

39:42

Majority rule doesn't decide it. Our majority rule has dramatically flip -flopped over the course of just a few years, although I think many people who are caught up in the

39:53

LGBTQ whatever nonsense are in the minority but then they're loud and vocal and in charge.

40:00

The fact remains that there's not some kind of consensus in our society over even basic things like what is a woman and what is a man and can people define radically what their gender is and so at that point you do have to press the atheists and you do have to press the secularists and you do have to ask what is the source of your grounding for morality and the fact is they don't have an answer to it at all.

40:30

Yeah, I mean there's literally I mean they'll have a response it just won't be a good response. Right?

40:36

You know, they'll appeal to the whole like common sense everyone knows it's wrong to kill someone.

40:42

Yeah, I mean you appeal to intuition. Well no, everyone doesn't know it's wrong to kill someone. We've killed 60 million babies.

40:47

Right, right. Just look at the abortion discussion it's obviously not common sense at all. Right. Which is pretty funny you know

40:54

I'm sure you've probably seen the you know the response before to Christianity that you know if you need a book from a sky fairy to tell you what's right and wrong then you might be a terrible person.

41:06

Sure. But then they're the same people that are screaming at the top of their lungs to for the quote unquote right to murder their unborn child.

41:16

They chop them up in their mother's womb and to you know mutilate people so they're unable to have kids for the rest of their life and they're those same kind of people you know.

41:27

Yeah, give me a break. Let's listen to you. Give me a break with all that stuff. That's totally ridiculous.

41:33

So you have this idea that government and religion are inherently tied together in some capacity.

41:44

Right, and when you look at the founding fathers you know you see the Declaration of Independence which is essentially viewed as the why behind form the

41:56

United States of America. Right, that's how Abraham Lincoln viewed it. He viewed it as the why and then the constitution was the what basically.

42:05

Like what does the country actually look like and in the Declaration of Independence you see the founding fathers say hey every single citizen of the

42:15

United of our new country that we're forming and every man has certain rights given to them by God and those rights cannot be taken away unjustly.

42:29

Right. So you clearly have you clearly have a religious worldview affecting government in some way.

42:38

So that's what the founding fathers thought but then what Tim could you just maybe explain for us a little bit you know does the

42:48

Bible you know teach us that God has a certain perspective on how government should operate and what

42:59

I mean there is you know obviously the Israelites they were they were a nation under God right.

43:09

They were founded by God right. He establishes them he gives them all their laws and he spells everything out plainly for them and tells them to follow him and even go so far as to say you know for a long time don't have a king if I will be your king instead

43:28

I will be your leader and obviously we know that they eventually they left that idea behind and it wasn't very good for them but so we know that when it comes to the

43:38

Israelites you know God was obviously very integral to their government structure but then how does it relate to you know other countries that are not that are not considered like God's you know chosen people as the

43:57

Israelites were you just have you know pagan nations everywhere else it does

44:03

God view those other nations as they would be better off if they established some some form of Christianity as like the justification for their governments or does

44:18

God think that they're better off being you know pagan well yeah well

44:27

I think everyone has to basically run the deserted island experiment that I mentioned and you know think about you know what would you do if you were in charge with you know essentially coming up with the government right now and you know

44:42

I think the problem is that as you read through the old covenant law the old covenant law was doing a variety of things so the old covenant law essentially had what you might describe as civil laws meaning it had within it like laws about that were essentially providing a penal code for the

45:02

Israelites so it had those kinds of laws it had like a sacrificial system kind of laws and then it also had you know what you describe as sins or you know moral kind of law that was present within it so you have different kinds of things that were all in this one package which is described law which is presented as a unity to the

45:22

Israelites at that point but like it was a law that had many functions as far as that goes so part of it was to tell them

45:30

God's standards for them as individuals part of it was a law to tell them God's standards for them as a nation and then part of it was to give them some mechanism for atoning in a temporary way for their own sins so you had those different kind of components within it as a unity but then as I mentioned before if you just read

45:52

Deuteronomy 4 like 5 for instance see I have taught you statutes and rules as the

45:58

Lord my God commanded me this is Moses that you should do them in the land that you are entering to take possession of them keep them and do them for they will be your wisdom and understanding in the sights of the peoples who when they hear all these statutes will say surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people for what great nation is there that has a

46:16

God so near to it as Yahweh our God is to us whenever we call upon to them and what great nation is there that has statutes and rules so righteous as all this law that I've set before you today and then he tells them only take care and keep your soul diligently unless you forget the things that your eyes have seen unless they depart from your heart all the days of your life so make them known to your children and to your children's children now like when you think about what's actually there like the

46:44

God viewed his law as absolutely like even like you know if you think about like how do you form a government well it tells you what kind of government to form within the old covenant law and God viewed that as absolutely superior to anything that ever existed at the time right and so one of the things that's very difficult for me to imagine is it's difficult for me to imagine that there's any way to you know human beings can come up with something that's better does that make sense yeah like if God like I think if God had a vested interest in creating a government

47:19

I would want to know what he thought was the kind of features that he wanted within that government now surely what you have to do is you have to think well how is the coming of Christ influence some of the things that are there in particular

47:35

I'm thinking of like you know now that Jesus is the once for all sacrifice for sins you it would be immoral you know to go back to the old sacrificial system for sure so you do have to think about how

47:47

Jesus like fulfills certain aspects of the law and has right brought them to completion but at the same time you know if you're if you're asking me you know what kind of law should a society come up with like a legal code in terms of like a government structure it's it seems to me to be the height of arrogance and hubris to think that you can somehow come up with something better than what

48:13

God came up with and so you know if you were to ask me what do we do I don't know that I don't know how

48:19

I can improve upon what God did and I would want to know what he did and be influenced by what he did at that point and like so I don't know that I have any kind of ability to come up with something better and it would feel very prideful and arrogant to think that I could so you know if God made a government you might want to study the kind of government he made so that you would know what kind of government you should be making because that government itself does provide like a definition for what is just and what is right and what is moral and I just I simply don't know how to improve upon it okay like I don't know yeah so then like the issue then is like you know there's a whole discussion about like theonomy as it relates to this kind of topic and without necessarily wading into that you know mess

49:06

I would say at the very least like I don't understand how you can improve upon God's law and if anyone were to ask me what you know should be done

49:16

I would say I would I would want to I would think that a nation you know if they like and if God says of his law you know what nation is there that has statutes and rules so wise as this and a

49:30

God so near to them than that I would think at the very least like what you should be doing is you should be looking to the old covenant law to define morality for you and the thing is

49:38

America largely did that you know they largely did that that's why you know many of the things that we've overturned recently were things that were you know founded fundamentally in a biblical world view and some of these things are very deeply unpopular we don't even know why we've overturned them but the reason why we've overturned them is because we're checking a biblical morality at that point and like that even shows up with like you know this might scandalize people but I don't know that we've ever been afraid of this in the past but you know why do you think that women's suffrage wasn't a thing right?

50:16

Why do you think it wasn't a thing for so long and like is the fact that we've granted women the right to vote now is that like a wonderful thing?

50:24

Well the thing is like if God created like men to be leaders in their home right?

50:31

If God created men to be leaders in their home and like he ordained within the church that like a woman is not to teach her exercise authority over a man and like then what you have to understand is like like the reason why there wasn't women's suffrage is because it was based on a biblical world view that said that the husband was the authority over a wife and the husband should represent the family as a family unit okay?

50:56

So when you think about it in that kind of way right? Like what it would make a kind of sense to say yes the husband should vote and now if the wife has the ability to cancel out her husband's vote by having a right to vote that undermines his authority to influence the society in that kind of way but we're so far from that we don't even think like why was that there?

51:20

Do you get what I'm saying? We just think it was a well we believe the feminist lie that was hateful to women and everything else but like the issue is that like this was founded on a

51:28

Christian world view that's why you had anti -sodomy laws because the old covenant you know makes sodomy a death penalty offense like that's why we did that right?

51:37

And so that's it wasn't because we just you know hated sexual minorities or anything else we had a

51:43

Christian world view and we had laws that were based on that and now we've gotten rid of them okay? So then like to answer your question you know in a little bit shorter way

51:52

I don't know how like I don't know how you ground like your civil code apart from the

51:59

Bible and I think you know America was some sort of effort to do essentially that to copy what you're going to find in the old covenant law and like that's essentially what the

52:11

American experiment was and that's why they're saying it's you know suited for a moral and a religious people and wholly inadequate for any other and so if you don't appeal to the

52:20

Bible I don't know what you're appealing to like you know so what do you appeal to at that point and how you're going to make your laws?

52:27

You know and I think if you listen to a lot of Christians at this point and you run through the deserted island experiment essentially what they would do would be they would have to find some pagans to figure out how to rule them you know because they wouldn't want to impose the

52:41

Bible on anyone you know it's like well I guess you better find some pagans and let them do whatever you want so you can you know suffer for righteousness sake or something and it's just like I don't think that is reasonable or rational or normal you know

52:55

I think you have to ground your morality somewhere and if you're not the Bible then where? Right.

53:01

Yeah and you know you look at like this is Psalm 33 to 12 it says blessed is the nation whose

53:09

God is the Lord the people whom he has chosen for his own inheritance and it seems like when you look at the founding fathers they understood that right and so I mean

53:20

I think still on our money it still says one nation under God doesn't or something along those lines.

53:28

In God we trust. In God we trust. That's what it says and you know the pledge of allegiance is one nation under God and I don't think many of the blessings we've experienced are blessings that are

53:40

Deuteronomic in nature like I mean I think when you have a nation that acknowledges God as sovereign like there are blessings that come from that and the remarkable prosperity that you see within our own country are it is coming from a formal acknowledgement of God as being in charge.

53:56

Right. It's a testimony of Psalm 33 for example. Right. Right. Now you know as we're you know abandoning those things then you gas goes up to 599 or whatever it is.

54:11

It's not quite that high here in Alabama but. My wife was like posting in the group media you know how excited she was that she found gas at 409 or whatever.

54:22

I know. I know. I laughed at that. I thought. My reaction to that was to think man we're excited at 409 you know and I wanted to make a sarcastic comment about this is how far we've fallen but then

54:35

I thought well we should be excited at 409. in all circumstances anyways. It's like you know you just keep your sarcastic comment to yourself like we should be rejoicing in all things right.

54:47

It's never. Right. We should be grumbling and fussing and complaining anyways you know. Right. But. That's the result.

54:54

Gas prices go up and. Gas goes from 159 to 459. Right. But you know

55:02

I yeah I think you see the founding fathers now they're they're they they understood this and I mean if you if if you want to argue that the founding fathers when they wrote you know when they drafted the

55:15

Constitution when they drafted the Bill of Rights when they drafted the Declaration of Independence. Now I understand you know when it comes to the

55:24

Declaration of Independence and the Constitution you know it's not the same authors I think there were only six common authors between the

55:34

Declaration of Independence and the Constitution so I understand that it's not all the same people there but regardless you know you see they understood that it was imperative that they acknowledge

55:49

God's existence and that God is the one who is giving us rights. He's giving us he

55:55

God is the one who gives government authority in the first place right. And and to ignore that and say that you know they clearly meant separation of church and state meaning there can be no you know traces of Christianity when it comes to our government especially the laws that government enacts then you're just totally ignoring.

56:20

It's nonsense. All the work they did. Yeah you're ignoring that but it's nonsense it's just like how do you like okay alright let's take the

56:27

Bible out of it alright so we can't punish murder anymore because the Bible talks about murder. Take the

56:32

Bible out of it you can't punish stealing anymore because the Bible says like thou shalt not steal right? Right right.

56:37

Those are Christian values. You can't have those anymore. But they're not I mean they're not shared they're obviously not just shared values with every culture and every society.

56:45

We're living in a culture and society right now that does not share the value thou shalt not kill when it comes to the unborn.

56:52

And there's been plenty of you know societies throughout the history of the world that do not share that value. You know Hitler did not share that value with the

56:59

Jews. So like if like there's no way to unravel the mess I mean God defines morality for us so like you say okay well we can't have we can't legislate morality you know you think you've said something profound there.

57:12

Then I guess we can't punish murder and I guess we can't punish theft you know and like you know the truth is that socialism is theft and that like is exactly what's happening at that point and the only way to push against socialism is to is to you know be pushing at it because the

57:27

Bible says thou shalt not steal. Well you can't take money that I've earned and worked for and give it to people who haven't earned it and haven't worked for it and so.

57:34

Right. But then like you get rid of that like I mean like what do you what do you have left right.

57:40

So I mean at every single point whatever the laws are like you get rid of everything that's in the

57:46

Bible you have nothing left like there's nothing left to what do you do you know. Yeah yeah. And so like the issue is well where do they come from right like where is your morality coming from where are your laws coming from who gets to say and you don't like the

58:00

Bible's grounding for it then what are you going to appeal to it's the point and you know so I guess not it's not just that you can just pull the audience and figure out what parts of the

58:10

Bible they agree with and then declare those to be neutral like the issue is like like like this is irrational okay.

58:17

Mm -hmm. Like you have to you have to have some grounding for your morality and the Bible is a grounding for that and and you know and Christians don't need to quit being embarrassed by it so so we have man like you know it's not like all we have like it's pitiful thing it's like that's what we have and it's enough it's sufficient and yeah and you have to trust in it and depend on it and quit apologizing for it and you know if if people would be more bold in that kind of way then like it may be that many people will repent too.

58:49

Absolutely yeah and I love that too what you said I mean look if all right if we want to take

58:54

Christianity out of it then we need to rewrite it. laws that you know penalize murder and rape and theft right because those are those are

59:03

Christian values. And slavery. And slavery right right all of these things you know they're

59:10

Christian they're Christian values and you can argue that they're not that they're common sense but you're just wrong.

59:16

I mean you're just flat -out wrong and you there is no basis for morality outside of the

59:22

Christian worldview because God has already said what is good and what is right and what is evil and what is wrong.

59:29

So Tim that's that's everything that I've got is there anything that you want to touch on that maybe we didn't we didn't really get to in the conversation?

59:41

Yeah I'm sure that we could go a variety of different directions with the topic in general but then

59:47

I think the broader point is made that you do have to have some sort of grounding for your morality and if it's not the

59:54

Bible then what is it? And you know I think you know atheism essentially doesn't have that or secularism is bankrupt at that point and atheism doesn't have an objective moral grounding.

01:00:05

I think the more that our culture and society does decay around us the more that like it'll be clear that we need

01:00:13

God's word to govern us in that way and that's our only hope. And you have a lot of people right now who are basically trying to chuck that over the rails but then the shocking thing is how far they're going.

01:00:25

And I think the more that like it's not actually shocking if you understand that this is essentially what the scriptures will tell you it would happen when a society refuses to honor

01:00:36

God in its thoughts. They become futile in their thinking. Their foolish hearts are darkened and professing to be wise they become fools.

01:00:42

Exchange the glory of the you know immortal God you know to images resembling man at that point.

01:00:49

So God gives them over to certain kinds of iniquity and that's what we're seeing in our society that God is giving as they're not honoring

01:00:56

God in their thoughts is giving them over to things that we thought unthinkable. Right?

01:01:02

We thought these kinds of things are unthinkable but then what we're finding is they're not. You know and you're going to have individuals marrying robots and you're going to have individuals marrying their pets and you know normalizing pedophilia and every there's no like there's no breaks apart.

01:01:17

You take away the break of the Bible there's nothing objective left and the problem is that sin always wants to go further and further and further and further and wants more and if you check the

01:01:32

Christian worldview you check the whole project. Right. Yeah. Absolutely.

01:01:37

And you know yeah obviously there's a lot of different ways that you could really take this conversation but I do think that is sort of the root issue of the problem is once you once you try and argue that God needs to be removed from politics altogether.

01:01:56

Then you essentially have no justification for government. I mean there's and not only government but there's no justification for your morality in general and I don't think

01:02:08

I just don't think people understand that I think too often our society takes that for granted because we are even now even today we are still benefiting from the

01:02:23

Christian worldview that our nation was founded out of and you know now that's fading away and fading away quickly and and you're right there will be people who come along and not only say like hey it's it's it's it's not only okay but it's it's good to you know be attracted to the same sex it's good to mutilate our bodies and pretend that we're we're a gender that we were not born as they'll they'll say hey it's good to be attracted to you know children and it's it's good to be attracted to animals you know eventually it'll be it's good to murder the people we don't like right already is yeah and right yeah

01:03:09

I mean it is when it when it comes to abortion we are already there I mean you know there

01:03:15

I can't tell you how many times I've seen liberals essentially advocating for essentially that towards conservatives right you know but and that's essentially what's happened with the great reset thing that we've experienced recently yeah yeah and so I think really we're just we're just we're seeing you know

01:03:35

I guess it was in the book of judges to maybe two times it says everyone did right what was right in their own eyes and that's essentially a description of the atheistic worldview right is once you reject

01:03:51

God then you reject morality and everyone will just do what they think is okay and and we're seeing that more and more but even even now we are still benefiting from this idea that there are still you know some things that generally you know with massive exceptions sometimes are still considered evil but you will see those fade away

01:04:17

I mean if if you want to reject God then eventually you'll reject those things as well and I think we need to get people to understand that once they reject

01:04:26

God they reject any justification for anything that they think is like murder is bad for example you just lose it and you can't you don't have a justification anymore and so so we as Christians we really need to be you know set we need to be saying that and and we need to be okay with the justification that God said it and that's a good enough reason right and and realize that they that someone who rejects

01:04:55

God's existence or even someone who you know who realizes God is real but but hates him you know they don't have anything like that all they have is their own justification they all they have is well

01:05:09

I think it's it's good or I think it's bad and and that's a yeah

01:05:14

I mean God said it do what now? It's a flimsy ground to stand on.

01:05:21

Yeah that's that's flimsy and we have you know a solid rock to stand on we have truth to stand on a solid foundation and they simply don't and we need to make that plain and we need to make that clear and so hopefully this has been a helpful conversation for you guys and and hopefully it's you know hopefully in all of this it's also not only you know helped you to understand how

01:05:47

God views government what the purpose of government is according to God and the benefits of of introducing the

01:05:58

Christian worldview and letting the Christian worldview influence politics it's beneficial for so many reasons and God says it's beneficial he straight up says that the nations who do that are blessed right but then not only that hopefully hopefully this has been helpful and helping you understand what the founding fathers thought because they understood these things and they were willing to risk their lives in so many ways and and their families lives and their you know their fortunes their livelihoods on this idea and and you know there's too many people out there who want to try and pretend that the founding fathers were the same as like you know a 12 year old atheist on a message board somewhere that they they pretended they were

01:06:44

Christians but in reality they weren't and I think there's a discussion to be had about you know how faithful were they as Christians but then the reality is they did understand that God was real they recognized that and they they did fear him enough to allow him allow him to inform their view of government and how they founded the country and so hopefully this has been helpful for you guys hopefully it's equipped you guys to be able to go out and have these conversations with people who disagree and and hopefully that leads to sharing the gospel and and sharing the message of hope with them because if they if they don't if people don't hear the gospel then they they will not turn from their sin they will not realize that there's a hope there is a way to avoid the punishment that comes with sin and so so hopefully this is equipped you guys to be able to have those conversations and we want to take the time to to thank you for listening and and supporting us and we wish you guys a happy July 4th and we'll catch you on the next one this has been another episode of Bible bashed we hope you have been encouraged and blessed through our discussion we thank you for all your support and ask you to continue to like and subscribe to Bible bashed and share our podcast with your friends and on social media please reach out to us with your questions push back and potential topics for us to discuss in future episodes at Bible bashed podcast at gmail .com

01:08:15

and consider supporting us through patreon if you would like to be Bible bashed personally you can and please know that we also offer free biblical counseling which you can take advantage of by emailing us now go boldly and obey the truth in the midst of a biblically illiterate world who will be perpetually offended by your every move