Prayer and Politics: When Do Christians Really Partner with Evil?

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the conversations that matter podcast. I'm your host, John Harris. Hopefully this won't be too long of a podcast.

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I did want to just address something that was a controversy yesterday.

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It's a controversy today. And normally I think I would pass this by, but as things developed,

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I said, you know, this is something that I think could help a lot of people because we all have questions in our own lives of, you know, when is it appropriate to, like how close is too close?

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When can you be with someone who is advocating something against Christianity as a co -belligerent or in some kind of arrangement where you're together and maybe you're not contradicting them.

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I mean, can you do that at a job? Can you do that in the workplace? Can you do that in politics? Can you do that in the church? What kinds of places can you do that if you can do it?

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I mean, these are questions I think that everyone has in Christianity at some time or another, they're going to be wondering whether or not they're compromising.

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And I think as things keep going the way they're going, and right now, the way they're going, just to be clear, there were more

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Bibles sold last year than there have been in a long time. There's a lot of good things that we can see happening, a lot of interest,

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I think, in Christianity. But at the same time, the levels of church attendance are falling and there seems to be a secularization or a secularization coupled with a paganization that's happening more and more, even during the

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Trump presidency. And I think those trends will likely continue unless the Lord, of course, intervenes and it depends on the region and so forth.

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But that's the data that I've seen at least. So we'll see what happens.

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I'm hopeful that the Lord's doing something, but I'm not sure exactly how it's going to all shake out. So I think as that happens, we as believers are going to be pressed more and more into coalitions with those who are not

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Orthodox in their theology, or even Christians, perhaps. People who are interested in maintaining some of the walls that we want to maintain because the other walls have been broken into.

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So we're kind of retreating, think of like a siege, and you're in the, people have breached the walls and now you're farther in, you're blocking the door.

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And there's people who wouldn't have been with you on the wall necessarily, but now they're with you and they're helping you in this element of the siege.

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And we have to figure out exactly how we're going to work with those kinds of people, right? So I think these kinds of questions are going to become more and more.

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And so with that in mind, I thought I would maybe help the conversation along by bringing some scripture to it and bringing you a scenario that's been controversial, which is

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William Wolfe in the White House, who's the, just for those who don't know, he's the president of the

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Center for Baptist Leadership. He's been on the podcast before, but he was in the White House yesterday. And of course there were other people in the

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White House as well. Some of, one of the things they did was they prayed for President Trump, and this was under the banner of the office.

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Was it Office for Faith? Let me look it up real quick. I think it's the, yeah,

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White House Faith Office. So that's what it's called. But Paula White, of course, was there. And so this became a controversy.

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Paula White is a prosperity teacher. She preaches a false gospel, as I understand.

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I haven't looked into her deeply, but that's the claim at least, that that's what she advocates. And I have no reason to doubt that claim, but she was there along with someone like William Wolfe and a number of other people who range in their, let's just say their views on scripture and their orthodox opinions and so forth.

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So is that okay? Is it okay to be in a room like that? What if the president calls you up or someone at the behest of the president calls you up and says, we want you, we want you to come pray.

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We want you to come advise the president. Can you come? What do you do? Do you check to see, okay, what's the guest list gonna look like?

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Is everyone else there an actual Christian? If not, you know, if there's one person that's not, do you stay home?

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What are the rules in this case? And so let me show you the situation and then we'll get into it a little bit.

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So here's some tweets that William Wolfe put out there. He says, it was a huge honor to represent

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Baptist leaders and meet the real Donald Trump today, along with other Christian leaders and pray for him in the

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Oval Office. It's been an incredible day, been keeping this under wraps until it happened, but can't wait to share more.

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And this was, and it's important for me to note that he didn't just take this picture. This was actually someone,

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I was talking to someone about this today, just mentioning it and they're like, well, why would he post a picture of it? I said, he didn't. It was

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Margot Martin who posted it and whoever this person is, they work in the

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White House. So the government effectively posted this. So the government puts it out there and William's in the picture.

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So is Owen Strand, by the way. I didn't notice that at first, but people kept pointing it out and then I realized finally that's gotta be him.

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So it is. But the post is a picture. If you're watching, you can see it. And it says,

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President Trump's White House Faith Office welcomed faith leaders from across the country to pray in the Oval Office.

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So these are faith leaders. And one of the things I wanna just point out off the top here is you have to ask yourself, why is it

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William Wolfe? He actually has no official capacity in the Southern Baptist Convention. He's not running an entity.

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In fact, a lot of Southern Baptists in high positions probably don't care for him because he holds them accountable.

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Why is it him? Why would the Trump administration not invite Clint Presley, the president of the

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Southern Baptist Convention to come? I mean, Clint and William actually live, I think, fairly close to each other.

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They're both in Southern North Carolina. And it's not like it would be inconvenient to try to get

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Clint to come. Why wasn't he there? Why wasn't some other person there? So maybe even someone closer to Washington, DC.

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They have lobbyists, right, from the ERLC, but no one from the ERLC was there. It was William Wolfe. And I think the answer is obvious, but I think it's good to think through it if the answer is not obvious to you.

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Everyone in that room represented an individual who is in support of the

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MAGA agenda on some level. There's someone who was very pro -Trump, wanted Trump elected, wasn't neutral about it, wasn't and isn't neutral about aspects, important aspects of the make

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America great again, America first type agenda. And that's who was in the room.

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So that's, I think, why William got an invite. He didn't tell me that, but I'm just saying that that is what makes the most sense because otherwise you would think it would be someone who's an official representative of a denomination, but William is, he is being rewarded here in a sense.

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I guess you could call this a reward, but it's a matter of influence on some level.

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He's being granted this because he's on team Trump in some respect. That's why

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I think he's there. Now, obviously the Lord in his sovereignty has worked out that William's there as well, but I'm saying the, you know, from our perspective in an earthly way, the cause that I think the mechanism for God's will to be done here is the fact that William was that way leading up to the election.

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So I think that's important to point out. That's why he's there and not someone else. But I think there were some other

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Southern Baptists in that room and he wasn't the only one. I think there was another Southern Baptist pastor, at least one who was there, but I don't recognize all of these guys.

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I do recognize some of them, but all kind of religious right guys.

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David Barton's there. You can see him. Yeah, anyway, there's a few.

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I recognize their faces and I can't actually place, like, I don't remember their names exactly. I've focused so much on the evangelical left that I could do a lineup and recognize all those guys and give you their names.

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But I haven't focused quite as much on these guys. And some of them aren't even that famous,

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I don't think. They're not as popular. But again, like William, they're there probably because they support the president in some way.

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So there's William. He posted this picture outside the White House after the whole thing happened.

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And why shouldn't he? I would post a picture as well. So here's the backlash, if you want to call it that.

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Justin Peters says, this is being led by Paula White, one of the most egregious and obvious false teachers ever to disgrace the name of Christ.

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I may vote with a false teacher, but I will never ever under any circumstance pray with one or participate in any spiritual endeavor of any kind with one.

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So that was his statement. And I went back and forth a little bit with him because I defended

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William. I was saying I was glad to see William there. And he took some issue with that.

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Maybe I'll show you that. If people ask me, if you guys want me to show you that,

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I'll show you that. How's that? So I can see the comments already coming in. If not, then it's not that relevant for our purposes,

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I suppose. Gabriel Hughes says, prayer led by Paula White, never, ever, ever, not without serious repentance, which would require her stepping down as a pastor and rejecting her false prosperity theology.

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So now I found out, by the way, the prayer was not led by Paula White.

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She did not pray in the White House, as far as in the terms of leading the prayer or audibly saying a prayer.

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So this was assumed, I think, because she is leading this office, but she actually was not the one leading the prayer, which is interesting.

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So there was some false assumptions going on here. Bill Roach, who has been on the podcast before,

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I would just, I guess, disagree with him in a friendly way about this, but he says, who you pray with says a lot about who you pray to.

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I joined with Justin. I would never pray with Paula White, which that's an interesting, that's kind of a serious accusation, actually, because it's implying you're not really praying to God if you're praying with Paula White.

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That's a very serious charge to make about some of the guys in that room. A guy named

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Chris Honholtz, I hope I'm pronouncing the name right, but he says, Justin is absolutely correct. Truth matters over and above politics.

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Paula White is disqualified from the role she asserts to hold and teaches false doctrine, which is in direct contradiction to scripture.

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She is doubly wicked, and no person claiming to preach the word of God should stand with her in such prayer. And then

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Nathaniel Jolly says, who's a pastor, or I think he is a pastor in Oklahoma, if I'm not mistaken.

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I think he was, he was like in Alaska. I think he's in Oklahoma. I'm not sure if he's still there. But he said, there is no circumstance that would get me to join in prayer or any spiritual engagement led by Paula White, none.

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It would be indefensible as a faithful believer. So these are all very serious charges. And, you know,

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William, I had a conversation with him, I don't know, two weeks ago, maybe. And he mentioned that this was a possibility that he might go to the

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White House. And he predicted, you know, he hasn't given me permission to say this. And so I am stepping out a little bit on a limb, but I think it's okay to say this, that he predicted exactly the kind of backlash

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I think that's coming now. And I don't want to really represent him further than saying that, because I don't know if he would appreciate me.

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I'm really just trying to compliment him that he could read the tea leaves and he understood. But I will say,

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I'll just say this. He is not approving, he does not approve any of the heterodox theology that might be represented in that room.

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I know for a fact he was there for one simple purpose, and that is president of the United States or someone at his behest has invited him to come and he wants to serve his country and he wants to serve the

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Lord. And if the Lord is going to put him in a place where he has a greater amount of influence, he wants to use that influence, especially in a place where he could dilute the influence of potential bad actors.

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And I have to respect that, I think that's a noble thing, knowing that you would be attacked by some of your own peers, but seeing a higher purpose in this, which is how

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I think he approached this. But yeah, it's true, I'm friends with him. I really,

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I like William, I think he's a fighter. I think we need more guys like him to be quite honest, who are motivated and want to see the word of God and biblical ethics be promoted in the public sphere.

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We need guys like that, but regardless of whether it's him or someone else, or you maybe, maybe you're asked to be part of,

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I was talking to my dad today and he's a pastor, local pastor and years ago, he had been asked to be part of an interfaith thing in the community that we lived in at the time.

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And it was compromising though, because the whole idea was to set up like charitable things that the town could then let this interfaith group know about, and then they could go do, and then donations and that kind of thing would go to this entity, this interfaith entity with Muslims and all kinds of people.

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And his response was basically like, look, if you need help, if you need charity from the church, if you need people to help with Thanksgiving or Christmas, providing meals, that kind of thing, we're happy to do it.

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And people can give to our church if they want to help with that. We're happy to just give if it helps our town, if it helps our community, but we can't get ourselves into a situation where we have all these false religions that we're in one, and we're not just co -belligerents, we're now cooperating and endorsing one another in calling it ministry, essentially, like a

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Muslim giving someone food is a ministry just as much as a Christian under the umbrella that they wanted to or the arrangement they wanted to make.

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And so, there's all kinds of scenarios where you're going to be rubbing shoulders with these unbelievers, whether it's local, whether it's as the levels that William Wolfe is operating at.

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And so I wanna just give some, hopefully some biblical clarification and hopefully some common sense, and tell you where I think the lines are on these things.

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So that's the whole point of this podcast. I think that's all I want. Oh, I was gonna just share this before we get into the scripture, if I can pull it up.

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Let's see here. This is, people were wondering, and there seems to be a lot of ignorance about this, but you can easily see it online.

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This is the fact sheet from the White House on the establishment of the White House Faith Office.

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So it says on here, and this is actually pretty key, that the White House Faith Office will empower faith -based entities, community organization, and houses of worship to better serve families and communities.

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And this is, by the way, no different, I don't think, or much different than what George W. Bush was doing. This office,

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George W. Bush, I think, was the one who first started this, and it has just never gone away. And I kind of think it should, to be honest with you, maybe this is a little bit of a rabbit trail, but it's like the

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Department of Education, or the prison system, or a lot of things that I don't really care for. I'm really grateful that there's

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Christians being salt and light. I wouldn't condemn a Christian welfare worker for working in a corrupt system and trying to bring salt and light to that.

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I do think, though, that the system itself is probably not good. And I would say that for this, I don't necessarily care for this.

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I don't think it was a good idea when George W. Bush set it up, necessarily. There's always been unofficial advisors to the president.

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I mean, Billy Graham was one of those guys, right? I don't know how many presidents he advised in spiritual ways, but forming this office for the purposes that I'm about to read for you,

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I think is more about interfaith initiatives. It's government money being used by entities to promote an agenda of some kind.

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This has been the problem with USAID, really. It's that the government was giving these organizations like World Vision all this money to do something the government couldn't do, but essentially the government is paying for it.

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So they become an arm of the government. And this has been, I think it grows the government in ways that I prefer that it didn't and so forth.

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But look, if I was asked to head it up, I would probably say yes. I'm not getting those calls, but I'm just saying, it's like those other things that I mentioned.

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If it's going to exist, we want good people in those roles, obviously. But I personally don't think it's a good thing to have exist.

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But I'll read you the rest of the things they do here. The office will be housed in the domestic policy council and will consult with experts within the faith community and make recommendations to the president regarding changes to policies, programs, and practices to better align with the

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American values. It's pretty broad stuff. This isn't necessarily gonna touch on the things that Paula White is specifically in error on.

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American values, that's pretty broad. There is an assumption there, by the way, though, that American values are essentially

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Christian values. Everyone in that room was a Christian of some variety. I'm not saying an Orthodox or a born -again believer in every sense.

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I'm saying, though, that there weren't Muslims or members of other religions. The office will coordinate with agencies on religious liberty training and on identifying and promoting grant opportunities for nonprofit faith -based entities, community organizations, and houses of worship.

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And it says the office will work in collaboration with the attorney general to identify failures to enforce constitutional and federal statutory protections for religious liberty.

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So a lot of this is about religious liberty, but now there's a whole section on defending religious liberty, touting

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Trump's record. It's really about maintaining a,

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I guess, a communication with people who support the president's agenda, who are in these religious communities,

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Christianity in particular, apparently, and making sure that religious liberty is being promoted because that's part of President Trump's agenda.

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And these guys can help him understand how better to do that. So there is an element of crafting policy here, of statecraft.

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And then, of course, advising on what organizations should get money from the government to do certain things, rewarding people who are gonna be more loyal to America First agenda, and not rewarding people who have been, who bat on that.

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I mean, that's really what it is. So this is what you have to ask yourself before we even get into scripture here.

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What kind of a role really is this office? Is this an ecclesiastical role? Is this an official ecclesiastical position that Paula White even has?

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Is it a ministry? Is it a parachurch? I would contend, based on what we just read, it is none of those things.

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It is not ecclesiastical. It is now, I'm not saying it can't be corrupted into potentially becoming an ecclesiastical arm of the church or something like that, but it would take a lot of steps,

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I think, to get to that point. Like, and what I mean by that is like an official, like England has an official church, that kind of thing.

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Like, we're not looking at that, is what I'm saying. Like, it would take some steps to get to that point. These guys aren't using ecclesiastical authority.

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They're not ruling on matters of doctrine or anything like that. So this is essentially a government entity.

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This is an advisory board for the government. It is statecraft that we're talking about here. So then

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I think a new set of questions, if that's the case, are going to apply to this. Would this be a compromise, let's say, if you were a senator and someone gave the invocation who didn't have

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Orthodox theology and you remained in the room and were respectful during that time? Are you having fellowship with darkness, if that's the case?

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This Saturday, there's a funeral that I am invited to that I will likely go to for a friend of mine whose father passed away.

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The friend of mine is a believer. In fact, I was instrumental in leading him to the Lord years ago.

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And his father is part of a

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Roman Catholic tradition and I know according to a lot of these guys who are criticizing William Wolfe, that would be outside the boundaries, certainly.

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And I'm gonna probably go to a Catholic church where there will likely be prayers.

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There will likely be, I'm assuming there's gonna be a liturgy with songs and things, I don't know. It's been a while since I've been to a

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Catholic funeral, but I'm gonna go to pay my respects. And this is something

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I didn't really even think about in detail as being potentially compromising. It's just kind of like what you do, right?

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Like you're there, I'm not there for the purpose of endorsing that particular brand of Christendom.

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And I don't think the people there assume that I'm doing that. And I don't look like I'm doing that. And I'm not really giving any cover for that or just giving the impression that it's all okay or anything like that.

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That's not at all why I'm there. In fact, there'll be a lot of people there probably who are not practicing

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Catholics. But they're there because this is where the service to honor this individual is being held.

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Is that a compromise, right? So like, I'm bringing up a number of different scenarios that touch on similar points.

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But in each of these scenarios, hopefully the thing that you're asking yourself is, what scriptures apply to each setting?

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And I think different scriptures apply. So maybe it would be good. I wasn't gonna start there, but now that I'm thinking about it,

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I probably will. Maybe it would be good just to bring up the verse that Justin Peters referenced, which was in Romans chapter 16.

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And I'm looking at my Bible right now. I don't have it pulled up on the screen, but if you're looking at a screen or you're looking at your

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Bible, you could pull up Romans 16. And if you go down to verse 17,

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Paul kind of breaks a flow. The flow is he's ending the letter to Rome, the church at Rome, and he's saying to greet various people.

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Greet one another with a holy kiss is kind of his cap on that, because he names all these guys by name.

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And then he says, greet one another with a holy kiss. All the churches of Christ greet you. And then he switches in verse 17, and he gives some final instructions to them.

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And he says, now I urge you, brethren, keep your eye on those who cause dissensions and hindrances contrary to the teaching which you learned.

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So watch, observe. You don't want divisions.

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You want unity in the church. And when it's hindrances, hindrances to those who are keeping them from barriers to spiritual life and development and so forth, by introducing teachings that are contrary to the ones that they learn.

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In other words, the apostolic doctrine, true orthodox theology. He instructs, he says, and turn away from them.

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Different translations say this differently. Some say mark and avoid. This word's used,

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I know, one other time at the beginning of Romans, when I think it says like, I think it's, it says we have turned, oh,

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I think it's Romans three. Maybe I should just look it up real quick. See if I can find it real quick.

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No, it's not popping up right in front of me. Well, anyway, maybe

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I'll look it up later, but it's used in the sense of turning away from, I think, righteousness.

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And it's like a wholesale turning away. And so it's a rejection.

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It's a shunning. It's really, I think, talking about church discipline here. This is what we're talking about.

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And it says, for such men, it describes them, our slaves, not of our

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Lord Christ, but of their own appetites. And by their smooth and flattering speech, they deceive the hearts of the unsuspecting.

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For the report of your obedience has reached to all. Therefore, I am rejoicing over you. So then he talks about complimenting them, but this is who we're talking about, right?

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So let's just assume Paula White's in that category. She is not of our

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Lord. She's of her own appetite. She uses smooth and flattering speech. She deceives the heart of the unsuspecting.

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Now, if she was in your church, and I mean, this is a letter to a church, a local church, then

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I think the answer's obvious. What should happen there, right? You should confront that.

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And then what would start would be the steps of church discipline, if there was unrepentant spirit there, right?

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That's pretty obvious to me. I think that's all really that it's saying. So you can go to other passages that I did not see.

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Oh, someone said it's Romans 3 .12. Thank you, thank you. Romans 3 .12 is the other place that that particular word is used.

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And that says, okay, so I was right.

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It is Romans 3. All have turned aside together. They have become useless. There is none who does good, not even one.

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So that turned aside is the same word. So it's a complete rejection, I think, that that's what is being discussed here.

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It is a rejection. It is a shunning. It's church discipline. It's the final step. And I think verse 17 is not giving detailed steps here.

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Like Matthew 18 does. I mean, cause it starts with like, keep your eye on those who cause dissensions and hindrances.

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And then it says, and turn away from them. So like, if you're keeping your eye on them at first to test whether these people are doing what verse 17 is describing, then like that obviously has to come before turning away.

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These are two different things that are going on there. So it's a process. Anyway, all that to say that's the verse

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Justin Peters used and said that, you know, essentially if you're in that room, and I think in later tweets, you know,

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William Wolfe was in that room. He is guilty of this. He's not turning away from her. And so we have to ask yourself, is that the context in which this verse is to be applied?

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I'll leave that hanging for a moment. Now there are other verses that were not brought up, but I would like to just bring them up very briefly if I can.

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We have, there's a lot of verses about false teachers, but let me just read for you a few that I pulled up here.

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You have 2 Timothy 3 .5, holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power, avoid such men as these.

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So the same kind of thing here, avoiding men who are false teachers. Titus 3, reject a factious man after a first and second warning, knowing that such a man is perverted and is sinning beyond being self -condemned.

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2 John 1 .9, anyone who goes too far and does not abide in the teaching of Christ does not have God. And the one who abides in his teaching, he is both a father and son.

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If anyone comes to you and does not bring this teaching, do not receive him into your house and do not give him a greeting, for the one who gives him a greeting participates in his evil deeds.

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And in that particular context, so far as I understand, this was viewed as an endorsement that you have someone coming and they're a traveling preacher and you're giving them sanction.

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You're helping them further their mission, their teaching.

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And that's what it meant to be in someone's house. I don't, so I've wrestled with this before and I actually respect people who might disagree with me on this, because there's some who will say you'll never have a

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Jehovah's Witness in your house because you'd be violating this. I actually don't think that's the same scenario, but I totally respect people who wanna be careful and stay away from any appearance.

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So I get it, but that's, I think it's in the sense of endorsement there, but we could go on and on.

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First Timothy, Galatians one, Matthew seven, right? You wear false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly a ravenous wolves.

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There's all these different things, all these different warnings. Now, why do I bring this all up?

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Because the same people, mostly Paul, John, and Jesus, right, the same people who said these things and wrote these warnings also lived at a time where there was,

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I would contend, the most corrupt establishment of religion that maybe there's ever been.

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And that would be the Pharisees. That would be those who Jesus argued with constantly.

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Yet at the same time, you do see Jesus and Paul going into situations where they're going to bring true teaching.

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So they're emissaries of God to bring true teaching into the temples. And they would likely have had to see ceremonies, be,

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I guess, present for ceremonies and prayers and so forth that were administered by false teachers.

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Now, obviously they're not contradicting their own advice, right? Why are they there? What are they doing?

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Well, they're there for a specific mission, a specific purpose. They're not there under the banner of this is the true church and these people,

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I'm going to endorse these people. Often, obviously Jesus is even rebuking, but even before he's rebuking, right, is he's just going to the temple to teach.

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And they're amazed at his teaching because he teaches as one having authority. He does so without causing major stirs, at least early on in his ministry.

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He does so with the mission of, a positive mission of getting his message out. And he's using this mechanism to do so.

31:07

He's not a leader in that particular setting. He's not a leader of that false church, if you will, that temple, pharisaical sect, whatever.

31:20

So I see even, you know, I remember one time I went, I'm going to submit this. I went to a

31:25

Mormon church once, it was years ago. I've actually been in mosque too. Cause I did a philosophy of religion class.

31:31

I just remembered that I went to a mosque once and they did their evening prayers and I was present for it, right? And I obviously wasn't endorsing that.

31:38

It was obvious why I was there. I was there for the purpose of learning and observing. When I went to a

31:45

Mormon church, right? There might've been some people who didn't know who I was, who wondered why

31:50

I was there. But really the reason was, was we had Mormons showing up at our church with their elder badges on and they were brazen.

31:57

I mean, they came in, stayed for Sunday school, stayed for church, said, we came to your church.

32:03

Why don't you come to ours? Kind of like as a, I guess, I don't know, challenge. And I said, sure,

32:09

I'll come to your church. I was kind of curious too. I've never, I walked in, there was all these paintings on the wall of Jesus preaching to like, it looked like Native Americans.

32:19

It was really interesting. And then the service was, it wasn't like a typical

32:24

Baptist service or any Protestant service where you're preaching. It was people just giving testimonies. And they have these kids who they say are priests in the order of Melchizedek.

32:34

Talk about a blasphemy. But they come out and they, I think as I remember, they didn't even have like wine or grape juice.

32:41

It was water for their communion. It, there was a bunch of, you know, odd things, different things.

32:47

Anyway, I was in the back and sitting there with a friend of mine. And there was no endorsement coming from me, obviously, of any of the activities that I was seeing.

33:00

In fact, I had been already, I guess, in that situation,

33:05

I had been in discussions with some of these missionaries. They already knew that I disagreed with them. But all that to say,

33:14

I think it is possible to be in a room with people who are doing things that, or people who are unorthodox, doing things that God is not hearing.

33:26

And for one to be an observer or one even to respect a solemn occasion in the sense of a funeral, or one to, even in the case of where William Wolfe was, to pray silently in your mind for Donald Trump, although, as I understand, the prayer wasn't even given by Paula White.

33:43

I don't know who it was given by, the audible prayer, but I don't necessarily see anything compromising in that, but there's a bigger reason here.

33:53

And that goes back to what I said earlier. I don't actually think this is a church. I don't think this is even necessarily ecclesiastical in the sense that there's no governance over any kind of church or denomination that's being practiced here.

34:09

This is a government advisory board. And I think the verses that I just read for you are for a different context.

34:16

These are about the purity of the church, letters given to churches, and it's for church leaders to make sure that they can shoot the wolves and tend to the cheap and ensure that the flock is safe in the fold.

34:33

These are verses for in the fold, right? When you're outside the fold,

34:38

I don't mean like you're a Christian, but you're out there in the world doing things like conducting business and engaging in politics and those kinds of things.

34:48

I think there are other examples we have and teachings in scripture that are wise to consider on this that I think would give us a different impression.

34:57

And so with that, I've said this for a long time. I don't know how long I've said it, but it's been a long time.

35:04

I think the book of Daniel and Daniel's example is one of the most important books in scripture for us to understand for these times, because it is the example of someone who did not compromise, very uncompromising man, and so were his friends.

35:22

And they had all kinds of challenges beyond what we face and opportunities to compromise.

35:29

And they operated in, for Daniel, it was actually, it was somewhat of almost, it was an ecclesiastical capacity, but it was also a governmental capacity.

35:38

And I think for us, especially when we are being pressed together with those who might share quote unquote family values or some semblance of Christian values on some level, but they're not actually

35:51

Orthodox believers, we're gonna have to look to Daniel's example to see how he operated.

35:56

So with that, I just wanna go to Daniel. And if you have your Bibles, I guess you can turn there, but let's talk about it a little bit.

36:03

So, oh, I lost my place. I had Daniel pulled up and now it's gone. All right, give me a minute here.

36:11

I have the big preacher's Bible. The pages are so weighty. Takes longer to flip.

36:17

All right, we're in Daniel. I'll just give you a few verses. Chapter one sets the context.

36:22

So we'll just read a little bit here. It says that there was a siege in the year reign of Jehoiakim, King of Judah.

36:32

Nebuchadnezzar was the one sieging from Babylon. And it says that the king ordered in verse three,

36:42

Ashpenaz, the chief of his officials to bring in some of the sons of Israel, including some of the royal family and of the nobles.

36:50

Youths in whom was no defect. So the king is summoning these people, right? And they were good looking, they had all these things.

36:58

And he told them, he gave them in teaching, he gave them understanding and discernment in knowledge.

37:08

And let's see, or I guess that's what they already possess. Anyway, it says, he ordered him to teach them the literature and language of the

37:17

Chaldeans. So this would have included religion. There's no doubt about that.

37:23

So it's not just the culture and the language. But they're getting a full spoonful of the

37:32

Chaldeans religion. So some rudimentary probably form of Zoroastrianism or something. The king appointed for them a daily ration, right?

37:40

So he orders them to take part in this, really this operation to make them rulers, to make them part of his government.

37:55

And it's a wise thing in some ways, like you're going to take those who would be your biggest problems, because they are the smartest, they're the wisest, they're already respected.

38:05

And you're going to recruit them to your team by taking them when they're young and impressionable, right? That's what he's doing.

38:12

And Daniel sees, he actually imbibes all of this, but he sees compromise and he's avoiding it.

38:20

He says, he's not going to eat the meat. And of course there's a miracle there, they feed him vegetables and he does okay.

38:30

They actually, him and Ananias and Mishael and Azariah all gained strength, but he doesn't eat the meat or let's see, it says, let's see, verse eight, it says,

38:43

Daniel made up his mind that he would not defile himself with the king's choice food or with the wine.

38:48

So it wasn't just meat. So he sought permission from the commander of the officials that he might not defile himself. So these were, this was meat, presumably sacrifice to idols.

38:57

This was part of, he would not take part in the religious ceremony. He'll learn about it, but he's not going to take part in it.

39:03

That's really the point. And then chapter two comes. And this is interesting to me because it says here that the king has this dream.

39:16

He wants the, and this is the word it uses in my English translation of verse two, the magicians, the conjurers, the sorcerers and the

39:24

Chaldeans to tell him the dream. And if they don't, they get killed. Those are the people that, and they can't do it, right?

39:33

Obviously, and then Daniel can, but Daniel at this point is, he's going to be killed along with them.

39:41

And you say, hmm, that's, well, why would he be killed? Like he's not a magician. He's not a sorcerer. He's not a

39:46

Chaldean. So why would he be killed? And the reason is, is because he's serving in their ranks.

39:53

He's surrounded by them. That's where he works now. And he's working in basically a governmental capacity, but it's got a religious connection.

40:05

And these would have been on a certain level, I guess, his peers, even though he completely disagrees with them and won't compromise by following their religion.

40:17

So he says that, he prays about it, and it says that he wanted to, verse 24,

40:30

Daniel went to Ariok, whom the king had appointed to destroy the wise men of Babylon. He went and spoke to him as follows, do not destroy the wise men of Babylon.

40:38

All the people that I just read for you, the conjurers, like he didn't want them destroyed, which is interesting also to me, says don't destroy them.

40:48

Take me into the king's presence and I'll declare the interpretation to the king. Now you think he sees an opportunity here? I think so.

40:54

He's gonna do what they couldn't do. And in so doing, what does he end up making himself out to be?

41:04

He's humble. He says, it's God that's interpreting a dream, but what position does he arise to in the hierarchy?

41:12

He becomes the ruler of it. He becomes in control of the president's faith commission.

41:17

Now, oops, that's not what it says. This is beyond anything that we have in our country. He's in charge of all these bad guys in a sense, right?

41:25

Like you talk about errant theology. I mean, that's what you got here. And later on, as you keep reading

41:33

Daniel, you find out that this happens again, right?

41:39

With Nebuchadnezzar. So Daniel is called after the Magi failed to interpret

41:46

Nebuchadnezzar's second dream, and that's in Daniel four. It says, finally, Daniel came into my presence.

41:52

I said, Belshazzar, chief of the magicians. I know that the spirit of the holy gods is in you and no mystery is too difficult for you.

42:00

This is interesting. Even, you know, holy gods, like he, so Daniel is faithful.

42:06

He's uncompromising. He is surrounded by wickedness. He's surrounded by compromise, surrounded by people that don't follow the true

42:12

God. And yet he's a salt and light in that. He does follow the true God in this governmental capacity.

42:21

I think this is big. And this is hard, I think, for us in a way, because we are so used to the way things have been.

42:32

We've been a pretty Christian influence country for a long time.

42:38

And yeah, there's been heresies and so forth. I suppose you could say as time's gone on, maybe in some ways they've gotten worse.

42:46

There's been more corruption. There's been more dilution of Christian influence. And we're at a point now where we're having to navigate things we've never navigated before in some ways.

42:59

And we don't like it. I don't like it. And I want to reinforce every barrier that we have.

43:05

That's why last year, when the Republican National Committee had someone who was Hindu given invocation,

43:12

I was against it. A lot of people were. Don't do this kind of thing. This kind of thing is pretty rare, but it's happening more.

43:19

There's an uptick in it. There's barriers being eroded. Now, Paul the White being the White, that barrier was eroded a long time ago,

43:25

I think. But still, I mean, look, this is a new office. New in the sense of like, in my lifetime, this office didn't exist.

43:34

It started in my lifetime. I'm not that old. So yeah, there's just a lot of new things,

43:39

I think, that we're trying to figure out and navigate. And if things got so dark, if they got as dark as things were for Daniel in our country, if we just had magi, sorcerers,

43:52

I mean, witches, like it was that bad. And you were summoned by the king or the president or whatever to be an advisor, to help him with things.

44:05

What do you do in that case? I mean, I think that I would like to say that I'd try to follow Daniel's example.

44:11

And I think the way I'd apply it is I would be in that room and I would probably give a reverent observance to,

44:20

I'll probably pray in my own mind to the true God, but I would see a place in civic ceremony for trying to petition

44:31

God on behalf of the president. I would not believe there was false religion in there that any of those prayers were getting to God, but I would know that the idea that there should be some kind of a transcendence, some kind of accountability,

44:47

I would see that as, I suppose, something that I could maybe tap into, just like Paul did in Acts 17.

44:55

I would look for the opportunity to do that. How can I introduce people to the

45:01

God that truly exists, that they're not reaching, but he's not far from each one of us?

45:09

I think that's what Daniel did in Daniel chapter two. And anyway, I think that William Wolfe, it's not a parallel example in every way.

45:17

Of course, Daniel's example is much more egregious. I mean, Paula White, at least, is, I think her theology, she's recognizing the

45:27

God of scripture. She's, even if she's not born again, let's say, and she's a false teacher and so forth, she's not a magi, we'll put it that way.

45:36

There is this facade, at least, of the true God of scripture is the one that's being petitioned.

45:43

But she didn't even pray. And I saw, even after I said that, because I announced that, there were still people saying that this was wrong.

45:49

It doesn't matter if she didn't pray. She was in the room and William was bowing his head.

45:56

So presumably, and I think he said, he prayed for the president. He shouldn't pray for the president if he's in the room with a heretic.

46:02

I just think that that is so outside the scope of the verses that I read for you earlier, including

46:09

Romans 16, 17. I think those are for a church, an ecclesiastical setting, where you are to mark a false teacher in your midst and start the process of church discipline.

46:24

That's what I think's going on. And I don't think that's the setting when the president's asking you to come to the office to essentially advise him on policy things.

46:35

So that's my take on it. I think that's the difference. Why so many guys, and there were a lot of guys beyond even what

46:42

I showed you, why so many of them are applying these principles for the church to sort of like almost an informal prayer, it looked like in the

46:53

Oval Office. I think that might, and this is just my gander at it, this might have something to do with guys who come from a pretty ecclesiocentric model of like seeing the church as the preeminent and sometimes almost the only thing.

47:10

I've talked about this before. You can go back to my episode on ecclesiocentrism, but there's a lot of churches out there, and especially in the more like very biblicist, expository preaching model, which

47:21

I go to a church like that, which I'm grateful for that. But there's a tendency in those churches sometimes to kind of like filter everything through the authority of elders.

47:30

Like even like the mayor's decision should go through us, and if you're gonna move, that should go through us. Like the elders take on a lot of authority that goes,

47:37

I would say, beyond the spiritual authority they have. And the church becomes the place that you channel all activities through.

47:46

If you're gonna have a bowling league, you do the church bowling league, right? It's that kind of thing. And so there's so,

47:54

I think in those settings also, there's such a habit of fighting with charismatics and fighting with prosperity preachers and so forth that like they become the enemy.

48:06

And so when you see a different setting, which this is a different setting, you start applying all those things that you are used to applying in your church to that.

48:16

That's my gander at it. That's what I think is going on. I think it's perfectly fine to acknowledge that Paula White is a false teacher and still go to the

48:25

White House and pray with the president, even though she's in the room, right? I think it's even okay to sit at the table.

48:33

Someone sent me the picture, I guess, of Paula White's at the head of this table and all these guys are, you know, it almost looked like welcome to the long house, but, you know, women at the head.

48:45

There's another girl there too, I guess. And then just like guys lining the table. Well, here's the thing, like if you're, if that's part of the activity, you probably don't know that going into it, but if that's part of what you're doing and you're getting a briefing from the person who administers this particular office, then you have to ask yourself, is it a compromise for that person?

49:05

I don't think so. I don't like the setting. I don't think, I would rather William Wolfe, in fact, I tweeted that out,

49:11

I'd rather William Wolfe be the head of this office, not Paula White, but is William sitting there, is that in and of itself a sin?

49:17

No, it's not in and of itself a sin. No more than it would be if he, you know, was on some kind of a committee in the

49:27

Senate and there was a chair of that particular committee and it happened to be a woman who's a heretic or something and, you know, and they're there to fix some problem, you know,

49:36

I don't know, immigration or pick whatever political issue you want. I think the same kind of thing would apply to that.

49:42

I think the goal though, should be the same goal Daniel had, right? So like William should, and I know he does, William should want to go as far as God would have him go with influence, power, showcasing who

49:55

God really is. He should, and I hope he wants to be the head of that table someday or maybe beyond that, you know, and I don't think people are going to get to that point.

50:06

Our guys are good guys who have good theology. They're not going to end up getting to those places if they're just not even willing to walk into the room and pray with the president, because someone with bad theology might be in the same room.

50:21

They're not ever going to get to those places. I mean, look at the president himself, right? I mean, he's not,

50:27

I don't think he's born again. I don't think he has good theology, but if the president of your country beckons you to come to advise him on a matter,

50:35

I'm going to be there and it's not going to be a compromise to be there. So that's my two cents on it.

50:42

I hope that was helpful. One other thing, and maybe this is a little trolly, but I did post,

50:48

Owen Strand was in the room and I did say like, how dare William Wolfe would pray with someone who doesn't have orthodox, or what'd

50:57

I say, heterodox beliefs on the Trinity. And some people didn't quite catch that. Owen Strand's an

51:03

EFS guy, eternal functional subordination, and basically he would affirm, like he would say that the

51:14

Godhead, the three members of the Godhead are, he would affirm what the

51:21

Nicene Creed says, that they're of one essence and so forth. The problem is though, in his view, it really breaks down to three separate wills, that the son has a separate will from the father.

51:32

In fact, even at one time said that there were three different glories in the Godhead. So they don't even share,

51:38

I guess, in one glory or one will, they have three separate. And that I think inevitably breaks you down into some kind of like a tri -theism.

51:47

Like if you follow that to its logical conclusion, like he doesn't follow it to its logical conclusion, but look, it's a heterodox belief on the

51:53

Trinity. And the only reason I bring it up was a lot of the guys accusing William Wolfe of compromising here or implying it's a compromise because Paula White's in the room.

52:02

They've all been in situations where they've been praying with Owen Strand, because he speaks at G3 and places like that.

52:09

And that's where these guys are. So I just thought I'd point that out. It's like, I don't know if that registers, but I don't know why that's not a problem exactly.

52:20

Maybe it's not as egregious as Paula White perhaps, but I don't know, it is kind of bad. It is kind of bad.

52:26

All right, well, I'll take any kind of comments or questions right now, and then we'll end the podcast.

52:33

I hope that was helpful though for everyone in just going through a little bit of Daniel and hopefully showing you how

52:39

I think about these things. I've had to think about these things for a while. I've told the story before, but when I was at Master's Seminary, there's a guy,

52:45

I still remember, he was like my, the guy who was like advising me or helping me kind of acclimate to the campus.

52:51

And he had been saved out of Catholicism. And I remember years later, I had messaged with him and he basically told me that he was, that you could never, even in a political setting, even to fight abortion, could never partner with a

53:07

Roman Catholic because what fellowship is light with darkness? So even at like as co -belligerents, you couldn't go to an event if there were

53:15

Catholics there that were speaking in the cause of pro -life, even if it wasn't anything about their doctrine, that spirit does exist out there.

53:25

And I don't think that is at all what that particular passage has in mind, but I think that the context does matter.

53:34

All right, well, I'll try to land this because we've been going almost an hour. Trudell says,

53:40

I saw Owen Strand in that photo. Yep, exactly, he was there. William Wolfe for SBC president.

53:47

That would be nice. I don't know. I don't know. I mean, I don't know if William even wants that, but that would be nice.

53:55

It's the abolitionist debate redux. Do we want a small opportunity for influence or none at all?

54:01

It makes a shrewd point. I've tried to be careful with this because I think there are guys who are abolitionists or at least use that label who are not as imprudent as some who use that label.

54:15

But yes, there are definitely some abolitionist types, abortion abolitionists, of course, is what

54:20

I'm talking about, who see it as a compromise. To any incremental kind of change would be a compromise.

54:31

And so there's a sort of rigidity there. And I guess that's what Trudell's getting at is that some of these guys, like they'd rather give up the country.

54:41

Like, I guess, let the heretics have that office. Let Kamala Harris, because there's a lot of those abolitionist guys were saying that you should not vote for Trump.

54:49

It's a compromise. But like, what's your alternative, right? Kamala Harris is gonna be the president. So if that's your incremental compromise and that's a sin, then yeah,

55:00

I mean, like, I guess you're just saying we're not gonna be involved. And that's what I think it is. It's basically a vote to say like, we're not gonna be political effectively.

55:09

That's practically what's going on. The coexist movement promotes tolerance and respect for all religions and belief systems that gained popularity in the early 2000s, particularly on college campuses and the music industry.

55:21

Yeah, you know, I think if this was like an interfaith body that was promoting interfaith, like it was promoting we're all the same or something, that would be different.

55:30

And William being in that room, I think would be a compromise, but that's not what happened at all. All right, let's see, what else?

55:39

Many years ago, I went to my mother -in -law's Roman Catholic funeral. Years later, my father -in -law told me that it ministered love for his family and was instrumental in him receiving the gospel of Christ.

55:48

That's interesting, wow. That is very interesting. Look, in a Roman Catholic church, there still is a

55:55

Bible sitting there. There still is mention of Christ and the Trinity. And I mean, in fact, some of them have better Trinitarian theology, probably than Owen Strand actually.

56:06

But yes, there's obviously you have the Mariology, you have the imputed righteousness issue, you have all kinds of things that are problems.

56:13

This would be a moot point if dealt with in 2016 when Pastor Paula was his advisor, why the church refuses to address women in pulp, it amazes me.

56:21

Yeah, she shouldn't be a pastor. She's not, I don't think, like in God's eyes. But this, yeah, in 2016, that wasn't really the hot topic, was it?

56:31

It really wasn't. Betty says, even if women could preach, which they cannot, she disqualified herself when she made her trek to the

56:41

Pope ecumenicism, but had an affair there with Benny Hinn, also bound to the Pope. I did not know about the affair with Benny Hinn or bowing to the

56:48

Pope. It's pretty bad, I'm not gonna lie. I have no defense to make of Paula White, nor do

56:54

I want to defend her. I really just wanna defend William for being in the room when there was a prayer and Paula White happened to be there in the same room, that's basically it.

57:05

You were so real for that tweet. Also the author of the case for Christian, yeah, I joked about,

57:11

I said that Trump had the author for the case for Christian nationalism in the Oval Office. Of course, that's Stephen Wolf, not

57:16

William Wolf. People had already confused it and I thought it was hysterical. Barry Moss says, I was siding with Justin on this.

57:22

However, I have to agree with you, John. If the president calls me to come pray for him, I now believe I'd go, thanks. Yeah, thanks

57:27

Barry. You know, I wanna say this about Justin. I appreciate Justin's exposure of the prosperity gospel stuff.

57:34

I don't have any ill will towards any of those guys. I don't know, it breaks my heart a little because I don't like counter signaling them, but yeah,

57:42

I just think he's wrong on this. And I don't know, like I don't know if there's much more to say.

57:48

I just think he's wrong on it. And I understand the sensitivity though. Like if your whole life's work or most of it is in your adult life has been against prosperity preaching and you have a prosperity preacher leading this office.

58:00

Like I do get it. That's been your emphasis. So, and it is egregious, right? So I get that.

58:06

All right, Jeremiah. John, even if your refusal is for conscience sake, you can't be serious. The description in Daniel doesn't override the prescription we find from Paul about violating a

58:15

Christian's conscience. So if I understand this right, Jeremiah, okay,

58:23

I mean, I didn't really get into that. Yeah, if your conscience says not to do it, I would say don't do it. Yeah, I think we're on the same side on that.

58:30

William's conscience, that wasn't an issue though. William's conscience wasn't saying that. So, and then if that's a conscience issue, if you really want to put it there and it's a sort of an adiaphora, then guys like Justin shouldn't be imposing this, right?

58:46

If it's a conscience thing. That doesn't mean the pillar clutching is okay. I think you're correct to call out the knee jerkiness, but the principle of conscience can't be overridden.

58:56

Yeah, I don't know. I just didn't, I wasn't addressing that. I hope I was. I don't think

59:01

I mentioned that, but now that it's brought up, sure, yeah. If you think that this is a violation of your conscience, which you believe to be right for yourself, or you just get a bad feeling about it, don't do it.

59:11

You don't have to go to the White House just because you get a call. All right, been a while.

59:18

Great to see your reach growing. Excited to re -engage and hope to catch up soon. Appreciate your perspective.

59:24

Thanks, Ryan. Good to see you. So yeah, I mentioned, maybe

59:30

I should save this. We got 30 seconds. I'm going to save it. There's going to be some changes on this platform, but I'm going to save my announcement on that for a later time.

59:40

Get the book. I keep forgetting. Actually, I made a bunch of videos, so maybe you've seen, maybe you're nauseated about it, but on the regular podcast,

59:48

I often forget to plug it. So please, Against the Waves, Christian Order in a Liberal Age.

59:53

Those who have read it really like it. So there's, I view this as like a resource, right?

01:00:00

So there's a lot of chapters on a lot of different things. I think it was William Wolfe, actually, who told me, he goes, it's so long.

01:00:07

It's not that, it's like 300 pages, but I understand, a lot of books are short now. It's one of those books, you can skip the chapters that you already know about and use the ones for a reference that you don't.

01:00:17

Like I got a chapter on the proposition nation in here that has so many footnotes and just explains it,

01:00:24

I think, well, obviously I wrote it. So I, you know, that's what I think, but there's, what is a nation?

01:00:30

It's just packed with scripture. There's some really, I think, important chapters in this book.

01:00:36

So you get it as a reference, especially if you're a pastor and some of these topics come up in your church.

01:00:43

I think it's a good book to have. I would love people to just read the whole thing, but I'm saying, even if you don't read the whole thing, it's a great reference.

01:00:50

So Against the Waves, you can go to againstthewavesbook .com or you can go to johnharrispodcast .com

01:00:55

or you go to Amazon. Of course, that doesn't help me as much, but it does, it still helps me. So Amazon, it's also on Kindle, it's also on Audible.