Doesn't Being Pro-Life Mean Supporting Gun Control?

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

We're your hosts, Harrison Kerrig and Pastor Tim Mullett, and today we'll seek to answer the age -old question, doesn't being pro -life mean supporting gun control?

Now, I'm sure if you're a living, breathing person who's not living under a rock, you've probably heard that in the last probably month or so, maybe a month and a half at this point, there's been two sort of major mass shootings, major in terms of the devastation of them, but then also the coverage of them by the mainstream media.

So what always happens whenever something like this comes up is naturally everyone sort of starts debating what should we do about the fact that we can own guns and the laws that surround owning guns, because I think a lot of people are legitimately concerned over the safety of others, and people just don't always agree on what makes people the most safe.

So a lot of times what happens is you'll see on major news outlets, you'll see all over social media, people will all of a sudden be debating everywhere, what should we do about gun control?

Should we implement stricter gun control laws? Should we ease up on gun control laws?

Should we start arming certain groups of the population that are not currently required to be armed?

These are all questions that are being debated all over the place right now. So we wanted to be able to have an episode that helps

Christians think through these questions as it relates to guns, as it relates to weapons, as it relates to self -defense.

What should our view be? What does God tell us about these things? And Tim, really the place that I think would be most helpful to start would be, just to ask you the question, before we get into what should we do, should we own guns, should we not?

What should we do with those weapons that we have? Really the first question I wanna ask you is just what do you think about having these debates at all pretty much immediately after a big situation like this happens where you have some sort of mass shooting?

Do you think that there should even be debates over gun control immediately after these things happen?

Or do you think that's appropriate for the situation? What do you think? I think the standard conservative response is to basically say to the liberals at that point because the liberals use every one of these situations as an opportunity to essentially try to take everyone's guns away from them.

The standard conservative response to that kind of thing though is to say that hey, this isn't the time or place to have that kind of discussion and while the bodies are laying on the floor so to speak, this isn't the time.

We need to agree with those who grieve and we can have this kind of discussion later. And I've never...

Honestly, I don't really think that that is a good response to the left as far as that's concerned.

It doesn't appear to me that your standard conservative is even remotely grieving about a situation that they're so far removed from and it does seem difficult to sustain the kind of personal grief for every atrocity that happens in the world.

We're living in a bit of a different time now if this is something that's happening in the local...

in your area so to speak and you can literally imagine yourself standing outside the massacre and the bodies are on the ground and someone comes up and wants to engage with you in a gun control kind of discussion at that point then

I would think that yes, in that specific kind of situation that wouldn't be the time but then when you're living in the social media world and you're aware of all sorts of events like this you're not exactly in that moment talking to grieving people at that moment and so I've never been persuaded that there's some sort of lack of propriety in having the conversation itself.

Now, what I mean by that is I don't begrudge them for having it in that way meaning...

I think it's a dumb conversation to have, period so that's just telling you where I'm coming from I think it's a dumb conversation to have at that moment, period just because it's a dumb argument that's being made but the fact that they're having it at that point in time

I don't necessarily... when are you going to talk about it? So it's just one of those things where it's just like...

you can imagine something like that happening in your home for instance where maybe there's something that's a bit dangerous in your home and one of your kids maybe you have some sort of BB gun in your house or something like that and you can imagine one of your kids shooting another kid from that then if your wife were to come up to you and basically say hey, we need to do something about this because this is not the first time this happened and our window is getting busted out

I don't think at that point you're just like hey, not the time and not the place at that point it's like, no this is an opportunity to revisit what we're doing here

I don't know the best decisions are going to be made in an emotional framework anyways but I don't know that it's a horrible thing to have a conversation

I think it's more just about particularly when you're commenting on issues that you're not intimately involved in from a distance anyways

I think yes I don't begrudge a person for having a conversation because of timing

I just more begrudge them for having a conversation because it's a dumb argument that's being advanced now do you think that there's any legitimacy to the objection that hey so we might not be necessarily mourning directly with those who mourn but then isn't there a sense in which you view something like that and the natural response would be

I can't believe something like this happened this is utterly evil and wicked isn't there still that response though I'm not saying that you should be a robot or something along those lines now

I mean I would pick at your words a little bit just to say that yes I can believe it would happen honestly because and that's part of the reason why the discussion goes the way it goes is because you have a fairly naive view of the way human nature actually works as an operation in these kind of discussions

I don't think a Christian should be absolutely emotionless like a Spock kind of person just carefully having a discussion but at the same time there are thousands of atrocities just like that that are happening every day all day long that now we're made aware of by virtue of the fact that we're living in a world where all these things are being put on full display all day long every day if you go on social media it's just like a horrible thing after horrible thing after horrible thing and there's only so much outrage and scandal and weeping that you can possibly do at a certain point it's just like these are up for public comment so we need to be able to provide public comment for it as far as that is concerned so I don't think you should be emotionless

I'm just trying to suggest that there is it is a bit of a different situation that's happening with these kind of things when you are not there on the ground in the moment and have no connection to anyone in some sense

I don't know that it's possible just to every time something happens

I don't know that it's necessarily possible or necessarily reasonable just to every time a problem surfaces in the world just to say well you know we need just it's inappropriate to talk about now

I mean in a lot of these situations yes I do think you need to take some time to actually figure out what happened first and so social media does kind of encourage everyone to instantaneously respond with very little information and try to fix problems like you know the bible says if you give an answer before you hear it it's following shame so I do think there is a type of appropriateness to waiting and suspending judgment until you can figure out what the situation was and we don't do a very good job at that but you know

I do think conservatives could be criticized at that point where they could just look at us and say essentially it's always inappropriate to have it when are you going to have it how many times does this have to happen before you're willing to have the conversation and by the time it all dies down then no one wants to talk about it anymore right right it's not the popular thing anymore it's never going to be the time and place to have this discussion and I understand that but I don't

I mean it's just in some sense it's like if Japan were to drop a nuke on us we have to figure out what we're going to do not the time and place people are grieving it's like no but they may drop another one if we don't do something

I just question that kind of logic in general is the only point right I guess the other bit of pushback that I want to ask you is there any legitimacy to basically saying hey look this is a really for a lot of people things like this tend to be really emotionally charged is there any value in saying maybe we should at least wait a little bit to let the emotions of everything die down and make sure people have processed it in a logical way or do you think that's not valuable in this day and age ?

I don't know the type of person you're talking about who is going to be thinking purely on emotion is the kind of person who needs to make decisions at all .

You would hope that the kind of people who are not largely appealing to reason and logic and principle and spine and individuals who are making decisions who are not training themselves to respond emotionally .

I don't know it helps it either way emotional thinker is an emotional thinker .

If all we have is emotional thinkers we're in trouble anyway .

Surely you can get a mob worked up in the midst of a tense situation and something needs to be done .

I don't think it's the best time to make decisions . Having a conversation is having a conversation .

That makes sense. Turning to the topic at hand which is not necessarily directly mass shootings but what should

Christians think when it comes to owning guns and self -defense .

Why don't we start with that title question . I've seen a lot of people online who are suggesting if Christians were notoriously pro -life .

It's probably one of the most annoying things about us . We think you shouldn't kill babies .

That's a pretty drastic and frustrating stance for anyone who is not pro -life.

Something that is often said towards Christians as a way to undermine both our stance on abortion and gun control at the same time is this idea that you aren't actually pro -life if you support owning guns .

Why? Because the people who support owning guns are according to some people actively enabling these sorts of tragic events , these types of mass shootings.

So the argument then is you're not actually pro -life if you support the second amendment .

What is your response to that? Do you think that being pro -life means being pro -gun control at that point?

I guess there's two responses to that. One response is just to say that they obviously aren't pro -life themselves.

These are the people who want to kill children. They're not the ones to lecture anyone on what it means to be consistently pro -life .

They're anti -murder. I'll concede the point. I'm not pro -life. I'm anti -murder.

I don't feel like pro -life is a good slogan that we should be using. I'm anti -murder and because there are murderers in the world

I feel like we need some ability to stop them. That's as old as sin.

It's as old as the devil. It's a problem that's never going to go away. Because murderers exist it seems to me to be a little bit unwise to give them a massive and overpowering technological advantage over you that would render you powerless in your attempt to stop them.

That's the issue. The issue is what do we do about the problem of murder? I believe murder is wrong.

I believe that Christians should try to stop it. So that means that I think it would be absolutely foolish to give evil people the ability to have some form of technology that would render you completely powerless if you actually care about life and preserving life and you should have the ability to have the same kind of technology that's available to those who seek to do harm.

Okay, so in terms of answering the question doesn't being pro -life mean being pro -gun your answer is well

I'm actually not pro -life. I just think it's a logical entailment of that is not that you should like get rid of guns because that doesn't logically follow from the position so I'm going to distance myself from the pro -life movement that I think is largely ineffective but you know

I want to distance myself from that but at the same time you know it doesn't follow to say that if you're pro -life then you want to remove any ability that anyone has to defend themselves from evil people so if you do value life then it seems like what's happening here is you have a major disconnect between the problem that we face so guns don't kill people right evil people kill people

I mean the issue is a rock doesn't kill people right you can use a rock to kill people you can use a gun to kill people you can use a fist to kill people you can't outlaw everything so you can't outlaw fist you can't outlaw chop all the hands off yeah

I mean maybe the feminist dreams would be realized at that point if all the men were you know had their hands removed but then like that isn't really at some point the issue is there are evil people that have murder in their heart and are going to kill people and you can take away guns but that doesn't stop a person they can strangle someone there's a lot of ways you can kill someone it's neither here nor there now the issue is if you want to protect people then if evil people exist in the world we have a responsibility to protect people and it seems to me that you don't want to cripple the law abiding citizens ability to protect themselves from those who have a propensity to break the law anyway so the kind of person who's going to be a school shooter they're the kind of person who basically you can tell them all day long you know you can't shoot people you know and this is a gun free zone but they don't care about that right so they don't care so like the issue is what do we do to protect life because evil is stubborn and pervasive and insane and there's no way to stop it through legislation evil is always going to be there just look at the fact that if you try to outlaw they know this in the abortion discussion this is what's so absurd about it they know this if you make it illegal for a woman to kill their child in their womb with a doctor then everyone is like what about the clothes hanger abortions that put the life of the mother at risk they know that you take away the forceps that are going to cut that baby in half and the vacuums are going to suck their brains out of their skull they can just stick a coat hanger up there if they don't want the baby the issue is not murder is going to murder that's the issue and it's almost take for granted that if you stop her from doing it in a legal way they're obviously going to do it in an illegal way even at the risk of their own safety it's just like that's the way it works the issue with the guns is evil people are going to do evil things so then you have to have some ability to stop them and it may be that you don't want them to have a massive technological advantage if possible if you have any goal of stopping them but it's a dumb argument being pro life for anti murder does not entail taking away any ability on the part of good people to protect themselves and others from evil people so I guess is the difference in your mind in terms of being pro life and anti murder is the difference basically like hey so no matter what

I don't want murder to happen but then I'm not like you know for all life period the end right

I'm for the protection of innocent life I'm not for the protection of guilty life so the bible talks about like if you spill the blood of man your blood will be shed for a baby in her mother's womb they haven't done anything to for fit their right to life right now if you kill someone you forfeited your right to life so I'm not just pro life in the abstract meaning that all life has dignity and value and must be protected at all cost period the end no like I yes we all have a right to live unless we forfeit that right through our actions if that makes sense yeah and there are things we can do that would forfeit that right and then at that point

I'm not pro -life for murderers mhm right I'm anti -murder right and that's why saying

I'm anti -murder is clear it's because I'm saying I'm anti -murder now there is such a thing as a justified killing and that's what the government is there to do is to bear the sword and to provide a justified just killing in the case of individuals who have violated the rights of others does that make sense yeah yeah so just saying you're pro -life does leave you open to this juvenile kind of uh argument that's being put forward that's not a good argument it's like oh

I thought you were against killing right it's like when I just read a dictionary there's a difference between killing and murder right

I'm against murder right and I'm not against all like there is such a thing as a justified killing and yeah so government sanctioned executions yeah yeah

I mean now just because the government sanctions it doesn't mean it's good but you know there are cases where it would be good for them to sanction it does that make sense right yeah like the holocaust is not is an example of a very bad one yes that would be a government sanctioned unjustified killing and so but the only way you figure out what a justified killing is is by going to the bible and figuring out what the bible's definition of a justified killing is and there are a few examples in there one of which is when someone murders you like you have the right or you have a responsibility as a nation to put that murderer to death an eye for an eye a tooth for a tooth a life for a life you know another example is exodus 21 1 -2 if a man steals an ox or a sheep and kills it or sells it he shall repay five oxen for an ox and four sheep for a sheep if the thief is found breaking in and is struck so that he dies there shall be no blood guilt for him so like there are rules in the bible of like someone sneaking in your house particularly at night and like exodus 22 -3 but if the son has risen on him there shall be blood guilt for him he shall surely pay if he has nothing then he shall be sold for his theft like the issue is if a thief comes in your house to steal something at night you don't know what his intention is you can't just see oh he's just trying to steal something right and so like then at that point there's a justified right to self defense at that point that can be lethal because you're in my house under the cover of night and I'm unable to discern like your motives at that point so there are times where like there is such a thing as a justified killing the bible gives us examples of those things and you know so I'm not just pro all life right

I'm not pro Hitler's life right like Hitler forfeited his right to life after he murdered 6 million

Jews right yeah yeah um so I guess so owning a gun then sure um your argument would basically just be well and I think you said this earlier but your argument would be well the criminals are going to own guns either way because they're criminals they don't care what the law they don't care what the law says they're going to do whatever they want to do as long as they think that they can probably get away with it most likely so so the answer then is to not um you know strip the right away from the law abiding citizen who is probably going to just uh to the best of their ability of follow the laws that have been that they've been put under um so the answer is to not you know make laws for them that would essentially strip them of a of the capability of defending themselves right that would be

I mean that's one argument I think that there's many arguments for um like the right to bear arms in terms of like arguments for the second amendment so part

I think the primary uh argument that was given at the time for like the adoption of the second amendment in of itself was like the idea that governments can turn tyrannical so like the issue was like it's a citizen's duty to protect themselves from a tyrannical government uh so one of the things that's happened is we believe that the government is essentially

God over us and we look to them like in these situations whenever a shooting happens we look to the government essentially to be our savior and that's what's happening so people are looking to the government to fix all problems but there's some problems that simply can't be fixed so one of those problems is the issue of murder it doesn't rise like individuals aren't innately good like individuals are evil and they're gonna like there's anger in their heart and they're of the father of the devil and they're going to you know murder is gonna murder right like so the issue is like how are they gonna do it so like but then um the issue though is that like you know with the advent of guns like it's just you know with every technology that's ever been invented throughout the history of the world when a like a group of people possess a massive technological advantage over others that what that means is that they essentially can do whatever they wanna do right yeah so like if you're going into the you know the tribe the primitive tribe and they have their wooden spears right and you have your uh tank your tank they're done you know

I mean it's just like like it like that's what a massive technological advantage essentially will do like it just basically puts the other person that makes them powerless and you can imagine this with any type of sophistication as it relates to the technology when you possess that massive technological advantage

I mean this I mean essentially it happens with swords you know with the different ages you know you're talking about the bronze age or the iron age or whatever else but then you bring the problem up to the level of guns and essentially guns are just an overwhelming technological advantage particularly when you have like laser beam laser beams on them and scopes on them and everything else like there's just a massive technological advantage there and I mean if you're pointing a gun at someone and you've learned how to shoot it

I mean essentially there's very little ability they have to react at that point right you pull a trigger they're dead right not in every case but I mean that's just typically that's the way it works so if you're a good shot there's adrenaline there's other factors but it's just the kind of thing where you don't you have a sword you have to actually walk up to them and you have to swing it well you have to populace, and the criminals now are the only ones who have it, then what that means is that everyone is essentially a soft target, right?

So everyone's at the mercy of the criminals, because the criminals could care less about your laws, and that's why, you know, the most unsafe place to be is to be in a gun -free zone, right?

Uh -huh. It's like, what that is is just this advertising soft target, right?

That's what it says. And so part of it is a criminal discussion, but then the issue, though, is, it's like, well, someone has to have the technology in order to keep everyone in check, right?

Right. And now are you going to trust the government to do it? Like, the same government who's locked us in our home for two years, the same government who is trying to force vaccines, you know, down our throats, or, you know, up our nose, nostril rape us, right?

You know, like, do you trust them? Do you trust these individuals to be the ones who have the overwhelming technology to basically call the shots and do everything that they're telling you to do?

Well, they have no track record of earning trust in that way. Like, they violated trust at every single point.

And so the issue with the Second Amendment was that there was an understanding that the rulers could go bad and become tyrannical, and now we have rulers who have gone bad and gone tyrannical.

And, like, you know, if they're the only ones with the technology, you're at their mercy. That's the point, right?

Right, yeah. So anytime they're wanting to force you to do something that you don't necessarily want to do, they have the ability to do it.

And that's why every time, like, you know, in every society, I mean, that's what's happening in Australia right now.

It has been happening in Australia is they've disarmed the populace, and now the government basically comes in and makes them do, you know, puts them in concentration camps, you know?

Yeah, yeah. If they don't get this vaccine. I mean, that's the way it works. And, like, throughout history, that's how it's always worked.

The first step of, you know, a totalitarian regime is to disarm the populace, and at that point, they're sitting ducks and they do whatever they tell you to.

And, you know, there's been millions and millions of people who have died due to communism after communism disarmed the populace.

That's the way it works. If they have the overwhelming massive technological advantage, you have no recourse at that point anymore at all.

So, I mean, part of it's that. Part of it's like, yeah, the criminals are not going to obey it, right?

They're the ones who are not going to obey it. Government officials are not trustworthy. They're not the ones, we can't trust them to do it.

But, I mean, I think that there's just plenty, I mean, there's biblical arguments just to say, like, you know,

Jesus tells his followers to go buy a sword, even, right? So, there's that.

But, I mean, I do think we also have, like, an actual responsibility to protect individuals, and that's something that has to factor into this kind of discussion.

So, you know, there's plenty of, like, situations where there's some sort of active shooter. And, I mean, I read an article just last week of a situation where there was an active shooter and the woman shot him, right?

Pulled out a gun and shot him. It's like, well, that's what you want to have happen. Like, the issue is, like, when, like, you have this overwhelming technology and there's no way to, like, unravel

Pandora's box at this point, everyone has it. Like, the issue is, if you make it ubiquitous, meaning it's widespread, then that deters people.

So, you have a strategy discussion that's involved in this kind of discussion as well. I mean, it's like, what's the best way to do it?

To discourage, you know, people from becoming an active shooter.

Well, you know that no one's going to, like, become an active shooter at a gun show, right? Well, okay.

So, you're bringing up an interesting point there. And I wanted to mention this while you're kind of on this topic.

The reason I want to mention this is because I really haven't... What I'm about to ask you is something that I don't know that I've really seen anyone mentioning.

If there are people mentioning this, I haven't seen it at all. And I've seen a lot of, you know, takes on gun control both ways.

But isn't it interesting that it seems like more often than not, these sorts of mass shootings are happening at schools?

Like, why are they happening at schools? And not, like, you know, the military base.

Like, every single action movie is always, like, at a military base or, you know, something like that.

Where there's going to be people, you know, fighting back at you. That's the whole conflict, right?

So, why are they happening primarily at schools? Well, yeah. There's, like, five answers to that.

But, I mean, part of it is, like, you know, schools are gun -free zones. And so, that means soft targets, right?

That means no one's going to have... There's, like, one, you know, resource officer in the building, maybe, who might have a gun somewhere.

Who knows where. I mean, it's just a soft target, man. I mean, it's, like, evil people are going to do evil things.

And, like, this is just... You've told everyone that this is functionally the easiest target that you can have, right?

And the kind of person who's going to do that is going to pick on women and children anyways, right? And so, like, there's part of it.

It's just, like, these are the most helpless people imaginable. And you make them even more helpless because, like, the teachers don't have guns themselves, right?

Right. You can imagine if every teacher were required to have a gun, what would happen, right? I would think that the school shootings would go down.

So, part of it's that. Part of it is, you know, asking. So, part of it's, like, it's a soft target. But then, a lot of it has to do with the fact that many of these kids, like,

I think in one of the more recent examples, like a transgender, you know, I'm using fake words here, but a guy who had those kind of tendencies,

I think. Yeah, there's no such thing as transgender people. Yeah. But then, you know, bullying happened and all this kind of stuff.

And then, you know, he's angry at the world and doesn't fit in. And, you know, and so, like, you know, biblically, where do wars and fights come from among us?

James 4 tells us, do they come from the desires or pleasures that are waging war on our members? Like, essentially, you know, murder comes from a sinful heart.

Essentially, it wants what it wants when it wants it. And, you know, in a lot of these cases, there's a desire to be loved and cared for and respected and everything else.

That, you know, a person has enough and then they go on a shooting spree. So, part of it's that. A lot of, in these cases, you have individuals who don't have father figures in their life.

And so, they've never learned how to, or they've had fathers in their life.

Their fathers were destructive in certain ways. And so, like, you basically have a lack of strong male influence in their life that can weed out some of the destructive tendencies.

And what we're not allowed to ask in any of these situations is, are these individuals smoking weed?

You know, are they high? Marijuana can really affect an individual's, like, perception of reality and make things that are very abnormal seem to be normal.

We're not allowed to ask, like, you know, how many psychotropic drugs this individual is taking.

And there is, you know, a lot of evidence that suggests that many of these drugs are very prevalent in these kind of situations.

We're just not allowed to talk about it because of the money that goes into pharmaceuticals. And so, yeah, I think there's a lot of things that could be happening in those kind of situations.

But, you know, typically, yeah, it is going to happen in a school situation because these are helpless people who have basically functionally been disarmed.

And that tells you something about the logic of the project is, like, you know, all that you do when you disarm people is, like, you create a gun -free zone is you do create a soft target.

Yeah, yeah, definitely. You know, sitting duck, basically.

Yeah. I mean, like, if you think about it, like, if you're a teacher in a school and you know that there's an active shooter and you have no weapon, you're never going to have a logical thought that leads you to say,

I need to run out there and confront the shooter, right? You're going to say, like, we need to hide and lock the doors, hope that they don't find us, right?

Well, if you're a girl. If you're a girl, yeah. We're definitely going to talk about that some more here in a minute.

But before we get there, before we get there, so I know that owning a gun is something that the

Constitution says is our right. The Second Amendment tells us that we have a right to bear arms.

So I guess my question would be, like, all right, so that's great and all, but is it an actual

God -given right that we be able to own guns or knives or whatever as self -defense weapons?

Or is that just something that the Constitution affords us and is sort of, you know, could go either way, basically, just depending on the government you live under and the specific laws that they have?

Or is it an actual God -given right that can't actually be taken away from us?

You know, you can't just—your right to life can't be taken away without, you know, proper cause, like we talked about earlier, murdering someone, raping someone, something like that.

Yep. Well, I think in a certain sense, like, the question itself kind of assumes an answer, or it assumes a burden of proof that may be a bit inappropriate.

Okay. Like, meaning, like, so the assumption behind the question is—and this is what people are asking—the assumption behind the question is, like, it's just assumed that the government would have the authority to disarm people.

Okay, wait. Do you get what I mean? Yeah, yeah. Like, and so then, like, the burden of proof is on the

Christian then to come up with the Bible verse, essentially, to, like, defend their right to have a gun, right?

Uh -huh. But the burden of proof should actually be on the government. Like, so you should—like, the burden of proof is on the government to demonstrate from the

Bible that they have a responsibility to police the possessions of their citizens.

Mm -hmm. Do you get what I mean? Yeah. Like, meaning, like, you can ask it as if the burden of proof is on me to, like, defend my right to have a gun, or you can ask it as the burden of proof is on the government to defend their right to take it.

And so then, like, you know, the way you go depends on your understanding of what the government is there to do.

And so, like, the country was founded, like, as a limited form of government because it acknowledged that, like, the government had certain responsibilities, but then those responsibilities were not exhaustive.

And so there's plenty of problems that exist in the world, but then, like, what you don't—like, what—you know, the

American project was not, like, forming a government that basically had unlimited—unlimited authority to do whatever it wanted.

Like, the government was given, like—was given specific, you know, powers, right?

And the powers not delegated to the federal government were reserved to the states, right? And so, like, the issue, though, is that, like, we just assume that there's such a thing as a federal government that is allowed to tell us what to do and micromanage our life, and, like, that's a poor assumption to make even from the start, right?

So, like, what you have to ask is why is it the government's purview to prevent me from having some sort of means of protecting myself, okay?

So, like, that's the issue. So, like, so now let's just, like, let's roll back the technology a little bit to where we all have sticks, right?

So, like, let's say that someone came along and, you know, cut a— Sharpened sticks or—

Just sticks, man. All right, just normal sticks. Yeah, just say someone, you know, decided to, you know, snap off a branch of a thick tree and he walked up and he smacked someone on the head with it, right?

Uh -huh, yeah. And it's like, well, what do you do in that kind of scenario? It's like, do I have a right to grab a stick myself, right?

Uh -huh. Well, I mean, like, if a guy's coming at me with a stick, I think I might like to have my own, right?

Yeah, preferably sharpened. Right, right. So, like, the issue there is, though, like, should

I have to defend my right to try to stop this individual from harming me in a manner that's appropriate, right?

So, like, what are you going to do? Like, you're just going to, like, let him come up and hit you, right? What are you going to do?

So, like, so then the issue is, like, well, what I'm trying to say is, like, this is a problem of technology at a certain point.

Like, it's a problem of, like, it can happen at any level. So you pick up a rock, you know, do I have a right to hold a rock, right?

If someone's trying to throw a rock at my head and bash my head in, can I pick one up and throw it back at him, right?

And if I'm living in, like, a village where, like, there's gangs of individuals who come along and throw rocks at people, am

I allowed to go, you know, maybe grab a few, put them in a pouch, and carry them around, right? Abel was probably wishing he had a rock.

Abel probably wishes he did. Yeah, so, but then the issue there at that point is you have to ask at every level of technology.

So a rock, a stick, you know, let's say that individuals start making knives, you know, what do we do?

Do we ban all the knives? Do we ban all the knives? Like, am I allowed to, like, so, like, so the point

I'm trying to make is, like, at a certain point, if there are evil people in the world who are seeking to do harm, then, like, you have to figure out how to protect yourself from them.

And part of the way that you figure out how to protect yourself from them is to create the better stick, right?

Mm -hmm, yeah. Like, you know, like, so what do you do? You just allow yourself to be pillaged by, like, the issue is if you're living in an evil world with evil people who do evil things, and they're gonna use their brains to figure out how to take from you what they want.

And so what you have to figure out how to do is to figure out how to use your brain to outthink them, okay?

And, like, the only way you do that is you develop and create technology that's better than theirs in order to stop them.

And if you're at a massive technological advantage, you simply lose. You're just at the mercy of them.

Like, that's what happens. So, like, so then, like, I don't have to prove from the Bible, I don't,

I mean, I can, but I don't have to. You know what I'm saying? Mm -hmm. Like, I don't have to prove from the Bible that it's okay to stop them from doing horrible things to me, right?

Right, right. So, I mean, like, now, like, does the Bible, I mean, meaning, like, you know, there should be some sort of innate moral awareness that, like, it's okay to stop people from trying to kill you or rape you or…

Yeah. Right? Like, I'm just thinking, just think in terms of basic, like, the basic, you know, issue at stake.

If there are evil people in the world, and there are, then, you know, and then those evil people are going to use the creation, like, to create technology in order to enslave you, then it better, you know, it is incumbent upon you in order to be faithful to God to try to stop them somehow.

So there's that. Now, I mean, you can read the Bible, and Jesus tells his followers, essentially, to go buy swords at, you know, a specific point in his gospel ministry because they're going into particularly dangerous territory, and, like, and they could be in danger of thieves and robbers on the road who don't care one way or the other that they're

Christians. They're just evil people wanting to do evil things. And so there's Old Testament examples of, like, you know,

Nehemiah and them building a wall, and the enemies of God reviling him, and they set a guard, you know, they had swords, they set a guard, and, you know, they prayed, right?

Like, so there's, you know, there were situations that happened where the whole of the

Israelites were going to be slaughtered because their enemies had conspired a plan against them, and they petitioned the government to let them have the ability to defend themselves, and they were granted that ability, but that isn't in the government's purview anyways.

Like, it's not in the government's purview. So, like, what I'm trying to say is the burden of proof is on the government to prove that it's their prerogative to take an individual's means of defending himself away from him, you know, or just allow himself to be a sitting duck to evil people.

And, like, that's, like, essentially the issue that can happen at a variety of levels.

Like, meaning it's not a gun problem, it's a technology problem, it's a defense problem, it's a, like, you know, if it's sticks we're talking about, it's sticks we're talking about, it's guns we're talking about, it's guns we're talking about, it's rocks we're talking about, it's rocks we're talking about.

Am I allowed to build a fence around my house, you know, in order to stop the zombie horde from coming in?

Can I electrify it, you know? Like, what can I do? And so, like, the issue is it just depends on what the plans are against you, right?

Meaning, like, you know, if you have evil people who are doing evil things against you, then, you know, do you have a right to defend yourself?

And then, in some sense, it's immaterial how you, like, what technology you use to do it. Does that make sense?

Yeah. So, I do want to give just a little pushback, or maybe just get you to kind of clarify what you meant.

Because right at the beginning of this, you said, you know, is it the government's, does the government have a right to control the possessions of its people, was essentially what you said.

So, in your mind, does that mean, like, when it comes to, you know, drugs or something, should the government not, like, you know, dangerous drugs, not, like, prescription drugs.

Should the government confiscate those things? Do they have a right to confiscate those things?

Or, in your mind, no, they don't have a right to that. Yeah, I think that the drug conversation is fairly,

I think it's kind of a complicated discussion in general. And you have the libertarian kind of individuals who basically, you know, they're basically saying, hey, limit a government, and the government doesn't have a right, and we don't need an anti -state.

And, like, we don't need the government stepping in and telling us what we're able to do and are not allowed to do.

And I think a lot of the laws in the book are essentially, you know, the government playing the role of an overprotective mother, like seatbelt laws and things like that.

And, you know, I question, like, the right of the government or the responsibility, the

God -given responsibility of the government to basically tell their citizens that they must be safe.

And I think when you accept that kind of logic, essentially that leads to the pandemic logic where they lock you in your home in order to force you to be safe.

You know, I don't believe it's their job to do the risk management for you. Right, right. I don't.

So, now, I mean, like with the drug kind of discussion,

I mean, you could look at that practically, and I don't think they're doing a very good job of policing it in general.

Yeah, I mean, they were straight up handing it out. I don't think they're doing a very good job of that, you know, and I think

I would probably – I think there's a good argument to be made that –

I mean, there are arguments to be made on both sides. I don't know that I've necessarily landed on that one yet. Okay.

I've listened to arguments on both sides, and I lean more towards the –

I don't see that as a scriptural right. Uh -huh. There's a scriptural responsibility of government is to, you know, essentially be a nanny state government at that point.

Right. Like, I believe they have a responsibility to bear the sword, but then I don't think they have a responsibility to bear the sword against swordless citizens, right?

Yeah, especially the innocent ones. Right, yeah. So, I mean, I don't see anywhere in the

Bible where God gives the government the responsibility to basically de -arm all of their citizens and put them at their mercy and basically force them to do anything that they tell them to do.

I mean, it seems like a recipe for disaster at that point. Uh -huh. But with the drug discussion, part of why it's complicated is because drugs do –

I don't believe that – I'm not a pure libertarian in that way. I don't believe that government –

I mean, I don't believe that porn should be legal. But then, like, you do have biblical passages that you can appeal to that define the government's responsibility along those lines to punish fornication and adultery in certain ways, and so I would appeal to those kind of passages.

But then with the drug kind of passage, I don't know that I'm finding a lot of passages in the Bible that basically make it the government's job to police alcohol or certain kind of drugs, so I need a better argument at this point.

Okay. I guess, is there anything in your mind that the government should be able to,

I guess, police in terms of possessions beyond just individual cases?

So, like, the individual person who goes and attacks another person with a sword.

I mean, he should be put to death, right? But then assume he's not for whatever reason.

It seems like the government would at least be in the right to say, like, all right, well, we're going to take your weapons because we don't want you doing that anymore.

You've proved that you're dangerous. So, beyond that sort of example, is there anything in your mind that the government has like a, no, they actually do need to have their hand in their citizens' possessions when it comes to this specific thing, whatever that is, or no?

When it comes to this specific thing related to weapons in general or just in general? Just possessions in general.

Yeah, but I don't, like, I think government can covet too, right? Right, right, yeah.

The government can be guilty of coveting, so I don't know that it's, like, there is such a thing as property in the

Bible, so you don't take anything that belongs to your neighbor. And, like, the government can be guilty of theft, and so I think you need, like, you do need some kind of biblical case to be made that it's the right of the government to take things that belong to certain individuals, as far as that goes.

Okay. Meaning, like, you need to make a case for why, like, the burden of proof is, I would say the burden of proof is on the individual to show why, biblically, this is the responsibility of the government to take certain things from people.

And, you know, the government does confiscate, they do steal a lot of things from their citizens that they have no right to take.

Yeah, even the kings of Israel. Yeah. That's how God described if they pursued kings, then they were going to take all of their stuff.

And they're going to take, and they're going to take, and they're going to take, and that's, I mean, our government is out of control takers at this point. So, like, now, like, you know, there are individuals who can make certain choices that forfeit certain rights.

Right. For sure. But then just, you know, taking things that are, you know, being produced by citizens that,

I mean, the things are neutral in themselves. So, meaning, like, you know, like, if you come in and, like, if your government comes in and they take all the people's sticks, right, that they made, it's like, we're the only one allowed to have sticks.

It's like, well, I know how this kind of ends up, right? Yeah. Like, basically, you're the only ones with sticks.

So, that means we do whatever you tell us to do, right? Like, and there's no brakes on it anymore because now we're all defenseless, right?

Right, right. And that's just the way tyranny works, so. Okay. So, some pushback that I have seen before, and I think, you know,

James White, he mentioned this as well, but as, like, pushback that he's seen. But I've seen a lot of people who say there are certain weapons that kind of get the spotlight in these conversations, one of those being, like, the

AR -15. So, the argument is basically, like, hey, you don't need that, right?

That's, like, military -grade weapon, and what do you need a military -grade weapon for?

If the government ever comes for you, like, they've got tanks, and all you're gonna have is an

AR -15. So, the logical conclusion is to say, so, you don't need that.

So, we should make it illegal to own that so that people can't use them to easily kill people in schools, for example, right?

Sure. So, what should, like, the Christian view be, or even just, you know, like, the

American citizen view when it comes to that sort of argument? Like, hey, we shouldn't be allowing people to own, you know, quote -unquote, military -grade weapons.

It should be, like, bolt -action rifles or something instead, muskets instead.

Probably most people are just thinking, like, yeah, maybe it's fine to own pistols, but you don't need, you know, a 30 -round rifle, semi -automatic rifle.

So, what's the thought process there if you're the Christian? Yeah, I mean, I did a

Twitter thread on this, like, idea conceptually that, I mean, I can kind of bear out to try to answer that kind of question.

But, you know, just imagine that you are in, like, just imagine for a second that there is some sort of technology developed that, you know, essentially allows you to stop time around you, okay?

So, let's say that you have, like, a gadget you developed that is, like, a time bubble or something.

Now, this is, like, pure sci -fi, obviously, but I'm just trying to get you to think through a principle here. But just imagine you have a time bubble kind of technology, you know, let's say it's a watch or something like that, that essentially lets you move around while everyone is just, like, frozen, right?

Mm -hmm. All right. So, if that kind of thing were possible, you can imagine, like, the entailments of that.

What that would mean is, like, if you, you know, you see a pretty girl or something like that, you could just, you know, grab her, put her in a truck, drive her off, right?

Okay. Yeah, I'm just trying to, I'm telling you what depraved people could do, right?

Right. Like, you see, like, you want to take people's wallets, you can just walk through a crowd and take everyone's wallets, right?

See a car you like, you can grab the keys, take the car, drive it off, no one can do anything about it because you're essentially operating at a different, like, time -frequency -speed than them, right?

Okay. All right, so the issue then would be that that technology would basically put you, like, you'd have an overwhelming technological advantage that basically means you can do whatever you want, right?

Right, right. All right, so that's the way, like, civilizations have always worked throughout the history of the world, is that the individuals who have the overwhelming technological advantages, they do whatever they want.

That's the way it works, okay? Mm -hmm. So, like, that's the issue, like, the issue is, like, if you have an overwhelming technological advantage, you are basically entering into, you know, lower -G god mode, right?

Yeah, pretty much. All right, so, like, the problem then is that, like, this can happen at any level conceptually, so it doesn't matter, like, if everyone has sticks and you have the, you know, the, if everyone has sticks and you have the

AR -15, you're basically a lower -case g god, right? Mm -hmm, mm -hmm.

You do whatever you want, right? So, like, so the issue then is, like, well, like, who has, like, if there are these technologies that are invented, the government has the overwhelming technological advantage over its citizens, then functionally the government does whatever they want, okay?

Yeah. Right? So, now, is that the arrangement that we thought we were signing up for in creating the

United States? Well, no, that isn't the arrangement we thought we were signing up for. We weren't signing up for, like, a kind of arrangement where, like, government authorities were essentially had unlimited ability to, like, do whatever they want with us, okay?

So, like, if you give them that massive technological advantage, like, the issue is they have it, like, that's what they have, and so then you're at their mercy.

So, that's, like, so part of the issue is, like, well, we should have the kind of weapons that they have, right?

Yeah. And if we have the same kind of weapons they have, then what that means is they're accountable to their citizens, right?

Right. And what that means is, like, meaning, like, you know, like, if you're, like, all right, you imagine, like, let's roll back time, everyone has their swords, right?

Mm -hmm. I have my sword, the king and his men have their swords. Well, yes, the king and his men, there's a bunch of them that can gang up on me, right?

Yeah. But we all have the same technology, like, that's the point. We all have our swords, and it might be that, like,

I'm better at my sword than one of the king's guard, and so, like, if one of the king's guard wants to, like, rough me up and, you know, do horrible things to my family,

I could stop him if he's off the books, right? Mm -hmm. But then if he's conspiring with the rest of the king's guard to basically tax us to the point where we can't feed our families, at a certain point, what happens is the peasants get tired of it, right?

Yeah. They all grab their swords, and, like, then the king is accountable and in trouble, right?

Right, right. Does that make sense? Yeah. But then that is only possible if we all have the same kind of technology, right?

Or the ability to have the same kind of technology that, at a certain point, like, you can't, like, you can stir up the people, and you can stir them up, and you can, you know, lock them in their homes, you can take away their freedoms.

At a certain point, like, you're going to become accountable to them, and so, like, the issue then is that the government's not neutral, like, they're not neutral, and that's part of the issue that's involved in this kind of discussion.

They're not neutral, they're evil individuals, right, who, like, are showing that they have contempt for the governing documents, the constitution that we have.

So, at a certain point, you do have to have, like, citizens who have the ability to defend themselves, and it's like, well, you know, like, if you have an armed populace who knows how to use it, the reason why

Americans have won wars in the past is because we had guns, we trained them, we knew how to use them better than the other countries did, right?

Right, yeah, they grew up their whole life shooting, basically. Yeah, so now if the government turns on you, and is starting to oppress you, like, what you need is, like, you need a government that's accountable to the people in a certain sense, and, you know, us having, you know, an

AR -15 instead of just a six -shot pistol is a means of greater accountability for them.

Right. Yeah, I mean, certainly, there's, like, you know, a thousand tanks or whatever that we have, whatever, they can, you know, bring their tanks in, but, like, they're not gonna bring their, they don't have enough tanks to stop, you know.

Everyone. 26 million people, they didn't have enough, you know, tanks and, you know, ship, you know, planes and everything to stop, you know, the, you know, the terrorists over there in the

Middle East. Right. Surrendered all their assets and resources to, right? Right.

And, like, that's the thing. It's like, so, you say, oh, their planes and everything else. It's like, yeah, they lost all, they lost millions of, you know, dollars of technology, you know, to a bunch of individuals who just had guns, right?

Right. So, but yeah, the short of it is, yeah, I mean, you know, what are they allowed to have?

Yeah. And if they have overpowering weapons, then why shouldn't we? So, it's basically like, well, yeah, obviously, they have a, you know, technological advantage, right?

I mean, we have a, our military spends more than, I think, like, the next nine countries combined or something.

I don't remember the statistic exactly, but America spends a lot in terms of the military.

And so, obviously, there's going to be a technological advantage there. I mean, they have planes that don't require a physical person in the cockpit to fly them, you know?

So, but if you say, like, well, we can't hope to keep up with that.

So, you might as well just take away the AR -15. Your response is basically to say, well, yeah, like, sure, maybe we can't, like, keep up in terms of just the actual technology.

But then, you know, there's like, what, 150 million people in the U .S.? Or is it 300 million?

I can't remember. I think we have 380, maybe. I don't know. But, you know, if that many people are armed, the military,

I mean, you have to drop nukes or something. Right, yeah. It's something, like, utterly devastating and just totally over the top, you know, that changes the course of history forever.

So, am I kind of understanding what you're saying? Yeah, what I'm trying to say is

I'm just trying to – I'm basically just trying to say that, you know, the assumption there is that the government obviously should have a massive technological advantage over their citizens, and I would challenge that assumption.

Okay, okay. I would challenge that assumption to say that, you know, like, what do we do if they go bad, right?

Right, right. Well, if we go bad, then we might want to have the means to stop them. Right. So now, if you just believe that they're all wonderful and they're all good and, you know, they can do no wrong, then, you know,

I do have some, you know, land to sell you in Florida, you know, that I might be interested in.

Right. Now, we – Doug makes a response, like, you know, related to this, too, but, you know, in one of his posts he says, he says the

Second Amendment was not – this is an objection – the Second Amendment was not included in the Constitution because the

Founders wanted to preserve their posterity, the right to hunt squirrels with muskets, so he's saying it's not because they wanted to preserve their right to hunt squirrels, it was included because they wanted the population to have the resources available for a well -regulated militia.

Now, this militia was for coordinated military defense from the outside invaders, indigenous hostiles on the frontier, or, he says, tyranny from the johnnies in Washington.

This means that assault weapons need to be part of the mix. If someone replies that modern weaponry was not in view, it should be noted that modern form of militias were not in view either.

They're not talking about a National Guard that could be called up by George III. But surely the response come, this can't mean to include high -tech weaponry like shoulder -mounted surface -to -air missiles, and he says, well, sure it does, how else could we shoot down their surveillance drones?

So, you know, I would just say something similar to that. Right. Like, if the government – I don't want the government having, you know, just a massive technological avenge over us if we can help it, and so I don't just grant that it's natural and normal and obvious that they should have an overwhelming technological advantage to essentially be able to make us do whatever they want us to do.

You know, and that kind of – I was thinking about this, because in one sense it sounds a little bit ridiculous to say, like, all right,

I should be able to own, you know, a bazooka, for example, because I need to be able to blow up the

Abrams tank if it ever comes rolling my way, right? Right. So, like that – and I think in our society that sounds pretty ridiculous, because it's like, all right, well, we can own bazookas.

Well, how do I know someone's not just going to blow me up with a bazooka, you know, like randomly, because they just – they got mad at me for saying something.

Well, then the next step is to say, well, I'll just get a bazooka too.

Right, well, that's the issue, right, yeah. So, the issue in my thought experiment before is, like, you know, you imagine that scenario where, like, you have the time bubble and you can do whatever you want.

Well, like, in my, you know, hypothetical imaginary scenario, like, the only way to stop that would be to have your own, you know, to where you both are operating in normal time together, right?

Like, but then the issue is then if everyone had one, then you even the playing field.

That's the way it works, right? Yeah, I mean, you think about – you think, like, all right, it sounds ridiculous to say, like, hey,

I'm just going to own a bazooka too to deter you from shooting me with your bazooka, right?

But then wouldn't we all agree that we as Americans feel safer knowing that we have nukes to deter

Russia from shooting their nukes at us? Well, there's certainly – that is the logic, right? Right. But then, you know, we – that's the whole logic of the project is to say that, well, we have ours, you have yours, you shoot yours, you shoot – we shoot ours, and we all go down together, you know?

Yeah, like, all right, you want to shoot me on, you know, mutual destruction, ensured mutual destruction or whatever.

Right, right. So now, I mean, I do think you have to, like, you do have to think, like, well, about the nature of technology itself.

Like, you have to think about the nature of how technology actually works and is it the government's responsibility to take, like, to regulate, like, the kind of technologies that we can have in that kind of way.

And, like, so, like, the issue is, like, what is their regulatory goal or responsibility along those lines?

And, like, the issue is that, like, with weapons in general, like, you know, you can take the guns, you can take the knives, and we're helpless, right?

Right, right. Then whatever you say goes, right? Like, whatever you say goes, and, like, there's no stopping you at that point.

Yeah. And the issue is, historically, whenever that's happened, whenever they've de -armed the population, they do whatever they want to do.

Yeah. You know, and I'm talking about hundreds of millions have died in those kind of scenarios. Like, it's insane.

Like, it's, like, that's the way it works. But then it just happens at every level of technology, and that's what you have to think about.

So, but then the issue is, like, the more pervasive a technology is, like that, that gives you that kind of advantage, you deter people, right?

Like, that's what happens. You can't just do whatever you want to me anymore. So, if we all had our little time bubble things, then no one, like, they would all be useless, right?

But if you don't have one, you're at the mercy of everyone else who does, right? Right, right. And then it doesn't do you any good to say, well,

I'll just be at the mercy of the government then, right? Because they can go bad, man. They're not Christians. Right, right.

Well, I guess, you know, I'm safe from the bad guys, and now I'm, you know, at the mercy of the other bad guys, right?

The ones with the suits and ties. Right. Now, Canada just passed a law that I think is,

I don't know if it's necessarily a law that gives the government the right to confiscate guns.

But I think it at least is outlawing the sale of guns at this point.

Yeah, I heard something about that I'm not aware of. The details. Yeah, it sounded like an outlaw or something, but I don't know.

Now, let's say that were to happen in America. Should Christian, and let's assume it's a, you can't buy guns anymore, and you cannot own guns anymore.

So, if you own a gun, you are required to turn it in to the government.

What does the Christian do at that point? Should the Christian, number one, let's assume there's one

Christian who does not own a gun, who now wants to own a gun because they're worried that the government's coming after them.

Or even, you know, their neighbors are coming after them or something and they need to defend themselves. Should that person go try and buy a gun off the black market anyways?

And then let's assume there's a second Christian who already owns a gun. Should that Christian turn in their guns or should they keep them against the government's will?

Yeah, well, part of what you have to do is you have to ask yourself, what kind of government are you living in? And, like, part of the government that we're living in is we're living in, like, a, you know, essentially a representative democracy.

But then, like, the highest human authority in our, or the highest authority in our nation under our former government is the

Constitution itself. And the Constitution does give us certain rights. And so, let me see if I can just give you a thought experiment, just to help you to maybe navigate some of these issues.

But just imagine that you were to receive a tax bill from Georgia. Mm -hmm.

What would you do? Ignore it. I mean, but shouldn't you submit to the government?

I mean, yeah, like, the Alabama state government. But, like, they're telling you to do something and they're, you know, official, right?

I mean, yes, they are also a government, yes. So, it's not your government, right? Right. So, like, the issue is, like, you wouldn't obey that, but then would you be violating

Romans 13? Well, no. I mean, you wouldn't be violating, like, you submit to the governing authorities. And, like, there are rules, right?

There are rules to these kind of things. And so, like, submitting to the governing authority doesn't mean any, like, tyrant who comes along and says, hey,

I'm in charge, right? Mm -hmm. So, like, if someone, like, walked up to you and just said, hey, I'm a king,

I'm the king of America or something, you know, give me all your money. You know, it doesn't look like they have a gun or anything.

They're just, I'm the king of America and I command you to become my servant, you know? What would you do?

Tell, I mean, I would just tell them, leave me alone, crazy person. Right, because you're not actually, you don't have the authority to do that.

That's the issue, right? Right, right. You don't have the authority to do that. Now, like, under our form of government, like, the highest authority is the constitution and, like, the legislators and, like, the president of the

United States. And the judges are under the authority of that constitution. And so, the constitution gives us rights to guns.

And, I mean, it doesn't give it, like, as if it granted to us the rights to guns. It's just recognizing our right to that.

It's intrinsic. And that was part of, like, the discussion about how it was even rewarded. Like, how are these rights, these rights are not being granted by the government.

They're being recognized by the government. But then, like, in that kind of way, they're under, like, that's the rules.

And so, whenever, like, the way the system's set up is that when, like, you know, different branches of government try to overreach, then it's the citizens and the other branches of government's responsibility to resist that, to work it out in the courts.

Does that make sense? Mm -hmm. Like, so, like, if, you know, if the legislative branch or, you know, if the president were to, you know, do a ridiculous, you know, executive order, you know, where he pretends like he's a member of the legislative branch and just makes laws by, you know, divine fiat or whatever.

Like, if he were to do that, like, it would be our responsibility to say no and then challenge it in the courts. Because what's happening is he's being the tyrant.

He's the guy walking up to you and saying, give me all your stuff. And it's like, no, you're under the authority of the

Constitution. We all are. And you can't do that. That's not the way that this works. And so, at that point, it's, like, a citizen's responsibility to resist and work it out in the court system.

And then, if it doesn't get worked out that way, you know, our government makes it our responsibility as citizens to overthrow tyrannical rulers who refuse to submit to the laws that are established for them.

And so, like, in that way, like, it is in our government framework our responsibility to overthrow tyrants.

Okay. So, the long and short of it is, well, being in America, living under the

Constitution, the Constitution recognizes our right to bear arms.

And that's above them. Like, that's an authority above, like, you know. The executive branch, the legislative branch.

The executive branch is not a king, you know. Right. He's a man under authority, just like we are. And if he violates it, we're supposed to resist.

That's the arrangement we're under. Okay. So, we should resist. What about a government that doesn't recognize that right?

That doesn't, like, recognize the right of its citizens? To bear arms. Yeah. There's no, like, there's no

Constitution that, you know, says that citizens have the right to bear arms. There's not even a

Constitution. It's just like a, you know, a monarch or some sort of totalitarian ruler.

What do those Christians do? I mean, I think you persecute one town, you flee to the next, you know. So, I can, one of the things that's amazing here is that we're living in a transitional time where we're living in a time where we do have the moral high ground to resist.

And then what we're doing is we're, like, we're being told by, you know, our effeminate evangelical leaders to basically just, you know, hand over all authority over ourself to, you know, tyrants, basically.

Like, so, like, we're in a stage right now where we're being told that the biblical response is to enslave ourself to tyrants, essentially.

Right? To give away all ability we have to defend them. And so, it's like, like, there's a...

In the name of, like, turning the other cheek or Romans 13. Willingly go into slavery. Like, that's, like, so, right now, like, we're free men who are, we're being told to enslave ourself to these individuals who don't have the moral high ground in order to protect our evangelical witness.

But, I mean, once we do that, you know, I mean, it's like, it's unthinkable. You know, it's like, biblically speaking, it's like, if, you know, live as free men, right?

And if you can find a way to, you know, remain free, then take it. Right? So, like, so, we're in a situation where, like, we haven't been enslaved yet, but we're being told that the path to faithfulness is to enslave ourself to evil men.

Right? And then, like, once we give them all of the, you know, just give them permission to do it, they'll take it.

And then it's like, then we're going to have to figure out what, how do you respond when you're living in, like, in a totalitarian regime, you know, that you let happen.

Right? Right. Like, you don't have to let it happen. You know? So, like, you know, so, it's like, I mean, conceptually, it is like someone walking up to you, just some random person walking up to you and saying,

I claim you as my slave. Right? Mm -hmm. Like, what our evangelical leaders are essentially telling us is that anyone who does that, you just say, okay, in order to protect your witness.

I'm your slave now. I guess, I mean, you said that you're my king, and so, sure,

I guess I have to just, you know, go to your basement and you chain me up, you know? Like, I mean, it's just that level of stupid.

Right. Like, it's that level of absurd to the point where you say, no, I don't have to, no, you're not my king.

Like, you don't have the ability, I don't have to do what you say. Like, what, are you nuts? You know? Like, and that's, like, what we need to do to our government is to say, you're, are you nuts?

Like, we have a constitution that gives us rights. You're not allowed to do this. Right? But we're supposed to lay down our rights.

Remember? Yeah. The Christian life is all about laying down all your rights, I thought.

No. Yeah. I mean, lay down my right to my wife, lay down my right to my kids, you know?

Lay down my right. I mean, like, this is, certainly, like, Christians are to be individuals who, like, don't seek retaliation, you know?

So, if someone hits you on one side of the cheek, you turn the other cheek, we're sure we're supposed to be forgiving. We're supposed to be merciful.

We're not supposed to be individuals who are litigious, who are vengeful, who are taking matters into our own hands, who are unable to overlook an offense.

Like, sure, we're not to be vengeful. But that's very different than just, like, individuals who are basically laying down rights.

And so, like, the issue with rights is that, like, a right, you know, and there's a lot of pastors who say that kind of thing, and I think they haven't thought through what they're saying.

But, like, the issue with rights is, with every right, there's a corresponding responsibility. So, if I lay down my right to my kids, right?

Like, what I've essentially done is I've laid aside my responsibility to be their parent and to protect them and to provide for them and to care for them.

So, like, the issue is that if you lay down rights, you're laying down responsibilities. If I lay down my right to guns, then

I'm laying down my responsibility to protect weak people who need protection. So, like, it's not that simple.

If you tell me to lay down my right to my property, I'm laying down my responsibility to, like, take care of my family, to steward

God's money the way that He tells me to do. So, we shouldn't just voluntarily surrender rights in that way.

Like, we should, like, certainly, you know, someone is holding up a gun to your head and saying, give me all your money.

And I do think what you say, you're not surrendering your right to property. What you're doing in that moment is you're, like, you are basically saying it's better to live than to get a bullet in my head over this stuff, right?

But under coercion, right, you're giving in to a thug in order to, you know, live the next day.

So, I don't think, like, there is a type of Christian who is just, like, full of vengeance and just, you know, don't nobody, you know, treat me bad kind of thing.

Yeah, and that's the situation Peter is actually under. It's just, like, he didn't have a category for suffering for righteousness' sake.

And, you know, essentially, Jesus at that point rebuking him, you live by the sword, you die by it. Meaning, like, you know, you're so ready to chop someone's head off, right, that you don't see that I have a purpose to go into the cross and this kind of thing.

So, but the issue – Even though I've told you time after time again that that's exactly what I'm going to do.

That's exactly what I'm going to do, and you just won't hear it. So, the issue is, like, you're not laying down your right to life or property or, you know, relationships or whatever.

You're not laying down your rights. What you're doing is, like, you're not being vengeful, if that makes sense.

You're not developing a personality that is dominated by vengeance. But that's very different from, like, laying down the responsibility to steward the things that God's given you.

Right. And, you know, that's interesting. Because, you know, as Christians, obviously

Christ, he set an example for us in terms of the way that he loved us as his adopted co -heirs, basically.

Meaning, he laid down his life for us. He loved us unto death, right? But then you do have a lot of Christians right now who are saying, you know, we need to lay down our rights to own guns.

Right? And they're even, I've seen plenty of people going as far as to say, hey, like, if you're in the situation where there's an active shooter, like, you hide.

Right? You hide. And it's like, I guess the confusion there is like, all right, but we're the same people who keep saying that there is no greater love than this, that someone laid down his life for his friends.

So, which is it? Like, it seems like if that's what you believe, and you're put in that situation.

Now, I understand that it's one thing to talk about it, and then it's another thing to actually do it.

I get that, you know, it's easier to talk about something than actually do it. I acknowledge that that's real.

But then there are plenty of people throughout history who have been able, you know, to lay down their life for someone else.

And if we're the type of people who are saying that's the greatest way to love someone, isn't there a sense in which we should be, as Christians, telling people, like, no, you, if there's anyone who's not going to hide and instead is going to, like, confront the situation, it's going to be you as a

Christian. Like, if you have the ability to. Or am

I oversimplifying it? No, there's, I mean, the whole issue with the discussion is, it's like, what's happened is that guns essentially have been demonized.

And they're treated like, it's like, if you imagine Lord of the Rings or something along those lines.

Like, Lord of the Rings, the ring is kind of inherently evil. Yeah. And it's altogether corrupting.

It corrupts, yeah. Now, that's part of the problem with the way Tolkien wrote it is that, like, the ring was supposed to symbolize sin.

But then, like, the problem is that sin comes from within. It doesn't come from without. Right?

So, there's no, like, magical talisman that's inherently corrupting. Like, that's not the way it works. So, but then the way we're told to view guns is we're told to view guns as if they're the ring of power, right?

Yeah. Like, that they're inherently evil and corrupting and, you know, like. They're going to find a way to kill someone.

And they're going to manipulate everyone around them to get them to kill people. Yeah, it's like the fantasy sword or whatever that has, like, the evil personality in it or something.

And then, like, you, you know, you equip the thing and it's going to turn you evil, you know, or something like that.

Like, it's just, like, that's not the way that guns work. I mean, they're just, it's just a tool, right?

It's just a sophisticated tool. So, but then the issue is, like, where does evil come from?

And we're living in a culture and society right now that doesn't realize that evil comes from the heart. So, then, like, the issue is, like, you know, if someone wants a gun, it's like, well, you must be a

Trump supporter and, you know, mass murderer, killing spree kind of person. It's like, no, I, I, the only reason

I would want a gun is so that I could stop what's happening in Chicago every week from happening at my house.

Yeah. Right? Like, I don't want my, I don't, like, like, and that's part of the thing that's so dishonest about the whole discussion is that no one cares about all the gun violence that really is happening.

And yeah, a lot of kids are dying from guns, but they're dying from guns in the inner cities due to gang violence.

Right. Like, a thousand times more than, like, they're dying to school shootings. Yeah. Hey, I'm pretty sure.

So, and I saw this the other day, 50 people died in Chicago over Memorial Day weekend from guns.

Right. And that's just one city. Like, that's one city. And, like, how many school shootings happen a year?

Right. Not many at all. Right. And, and, and that, you know, totally outnumbers that one school shooting in that one city.

And so, like, there is an epidemic of gun violence. It's just not where we think. And it's not politically correct to talk about it.

But, like, the issue is if there are people, if there are gang members who have guns, they're going to do what they're going to do.

And they're going to shoot people. And so, it's like, if I don't have one, then, like, I've surrendered my responsibility to protect my family and protect those who are around me.

But if everyone, like, relearned how to be courageous, then what you would realize is that, like, you have a moral responsibility to protect the weak.

Yeah. And the only way you're going to do that is to, you know, not bring a knife to a gunfight or whatever, right?

I mean, that sometimes may work. But, I mean, that's the point. Like, the point is, like, you, you have to be ready, you know.

And so, what, what we did in previous generations is we trained men to be ready to protect people.

And that happened through, in a wide variety of ways. I mean, you, you teach your kids to, you know, you don't pick on a girl.

You don't fight a girl. You don't, you know, even, like, the Your Mama jokes have, like, they arose in a kind of worldview where men were trained to defend women, right?

Uh -huh. And so, like, if you think about, like, now, it's just funny, you know, because you lost, like, the foundation for it.

Like, it's like, don't nobody make fun of my mom, you know. It's like, who cares, you know. It's just a joke, you know. It's like, no, but that was, happened in a society where men thought they had a responsibility to protect women, right?

Right. Particularly their mom and their sister. And then, like, you would get this kind of outrage that would happen if you said something insulting.

But the point, though, the point, the broader point I'm making is, like, you used to have trained men to be courageous, and then they would.

But now what happens is, you know, you can have a, you know, a sodomite go into the, you know, Pulse nightclub and just shoot people and unload, right, and do all that.

And, like, everyone just sits around and waits because they don't have any courage. They don't have any. Yeah, but one of the things

I've taught my kids is, like, hey, when you get to be a teenager or, you know, whatever, someone starts shooting, you all run at them.

And maybe he'll get one of you, but he won't get all of you, right? Mm -hmm. But that's what you do.

Like, you go and you go after him, right? Right. But, I mean, like, if you had guns, it'd be a lot easier, right?

Right. Like, you pull them out and you stop them, right? But that's what you need. Like, you know, if there is evil in the world and it's going to express itself, like, then what you want is you don't want to wait on another man to do your job.

And that's what many people do with the police. They're looking to another man to basically be a man for them. Right, yeah.

Instead of, like, you know, thinking to yourself, no, I'm a man and I have a responsibility to protect people around me, instead of just being a coward who's just going to watch as someone unloads on people.

Yeah, it just seems like one of those things that you would say, well, if I'm going to, you know, if I'm put in that kind of situation, if I'm going to die,

I'm going to die fighting. You'd go out and hail a gunfighter, right? I would much rather, you know,

I would much rather be dead because I was trying to protect other people than I'm dead because I was hiding and I got caught.

Well, I mean, I can't tell you how many times I've had that kind of thought process happen in my mind. Like, you know, what if someone were to come up to our church and start shooting?

Right. What would be my plan? And, you know, I have it worked out in my mind. There's a plan. Yeah. You know, and I hope that the rest of you guys have a plan.

Yeah, I think the same way. I mean, I hope you do. Obviously, I hope that, you know, you don't want that to happen, but then that doesn't mean you don't mentally prepare yourself for if it does.

I saw a funny meme or whatever where the bear is attacking a man.

It said something like, you know, 40 % of men's life is devoting to trying to figure out what they would do in this exact situation.

Yeah, that's pretty accurate. Alright, what do I do if the bear attacks me?

Real men, you know what I mean? I'm pretty sure I was thinking about that the other day.

I heard some story about someone. Oh, no, you know what it was? I saw a video of a guy who was riding his mountain bike out in the woods, and he had a camera set up, and you see him kind of ride past.

And then a few seconds later, he's running back with his bike, and then you see a bear step in the frame.

And then, you know, the comments are all like, yeah, they're similar. Most men have devoted a significant amount of time to asking themselves, what would

I do in this exact situation? That's right. But what I was going to say is, you know, we interacted with someone online who was basically, you had mentioned the idea of men needing to be courageous.

If we don't train men to be courageous, if we don't train them to know how to use weapons to attack people who intend to cause harm on other people, then how are you ever going to do something like raise up enough people to storm the beaches of Normandy, right?

And this person that we interacted with, they kind of viewed that as like a preposterous thing.

Like, that's just not something that we have to train people up for. But then, you know, unfortunately for that person, a few days later, you know, the shooting happens, right?

And what is everyone doing? They're praising the person who was brave enough to run in there and shoot the guy, right?

And now, obviously, those are different situations. They require, you know, they're not in every way comparable, but they require the same exact thing.

Courage is courage. Right? Yeah. Now, do they require the same degree? I mean, we can debate that,

I suppose. But, you know, like, that person was the type of person who most likely was raised up, or at least later on in life, taught themselves to be courageous.

If you can't face a virus with a .01 chance of death, you're not going to be able to storm the beaches of Normandy.

You know, if you're walking around wearing a mask right now on your face, like, you're doing that in a non -ironic way or something like that.

Like, you know, you don't have the requisite courage needed to do anything. But, I mean, just think about different civilizations throughout the history of the world.

I mean, like, the Spartans or, you know, different societies like that. I mean, they trained their kids from an early age to know how to use a sword because that was tied to what it meant to be a man.

Right. It was tied to, like, being able to defend yourself and defend others. And it wasn't, like, no one thought, oh, well, we're training you to be a sword, how to wield a sword so you can be a mass murderer.

It's like, no. It's like, no, there are actually evil people in the world. Like, and so, like, the issue is, like, we're, you know, we're supposed to protect ourselves from enemies both foreign and domestic.

Like, that's the issue. Like, the issue is that there are enemies out there. There are evil people who have evil designs and evil plans.

You know, some of those designs, I mean, some of those evil people might be, you know, these individuals who have a chip on their shoulder or they're mad at everyone around them.

And, you know, probably on significant kind of drugs, they may be the enemies that we need to protect each other from.

It may be, you know, these enemies in the inner city, gang violence. It may be, you know, the bureaucrats in Washington or the enemies that we need to protect ourselves from.

But, I mean, imagine, like, you know, if China or Russia invades. Like, what are we going to do with all of our safe space warriors, you know?

Right. Like, what are we going to do? It's a joke, man. I mean, it's just like, they said something mean to me.

They can't even handle that. You think that they're going to be able to, like, they can't even, like, face, like, you know, the statistically insignificant kind of risk that was associated with this, you know, pandemic fake thing that we just went through.

Like, they're not going to be able to do. I mean, they're just going to roll over, you know, and we're enslaved. And, like, our civilization goes.

And, like, when the men go, the civilization goes. That's the way it works. And it's like, oh, well, who's attacking us? It's like, well, just wait, man.

You know? Get a few years. You know, that Russian, you know, no one thought Russia was going to invade

Ukraine either, right? Right. Everyone would have bet against it. Now, all of a sudden, their citizens are having to fight.

Right. I mean, but then, like, you prepare yourself for that beforehand. And, like, the way you prepare yourself is the way that you respond.

Right. And so, I did see a video of a guy who stopped a robber, you know, at a store.

And, like, the guy pulled a gun on him. And he reached up and grabbed the gun and, you know, disarmed him.

And the lady he was interviewing was so enthralled by that. She's like, I'm sure that that was your military training.

And he's like, no, that wasn't my military training. That was, I had planned in my mind what I would do in that exact scenario.

And then when it happened, I executed the plan. You know what I mean? Yeah. And that's the way it works.

You plan. Like, you have to plan on what you're going to do. And so, what are we going to do if there's a shooter at our church?

We need to have a plan in our mind what we're going to do. You know, I hope the plan at our church is that, I mean, I hope it never happens, but I hope the plan at our church is that the moment he walks in, all the men in the room charge him.

And he may get two or three of us, and then we get him. Right? Yeah. Or at least all the men pull out guns and shoot him.

Or that. Yeah. I mean, that'd be better, you know, too. But, yes, you need a plan.

Right. Okay, well, that's all the questions I have. Tim, is there anything that you want to just bring up that maybe we didn't cover or even just summarize what we have talked about?

Yeah, no, I think you have a lot of evangelical leaders right now who are essentially just falling all over themselves trying to win the world's approval by being agents that are actively trying to enslave us in the moment.

And so, they really do need to think through some of these things. And, you know, the Predictable Fellows all come out every time we have one of these predictable discussions about gun control.

And, you know, they want, like, common sense gun control measures. And it's just like, yeah,

I mean, I don't know that I trust, you know, any of these leaders that we have to do anything common sense.

I mean, they've asked us to deny common sense at almost every single point. And so, I don't know that we have a shared agreed upon definition of common sense anymore.

But then what it sounds like you want to do is you want to, you trust the government implicitly to be your dad, you know, and your

God. And I don't, you know, I don't trust the government to do that. I think that they're obviously corrupt and are filled with an evil agenda.

And I think that it's our responsibility to try to, like, it's our right to bear arms, but it's our responsibility to bear arms in order to protect individuals that God has placed in our life.

So, like, this isn't, I mean, just trying to reduce it to some kind of pro -life discussion is just neither here nor there.

Like, we need to be men of courage who are, you know, using the resources that God has given us.

And we're still in a country right now that, you know, has these rights still, and we need to use them or we're going to lose them.

And when we do lose them, it goes bad. You know, you can expect hundreds of millions dead at that point. That's what's happened throughout history.

So, just look at, you know, what happens when communism has taken over countries, and there's, you know, plenty of historical examples to show you.

First move is disarm population. Second move is you're done, you know. So, if that's what you want, then,

I mean, you know, it's hard to, like, the naivety there is just mind -boggling.

Right. Yeah, well, thank you, Tim, for walking us through that and answering a lot of my questions.

Yeah, hopefully this is helpful for you guys out there listening and sort of forming your own understanding in terms of how

Christians should view weapons of self -defense and that they aren't inherently evil.

I think that's a really big point that we made, is they aren't inherently evil, as a lot of people really kind of make them out to be.

And we need to be people who are ready to actually, you know, lay down our lives for our families, our friends, you know, our neighbors.

That's what Christ tells us is truly loving. And part of being prepared for those types of situations in a way that maybe you don't have to actually, you know, like, lose your life in the name of protecting them, but you are laying down your life, meaning you're putting yourself in harm's way and stopping someone who is trying to harm the people that you care about.

Part of what helps us do that is actually having weapons. And so we hope this has been helpful for you guys.

We hope that this equips you guys to go out and have your own conversations about what it means for Christians to own weapons.

And we want to thank you for all your support, and we look forward to having you on the next one. This has been another episode of Bible Bashed.

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Now, go boldly and obey the truth in the midst of a biblically illiterate world who will be perpetually offended by your every move.