January 5, 2026 Show with Daniel Darling on “In Defense of Christian Patriotism”

Live from historic downtown Carlisle, Pennsylvania, home of founding father James Wilson, 19th century hymn writer

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Jim Thorpe. It's Iron Sharpens Iron. This is a radio platform in which pastors,

Christian scholars, and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

Proverbs chapter 27 verse 17 tells us iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

Matthew Henry said that in this passage, we are cautioned to take heed with whom we converse and directed to have a view in conversation to make one another wiser and better.

It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next two hours, and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions.

And now, here's your host, Chris Arnson. Good afternoon,

Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, and the rest of humanity living on the planet Earth who are listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com.

This is Chris Arnson, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Monday on this very first live broadcast of 2026,

Monday, January 5th. And I hope that all of you had a wonderful New Year's Eve celebration with loved ones and that you have started off the year with optimism of our

Lord's blessings upon your life. Well, one of the things that I love to do here on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio is take up the very strong suggestions and recommendations of people for whom

I have the highest esteem, such as my friend David Dykstra, retired pastor who was recently on this broadcast discussing his book,

Yearning to Breathe Free, Thoughts on Immigration, Islam, and Freedom. And if you haven't heard that interview with Brother Dykstra, I strongly urge you to look that up in our archives,

D -Y -K -S -T -R -A. You could type in his last name in the search engine and you'll find that.

But he, in social media, was strongly recommending that folks get a copy of a book called

In Defense of Christian Patriotism by Daniel Darling.

And I immediately knew, having such a strong confidence in the discernment of Brother Dykstra, that I had to get this man on my program.

And Daniel Darling is our guest today, author, pastor, thought leader, director of the

Land Center for Cultural Engagement at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, and assistant professor of faith and culture at Texas Baptist College.

And today we are addressing that very book that I mentioned, In Defense of Christian Patriotism.

It's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the very first time ever to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Daniel Darling.

Well, Chris, thank you for having me, and so grateful for the ministry you have here on the radio. I love what you're doing, and just glad to be joining you today.

And I am thrilled about it myself, and I'm sure our listeners are as well. And well, tell us something about Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, where you are a director of the

Land Center, and you could tell us about that as well. Yeah, so Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary has been around since 1908, was founded by B .H.

Carroll, and it was the second Southern Baptist Seminary founded after Southern Seminary.

And we've been faithfully training young men and women for gospel ministry in a variety of vocations and callings, primarily training young men to be pastors, but also a lot of young women to go into ministry in a variety of roles.

We got a lot of young men and women going to the mission field. It's a great legacy here, and you probably know a pastor or two in your life that is a

Southwestern alum. We also have a college, Texas Baptist College, which does great work.

And I teach in the college, and I lead the center, the Richard Land Center for Cultural Engagement.

If you remember, Richard Land was a Southern Baptist statesman. He was the president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission for about 25 years and was well -known on radio and was on TV a lot and wrote books and things and was just a well -known and respected conservative leader.

And we lead the center that's in his honor, and we have a faith and culture concentration.

So if young men or women want to come and kind of get equipped on how to think through public policy ideas and public theology and maybe feel a calling to go into public service, it's definitely an option for them.

We host events. We have content. We have all kinds of things to try to help equip the church to think well about the moral and ethical issues facing us here in the 21st century.

Well, if anybody wants to find out anything about my guest, Daniel Darling, his website, very easy to remember,

DanielDarling .com, DanielDarling .com. And God willing, I will be announcing that toward the end of the program as well.

And keep in mind, folks, when you hear me referring to my guest as Daniel Darling, that's not a term of affection for him.

That is his last name. And I pay you tribute, brother, for surviving your childhood and teen years with the name

Darling. Well, you know, occasionally I still, if I'm calling for something, people say, is that really your name?

It's a great name. Or they'll give me the whole, you know, ask me about that. You know, am I related to the people in Peter Pan?

Have I seen the Andy Griffith special? There's a couple of famous Darlings. Ron Darling pitched for the

Mets in the 60s, and now he's a color commentator. But yeah, I mean, my wife always calls me

Darling. It's not always a term of endearment, but she does always call me Darling. Well, we have a tradition here on Iron Trip and Zion Radio, whenever we have a first time guest such as yourself, that guest will provide a summary of their salvation testimony, which will include the kind of religious atmosphere, if any, in which they were raised.

And what kind of providential circumstances our sovereign Lord raised up in their lives that drew them to himself and saved them?

And I would love to hear a summary of your story, brother. Well, I'm honored to tell the story.

It really starts even before I was born. My dad grew up in a very dysfunctional home in the

Chicago area, a broken home, and dysfunctional, unchurched. And his older sister had encouraged him to start watching this guy on TV named

Billy Graham. You may have heard of him. And long story short, my dad walked forward at a

Billy Graham crusade in 1971 in Chicago. Actually, I have a picture of that crusade in my office up on the wall.

And it really changed the trajectory of his life, of really the whole family. He was in his, I think, early 20s.

And so my dad became a Christian, radically changed his life. He married my mom.

My mom passed away a couple of years ago, but my mom was Jewish. She converted to Christianity. And they raised us in the church, grew up in the

Baptist church. And so I heard the gospel my whole life. We went to church three times a week, every time the doors were open, and sometimes when the doors weren't open.

And my dad was a faithful layperson, a church elder, and my mom was very active as well.

And I remember distinctly becoming a Christian at the age of four years old. I was riding in the back of our

Chevy, red Chevy Malibu, here in the Chicago area, and made the decision to follow

Christ. Of course, we know—I believe in the theology that says that God is the one who first acts to save us, and of course, being dead in our trespasses and sins,

He comes and rescues us. And I believe that with my whole heart, that God saved me. And I really have always loved the ministry.

I've always loved church. I still do. I'm almost—I'll be 48 here in a few weeks.

And I look forward to Sundays. I can't wait to go to church, to sing, to worship, to hear preaching. God has given me that love for His people.

And so that's my story. I always felt called to ministry work. I've really had three loves in my life.

I love ministry work. I love—I felt called to full -time pastoral ministry, vocational ministry in junior high, really.

I've always loved writing, you know, ever since I turned in a few essays in junior high and had a teacher say,

Hey, I think you might pursue this. So I've always loved either putting words on paper or reading.

Just love, love kind of doing that. And that's taken me to a lot of really cool places.

And I've always loved sort of history and politics. My parents took a trip.

I think it was like, I was like 10 or 11. It was 1988 or something like that, or 89.

We took a trip. We packed our Chevy station wagon in Chicago, and we drove to Washington, D .C.

And, you know, I was captivated, you know, seeing the monuments and all that kind of stuff.

So I've always had those three loves, the church, the cultural stuff and politics and writing. Lord sort of put all those three together in various ways.

I've served as a pastor, which I loved. I've served as an executive doing public policy in D .C.

and state capitals. And now I get to teach here in the Southwestern Seminary.

So the Lord's given me those opportunities and really thankful for it. Hallelujah. Well, this is a fascinating subject to me because you would think that the subject of Christian patriotism would not be controversial, but sadly it is.

And not only is it controversial in how those on the left react to the expression of patriotism by conservative

Christians, of course, those on the left often, especially if they are running for office, have some kind of patriotism that they will wear as a facade.

And not to be overly broad -brushing there, I know that there are fine men who fought in all of our wars that are from a far more left -leaning perspective than I adhere to.

So I can't say that no one on the left has any valid form of patriotism.

But when it comes to Christian patriotism, there seems to be not only a visceral reaction from the left, but even within conservative

Bible -believing circles, there is a spectrum of view on this, and it can cause heated debate and division.

And so what was the reason that compelled you to write this book to begin with?

Because, obviously, the very title itself, In Defense of Christian Patriotism, reveals that there are critics of this concept.

Yeah, well, a few things. I think, one, you touched on it, but I want to expand a little bit more.

You know, I think over the last several decades, there's been a decline in patriotism, really, in the

United States. I think, actually, what's been fairly chic and popular is a sort of American self -loathing, thinking the worst about America.

And I think we mostly see this on the left, but you see some of it on the right, the sort of black -billed idea that everything's terrible and whatever.

But most of it's on the left. Some of it's our educational system that's kind of—kind of take the Howard Zinn view of history, that, you know, we're only defined by America's sins and bad things that we've done, which we have.

And then I think in the evangelical world, Christian world, even among good conservative, Bible -believing

Christians, there's a real renaissance, I think, to say that you love the country, you're proud of the country, you love being

American, America's a good country. I think in part because we've been hit so hard from the media and other places that say, you know, any time a

Christian does that, you're conflating the kingdom of God and the kingdom of man. And so there's this real hesitance, real reticence, like any expression of love for country is somehow idolatry.

And I think there are idolatrous ways to love your country. I talk about this in the book, right?

I think Jonah, for instance, is someone who was so patriotic. He loved his country so much that he didn't want to participate in the mission of God.

However, I think today we have an imbalance the other way, that people just sort of loathe their country or are indifferent. And first of all,

I think we've created a false dichotomy that you have to choose loving God or country. And sometimes you have to make that choice, right?

When Peter is saying, you know, being told not to preach the gospel, he has to say, no,

I obey God rather than man, you know, the book of Acts. But most of the time, it's not a binary choice.

It's about ordering our loves. And here's where I borrow from C .S. Lewis and G .K. Chesterton and others,

Augustine, where we order our love. So of course, God is first, the kingdom of God is first, but underneath that we have lesser allegiances and lesser loves that we can order rightly.

And, you know, we know how to do this in other areas of our lives, right? I mean, I've had friends say, well,

I can't do the Pledge of Allegiance to America because I only pledge allegiance to Christ.

I've seen people post it on social media and say, well, I don't know, we know how to do lesser allegiances.

Twenty -three years ago, I pledged allegiance to my wife. And I knew, of course, that my allegiance to Christ supersedes that, right?

But the pastor didn't stand there and say, okay, Dan, you have to choose between allegiance to Christ and allegiance to Angela.

No, we order it rightly. And of course, Christ is highest, but then we do it underneath that. And we know how to do this in other areas, right?

I mean, in a sense, I'm pledging allegiance every month to my mortgage company and to my cell phone company.

These are lesser things, right? And so I think we could do that with America. And so not only do

I think it's okay to be patriotic, I actually go a step further, Chris, and say, I think it's incumbent on a

Christian to love their country. And the reason I say that is because, first of all, it springs from gratitude that this is the place

God has given us. We are Christians. Yes, we're members of the kingdom of God, but we're not disembodied people.

We're born to a place and we have a home. And it's good to love that and be grateful for it.

But secondly, when Jeremiah speaks to the exiles in Jeremiah 29, and I think

New Testament Christians can consider themselves exiles. Peter says this, we're strangers and exiles, citizens of the kingdom of God.

What does he say to the exiles in Jeremiah? He says, seek the welfare of your city, seek the flourishing of your city.

I don't know how, Chris, to seek the flourishing of our cities and our country, if we hate or loathe our country.

I think it's fundamentally incompatible. Richard John Newhouse said, I think 40 years ago, he said, patriotism is a species of discipleship.

And I think he's right that indifference or loathing of our country is not only not more spiritual.

I think it's actually at odds with how God would have us think about the place where we've been born or where we are as citizens.

And so I really want to help Christians think through this. This was kind of the genesis of the book. And then what does that look like in terms of our politics?

How do we think about our history? How do we think about what are some of the things, if we love our country, how can we renew the country for the next 250 years?

What does that look like? Excellent. Now, before I go into some questions that are specifically related to our country, you and I as American citizens, how does the

Christian, and is it required of a Christian, in some other country, perhaps even a third world country, perhaps even a country under Sharia law, where they are just oppressed by the weight of tyranny, by their lives being threatened by a dictatorship that hates

Christianity. They themselves may have been imprisoned and perhaps faced death.

Perhaps they have loved ones who have been tortured and killed. And even beyond that realm, but even a country wracked with poverty where there is little joy to be found anywhere as far as what their native land can provide for them.

Is that person of that kind of a country required of God to be patriotic?

Well, that's a great question. I get asked that. I get asked that periodically. And I think the way to think about it is this, that love of country and patriotism doesn't always equate to support and love of policies or even the current state of the country.

I mean, Teddy Roosevelt had a great quote where he said, you know, patriotism doesn't imply that you're going to support an administration or president or policy.

In fact, sometimes patriotism causes you to oppose that. So it's obviously a lot harder to think about this when you get outside of America, which, you know, we have for all of our issues is very prosperous and free and wonderful.

If you're in one of these countries, say if you're a Christian in North Korea or in a closed Islamic country and you're suffering or any of these places or even, you know, a house church member, you know, arrested in China, I think you can love the place you're at and the distinct culture and the good, redemptive virtues of that country while also being really sorrowful and remorseful and really maybe even angry about the state of the country, the policies, right?

I think of a place like China where if you're a Christian in China facing persecution, you don't like the communist government, there's not a lot for you to like about the current state of the politics or of the governing of the country.

But there are distinctly Chinese, you know, redemptive things about the nation and the land that are good that—and sometimes patriotism of a country causes you to really fight for a better system in a better way.

I think of Dietrich Bonhoeffer going to Germany. Everyone pleaded with him to stay in America or stay in the

UK during World War II when Hitler had taken over his country. And he went back to oppose

Hitler and oppose Nazism in part because that was his nation and he loved that nation and he wanted to see it differently.

He wanted to see the good Germany, not this kind of Germany. So, you know, it's complicated, like you said, but I think every country has a story, has a history, has redeemable virtues, even if it's been taken over by tyrannical governments.

And in some ways, the truest form of patriotism is to say, no, I want to—you know, if I have agency to fight and make it, you know, to push back on these policies.

Sometimes you can't, right? Sometimes you have no voice, you have no agency. But I think of, like, even today, the protesters in Iran, right?

These people in Iran that are protesting the totalitarian government of the mullahs and of the

Islamic State, they love their country. They know

Iran has beauty and natural resources and a wonderful history going back centuries, and they want to restore that.

So they're actually protesting, in a sense, because they love the country.

So it is a little complicated, but I think we can say that, you know, that we can be proud or we can love a country, be patriotic, even if things aren't going as well as we would like.

Now, before we go to our first commercial break, you mentioned before in generalities that a person can be guilty of a wrongly motivated or expressed patriotism, perhaps a patriotism that either borders on or even leaps over the border of heresy in some way, idolatry.

Can you give us some specific examples of that kind of a patriotism that you've witnessed, perhaps even from those who have an identity as a conservative, patriotic,

American -loving individual? Yeah, that's a great question. And, you know, like any of our good things, our loves, they can turn into idols, right?

And we want to be wise about that, right? And I use the example in the book about Jonah.

Jonah was a patriot. He was a prophet in Israel who had prophesied correctly good times to come in the northern kingdom.

He was very close to the king. And Israel's main threat, main enemy was

Assyria. They were bloodthirsty and terrible people, and they were

Israel's sworn enemy. And God had a special assignment for him to go to Assyria to preach repentance, to show the world—you know,

Israel is supposed to be a light to the nations—that Israel, you know, to show the nations, declare to the nations that God wanted them to repent.

And Jonah didn't want to be part of that mission. It's not because he didn't think God couldn't save them, but it's because he knew they couldn't, and he didn't want them to experience

God's love. And so his love of country became the ultimate thing.

You know, when good things become ultimate, I really think that's where we get in trouble. And so, you know, that's an example there.

I think, you know, if our patriotism causes us to see the mission of God, to bring the gospel to the nations as inconvenient or even an impediment to our patriotism, if our patriotism causes us to think that we're better than other people because we're born in America, if it causes us to be stingy and not generous, all those kinds of things, if it becomes the overriding thing,

I think a good test of that is to see—another way that, another symptom of a love of country that is too foreign, too idolatrous, is, you know, do we put our entire hope in our country?

Now, I love this country. I think we have a bright future. I'm bullish on America, but it's not my hope, right?

The hope is in the kingdom of God. I think you can, sometimes it can express in a kind of politics that is existential, and we sweat it, and it's all or nothing.

And I do think politics has ramifications. I think policy matters. I'm not saying we should be different.

In fact, I have a whole chapter saying we should be engaged and involved. But when that becomes our overriding sense and we lose hope in Christ, I think that's where we say, okay, this has gotten a little bit out of order here, right?

Just like anything else. And here's the thing about ordering our loves. When something that is good becomes ultimate, we actually don't enjoy it in the way

God intended, right? If I make my wife my ultimate allegiance,

I'll actually expect her to fulfill things in me that only God can do. I'll actually won't treat her well.

Same with my kids. My kids are my everything. I won't treat them the way God wants me to treat them.

I'll make them little gods, and they're not equipped for that. And same with our country. If we invest so much in our country that it'd be expected to fulfill in us, or politics, something that only

God can fulfill, then I think we're boarding an idolatry. By the way, I think patriotism is the healthiest expression.

I think when it gets into idolatry, it gets into something different, something more perverted, something more sub -Christian.

And we have to go to our first commercial break, and if you'd like to join us with a question of your own, submit it to ChrisArnzen at gmail .com,

C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com. Give us your first name at least, city and state of residence, and country of residence, if you live outside of the

USA. Only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter.

Let's say you have issue with either the demonstration of patriotism that is manifested in your own church, or lack thereof, and you are troubled by it.

That kind of a thing, we would understand why you would want to remain anonymous. We don't want to be smirching the reputation of churches that we know nothing about here as the host and guest of this program.

So we would actually insist that you remain anonymous. But if you're just asking a general question about the church, the

Bible, and history in regard to patriotism, please give us your first name at least, city and state of residence, and country of residence.

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The Lord bless you in the knowledge of Himself. Welcome back. If you just tuned us in, my guest today for the full two hours is

Daniel Darling, and we are addressing his book, In Defense of Christian Patriotism.

If you have a question for Daniel, our email address is chrisarnsen at gmail .com. chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

Give us your first name at least, city and state, and country of residence. And we do have Tony with an

I in Santee, South Carolina, and Tony says,

I recall that a very good friend of the host of this show, Chris Arnzen, James White of Alpha Omega Ministries, had a campaign, as it were, after the horrific attack of America by a foreign enemy on September 11, 2001, whereby

Dr. White was urging Christians, not merely to be singing praises about America, like God bless

America, but that we should be singing things like, God bless

America with repentance. Isn't one of the false ways that people, even who identify as Christians, can demonstrate patriotism is when they give a glowing, wonderful, rosy picture of the country while acting like ostriches and putting their heads in the sand when it comes to things like the countless murders of unborn babies and now people of the same gender marrying each other.

Very good question, and I actually agree with Dr. White that in response, especially back then, perhaps it's not even especially back then, in the early days, in the aftermath of the most horrific attack on American soil by a foreign enemy, whereby there was the highest death count from a foreign attack on our soil, you had a lot of Christian ministries, churches, very well -known figures in media, in Christian media, it seemed as if they were giving nothing but the praise and adoration side of how to address

America in defense of ourselves after we were the victims of such a brutal assault.

But Dr. White was saying that basically we really need to be praying for God for repentance if we expect from Him to be spared of even greater terrorism and devastation.

I don't know if I'm making sense there. Well, I do think the person that asked that question has a really good point.

I think America should always, particularly Christians in America, should always be in a state of repentance, and I think calling for repentance and renewal in the country is a good thing.

I think the way we look at our country, we have to look at it—I think there's really two wrong ways to look at our country in terms of our history and even some of the things we don't like today, right?

Like you mentioned, abortion on demand, which I think is wicked and evil if we think of past sins in our past, like chattel slavery or other things.

I think there's two wrong ways to look at the country when you think through some of those America's sins.

I think the one way is to gloss over it and act like it's not that big of a deal or that it didn't happen, right?

Maybe try to minimize some of our sins, like slavery, or minimize abortion, like it's not a big deal.

It is a big deal, and it's an offense to God. It's a denial of human dignity. Both those things are.

So to try to whitewash our history or broad brush it and say everything's fine. The other wrong way to do it, and the opposite,

I think, is to act like that's the only story of America, that it's only defined by our sins.

And I think most of the tendencies to do that on the left to say America is uniquely—it was founded on racism, it was founded on subjugation, that's the only story, which is not true.

But there could be a tendency for those of us conservatives to say it's hopeless, it's irredeemable, it's wicked, all that.

And I think we have to have some balance here. I think a good way to look at it is the way that you see the

Bible tell history, some of its heroes, that it tells it warts and all, but it also—you think about how

Hebrews 11 talks about some of the heroes that we know they had sins and warts, but also here's some of the good redeeming things.

And I think when we are thinking about patriotism, we're thinking about the American ideals of freedom, of religious liberty, of consent to the governed, of all these things that are good.

We've never fully lived up to our ideals, right? We've never fully lived up to those words, all men are created equal.

At times, the culture has become overrun with sexual perversion, with violence, all those kinds of things.

We should lament those things. And so I don't think we want to be cynical. I talk in the book, but it's hard to reform something about which you are cynical or don't love, right?

Love motivates repair. So I think about that with my own kids, right? I have four kids and my kids are wonderful kids.

But if I want to see my kids grow, I can't do that by saying you're worthless, terrible.

No, that's not going to motivate them and say, well, I love you. And here's some areas where I think you could grow. There's some correction.

That's how God corrects us. And I think we have to be that way about our country. Say, I love this country. I love our ideals.

I love our history. But we have to acknowledge we have some real issues. We have some real problems.

And so I think the call for repentance is good. National repentance. I think we see in scripture cases of countries, you know, none of us want to example others, national repentance.

It's okay for us to say, you know, we abstract from some of our principles. We have a culture that could be sick in some places.

And honestly, you know, as we think about America at 250 years old, if we want to preserve this experiment in human government for another 250 years,

America will not endure without national renewal and repentance. And by that, I mean revival.

I mean, God's spirit working through God's people and people coming to faith in Christ and a turn to God in repentance and humility.

We've seen that throughout our history, whether it's the second great awakening, post -World War II era, these things are vital.

And one of the arguments I make in my book is that Christianity is vital for democracy.

You know, the founders understood this. They weren't all Bible -believing Christians. Some of them were, but they weren't all.

But one thing they understood was this idea of liberty will not endure without a strong layer, thick layer of virtue and religion.

I would argue Christianity. So Dr. White's call for repentance is exactly right.

We should be doing that, both personal repentance and calling our communities in our country to repent. Yes, excellent question.

Thank you. And we have another very good question from Glenda in Cicero, Illinois.

And Glenda says, isn't there also a huge problem with people who are from another country who relocate and take up residence in the

United States but continue to rave about how wonderful the country they left is and belittle the country where they are now citizens?

Well, that's a great country. I think, you know, there's a lot there, but I think you're talking in many ways about immigration and assimilation, which

I think are really important issues. You know, America is a very generous country, and a lot of people come to America seeking freedom.

They escape totalitarianism. They escape poverty. And that's kind of the

American story, people coming here with nothing in their pocket and loving America and the American dream and making something.

And I think that's a great thing. I'm generally pro -immigration. However, the person who writes the question is exactly right, that people who come into this country, you know,

Romans 13 and other passages give the country the right to really police and understand who comes into the country.

And I think it's perfectly reasonable and appropriate for us to say, if you want to come here and be a citizen, you have to love this country.

You have to love our ideals. Now, you know, most of the time when people come here, historically, they have assimilated, right?

You think of the waves of immigrants who came over, you know, in the 19th century, 18th century, that first generation struggles, their kids do better than they do.

And one of the things that they were able to do, and one of the things that made America unique, I mean, Alexis Tocqueville talked about this, is that immigrants who came here were able to love their home country, right?

If you came from Italy or Germany or somewhere like that, and keep those customs, some of those, but then really embrace and become full -fledged

Americans. And, you know, I don't understand people who come here and want to live here and be a citizen, and then all they do is tear down the country.

All they do is protest about how terrible we are, right? Like, you know, I think part of the requirement to be a citizen here is to assimilate and to love our ideals and love our country.

And frankly, what's funny about this, the most patriotic people I know are often immigrants.

You know, at our school, we have a lot of children, children of immigrants. And I remember on the election day last year,

I sat around and asked some kids, what do you guys think? And what do you think about that? Every one of them said, man, my parents are the most patriotic people you ever meet.

They play Lee Greenwood all the time. They have flags everywhere because they understand the difference between where they came from and America.

And sometimes it's actually not immigrants. Sometimes it is, right? Sometimes, you know, the government's made mistakes by bringing in masses of people from different cultures who don't know how to assimilate.

That's a big mistake. But a lot of times the least patriotic people are Americans who've been here and they're ungrateful.

And they've never been on a mission trip or they've never been overseas and they have nothing to compare it to. So they think all they see is the problems.

Yeah, all they see is the problems. And they think, man, this is a terrible place. I'm like, have you been anywhere else? Have you actually studied the history of the world?

I mean, anyway, so I think the person from Cicero, Illinois has a great point.

Yes. I think a glowing example of what you were describing as far as patriotic immigrants are the

Cuban residents of Miami, Florida. And whenever you hear the left trying to push for some kind of socialist agenda, their outcry against such nonsense is very, very loud and clear.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And, you know, they understand. By the way, if you ask the Cuban immigrants and Venezuelan immigrants, by the way, how they feel about socialism and communism, they will tell you that it doesn't work and they hate it and they love

America, love the freedom here. And this is the story we've seen that people come over here, love the country.

They have five bucks in their pocket and they work hard. And some of our great companies are great things that have been invented by people that love that.

So I do think we should welcome a limited number of immigrants as much as we can handle with our resource.

We can't take everybody. And have as our criteria that if you want to be here, you have to assimilate to our way of life and you have to love the country, right?

You have to love the country. And I think to me, that's common sense. Yes. And let's see, we have

Stephen in Kingsgate, Washington. And Stephen says,

I was wondering what your reaction is to the prominent slogan of President Trump, let's make

America great again. It seems to have its greatest critics on the left who will say

America has never been great and they will bring up things like slavery from our past.

And even on the other side of the coin, where you have the far right like Westboro Baptist Church, who is most well known for their

God hates fags rhetoric. They also have a website,

God hates America. So if you could comment. Yeah, that's a great point that they raise.

You know, I think Trump's political slogan was really genius in many ways.

I think it was, you know, he's a business guy, so it's a very simple thing people could remember. You know,

I think there's a few ways to think about history.

You know, I think when people say make America great again, I don't think they're saying everything in our past was just rosy.

Right. And let's go back to segregation and slavery. Nobody that's saying that is saying that, right?

What they're saying was there were some good things in the past that we've lost that we'd to preserve, right, that we'd like to restore.

You know, and I think there's a few things like that. You think of the American family, that is, you know, and things like that.

At the same time, you know, I think we should reject the cynicism that says, again, that America was never great, that the only part of our, you know, look, history is complicated.

And people pull one thread from our history, America's sins, slavery, segregation, treatment of Native Americans, all that, and say, this is the only story to tell about America.

There's nothing else redeeming. First of all, I don't think that's accurate. I think there's many noble and good things that we have passed down and many good things about America's past.

But when you say that the only story about America is our sins, I think that's the right reading of history.

I don't think it's the right way to think about the place that God has given you. And I think whether you're on the left doing that or on the far right doing that,

I don't think you only look at your country through that lens. Look, every nation on earth, the best nations in human history in a fallen world will have some parts of their history that they're not proud of.

It's just like the way we view people, the way we view our family. Man, you love your family, but you know your family members aren't perfect.

But is that the only way you see your family member? Through their faults, through the lens of their flaws?

I don't think so. I don't think that's the right way to approach it. And again, if you want to see America restored, if you want to see justice in a particular way, whether it's pro -life or whether it's the family, whether it's poverty, whatever, being cynical and hating your country is a really poor way to achieve that.

I think patriotism and love of country motivates reform, motivates repeal.

I think of like, for instance, some of the great social reformers in America. Think of Martin Luther King Jr.,

think of others, Frederick Douglass. They revered the constitution.

They loved the founders. They loved this project. But what they were saying was, hey, America's not living up to its promise.

So we love this country, right? But if you think the country is irredeemable and everything's terrible and there's nothing good, it's hard to make change, right?

So I think it's actually counterproductive. Now, could you give us, before we go to our midway break, some of the most serious and urgent reasons why

Christians should be patriotic and what would be the negative results that would occur in your understanding and worldview?

What would occur negatively if more and more Christians ceased being patriotic?

Well, I think what you have, if Christians—first of all, I think it's poor stewardship of our citizenship that God has given us.

I think it's a poor discipleship. It's indifference. God has given us this country.

We are to steward it in our time and our place. And so to be lack of patriotism is to be indifferent, is to not care.

And so I think that's disobedience to God in many sense. And then I think, you know, if everyone in the country is overcome by cynicism, that's a very bad place where, you know, you don't have a national story that you can share, that you don't have a rallying point as a people.

And I think that's not a good place. I think as a

Christian—and God really has placed us here in this time and this place for a purpose. And the country needs the church, an active, engaged, prophetic church to, you know, this country will only prosper.

You know, as goes the church, goes the nation. And so if we withdraw, if we get cynical, if we are ungrateful, what will fill that void will be worse.

And so I think it's incumbent on us in our time to live this out. Yeah, those on the left, the dangers of their lack of patriotism—and once again,

I'm not saying everyone on the left is not a patriot. I disagree with them wholeheartedly on their worldview and beliefs.

But those that are elected into political office and have something to say as to where the money is spent in regard to the governance of this nation, if you despise

America and you think it's so awful and you have this unrealistic, hallowed view of other nations, you're going to be more concerned about the well -being, comfort, and happiness, and success, and prosperity of those in other parts of the globe to the neglect of this nation itself.

And we see that constantly with those on the left. And we saw it vividly when

Joe Biden was the president. And it is like a father in a home who has a wife and children at home who are starving because the father is spending all his money outside of the home being generous with friends and their families and children and so on while the money is absent at home.

Am I making sense? Yeah, that's right. You're right. And I think there's a real balance here.

The government's first job is to take care of their people, right? Romans 13, take care of our people, government's job is to take care of their own citizens.

So if you're president of the United States or if you're mayor, if you're congressman, your people are your first priority.

Just like me as a father, my family is my first priority. But that doesn't mean that's our only priority, right?

I think it's about ordering our lives. We work outward, right? So here's what's close to us.

Our people, our American citizens are close to us. But then I think we can also care, you know, the

United States, God has given us, get to us with prosperity. And so there's a lot we can do.

And we've been a generous nation just because we have to take care of ourselves first doesn't mean that's all we do, right?

We have a role in the world as a superpower, whether we like it or not. And, you know, when we retreat from the world, what fills the void are bad actors like China and Iran and others.

And we may want to take a break from engaging the world, but the bad people aren't.

And eventually it comes back on us. We've seen this in our history, right? When we sort of mature after World War I, you know, ignoring the world kind of came back on us and that happens from time to time.

But our first priority is America, Americans. Politicians' first priority is

Americans. Then we can work outward from there. Sometimes you can be so internationalist that you don't take care of at home.

And I think that can be a mistake. So you're right. It's not wrong to say our first priority as Americans, particularly if you're a politician, is to serve

America and then work outward from there. And we have to go to our midway break right now. Once again, if you have a question, submit it to chrisarnson at gmail dot com.

As always, give us your first name, at least your city and state of residence and your country of residence.

If you live outside the USA, don't go away. We're going to be right back after these messages. Greetings. This is

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But today I want to introduce you to my senior pastor, Doug McMasters of New High Park Baptist Church on Long Island.

Doug McMasters here, former director of pastoral correspondence at Grace to You, the radio ministry of John MacArthur.

In the film Chariots of Fire, the Olympic gold medalist runner Eric Liddell remarked that he felt

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I sense that same God -given pleasure when ministering the word and helping others gain a deeper knowledge and love for God.

That love starts with the wonderful news that the Lord Jesus Christ is a savior who died for sinners and that God forgives all who come to him in repentance, trusting solely in Christ to deliver them.

I would be delighted to have the honor and privilege of ministering to you if you live in the Long Island area or Queens or Brooklyn or the

Bronx in New York City. For details on New High Park Baptist Church, visit nhpbc .com.

That's nhpbc .com. You can also call us at 516 -352 -9672.

That's 516 -352 -9672. That's New High Park Baptist Church, a congregation in love with each other, passionate for Christ, committed to learning and being shaped by God's word and delighting in the gospel of God's sovereign grace.

God bless you. Still praising

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Going back to 2005, one of my very favorite guests on Iron Sharpens Iron is

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In Defense of Christian Patriotism. And once again, that's chrisarnsen at gmail .com.

Give us your first name at least, city and state, and country of residence. Before I go to any more listener questions,

Daniel, I was wondering if you are familiar with two -kingdom theology and if the abuses of that theology have led to a lack of Christian patriotism.

And I just want to remind our folks, I've had people who are both greatly in favor of and defenders of two -kingdom theology on the show and also opponents and critics of two -kingdom theology on my show.

I have friends and very close brothers and sisters in Christ on both sides of the issue.

But there can be, just like anything else—I'm a Calvinist and there are hyper -Calvinists out there—but with two -kingdom theology, there are also abuses.

And I was wondering if you know what I'm talking about here. Yeah, that's a great question.

Yeah, I have great respect for people who adhere to two -kingdom theology. I don't necessarily track fully with it, but I think it does bring a lot to the table when it comes to thinking about public theology and all these things.

For instance, I really enjoy David Van Druden's book, Politics After Christendom, as he makes a case for, you know, the idea that, you know, over and against,

I think, people who want to take the theocratic Israel and project God's unique design for theocratic

Israel as something that's normative or expected of all nations in all times.

And I think he makes a great case that that's not the case, tying it to the, you know, sort of modest expectations of the

Noahic covenant, where, you know, God's expectations for nations under the

Noahic covenant are much more modest than they are for Israel. So I think there's a lot that it brings to the table. But I do think there's a way in which, just like, you know, kind of other ways of looking at that, two kingdoms, if not careful, can create a kind of false dichotomy between secular and sacred.

It can lead, it can lead to a couple of things, a separatism, a quietism that doesn't get involved in terms of political, social activity.

It can also lead to sort of thinking, well, if you're hard to kingdoms,

I think, thinking that, well, in the kingdom of man, you know, there's not a distinctly

Christian way to do things. Therefore, it doesn't really matter how I do things, right? So like, if I'm in the political, and I haven't heard anyone say this, but I think you can get there, that it doesn't matter how, you know, when

I'm doing politics, it doesn't matter how I conduct myself, because this kingdom worships the kingdom of God. So I'm much more

Kuyperian in my view of things. Although Kuyperianism can have some excesses too, right?

Like Kuyperianism can be a little bit triumphalist. It can be a little bit unrealistic in terms of what can be achieved in a fallen world.

So I think each of these has things to bring. For myself, where I get at, number one,

I think the whole world is God's, right? I don't think there's a divide between secular and sacred.

But number two, I really think, you know, when

I talk to people about political theology and getting involved in why I think Christians should be engaged,

I really have three places that I go. One is obviously Romans 13, where God has given the authority of governance to the states, which really ties back in the

Genesis, right? If you think about it, that God has designed humans to rule over creation.

God has instituted human government. Even before the fall, he instituted human government for Adam to rule.

But even in a fallen world, Romans 13, clearly

God has delegated certain authority to civil governments to be

God's servant for good, it says in Romans 13, and to bear the sword out in vain. A government that bears a sword is one that can restrain evil and must restrain evil.

If we really believe that, then how do you think about a government like ours, that is, of the people, by the people, for the people, to quote

Lincoln, that's consent of the governed? Well, I think Romans 13 then doesn't just apply to our attitude toward those who are in elected office, but also it applies to us, the voters.

We have a stewardship. As citizens, we share in the power, so we will be held accountable, just like everyone who's held public office in human history will be held accountable for how they wielded that power.

That's what Romans 13 is saying in many ways. Well, we'll be held accountable for the stewardship of our citizenship, voting and all these kinds of things.

We have a stewardship that few people in human history have ever had, right?

The ability to, in some ways, influence through our voice and our vote who rules over us.

I mean, most people in human history have not had that opportunity. Many people even today around the world do not have that.

And so I don't think we can just disengage and just tune it out and not be involved, not try to engage these things because I think it's an abdication of our stewardship.

Number two, beyond Romans 13, I was thinking about Jesus' command to love our neighbors as ourselves.

Now, loving your neighbor can be weaponized to justify all sorts of public policies, but the general principle is that we should love our neighbors as ourselves.

Well, if I've been given an opportunity with my voice and my vote to shape public policy, a policy that affects the flourishing of my neighbors, and I don't do it, how can

I fully say I love my neighbor, right? If I have an opportunity, for instance, to speak up through my voice, through my vote for my unborn neighbors, but I shrink back, can

I really say I love my neighbors as myself, right? And you go down the line on various things. So I really think loving neighbor requires that we steward well the citizenship that has been given to us as a gift.

I also think Jeremiah, again, in his advice to the exiles in Babylon was not to huddle together and wait out the storm, wait out their occupation, their exile, but to be involved in the life of their city and nation.

And let's think about this. These are Jewish exiles in Babylon, which is far more hostile to them.

They had far less agency than we have today, right? Nebuchadnezzar wasn't running for office, right?

And yet, what did Jeremiah tell them? He said, build your families, build gardens, put roots here, seek the flourishing, the welfare or the shalom of your city.

And so in order to do that, for us, we have an opportunity to do that.

Now, is politics everything? Absolutely not. Is everybody called to the same level of engagement?

Absolutely not. Some people are called to run for school board, to run for office, very noble calling to do public service.

Other people are called to do more quiet acts, maybe start a nonprofit, or maybe just with your voice and your vote, you support certain things or don't support other things.

But everyone should be engaged in some way. We should care about our cities and our communities. I think it's incumbent on us.

And so to shrink back and wash our hands of it, I don't think is a good stewardship of what

God has given us. That's kind of how I think about public theology in that way. Does that make sense? Yes.

And just for the sake of our listeners who are unfamiliar with a term you use,

Kuyperian, you're referring to, obviously, the great 19th century reformed theologian from the

Netherlands, Abraham Kuyper, who was also not only a minister, a

Christian minister, but he was also a politician in the 19th century there.

Yeah, absolutely. And so I don't think Abraham Kuyper was right about everything.

And I do think there's a sober warrant to think, you know, after he passed away and within a generation, all the

Christian work, the things that he'd done had sort of not endured. So there's something to be learned about that.

But I think in many ways he was right in terms of our responsibility to shape their communities.

And, you know, as a Baptist, we believe that Christians should be engaged in the life of their nation, that Christian ideals are key for human flourishing.

But we don't want the government getting involved in the affairs of the church. We don't want the government making decisions about right and wrong forms of worship.

That's not the role of the government. The government is not tasked with separating the wheat from the tares or the sheep from the goats.

That's Christ's job. Paul urged Timothy to pray in 1

Timothy 2 for all the leaders, everyone in authority, so we can live a quiet and peaceable life.

Why is that? So that the gospel can go forward because there's one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus.

The government's the mediator between God and man. That's Christ. So we want to pray for freedom.

So we believe in freedom of conscience, freedom of worship, that the state cannot compel someone to believe.

Forced conversion, forced belief is not belief at all. Jesus said,

Render to Caesar what Caesar's in the gospel of God's. There are things that we owe the state because God had delegated authority to the state.

But there's things that we don't owe the state. We don't owe the state our conscience. The state has no right over the conscience. It can't tell us how to believe.

And I think that religious liberty is a cherished right that we should defend and protect. And even as we say that, that doesn't mean, again, that Christians shouldn't be engaged in the public square, engaged in the life of our church or in the life of our nation.

And we have a lot of Christians at all levels of government, right? The Speaker of the House of the Southern Baptist.

We have a set of majority leaders, an evangelical Christian who graduated from Biola. We have

Christians at all levels of government. I think that's healthy and good, but we don't want the government deciding and telling people how to worship exactly.

Amen. And we have a listener in Kennesburg, Pennsylvania, Rolf.

And Rolf has both a slight correction of something

I said and also a question. He said, Chris, yes, Abraham Kuyper did live in the 19th century, but he also lived until 1920 and served as prime minister of the

Netherlands in the early 1900s. So that would be 20th century. Yes, you are right.

Nice. Sorry about that. Rolf says, do you think a lot of the distortion in how people have a poor or lack of biblical

Christian patriotism is because of a misunderstanding of separation of church and state?

That's a great question. I think there's a number of reasons why. And I think the problem today,

I do think there's folks that make love of country an idol today, but I think the far bigger problem is what your caller and the person that wrote in said that email suggested that the people are indifferent or actually unpatriotic, even among Christians.

Yeah, I think there's a few reasons for that. I think number one, a sort of cynical view of history, as we've talked about here.

But I also think the person that has emailed is onto something.

I think we've been told that we have to really avoid

Christians engaging in politics, in the country, and even loving their country because it borders, it's dangerous, separation of church, state, all those things.

And it's really this belief that started in the middle of the 20th century that took the founder's vision.

The founder's vision was obviously that the state should not interfere in the life of the church.

They did not want a state church, and I think they were right. They saw throughout human history, anytime you had a state church, it wasn't good for the state or the church.

And so they did not want that, a national church, state church. Baptists fought really hard against establishment because I think we rightly believe that, again, the state is not lord of the conscience.

Everyone has a right to believe and to choose what they believe. The state shouldn't imperil that.

So that's a very good, that's what the founder's vision. But that vision really took a turn in the middle of the 20th century to mean that any incidental contact between Christianity and the state is illegitimate.

Right? So it went from a, as I talk about in my book, from a protection for the church to almost antagonism for Christianity.

And you saw this really mid to late 20th century to where it was a real hostile environment,

I think, anytime those things happened, right? Fortunately, in the last,

I think, a couple of decades, the Supreme Court has pushed back on some of that. We've gotten rid of the

Lemon Test. We've gotten rid of some of these other things. Because what you had was an environment where, for instance, a state couldn't do business with religious organization because it was mixing church and state.

Christian social service agencies couldn't work and do foster care because they had certain beliefs into mixing the church and state.

The church was discriminated against. Christians, you know, people were discriminated against because of their faith.

And so I think that's a wrong approach. The idea of separation of church and state, in its purest form, really means that the church has a role and the state has a role.

And those don't, those are not the same things, right? That the church holds the keys to the kingdom, not the state.

The church, you know, the state doesn't make decisions about what is true faith.

You know, that is a job that is given to Christ, but that's that discernment and that all that is to the church.

So in its purest form, that's what that means. But what it sort of grew into is, as one court decision said, this high and impregnable wall between church and state, which is not in the constitution, was not even what

Jefferson intended. Not even what Madison intended. What's interesting, Madison, who was a champion of religious freedom and is against establishment, he said there should be a thin line between church and state.

But that turned into this high and impregnable wall. So again, it became antagonistic toward Christianity.

So then you have a lot of Christians who feel like that it's illegitimate, it's wrong. Anytime Christians get involved in politics,

Christians bring their faith to bear on public policy. And there was this myth,

Chris, that you could have a neutral public square. That's not the case.

Some values are informing the public debate. Richard John Newhouse, Father Richard John Newhouse, wrote about this 40 years ago in his book,

The Naked Public Square, which is a good read. And he said, there's no such thing as naked public square. It won't be naked very long.

Something will fill it. And we've seen things fill it, right? So if you push Christianity out of the public square, if you say that Christians, you can't bring your faith to the public square, you can't speak up on these issues, you can't speak up about abortion, that's religious.

You can't speak about marriage, that's religious. And I think most of our media still has this framework.

When George Bush ran for president in 2000, he said his favorite philosopher was

Jesus Christ. Well, the media went crazy with that.

They said, oh, he's got ushered in a dangerous new theocracy, all this stuff. Or when

Mike Johnson stands as Speaker of the House and says, it's by God's providence that I'm here, the media went crazy.

Oh, he's ushering in a theocracy, all this. Now, Mike Johnson spent his career actually defending religious liberty.

But what he's saying is that there's certain values that undergird our democracy. By the way,

I did like Alan Keyes' response to George W. Bush when he said,

Mr. Bush, Jesus Christ is God and King. He is not a philosopher.

That's a paraphrase of what Keyes said. Yeah, yeah. Well, and so I think the media still has this framework, and there's this huge freak out.

Anytime there's any incidental contact or overlap between Christianity and government, of course, the freak out only goes one way, right?

You have a lot of progressive Christians pushing policies and urging their favorite politicians to enact them.

But when Christians do it, it's theocracy. It's all those kinds of things. So I think there's been a double standard, and I think that's made

Christians nervous about loving their country, about getting patriotic, because they feel like it's all dangerous and it's all illegitimate.

Yes. And I think some of that confusion about the separation of church and state, which, if I'm not mistaken, was largely connected to a letter by Thomas Jefferson to reassure

Baptists that the government would not be meddling in their lives and theology and practice as Christians.

That's right. That sometimes people, I think, are confusing or conflating that with the constitutional prohibition of Congress from establishing a religion.

Those are two different… That's exactly right. Those are two different things. That's exactly right. Now, the founders did not want a national church, and really, the states began working this out at the state level.

Some of the states had established churches, but by the time we get to the middle of the 19th century, most of the states have gotten rid of those because a lot of Baptists and Methodists and others have said, wait a minute, you're imperiling the conscience by saying

Congregationalism or Anglicanism is the official sanctioned church.

Therefore, you're hurting these other ones and you're forcing people. So anyways, that got worked out, right?

So they did not want an established church. They looked at human history and said, you know, a state church is just not a good idea.

However, the founders could not have envisioned, Chris, the secularism that we see today.

They just could not have envisioned it. Even the most secular founders—Thomas

Jefferson, James Madison—understood that for this to work, you had to have a thick, vibrant religion, virtue, and I would argue,

Christianity. A thick Christianity in order for this to work. They didn't want the government to create that.

They thought they had to come from the bottom up. So this idea of secularism is not something they envisioned, and obviously that idea went way too far.

And I think we're seeing the fruits of that today where what will fill the void when you push Christianity out are things that are less desirable.

And so I think you're exactly right about that. And we have to go to our final break, and this is your last opportunity to send in a question if you so intend to.

ChrisArnzen at gmail .com. Give us your first name at least, city and state and country of residence.

Don't go away. We're going to be right back. I'm Dr.

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Well, welcome back, and don't forget, folks, this program is also paid for in part by the law firm of Buttafuoco &

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We are in our final moments of today's program on In Defense of Christian Patriotism, and I'll read one more question, and then

I'll have you summarize what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners today. We have

CJ in Lindenhurst, Long Island, New York, and CJ says, have you had any sharp criticism from Christians over your book?

Great question. I have had some criticism. I think a lot of it has been people to say, that sounds a little scary.

It sounds like Christian nationalism. It sounds like idolatry, but I encourage people to read it.

I try to be pretty thoughtful with it, and really, if you are someone who—look,

America is turning—this is our 250th anniversary this year. There's going to be a lot of conversation about patriotism,

Christian politics, Christian nationalism, all these kinds of things. If you really are wrestling with some of those ideas,

I really try to help Christians answer the question, how do I steward my citizenship well?

I live in America. God's put me here. What does that look like, and how do I do that well? So could you get the book, interact with it, disagree with it?

You can get the book wherever books are sold. Your favorite retailer, Amazon, Barnes &

Noble, independent bookstores, go to my website, DanielDarling .com. We have links to all of them there. But I'd love for you to get it and engage in that conversation.

Any final words on what you most want etched in the listeners' hearts and minds today? Really, I just want to encourage

Christians to think, okay, God has put us here, particularly American Christians. God has put us here in this place in this time.

He didn't put us 50 years ago or 50 years from now. He put us here now. So we need to embrace the moment that God has called us to.

He's made us for this moment. And I think there's a... Look, we can't fix every problem in America.

We can't... America is not the kingdom of God. The kingdom of heaven will...

Christ will return to usher in His kingdom in full one day. We long for that. But until then, there's a lot of good we can do.

Serving our community, serving our country, bringing the gospel to bear, bringing the

Scripture to bear on all these things and to be a public witness here. So I want to encourage folks that God has made us for this moment.

Let's not give into despair. Let's not give into apathy. We can really glorify God in what we do as American citizens here.

Amen. Well, I want to remind our listeners that the website for my guest once again is

DanielDarling .com. DanielDarling .com.

And by the way, just quickly, did you have any special events scheduled in the near future or anything else you want to plug?

Well, I can't think of any in particular, but I'll be doing some speaking around the country and I'm open to speak.

If someone's listening, say, I'd love you to talk about that at my church or my gathering. I'd love to do that. You go to my website, DanielDarling .com,

find out all about where I'm speaking and if you want to invite me as well. Great.

Well, not only do I want to thank you for being such a wonderful guest today on the program,

I want to thank again my very dear friend, David Dykstra, the author of Yearning to Breathe Free, Thoughts on Immigration, Islam, and Freedom, who recommended you so highly as a guest on this program.

And thanks a lot, Dave. It was definitely a good choice of yours for a guest on Iron Trip and Zion Radio.

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I want to thank you again for being such a great guest. I want to thank all my listeners, especially those who took the time to write in questions.

And I look forward to hearing from you with your questions tomorrow on Iron Trip and Zion Radio.

And I ask for your prayers for God's rich blessings upon this program in 2026 and beyond.

And I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater