Future Commish? And More On Moscow ManParts

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Non -rockabotas must stop! I don't want to rock the boat, I want to sink it!

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Are you going to bark all day, little doggy? Or are you going to bite? We're being delusional. Delusional?

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Delusional is okay in your worldview. I'm an animal. You don't chastise chickens for being delusional. You don't chastise pigs for being delusional.

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So you calling me delusional using your worldview is perfectly okay. It doesn't really hurt. Is he hung up on me?

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Desperate times call for faithful men and not for careful men. The careful men come later and write the biographies of the faithful men, lauding them for their courage.

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Go into all the world and make disciples. Not go into the world and make buddies. Not to make brosives.

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Don't go into the world and make homies. Disciples. I got a bit of a jiggle neck.

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That's a joke, pastor. When we have the real message of truth, we cannot let somebody say they're speaking truth when they're not.

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Take an amazing journey to a place that will blow your mind and move your mind so you will never be the same again.

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Wash yourselves and make yourselves clean. Remove the evil of your deeds from before my eyes.

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Cease to do evil. Learn to do good. Seek justice. Correct oppression.

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Bring justice to the fatherless. Plead the widow's cause. Come now, let us reason together, says the

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Lord. Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow. Though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.

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If you are willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land. But if you refuse and rebel, you shall be eaten by the sword.

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For the mouth of the Lord has spoken how the faithful city has become a whore. She who was full of justice, righteousness lodged in her, but now murderers.

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Your silver has become dross, your best wine mixed with water. Your princes are rebels and companions of thieves.

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Everyone loves a bribe and runs after gifts. They do not bring justice to the fatherless, and the widow's cause does not come to them.

02:19

What's up everybody? Welcome back to another episode of Apologia Radio. That's from Isaiah chapter 1. Isaiah chapter 1.

02:25

Get to know it. Very important section of scripture. Very relevant in principle to all the stuff that we face today all around us.

02:34

ApologiaStudios .com is where you guys go to get more. A -P -O -L -O -G -I -A -Studios .com, that's where you guys go to get more.

02:40

You guys can get all the TV shows, the after shows, Apologia Academy, which is awesome.

02:46

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02:53

You can also get all the other Apologia Studios productions right there. Kuldish, Sheologians, Provoked, Apologia Radio, all that in a bag of chips, y 'all.

03:02

I'm Pastor Jeff. They call me the Ninja. That is Luke the Bear right there. Do we really give them a bag of chips?

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You know, things can be arranged. Things can be arranged.

03:13

That's the freedom we have here at this place. All Access, by the way, keep praying because we have plans.

03:21

Lord willing, they all happen. And when they happen, it will be an amazing, amazing thing. And if you are already

03:27

All Access, you'll get all the new stuff. And you won't get what everybody else will be giving towards every month to join us.

03:37

After we put the new stuff in. So let me just say it will change things dramatically for Apologia All Access.

03:42

And be just awesome. Awesome. That's all I can say right now. That's all I can say. We'd like to say more, but we can't.

03:49

We can't. So, hey, just real fast, before we get into the show today, I wanted to address something. It is a common conversation.

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It's a common objection. I saw it in some of the threads yesterday on our platforms. And I thought we should address it quickly.

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And it does fit, actually, what we're going into with our very special guest. Actually, you know what we do?

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We'll bring him on. Let's bring him on. We'll bring him on so he can join in this conversation because he likes this conversation. It's a good conversation to have.

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Very important show today. We're going to do a good conversation about local politics. Some of you guys are like,

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I don't want to talk about politics. Well, you should because it's all about righteousness, justice, pleading the cause of the widow and the orphan, all that kind of stuff.

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Do you not want to wear a mask on your face? That's not everything we're talking about. We're also going to talk about how

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Moscow Man Bad did some bad things. We're going to talk to the guy that helped him to do the bad things.

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It has to do with boys have penises, girls have vaginas, and bathrooms. I did say it because it's true.

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I'm just waiting for YouTube to… It's true. I think you can probably say it. You can't say it anymore.

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I mean, if you're a tranny book reader at a library, you can. Yeah, that's true.

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Yes, yes. Gender benders have free reign. And they seem to do.

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We don't have a lot of freedom today, but they do. So we're going to talk to a special guest. His name is officially

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Gabriel Wrench. We call him Gabe Wrench. And he's lovingly known as the water boy over at CrossPolitik Studios, CrossPolitik podcast.

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Not as good as Apologia Radio, but decent. Can we say… He's on mute right now.

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Until he's off mute, until I hit the mute button, we can say really whatever we want. Go ahead.

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We'll ask him when he comes on, but I feel like they kind of were birthed out of Apologia Radio. No, we didn't.

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We didn't. We gave birth to, as much as a man can give birth to another man.

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That's a weird thought. Weird. Well, I don't know. Maybe today it's possible, right? You never know.

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Men can have periods too, apparently. Apparently, yeah. Apparently! Well, obviously we're in a goofy mood today.

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So anyway, CrossPolitik, we love these guys. You've seen us on there before, and we have a very close relationship with these men.

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And this man, his name is Gabe Wrench, and he is now welcome to Apologia Radio. What's up, brother?

06:16

Hey, thank you guys for having me. Always good to come on the mothership. Yes, the mothership.

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I like that. That's right, that's right. Well, hey, we'll get right into the conversation, but I wanted to address something that comes up as a common objection.

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Here it is. Maybe you've heard it, or maybe you've actually recited this objection before.

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So I think I had shared Doug's thing, Pastor Doug Wilson's thing on Romans 13 yesterday, and maybe some other stuff, and somebody had commented, like, nobody's asking you to deny your faith.

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You know, resisting the government and these government decrees really is only appropriate and righteous if the government is asking you to deny

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Jesus. I think that's one of the silliest objections imaginable, and it shows,

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I think, a great misunderstanding of so many critical, important sections of Scripture, as well as biblical principles, when people say things like, you can only resist an ungodly government when they're asking you to deny your faith, deny

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Jesus. Well, I would say this. My Christian faith is a comprehensive faith, and so when you ask me to accept gender bending, and when you ask me to accept the gay mirage, and all the rest, boy, we're going to get canceled after this, when you ask me to accept those things, you are, in fact, asking me to deny my faith.

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When you ask me to accept the devaluing of currency and the injustices that come with that, you're asking me to deny my faith.

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I just read it to you. It's from Isaiah chapter one. Go check it out. But what's interesting here is, in this particular text that shows

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Isaiah chapter one, important text, God says this. Here's what he says. He speaks to his people.

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He calls them Sodom and Gomorrah, and if you're new to the Bible, that's not good. Calling God's people

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Sodom and Gomorrah, not so good. It's kind of like a curse word. And so,

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I mean, that would be like calling the American Christian church Auschwitz. Right? Or something like that. You'd go, what?

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Auschwitz? Yeah. So it's a bad thing. Immoral city in the past, and God destroyed it for its wickedness, and God calls, he says this in verse 10.

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He says, Hear the word of the Lord, you rulers of Sodom. Give ear to the teaching of our

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God, you people of Gomorrah. And so then God says to them, what to me is the multitude of your sacrifices, says the

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Lord. He says he's had enough of their sacrifices. And he says, when you come before me, verse 12, who is required of you this trampling of my courts?

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Bring no more vain offerings. He says, I don't want it. Stop doing it. He says, everything you're doing, your new moons, your feasts, all these things, he says, all these things, my soul hates.

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So God says, I hate your worship. I hate it. I hate your worship, Sodom and Gomorrah.

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I don't want any of it. Don't even think about bringing this worship to me. That's actually a pretty strong thought that God says, don't want it, not interested.

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Don't even bother with the activity itself. So he says to them, he says, wash yourselves, verse 16, make yourselves clean.

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Remove the evil of your deeds from before my eyes. And here it is. He says, cease to do evil. Learn to do good.

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Seek justice. Seek justice, correct oppression, correct oppression, seek justice, correct oppression.

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Remember those very important things. Seek justice, correct oppression, bring justice to the father.

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Let's plead the widow's cause. Watch what he says here. He says, how the faithful city has become a whore.

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She who has worshiped the devil, was full of justice. Righteousness lodged in her, but now murderers.

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Your silver has become dross. Your best wine mixed with water. That's the devaluation, the devaluing of currency, by the way.

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Your princes are rebels and companions of thieves. Everyone loves a bribe and runs after gifts. They do not bring justice to the fatherless and the widow's cause does not come to them.

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So it's interesting here is that here God says, I don't want any of your worship. Why? He says, your hands are full of blood.

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And he says, all this injustice is all around you and you're not doing anything about it. You're not doing anything about it.

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You don't plead the widow's cause. You're not bringing justice to the fatherless. You aren't seeking justice. You aren't correcting oppression.

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And so therefore, I don't want your worship. So I want everybody that professes faith in Jesus and is using this really, really terrible argument that unless the government is asking me to deny

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Jesus, I have to obey every whim, everything they say. I would say it shows a vast ignorance of the whole narrative of biblical history.

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I mean, you have like, I mean, the handmaidens in the Exodus story, were they being asked to deny their faith or were they protecting people from death?

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Right? Were they loving neighbor and protecting them from death when the Pharaoh says, kill all the boys? And they're like, well,

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I don't know. These women give birth so fast and the babies are so strong like they're here before we know. We can't do anything about it. They're lying through their teeth to the

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Pharaoh to save other people's lives. They're not being asked to deny their faith in God. I mean, you can go down the biblical stories over and over and over and over resistance to tyrannical governments.

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I mean, even at the point where the king is like, hey, I want that property. And the guy's like, no, it's mine. No. Naboth. Yeah.

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You can't have this. No, it's mine. And you're not going to violate me like that. He wasn't being asked to deny his faith, but he resisted an unrighteous decree of a leader.

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And in this case, here's God saying to people, his people, he says, Sodom and Gomorrah, don't give me your worship.

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Don't want it. Don't bring it. Not interested. And here's what you need to do. Repent. Why? Because all this evil's within you and you're not doing anything about it.

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So as long as you're not doing anything about it, I don't want your worship. So I think we really need to take that into consideration.

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I mean that very humbly. I know that I'm being, you know, kind of heavy -handed in some ways with this, but I think we need to take it seriously. God telling his people, historically, don't want your worship, not interested in it.

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Why? Because you're not doing anything about the injustice all around you. So he says, cease to do evil. Learn to do good.

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Seek justice. Correct oppression. So, in principle, today, as God's people, as God's redeemed, as his covenant people, we have a world around us.

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We have different contexts and cultures we live in. So at differing degrees, we'll have resistance that is appropriate, meaningful, possible.

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Like, I think in communist China right now, the resistance is going to look a little bit different. It might look like you actually get nine years in jail for trying to subvert the authority of the state, like the pastor recently did.

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The wonderful Presbyterian pastor there who's serving nine years in jail for attempting to subvert the authority of the state.

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Something modern American Christians, I think, in the West would be like, no, you didn't need to do that. Because they weren't asking you to deny

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Jesus. You're allowed to believe that between your ears in China. China knew, somehow, that this guy was subverting the authority of the state.

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Isn't it interesting in history, like, when Christians are going to bring the gospel to places, they come to transform the entire culture. You know,

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Matthew 28, 18 through 20, bringing the all -authority on earth of Jesus to the nations, teaching them to do what?

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Obey Jesus. At what level? Like, obey Jesus, just that he's Savior? Or, obey

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Jesus, teach them to obey everything he commanded them? Well, what is everything he commanded them? Well, it's pretty extensive.

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It's pretty big. It's a few pages there. So, I say this to come as graciously and humbly as I can against this very, very poor level of argumentation and very poor version of Christianity that, when we see injustice all around us, when we see wickedness and evil, what we say is, well,

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I believe in Jesus. I'll stick to my commune. What does that have to do with me?

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I don't know. I mean, I don't, you know, I don't see no evil, hear no evil. God has something to say about that too in the

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Proverbs, by the way, Proverbs 24. He says to hold back those who are stumbling to the slaughter, rescue those who are being delivered to death.

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And he basically says to him, like, if you say, behold, I didn't know it. He says, doesn't he who weighs the hearts know?

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And won't he repay you according to your deeds? The point is, is this, you see all the evil, all the injustice, all the trampling on other people all around you.

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If you say and do nothing, if you don't rescue those who are being led to death, that's sort of a thing. God knows that you know and he'll require an answer.

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So I think that's important to just discuss and feel free, gentlemen. Well, I think that brings us to a good point here.

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So talking about politics, we say this all the time, politics is nothing more than legislated morality, right?

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So the question is, whose morality are you going to legislate? Yeah. So I think that brings us a good point here to bring in Gabe this, hey man, let us know, like, what are you, what kind of position you're running for the commission over there in LaTaw County?

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What does that mean? What does that look like? What kind of effect on your community and culture would that position give you so forth and so on?

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And whose morality will you legislate? That's a loaded question.

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So I'm running for LaTaw County Commissioner in our county. You know,

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I started doing this back in March is when you have to kind of sign off and fill out all the paperwork to do it.

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And, to be honest, the biggest reason why I did it is because I couldn't find anybody else to do it. And so, in Friday, the last day you're supposed to fill out your paperwork, my buddy called me and said, hey, you need to do it.

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So I filled out the paperwork and ran. And the nice thing about running for LaTaw County Commissioner is it's kind of a part -time position and you can stay local with your family.

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You don't have to go to Boise to the capital for three months out of the year. You're actually local so you can still raise your family and be present and not, you know, be gone.

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But this also gets to one of the most important things we need to be doing right now is keep our politics as local as possible.

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You know, our whole government was set up, actually, to emphasize local politics. Now, obviously, we've gotten a ways away from that.

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But that's why we developed county municipalities. That's why we developed cities.

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That's why we developed all these kind of micro forms of government so we can keep our government local.

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You know, the whole idea behind that is, you know, you throw a rock into the pond, well, what's the biggest ripple that happens around that rock?

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It's the first ripple. And the same thing with your city elections, your county elections, that should be the biggest ripple, the biggest political ripple that happens in your community right there.

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every state's going to be a little different on how their county commissioners are set up and structured and what their responsibilities are and not.

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For Latah County here in Idaho, there's three county commissioners and together, they're kind of like the city council and the mayor combined.

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Now, some counties only have one commissioner and he's kind of like the executive director of the county.

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So it's a little different structure. But here in Idaho, there's three county commissioners and so you have to have a two to one vote to get anything accomplished.

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So, like the city council and your local city, they do all the voting. But unlike the city council, the county commissioners also do all the administrating.

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So combined, we're like this city council and the mayor combined. And of course, you know, all legislation, all law, whether it's a county building code or a, you know, we're over the county commissioners in our county, we oversee all the sheriff's office.

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So the sheriff reports to us. The sheriff is also an elected official. But we set his budget.

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We set the county courthouse budget. We set the district attorney's budget. So we kind of in charge of like this administration and then there's some building administration that we're in charge of and everything.

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Now for our county, the county commissioners in our county are not in charge of the roads in our county. So there's actually a separate highway commission that's in charge of the roads.

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So there's an interesting dynamic there. But when you are looking at your local county,

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I mean, really, county commissioner, if we believe the sheriff is actually one of the highest authorities in the county, well, the county commissioners are super important in this role in how they encourage the sheriff to run and train his deputies and so forth.

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You know, with this whole COVID thing that's been going on, so in our state, we have a, we're supposed to have a

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Republican governor, but he's kind of governing a little bit more like the Washington governor than he is like a real Republican governor of the state of Washington, not

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Washington, D .C. And he's locked down the state, you know, once. And he's allowing all the kind of, he's allowing face mask regulation to start being implemented in our state.

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And first, this is where it's real important. Just as Christians, we need to know certain things, certain things about our constitution and certain things about what the

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Bible says about our government. And I'm summarizing here, but one of the basic things is the government never has the right to shut down your business.

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The government never has the right to tell you that you cannot provide for your family. Pandemic or no pandemic.

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Secondly, the government doesn't have the right to tell you what to wear. Right? You know, should

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I wear a blue shirt or a purple shirt? Should I wear, now there's, now there are, I think, applicable and acceptable standards here that our government should have for its population.

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Like, you know, no women going around topless. But that has to do with immorality versus wearing a blue shirt or a purple shirt kind of thing.

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And the government has no right to tell you to wear a mask. In the same way, we don't believe the government has a right to tell us to wear a condom.

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You know, we don't have the government that has the right to tell us to do all these things. And yet, the government does it and we just follow.

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We just go, we sink in. We get right in line like sheeple, right in line and we start doing it.

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And so what happens is, is we don't have, for decades, in Arizona, Idaho, all of us,

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Texas, where I'm originally from, for decades, we have not been exercising these local political muscles.

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The county commissioners should tell the governor right now that, you know, your shutdown, that happened back in April for us,

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April and end of May, or beginning of May, your shutdown does not apply to our county. You want to know why?

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Because we are the, we are the sovereign, I wouldn't say sovereign over our county, but we're kind of the highest authority in our county in regards to these kind of decisions.

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That's right. And then in addition, in Idaho, and this is, it might be similar to you guys in Arizona, but Idaho's quarantine codes are actually pretty biblical.

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So in Idaho, the state constitution specifically says that, I think it's section 52 or 56, it's in one of those sections,

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I can't remember if it's two or six, but it specifically says that the government, given a pandemic, the government has the right to quarantine certain buildings, certain locations, and isolate the sick.

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Right. As opposed to what we have now is where the government is quarantining everybody, including the healthy, and isolating everybody, including the healthy.

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Right. So when we talk about, you know, of course, you brought up Romans 13 earlier, Jeff, but when we're talking Romans 13, what's the highest authority in the land?

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It's not our governor. That's right. It's the constitution. Exactly. That's right. This is what a republic has established, that the highest authority in the land is the piece of paper.

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And so, the governor, when he disobeys that constitution, I am, it's my duty,

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Romans 13, to actually obey that highest authority in the land, which is the constitution. So when the government says, hey,

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Gabe, and your family, and you guys need to quarantine your house, I know you're healthy, but you need to quarantine your house, well, it's my job to actually say, no, you are not obeying the highest authority in the land,

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Romans 13, you governor. Amen. Right. I love it. Exactly. Doug actually did an amazing explanation of all this.

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What was the title of that particular one? It's at Canon Press. If you guys go check it out after the show, go to Canon Press and check out some of the last couple of episodes that Doug did on this particular issue.

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I think it was Mask or No Mask. Was it the sermon, Jeff? No, not the sermon. It was Blog and Mayblog. It was

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Blog and Mayblog, and it was the one where he talked about the governor that basically says, you may not push this blue button, and you can touch the red button, you can't push the blue button, and the governor does not have the right to wake up the next morning and say he has authority over all the blue buttons in the state.

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That's right. That's specifically what you don't have authority over. I do not have to obey you, and it's important for us to recognize.

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It's interesting, too, Gabe, because people will oftentimes say this. Yes, but Christians are persecuted to a much higher level, and with worse government regimes all around the world today, and in particular, when the church was just breaking into history in Rome, there was a much worse government.

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My initial quick response to that, it's very well thought out. It's very quick, though. It's this.

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That's called progress. Yes. Well, also, you got the additional layer there where it's like, you know,

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John the Baptist got charged. He got called, you know, you're a demon for not eating and drinking the wine, and then

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Jesus got charged with, oh, you're a glutton, you're a drunkard for drinking the wine.

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Yes, right. And so, and in the same way, I mean, you got these, you read

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Isaiah chapter 1 at the very beginning of all this talking basically about Levitical laws and liturgical laws, and God says,

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I hate your practice of that. Because, in the same way, it's like, you look at these masks, and now,

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I'm not against masks in terms of where they're medical necessary and where they actually work.

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So, you know, put that aside, you know, like the N95 masks and so forth. But the mask that we're wearing right now is just one huge, big virtue signaling that God hates.

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Yep. Right. You sit there, you're going to abort babies in the womb, but you're more concerned about the mask that you wear on your face than the babies in the womb.

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You're more concerned about the mask on your face than the governor actually obeying Romans 13. Right.

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That's right. Yes. So, we've taken all these gnats and we've turned them into elephants and we ignore the elephant and we're just drinking these elephants, you know, one after another in all this with the mask.

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And in addition, this has been before the pandemic and even during the pandemic up to April, there's been several studies, one from University of Minnesota and for their center disease and control.

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And that said, that cloth masks are basically, have zero effect against the transmissibility of the coronavirus.

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Cloth masks. Our whole city council last week took a picture of them up on the steps of city council, every single one of them wearing cloth masks, all seven of them wearing cloth masks.

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Because they mandated, they legislated, in our city, the city of Moscow, not the county, but the city of Moscow, they said, you need to wear a mask where you cannot social distance, six feet social distancing.

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And so, they're sitting here trying to virtue signal and say, hey, look, we're wearing masks, we're with you on this, when those masks do not do a darn thing against the coronavirus.

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And God, that's the kind of hypocrisy, that's the kind of Isaiah chapter one hypocrisy that God hates.

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Exactly. And, you know, I think that's, I'm really glad you brought that up, Gabe. I think it's important, when

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Jesus is confronting, in Matthew 23, just before he gives the final indictments and the promise of destruction, in Matthew 24, upon that generation, for their covenant of faithfulness, and their covenant of judgment is coming, now the sanctions are coming.

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In Matthew 23, he's challenging these religious people, and he says, Matthew 23, 24, he says, you blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel.

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A lot of people are like, I don't even know what the heck that means, but it sounds interesting. Straining out a gnat had to do with, basically, their wine, and gnats getting into it, and they would strain out these little tiny creatures, like, you know, to make sure that the wine is pure and it's all together.

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So he's saying, you strain out the gnats, like you don't want that unclean thing, but then you swallow a camel, so it's supposed to be cartoonish.

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It's supposed to be like a cartoon, like you're straining all these teeny, tiny gnats, but you're swallowing this ginormous, unclean camel that's in your cup.

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It's impossible. It's supposed to be like a cartoon. It's funny, actually. He's roasting them.

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Jesus is the original roaster, and he roasted them, straining out the gnat, swallowing the camel, and that gets to exactly what's happening in these cases with all the virtue signaling.

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You accept all the injustices around you, all around you, particularly, let's talk about our hands are full of blood, all the murder of the innocents around us, but then you strain out the gnat like you've got the virtue signal mask on saying,

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I want to love my neighbor, protect my neighbor, all the while you're killing your neighbors. It's absolute hypocrisy, and I'm not buying it.

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Here's the thing. It's like you've got your health department or the CDC. You've got all these health organizations talking about health when they're pro -choice.

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The secretary or the head of the health department in Pennsylvania is a cross -dressing, transgendered man, and they're telling you to wear a mask.

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It's like, no, thank you. I'm not going to listen to what your concept of health looks like because you've got everything flipped upside down.

27:55

In Colorado, there's an interesting moment that's happening in Colorado right now. In Douglas, Colorado, there are the county commissioners.

28:02

There's a tri -county health department that oversees the three counties, including

28:09

Douglas County. The county commissioners, because the tri -county health department just imposed a face -masking resolution on everything.

28:17

These are unelected officials in this health department in this tri -county health department, and they imposed a face -mask requirement on all these counties.

28:24

In Douglas County, the commissioners, what they did is like, fine. They voted to get out of that tri -county health cooperative agreement.

28:32

So the county commissioners voted to get out of it, and they're like, okay, we don't have to wear a mask anymore. Douglas County is one of the healthiest counties in the

28:38

United States. It's been ranked as one of the healthiest counties in the United States. This goes back to, this is why local politics is so important is because you can do these kind of things and take responsibility for your own county, and here's the thing.

28:51

If you don't like what I did, then vote me out next go -around. I can't. It's a lot harder to vote out your governor than it is to vote out your county commissioner.

28:59

It's so funny if you think about just how, the madness of that is these people with no authority. That'd be like me walking into Texas right now, like standing on the border, crossing the line, where it says, you know, welcome to Texas.

29:10

I love Texas, by the way. I step inside, and I start shouting at everybody, all right, everyone, I decree you all wear purple shoes today.

29:16

I now demand, I have no authority to do so. I'm outside of my own jurisdiction. I can't do it, but we are so ignorant about spheres of authority, and how authority works, how government's supposed to work, and in particular, so ignorant about how our own government works, and that has a lot to do with public education.

29:34

I'm a product of public education. I had to learn all this stuff later on my own, because you don't learn it in public school.

29:40

How does this work? And you know what, Gabe, too, one of the shocking things, and then I'll hand it over to Luke here, one of the shocking things to us over the last month,

29:47

I want to encourage everybody, just quickly, by the way, pray for Walt Blackman and the other legislators in Arizona right now who are working together to actually criminalize and abolish end abortion.

29:57

You'll be seeing that coming in the very near future. So also, send an encouraging word to Representative Blackman, Walt Blackman in Arizona.

30:04

Tweet him, Facebook message him, just send him an encouraging word. Encourage him to continue to be courageous. He's calling it murder.

30:10

He's working to abolish it. But what's interesting is that over the last month, we've been in private conversation, private meetings with legislators, sheriffs, senators, congressmen, all those, and we've been talking to them, and it's amazing, too.

30:24

A couple examples I have of where I brought up, like, okay, in terms of government, when we're trying to actually end abortion in the state, we can actually end it at the local level, because Roe versus Wade is not a law.

30:36

It's a court opinion, and of course, everybody knows here, right, that the Constitution says who makes the law who makes law? Anyone?

30:41

Anyone? Anyone? And you'd be surprised at some of the rooms you're in and the people you talk to are at the highest level.

30:47

We're talking like elected officials, senators, congressmen, all that stuff. You'd be surprised when you say, and you know that Roe versus Wade is not a law, right, like no law has been made on abortion.

30:56

They're like, oh, my goodness. I've never thought of that. Like our Constitution says who makes law in our country, and people go, oh, yeah,

31:05

Congress makes law. And you're like, and you sort of sit back and you go, this is how abortion is happening in all of our states.

31:13

It's people who are in legislative positions, they're legislators, duly elected, and they don't know how our law works.

31:20

Yeah. They clearly never watched Schoolhouse Rock. Yeah. Well, and you can't let the church get out of this.

31:27

I mean, we want to blame public education, which is, it's a real place to point some of the blame, but like, you got like Andy Stanley's church in Georgia is not going to go back to worship services until after Christmas.

31:39

January. Did we see, did anybody see how much money they took, by the way? Does anybody know? No, I don't think they did take any.

31:46

Are you serious? At least I saw online, I saw the numbers somewhere, they received somewhere around like $27 to $30 million annually.

31:52

I think they're okay. They're sitting pretty. Possibly. So I haven't got a chance to check to see if they took any COVID dollars.

31:58

Maybe they did. Yeah. Maybe they did, I don't know. I will say this, I had a debate, a radio debate, an unbelievable radio with Andy Stanley, and I try to be really gracious and respectful to him and engage with his position.

32:10

And you guys can go look at that online. It's on our channel, it's on Unbelievable's channel. But I will just say this, and you know,

32:15

I want to love Andy as the image bearer of God as much as I possibly can, but I'm actually grateful to God, really grateful to God that he's closed down until January, because I actually do hope that the people who are a part of that network of communities there in Atlanta and around,

32:32

I hope that this causes them to finally look at their leadership and the teaching and to say, I'm out. And go to some solid more biblical churches.

32:40

Well maybe we should take a break and then I have a question for you when we come back. Let's do it. Let's do it. So everybody, again, final word before we go to our break, and then we come back.

32:49

Stay with us. Please do this with us. It's a really, really big deal. I know I just said it kind of like off the cuff here today, but I just want to let you guys know, if you haven't seen it,

32:57

Apology of Church has been given grace. We've been able to speak prophetically to our local legislators here in Arizona, and it's a very big deal.

33:05

What's happening right now in Arizona is very, very big. End abortion now is, of course, global but nationwide. It's going to the state level.

33:11

Christians are speaking prophetically to their legislators and demanding an immediate end to the injustice of abortion.

33:18

But it's happening here in Arizona. I can't give you all the details right now, but I will tell you that we are side by side with a lot of these legislators, speaking to them

33:26

God's words, God's standards about protecting the unborn. And some big things are happening here.

33:32

Some very, very big things are happening here. Go send an encouraging word at some point today to Walt Blackman, representative in Arizona.

33:40

You can tweet him. You can send it to him on Facebook. Do whatever you've got to do. Make sure you encourage him for the work that he's doing.

33:45

He's calling abortion murder, and he's working for the abolition of abortion, not the regulation of it.

33:51

And so just give him encouragement to that end. And don't forget to go to ApologyofStudios .com to get more. And go to check out,

33:57

I'm so sorry, I don't know the actual website, CrossPolitic, the program we love. We love those guys.

34:03

But Gabe, where do they go to get more episodes from you guys? CrossPolitic .com

34:09

That's it. CrossPolitic .com All right guys, quick break. We'll be right back. Stay with us. I want their faith to not just be something that stands, but something around which culture can be built.

34:23

We want students who can think critically about arguments, but also about the culture around them, that can then speak clearly to it, and that also have the ability to influence and shape because of the power of their message.

34:35

Because that's really what the gospel does. The gospel throws down all the arguments against it. It speaks to the hearts of people, it influences, and it changes.

34:50

The goal for New St. Andrews College, as it trains its students, is not to make people who will be able to go out and just get jobs.

35:00

People who will just be bricks in the wall of our society. The goal for New St. Andrews College is to make students into men and women who will really impact culture.

37:11

a big program on Charles Manson and the cult that he started and all the background of that and the murders and all the rest.

37:18

Very important episodes. Good show. Cultish is actually a very, very, very entertaining show. Very informative show.

37:25

And of course, you get all the podcast episodes, the radio programs from the past.

37:30

There are hundreds of them from Apology Radio. Really, really important stuff. Good stuff. We think it will bless you in your walk with Jesus.

37:36

Back now with Gabe Wrench and The Bear, myself talking about current events, talking about getting into the commercial now.

37:45

We're going to get into the commercial. Yes? Before we get there, I was just going to say, kind of cap off what you were saying,

37:51

Gabe, earlier. As far as getting involved locally, one,

37:56

I'm super thankful and excited that you're doing this and I hope you get elected. Yeah, I was really thankful to see you.

38:02

I know we've had some people here at our church kind of get involved locally. You said it early on, but you can see literally just call and be like, hey,

38:12

I want to get involved. Is there any positions open? There's probably a position you can literally just step into. One of our head deacon, actually, he was in Chandler and he did that and they made him, what was he like, head of fine arts in Chandler or something?

38:26

Within like two weeks of him being there, he was the deciding vote against training reading hour at the library.

38:36

Right, right. It's that simple. You're right, but Christians shouldn't be involved in politics.

38:42

That was all bad. Right now, because he moved to Mesa, so he's trying to get involved in Mesa, but you literally just almost have to show up, but here's another thing that's crazy.

38:51

He's talking about county stuff, which, by the way, we need, to end abortion, we need

38:57

Christian county sheriffs because you're right, Gabe, they're the ones that have the power.

39:03

In the end, they have the most. So like, Jason was supposed to go yesterday, but because of COVID, they canceled this thing, but there's like a, it's like a training class to be a sheriff, a

39:15

Maricopa County Sheriff posse, and you literally go to one class and then you're in the posse, and so if there's like a county sheriff like that has to do anything, you can assist them, and that's all that, it's all that it takes is one stupid class and you're, you know, and it's like, so if you have a county sheriff, you know, that's willing to like stand, you know, stand in the gap to protect the lives of our pre -born neighbors, you can literally just show up and assist them and help them by one class, like it's that simple.

39:46

Well, here's why that's important is because I talked to our sheriff, our local sheriff, and he really said a very helpful thing in all this because a lot of us from the cheap seats will shoot at the sheriff or shoot at that authority who's the highest in the land and say, why haven't you ended abortion yet or why haven't you done this or why aren't you pushing back with the governor right now?

40:07

And he said, the thing is, I can stand in the street and say no, but if my town is not standing behind me, then

40:16

I'm just going to get run over. But if I have my town behind me, that's why this posse thing that you mentioned is so cool.

40:22

Yeah. It's because now he knows who's behind him. Exactly. And he's that much more willing to put himself out there and stand in the street because actually the whole city's behind him standing in the street also.

40:34

Yeah, exactly. So here, the question I have for you and then we can transition into the commercial, you know, so if you're elected county commissioner, then do you have the authority?

40:47

I know it has to go to vote, but say two out of the three of you agree on this. Do you have that authority then to make

40:52

Laytau County a sanctuary county for the pre -born?

40:59

Yeah, you have that authority and that's something, that's why I distinguished earlier between some counties might have one commissioner who's like the executive director kind of thing.

41:10

And so there's some, you still have some hoops and some challenges to do there, but I would have to get another person to vote with me on that.

41:18

So it'd be a two to one vote. Right. And so it's possible, but even, I mean, we're still in the situation even before that where it's like you have to educate before I can even try to bring a vote and put pressure on that middle person to swing my way to do that.

41:33

But yeah. Yeah. Sure. The point though is you have that, you know, because people don't think like that.

41:39

Locally. Right. They don't think that you have that certainty. Everybody's in this mindset that it's the

41:44

Supreme Court. I can't do anything until Roe v. Wade is overturned. Or the president of the Supreme Court. Yeah. There you go.

41:50

It's not that complicated. It's not that difficult. It's much more simple than that. Yeah, it is and it's not because the other thing is you also have to have a sheriff on your team to do that.

41:58

You have to have a number of people on your team before you even try to push that boat. And so,

42:04

I mean, yeah, in one sense, it's like, yes, you can do this. I mean, come on, everyone knows that the whole sanctuary city idea was spun out of an illegal immigrant sanctuary city.

42:15

Right. So, that play's been run already. Everyone knows it can happen. Yeah. It's just, you know, again,

42:22

San Francisco has a whole city standing behind them in the streets to do that. You know, in Latok County, I might have, what, 1 ,000 people out of 60 ,000 people standing behind me.

42:35

If I do that, it's not that, you know, should I do it or not. It's the calculation and how you get there.

42:41

Yeah, I agree. A lot of education, a lot of preaching needs to be done. All right, so, you also, let's just finish up here quickly on the discussion of the famous, the infamous commercial.

42:53

I guess, well, how long was it? 20 seconds long? Something like that, maybe less. It's a guy and a girl going into a bathroom, clearly marked as to who goes into which side.

43:04

One is a dude with pants and one is a dress and they go to their designated side and the mayor of Moscow did a public post on the mayor of Moscow or the city of Moscow platform,

43:16

I can't remember which one it was, Facebook, basically saying, you know, we're inclusive, we respect everyone's opinion, but not this one.

43:23

Right. And, so, just tell us, Gabe, about the fallout from that. What was that like? Yeah, so,

43:29

New St. Andrews, I worked with, when I was working on marketing with New St. Andrews, we put this video together and also, some others, of course, helped me.

43:40

It wasn't, but I was leading in the production side of it and so, when we put the video together, we put some of the text around it.

43:48

This is, we actually recently put this video together about a year and a half ago when the whole transgender decisions were going down, like, in North Carolina with the

43:57

NBA, not wanting to have their playoffs in North Carolina because, at that point in time,

44:03

North Carolina did not have transgender bathrooms. So, there's a bunch of that kind of stuff going on and then, of course, you have the recent

44:10

Supreme Court decision using the 1964 civil rights legislation to be able to say, hey, this also allows for transgender and homosexual activity to not be discriminated against.

44:20

And so, when that happened, we released the video on St.

44:28

Andrew's Facebook page and it, I think it's got over 500 ,000 views now. Wow. And what's really funny is just how simple of a video is it?

44:37

It's a 20 second video. No one says one word in the whole video and a guy walks into a man's bathroom and a woman walks into a woman's bathroom and then the text pops up on the screen basically saying, you know, the

44:51

Supreme Court doesn't know science like New York State students know science, roughly. And that video went berserk.

44:58

I mean, there's over, there's over, there's thousands of comments under the thread of just liberals bashing

45:06

New St. Andrews. And then that forced our mayor to address it, to make a public statement on their

45:14

Facebook page and the mayor basically said, our city is anti -hate, our city is against this kind of thing, our city is, does not, does not endorse

45:23

New St. Andrews' video and basically just saying New St. Andrews' hate. What is crazy about all this, and I went and I told our city council this on Monday night, last

45:33

Monday night about all this, two Monday nights ago, what's crazy about all this is that our mayor built those bathrooms.

45:41

Our mayor put those signage up, our mayor put the bathroom that's designated male and the bathroom that's designated female.

45:48

Right. And yet somehow in all this, New St. Andrews is the hateful one, he's the one that built the bathrooms.

45:54

We just actually put together a marketing video displaying and teaching and educating people how those bathrooms are to be used based off the mayor's signage.

46:01

And it, it tripped some switches here locally. That was pretty funny.

46:07

It was, it's funny because I, I didn't tell you this Gabe, I was actually, I saw that Ben Merkle, the president of New St.

46:15

Andrews and I was like, he was like on, Glenn Beck, Glenn Beck yesterday or whatever, you know, like I, and I saw it was an article in the

46:22

Washington Post, like it's getting some play, right? Like in some, and so I was texting him and I was like,

46:27

Hey man, you made, you know, made the big time, whatever. And, and I was going to have him come on and then

46:32

I forgot that I had just scheduled for today. So as I'm talking to Ben, you were like, Hey, we still good for Thursday.

46:38

And I was like, Oh, perfect. So yeah, I mean, it's getting some national, national press.

46:44

And Ben, I heard Ben on Glenn Beck was saying that the, it's actually, they've, they've actually gotten more positive feedback than negative.

46:55

And I think like, it's, it's been a good advertisement for them. So Ben went on Glenn Beck yesterday morning to talk about the black lives matter video that NSA.

47:04

Oh, okay. That's right. So what's funny is, is we had this bathroom video that was released.

47:10

Oh man, I'm so excited. Maybe three weeks ago. And we got all sorts of hate from that because, you know, we hate trans, we're transphobic, all that stuff.

47:18

Yeah. And then a week later, we released this fantastic black lives matter video.

47:24

The script was written by Nate Wilson. It was awesome. Um, and it stopped everybody in their tracks because here you have the mayor basically calling us hateful for releasing this bathroom video.

47:34

And then we released this black lives matter video that all black lives matter. Yeah. And, and it's, the hate, there's not much really hate under that thread because you kind of, you're kind of cornered in that video.

47:48

You're stuck. You jammed them up. Yeah. You're stuck. Yes. You jammed them. And so it's really kind of, the mayor is in a really awkward position where we're supporting all black lives matter and he's condemning our transphobic bathrooms.

47:58

Yeah. Yep. That's fantastic. Ah, such an amazing, delicious moment of providence.

48:04

Well, I love it. It sounds like God's giving you guys more students now because of it, so. Yeah. Well, yeah.

48:10

I mean, I mean like, like inquiries, web inquiries have just blown up. Um, uh, you know, called conference.

48:18

We have this world Duke summer camp that happens. Yeah. And we had to cancel because the mayor's orders.

48:24

My daughter, my daughter was gone. Yeah. Yeah. And, and so, and, and the mayor and University of Idaho because we're using their dorms.

48:31

We were renting their dorms for the students and the University of Idaho is being really silly about all this, but, but regardless, we had to cancel it, but there's, the local students are still able to participate in it and there's over 500 students online that are now able to participate in it.

48:45

Instead of having 160 students locally that could come and attend and do this thing, now it's over 500 students that are able to attend called conference.

48:52

So, a lot of things have just kind of blown up around this and I would just say to, you know, to your audience and to those who are wanting to engage culture, it really is very, and God's made it so easy to engage culture these days.

49:05

It is so easy to reach the gospel to our culture and all you have to do is put out a 20 second bathroom video that has no words in it and the gospel goes out.

49:13

Right. That post -meal dough. All you have, really the, the major sound is a toilet flushing and a zipper going up and that, that sparked all, all the success, all the success of communicating the

49:27

Christian worldview is, is a, is a toilet seat click and then, and then, and then, you're like, oh,

49:33

I get what's happening there. I've had other colleges, I've had other colleges say, oh, man, you guys got some, you guys got some cojones releasing these kind of videos.

49:41

It's like, what, why aren't you guys doing this too? Why? What's so brave about that? Oh, you're so brave.

49:48

You, you said a man is a man and a girl is a girl. Oh, you're so brave. Yeah. Well, you can do that when you don't take

49:54

Caesar's money. That is true. That is true. That is true. No PPP.

50:00

That's right. You know me. No PPP. No, no, not me. No, no, not me.

50:06

Um, all right. Hey, Gabe, we love you, brother. Thank you so much for what you're doing. I was so excited to see all your stuff, putting the signs up and all the rest.

50:13

I mean, honestly, I didn't communicate that to you and I just love you a bunch, man. I love what you're doing. I was just,

50:19

I was so glad to see that you are doing that and I'll be praying for you. I hope that, I hope that you make it through and love you guys.

50:25

Appreciate you guys having me on. Thanks for the support and the prayers and I hope to see you guys in Nashville at our Fight Lab Feast Conference October 1st, 3rd.

50:33

You guys got to get out there. We will talk about it. Let's just hope that there's not more lockdowns. When is it again? When is it?

50:39

October 1st through the 3rd. It's in a conservative state. October, all right. Everyone's on the ground has been saying that we're going to be the only

50:46

Christian conference in the fall that's probably going to be open. Well, that's right. Yeah, I was just wondering when because I think after,

50:52

I think the day after the election, COVID is going to disappear. Yeah, I agree. And so,

50:58

I was just wondering when because in November 15th, I'd be like, sure, that's happening for sure. Anything before there,

51:04

I don't know, could be different. All right, brother. I love you, man. And everyone go to CrossPolitic .com

51:10

to listen to more from the boys over there at CrossPolitic. Thanks, brother, for all you're doing. Thanks for having me.

51:15

Thanks, bro. All right, everybody. Great show today. Great show. Yes. Important stuff. Exciting too.

51:21

Yeah. And I do love how Gabe illustrated that particular point that this is a simple commercial.

51:26

There's no dialogue in the commercial. It's just a guy and a girl walking in the designated parts of the bathroom. And we know science better than the

51:31

Supreme Court. Flush. Simple. Zip. And it's like, how dare you? How dare you?

51:38

So hateful. Yeah, it's amazing. but, I mean, when you're courageous like that, look at the blessing.

51:43

Look at the ability that Doug and New St. Andrews and Ben and all of our favorites, look at the opportunities they've had to communicate

51:51

Christ and the biblical worldview because of this really, really, really, really brave commercial. And it's just,

51:58

I think the thing we have to all be aware of is that you have believers who know

52:03

Jesus that are secretly, they're like, they're a pot ready to boil over. Right?

52:09

And they need to see other believers, particularly men leaders, being brave enough to say and do something so they're like, all right, okay, we're in.

52:16

It's on. We need leaders. Solid men, faithful men and women, of course, and children to go out into the world to be brave for Christ, to preach the gospel, to stand up for truth.

52:26

And then we all just sort of start collecting together to do it. This is not a time to be safe. This is not a time to be safe.

52:33

It is not a time to be comfortable. It's time for godly, I'm going to speak to the men here, godly men to stand up and to say what is true and to do what is necessary to fight against injustices, evil, to preach the gospel.

52:46

And it's all about Jesus. Listen, when you're fighting against some of these things that seem like very small things, the

52:53

Christian worldview is a network. It's a comprehensive worldview. So, when you're defending those little things, you're actually on your way to this network of the whole

53:01

Christian worldview. So, like, when you're defending the issue of bathrooms and boys have penises, girls have vaginas, when you're defending that and you're just displaying it, you're defending the

53:11

Christian worldview. You're on your way to defending the gospel because what does everybody say now about that issue? They say, oh, it's not a gospel issue.

53:16

It is a gospel issue. It's the gospel issue that gets you into the conversation because they'll say, hey, like,

53:22

I don't really, you know, I have male parts, but I'm not really a male. I have female parts. I'm not really a female.

53:27

They're denying the created order itself. They're distorting, they're turning it upside down. Romans 1, right? They refuse to acknowledge the creator -creation distinction, so they flip it on its head and they say, well,

53:39

I'll worship this thing instead of the real God. And so, they profess to be wise, they become fools, and they're distorting the nature of the created order itself.

53:48

Like, that's how Paul opens the gospel presentation, with the distortion of the created order, particularly, that leads into sexuality.

53:59

So when, like, someone says, like, you know, do you really need to go all in on that issue? Well, Paul did when he opened up Romans 1.

54:06

The systematic explanation of the gospel starts with the distortion of human sexuality and the created order.

54:13

So when you talk about, like, standing up and being brave, someone says, do I really need to do it on that issue? Should I pick a big -ticket item?

54:19

Well, that is a big -ticket item, because it is a distortion of the creator -creation distinction, and the whole disruption of the created order and human sexuality and all the rest.

54:29

So fight those fights, because the Christian worldview isn't hodgepodge. Everything is connected.

54:35

Everything's under the authority of Jesus. There is no truth, beauty, or goodness, logic, science, order, without Jesus.

54:43

And so when you're defending what some see as little things, Christianity is a comprehensive worldview.

54:48

It's all and everything. Jesus says, whoever is not with me is against me. So there's no neutrality with Jesus.

54:55

So that counts for bathrooms. That counts for masks. That counts for governors. And by the way, it's just another example, dude, of, like, it shouldn't be eschatology is so important here.

55:08

It is. It is. I'd be a hot mess right now. It is. Eschatology is... Oh, by the way,

55:14

I'm going to be on Ally Stuckey talking about post -millennialism. Oh, nice. She messaged me. She's like, I want you to come on and talk about post -millennialism, like two episodes or something.

55:21

Sweet. So be on the lookout for me on Ally Stuckey talking about eschatology. But what I was going to say to this, I know we always say, like, eschatology matters.

55:28

Eschatology is important. And I'm like, yes, that's absolutely true. You know that I believe that. But in this case, when you talk about the authority of, like, say, governors and mayors and sheriffs and, like, you know, the higher -ups, those who are kings and authority, all those sorts of things, like, shouldn't it just be, regardless of eschatological framework that you hold, whether you're dispensational pre -mill, historic pre -mill, amillennialist, optimistic amillennialist, or post -millennialist, whatever the case may be, like, don't we believe

56:00

Psalm 2, where the father says to the son, he says, ask of me,

56:05

I'll give you nations for your inheritance, the very ends of the earth for your possession. Don't we believe the father when he says to them that same passage about everything belonging to Jesus, to the

56:14

Messiah? He says to the kings of the earth, he says, be wise, obey the son, or you'll perish.

56:20

So, like, that seems to count, regardless of your eschatology, like, is that true?

56:27

Yes. Is Jesus king of kings and lord of lords today? If your answer to that question is yes, he's king of kings, lord of lords today, he has highest authority, then does he have something to say about the mask mandates?

56:43

Does he have something to say about destroying the entire economy and all your neighbors and their livelihoods?

56:50

Does he have something to say to the kings of the earth today in regard to how they actually perpetrate injustices upon our neighbors?

56:57

Like, I mean, shouldn't the Christians be the first ones to say, excuse me, I have the answer to that. It's in this book.

57:03

Like, what's a righteous, what's a righteous quarantine? Oh, well, let me show you here.

57:09

It's actually, God talks about that right here. And you're like, oh, quarantining the sick, right? And there is a righteous version of all these things.

57:16

There are standards that are actually just and good. And Christians are supposed to be the first ones to say, hey,

57:22

God had a lot of really, really amazing blessings here in his law with regard to this issue, whether it's the pre -born, whether it's police abuse, that's a big one, police abuse, righteous standards for law enforcement when they're searching or seizing, those sorts of things, receiving accusations, accusing somebody, all that stuff.

57:43

Like the biblical worldview has the answer. Why aren't we the first ones, brothers and sisters, to stand up and say, hey,

57:48

I have the answer and it's not arbitrary. It's objective. It's true whether I like it or not or whether you like it or not.

57:54

It's actually God's own revelation about these issues. Like, why aren't we saying something? It's because I think we've, it's a reductionistic view of the gospel.

58:04

We've reduced the gospel and the Christian worldview down to a couple things.

58:11

Like, it's this, Jesus is the Messiah. He died and rose again. If you want to go to heaven, pray this prayer.

58:17

And beyond that, like, nothing else really matters. Because the big thing is to escape your humanity, to escape this world and get off into this sort of like foggy, gassy, vaporous existence in the spiritual realm, which is so much better than all this.

58:31

God has no concern for the earthly world. Again, welcome to Gnosticism. We've talked a lot about that. But we have it just down to those categories.

58:39

Like, it's just the category of like, who is Jesus? And how do I go to heaven one day? Okay, did they pray that prayer? Everything else, look,

58:46

I'm not worried about that. Because like, I'm going to heaven one day. Like, this world's a throwaway. Man, that's

58:51

Gnostic. But that's what we've reduced Christianity down to, so that like the Christian church in the

58:56

West doesn't have a thing to say to any of this stuff. And it's almost like, you know, what I wish people could do with us,

59:02

Luke, is that they could take the Covenanter tour. Yeah. The Covenanter tour. The Covenanter tour with us in Scotland.

59:13

Yeah, it's life -changing. And it is life -changing. Just walk down those streets and think about what those people were dying for.

59:19

Yeah. Like, I mean, we're talking about like Christians being brought into a place where they put your thumbs into like a thumbscrew thing and they're tightening down, just breaking the bones in your thumbs or your legs.

59:31

And listen, all you had to say was, fine, the king has authority over the church.

59:38

And then you get to go home. Yeah. You get to go home. You get to live life. You get to have your family. And these people are like dragged down this like mile -long street down to like get up on the platform now and hung or head cut off or beheaded, whatever the case is.

59:52

And it was just to say, okay, just say the word. They weren't taking any PPP money,

59:58

I'll tell you what. They were not taking no PPP. Down with PPP? No, not me. So these are

01:00:06

Christians in the past who said very, well, it's where the famous thing, you know, it's amazing is everyone loves to attribute this quote to like the founding fathers of America.

01:00:15

Resistance to tyranny is obedience to God. Resistance to tyranny is obedience to God. It's like, yeah, our founding fathers were actually quoting that.

01:00:23

Yeah. It's because they inherited what the covenanters gave them. They were inheriting what

01:00:29

John Knox had said. Resistance to tyranny is obedience to God. Yeah. So here's a leader, a faithful leader that it was, we don't agree with him on everything, of course.

01:00:39

He was Presbyterian. Presbyterian, we're a foreign Baptist, but he's a brother in Christ. But I mean, here's a guy who's resisting the powers that be because he was just very simply saying, hey, look, your position's ordained from God, but you don't have authority here.

01:00:53

Right. And that's not just, how do I know? Because God says, and so I'm gonna resist this tyranny to obey

01:00:59

Jesus. And my gosh, these people suffered hard. Like, I mean, like, yeah, I mean, how long do you think the modern evangelical would take to crack in that little, in that little yard?

01:01:11

Remember? Yeah. Where the gate was? And they were talking about how they, they're in Scotland in the wintertime.

01:01:17

Yeah. And it's cold. Yeah. I mean, it's really cold. It hurts. It's bitter cold.

01:01:22

And you get all that wind coming in from the sea there and everything. And they're freezing. And what they, what was it they got?

01:01:28

Did they get two ounces or two, was it two ounces of bread? Something like that. It was very, very memorable.

01:01:33

Like nothing. Yeah. You can't, I mean, they were dying. They died of starvation and exposure and all the rest. But like, they went for months naked.

01:01:41

That was the thing that got me too, is they put them out there naked. So they're starving and they're naked and they're freezing.

01:01:47

And you're like, how long do they last? Two days? Like, how much do you have in you? Like, maybe about two days of freezing, shivering, shivering naked like that and barely eating anything.

01:01:55

These people, like, literally starved to death behind these gates with exposure to the elements, all the rest.

01:02:01

And oh, goodness gracious, all these Christians had to do was just simply say, fine, the king has authority over the church.

01:02:09

I'll yield to that. Yeah. How many modern evangelicals would have just said, it doesn't matter, does it?

01:02:14

Like, I just want to live my life and love my kids. I just want people to know that I'm for them and not against them.

01:02:19

You know, I don't want to ruin my testimony as a believer. You know, I just want to have plenty of time to be a loving neighbor and sort of, like, earn the right to preach the gospel to my neighbor.

01:02:32

We shouldn't get involved politically. No. I mean, what's politics have to do with Jesus anyways? That's how

01:02:38

I hear it. What's politics have to do with Jesus? Oh, I don't know. What does politics have to do with Jesus?

01:02:45

Is anything political moral? And someone says, yeah. Like, is gay mirage a moral issue?

01:02:51

Is that also political? Do you think Jesus has something to say about that? I think he does. We have decided that we love the fact that Jesus is king over heaven, but we are not okay with the fact that Jesus is king over the earth.

01:03:06

Right. I'm so glad that St. Patrick didn't have that perspective. It made him brave enough to go into Ireland and convert an entire island to Jesus.

01:03:17

Or Knox, for that matter. Or Knox, or any other giants of the faith in history. I'm so glad they didn't compartmentalize

01:03:23

Christianity to, like, the spiritual over here matters. That's where Jesus reigns. But over here, not so much, not so worried.

01:03:29

Like, why were covenanters fighting so dang hard in those elements and naked and starving?

01:03:35

Because they saw that Jesus was king over every area of life, and they would say to the king, well, this isn't your jurisdiction.

01:03:41

He's like, well, then you're going to die. And they're like, well, it's fine. We'll end on this.

01:03:47

I love the story, and I wish, I wish, I wish I had memorized his name. I feel bad for not, because he deserves the honor.

01:03:53

I'll look it up, because he deserves the honor. When we were at the bottom of that street where they dragged the

01:03:59

Christians all the way down, and it's a long way. It's a long way. And it's all the same original buildings and all the rest.

01:04:05

I mean, like, what you saw down there is what they saw. So, like, when you're standing down where the platform was, and you walk down this long street, like, from where they were tried down to where they were executed, you feel what they felt.

01:04:17

Like, you're walking on the stones. You're seeing the buildings, all the rest. So, there's this pastor that he's dragged down.

01:04:24

His legs were broken. I think his were. And so, they're bringing him up on the platform, and I think that one of the things that the crowd would do and the soldiers would do is they would try to, like, try to, like, terrify the person who's about to be killed by mocking them and, like, making fun of them and all the rest.

01:04:40

Well, they were doing all of that, of course, because that's what their practice was. And this pastor is going up on the platform, and he was recorded to have said to those who were violating him and all the rest,

01:04:54

I'm more fearful every single time I go up to preach before God's people on the

01:05:00

Lord's Day than I am right now to walk up on this platform. And I thought, just like, epic.

01:05:07

Like, that's an epic way to go out. That's like a mic drop before he dies. We need more pastors like that.

01:05:14

We do. We do. We need men that are willing to say, I have no fear of man, I fear God before I fear you.

01:05:21

And I think that's truth. I'm glad you said that, and we'll end on that word. I think that's it is in substance, that's probably the main thing that keeps

01:05:29

Christians from fighting the good fight and resisting tyranny and evil is that we have more fear of man than we do have fear of God.

01:05:38

And we should all pray that we increase in the one and decrease in the other. I was,

01:05:44

I'll end on this, I was talking to a good friend of mine, long time friend that doesn't live here a few weeks ago, and just about all this stuff,

01:05:54

COVID, and everything, and I was telling him how I've honestly been surprised at the lack of pushback we've received for the hard stances we've been taken.

01:06:04

I don't know if you've felt the same way. Like I know we anticipated, but it hasn't been anywhere near what

01:06:11

I anticipated. And he said, well, what is your take on that? And I said, my take is that people just need someone to lead.

01:06:18

Talking about the video that they made, it was just stupid, it was a silly little thing, but they just, they took a small step in faith and principle and truth, and it's like, oh, you're so brave.

01:06:29

People just need pastors with a little bit of guts in them to stand on truth, and they'll follow that.

01:06:37

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