WWUTT 2275 Q&A What to do for Halloween, Teaching Kids the Bible, How Christians Vote

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Can Christians participate in Halloween? What are some effective ways that we can teach the

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Bible or church history to our children? And how should Christians think about voting this election season?

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The answers to these questions when we Understand the Text. This is

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When we Understand the Text, a daily Bible commentary to help encourage your time in the Word, that we may be conformed to the image of Christ.

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Tell all your friends about our ministry at www .utt .com. Here once again is

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Pastor Gabe. Thank you, Becky. You're welcome. Where have you been? Becky? Everywhere.

00:44

Just about everywhere. At least I feel like I've been everywhere. Yeah. Except for one place for too long.

00:51

Here. You haven't been here. Yes. If we had the chance to record this earlier, which, by the way, everybody, sorry we're late on dropping this episode.

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But if we had recorded it when we usually do, I wanted to take the opportunity on the broadcast to say,

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I have not seen my wife in a long time. Not only have y 'all not heard from her, I don't really hear from her all that often.

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So I was going to ask you out on a date. But then we did get a date. Well, kind of.

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We added on to some of our - Parental duties. Activities.

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And ended up with a date out of it. Yeah. That was a good end. But we were already out. So we went and got some ice cream.

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Yeah. It was awesome. If you take a picture of us at the end, it was officially a date.

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Yes. Because she takes a picture on, is it every one of our dates? I try. Yeah. Yeah. I think there's been a couple that I've missed and kicked myself for because it's few and far between.

01:51

We didn't have that memory. Oh, I remember that night. Yes. Well, before we get into some questions here, we got to come back to our study of Proverbs.

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We're in Proverbs chapter six. I finished chapter five without you. So this one's rather quick.

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I'll just go through the first five verses here. Proverbs 6 .1. My son, if you have put up security for your neighbor, have given your pledge for a stranger, if you are snared in the words of your mouth, caught in the words of your mouth, then do this, my son, and save yourself.

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For you have come into the hand of your neighbor. Go, hasten, and plead urgently with your neighbor.

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Give your eyes no sleep and your eyelids no slumber. Save yourself like a gazelle from the hand of the hunter, like a bird from the hand of the fowler.

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Now, all of that sounds kind of confusing. What in the world are we talking about here? But remember that all of this is in the context of the father previously warning the son to stay away from the forbidden woman.

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And he's going to come back into those warnings in the latter half of chapter six and then also in chapter seven.

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So these are warnings not to be too hasty. And if you commit yourself to a neighbor, if you pledge yourself with a neighbor, well, now you're bound to that neighbor.

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And you may have acted out of your flesh, may have been that your neighbor gave you a good deal, some sort of arrangement, an agreement, you're like, hey, sounds great to me, shake hands on it, and then you find out what you're actually bound for and you're stuck in this agreement now.

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And so the father is saying, do what you need to do to get out of the arrangement so that you will, whatever happens with your neighbor in this arrangement does not then reflect poorly upon you.

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It doesn't hurt your reputation. So then where the father goes next, which we'll read next week, go to the aunt, oh sluggard, consider her ways and be wise.

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Without having any chief officer or ruler, she prepares her bread in summer and gathers her food in the harvest.

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And so the direction from the father to the son then at that point is, be wise, be self -sufficient, do not be lazy, get your work done.

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And so that's kind of the nature of the warning with regard to the bond or pledge to your neighbor.

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Yeah. Jesus kind of gave a similar warning in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew chapter five, where he said, don't pledge an oath, but simply let your yes be yes and your no be no.

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Yeah. Same sort of concept. Yeah. So that's our look at Proverbs chapter six.

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Just be careful with what you commit yourself to. And if you do commit yourself to something, either get out of it if it's not good for you, or let your yes be yes and your no be no.

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Jesus said anything beyond this is evil. So be people of integrity as we represent

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Christ in this world. On the Friday edition of the broadcast, we take questions from the listeners and you can submit those questions to when we understand the text at gmail .com,

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or you can send us a voicemail, go to www .utt .com and click on that voicemail tab right there on the top of the page.

04:58

And babe, I've held on to one of these for a few weeks. Oh no, I'm so sorry.

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Because I figured this would be a good one for me and you. Okay. Instead of just answering it on my own.

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Awesome. I've received so many great comments over the last couple of weeks. Just at church on Sunday, in fact, someone had said to me how much

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I love and enjoy having Becky on the broadcast. Aww. I was kind of wondering if there was a subtext in there of like,

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Gabe, we love you, but get her back on. Well, it's different when you're having a conversation versus trying to have a conversation by yourself.

05:37

Yeah. Like, that only goes so far, you know, I don't know if any of you guys out there talk to yourselves, but, you know, the conversation's a little dull and a lot lacking, so.

05:51

Well, with the radio experience I have, I'm used to it. Yes. But it's still so much easier to do this.

05:57

As a conversation. Right, exactly. When I'm talking to you. And I know to other people, it sounds more conversational as well.

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Well, this voicemail, you're going to enjoy this. I can't remember if I played this one for you or not. Okay. But this is from Louie, and he's got some experience you might be able to relate to.

06:15

Awesome. Some work experience. Oh. Here we go. Hey there, Gabe and Becky. This is

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Louie from Chesterton, Indiana. I've been a longtime listener. I love to pass the time at work by listening to your podcasts while I'm operating heavy equipment at the steel mill.

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Becky, I know you've mentioned that you operated a large dump truck before, and that's the kinds of things that I do.

06:37

I run ginormous equipment like that. That's awesome. Anyway, I so very much appreciate your ministry.

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It's been instrumental in bringing me out of a big name it, claim it, ooby -dooby, should have run a

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Honda, gibberish, tongue -speaking, prosperity church cult. In between you and Paul Washer, Justin Peters, John MacArthur, I've been able to pull out of it and stay clear of it.

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So I really appreciate you. I'd like to get your opinion on celebrating Halloween.

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Do you feel it's appropriate for a Christian to celebrate in any way, like just handing out candy?

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And I'd like to get your thoughts on what you think of a church hosting a trunk -or -treat event on Halloween night, where they give candy away outside.

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So I'd love to hear your thoughts on that. Again, I thank you for your ministry. I'm praying for you guys.

07:28

May God bless you. Yeah, I appreciate that, Louie. Thank you. Yeah, thanks so much. Remember the big old dump truck days?

07:35

Yes, it was the best job ever. So fun. Now, all of what

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Louie mentions there about Halloween, we've done all of that. We have. So we've done trick -or -treating with the kids.

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I think we've done that pretty traditionally almost every year. Have gone out.

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Now, when we were in Texas, we always went trick -or -treating. Every October 31st. Yes, but in Kansas, there was a time that we didn't do anything.

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I guess not. And then we've also had a Reformation party instead, and we had trunk -or -treats.

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The church that we're at now did a Reformation Day party last year. We've got nothing planned this year. I don't guess we're doing anything.

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It's just gonna be a 31st that comes and goes. And then, I mean, we've done just about everything that you could possibly, like a fall festival.

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We've done the trunk -or -treat. We have an absolutely adorable trunk -or -treat picture.

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It might have been the first ever Halloween we had as a family. I think so. Mm -hmm. Yeah. So with me and you and Annie, and I was dressed in Ninja Turtle wear.

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I wasn't actually dressed as a Ninja Turtle, but I had a Ninja Turtle hoodie on. And then

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I was a Kansas City fan. Yeah, Kansas City Chiefs fan.

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Yeah. Because you had the jersey. And then Annie was the strawberry shortcake. Strawberry shortcake. Yep. Yes.

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So cute. That picture's a classic. It is. In our collection. But yeah, so we've done trick -or -treating and everything else.

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Obviously, you can probably tell by the way we're answering the question what we think. Yeah. Now, this is another one of those things.

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It seems like a lot of these questions that we answer on the broadcast tend to fall into that Christian liberty category.

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Mm -hmm. And this would be another one. Yeah. So if it's something that, for you, it's like, oh, there's so much of the occult wrapped up in it.

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And you're right. There is. Yeah, for sure. I mean, we've got just an army of skeletons in our neighborhood right now.

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Oh, it's interesting. And not just normal -sized. So many that the children are not afraid of them anymore.

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Yeah. They used to be creeped out by them every Halloween. They used to scream. Let's not go that way.

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Yeah. Yeah, we would totally avoid that route. But now there's just so many to get any direction out of our neighborhood that they're just used to it.

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Yeah. Which is sad. And they're huge. They're gigantic. They got enormous.

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They're like 10 to 12 feet tall. Yeah. That's over a story tall. Yeah. Where in the world do you store those things?

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I don't know. And you only have them out, I mean, I don't know that we've even seen them all month. Yeah. So they've only come out in the last three weeks or something like that?

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Yep. Oh, and - Yeah, I think that everybody just has storage units around here because there is no room in these homes to have anything like that stored up.

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One of these - You can't store it in your attic because it'll just melt. Oh, yeah. In Arizona. Yeah. That's true. One of these houses over on the corner, they've got like this whole, it's almost like a big skeleton party in their front yard.

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Yeah. Yeah. They've got a table and skeletons dancing. There's a Grim Reaper hanging out over there. Yeah. Where do you put all those things?

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I think they're part of the tour, the Halloween yard tour. There's that going on, right?

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Mm -hmm. Kind of like you have the Christmas lights tour. Yep. Yep. Now it's the Halloween tour.

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Halloween decoration tour. Yeah. We're going to go take a look at all this. I mean, I thought it was baffling enough, the

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Christmas decorations that I'd see out every year. Where do you store those - I know. They're amazing. ... for 11 months out of the year?

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But with Halloween, and do you do both? Does a family have both? We have a room that's dedicated to all of our

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Halloween decorations, and a room dedicated to all of our Christmas decorations. Who knows? I'd like to see how they pack that in there, though.

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Are they pack rat style, or are they nice, neat, and pristine? Yeah. You know? No idea.

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But is there anything wrong with dressing up as your favorite character, or something like that, and going door to door, and asking for candy?

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Not really. No. I mean, somebody's conscience is probably going to feel convicted over that, just because of all of the occult that's wrapped up in Halloween.

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So any sort of participation in it whatsoever is going to feel like I'm participating in something witchcraft or satanic.

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Right. Well, I mean, I can sympathize, I suppose, but I don't take that approach.

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But you also have to be very aware of your neighborhood or culture around you, because some places,

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I can imagine, it's not a good thing, at all. To just go to any house.

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Yeah. Right. Yeah. So maybe do a treasure hunt, and hide candy in your house, and be like, hey, kids, go find candy.

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So you know you have something in lieu of, but it's not putting yourselves in danger.

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Well, the neighborhood that we went and trick -or -treated in when we were living in Texas, the same neighborhood every year.

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Yeah, it was. Everybody was sitting outside. Yep. So you just walk right up to the house. Yeah. Yeah. Grab candy or whatever.

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So the kids actually asked me, they were like, how do we know if they're handing out candy this year?

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And I said, well... They'll be sitting in their driveway? The porch light thing.

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Yeah, that's right. And they're like, yeah, but I mean, in Texas, it was everybody was just outside, so you knew.

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And I was like, yeah, if you have a porch light on, that's the sign that you go at least...

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Pretty good indicator. At least go ring the bell, you know? Yeah. It's okay if they say no. But... I mean,

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I've used, I've handed out tracks. Yeah. There was the one year where we, I don't think we went out, but we stayed in.

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And then as we were handing out candy, we'd put tracks in with the candy. I remember that. I try...

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One year when we did the Trunk or Treat, I got all these tracks as the church. We had it set up where in order to get into the parking lot to go around and get candy from everybody, you had to get through me first.

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Right. I had my car parked right there. Right. You have to pass me and then go to everybody else and get to the cars.

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So I was planning this whole thing of like, I'm going to stop people and share the gospel. No, there's... They stop right there, they grab what you're handing, they're gone.

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They are. There's no time for a conversation. It was like, okay, fine. That's how this is going to go.

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It's quick. So that didn't work, but I still used the opportunity in later years to hand out tracks.

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One year I got one, it was a little book that I did, a little booklet. And we put those in, we ordered like 50 of them or something like that.

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Yeah. Gave those away to all the kids that came up and knocked on the door. So you can use that opportunity to be more evangelistic.

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Sure. You can do a Reformation Day party on that day, as a lot of reform -leaning churches are doing.

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You can hand your church card in there too. Yeah, that's right. Hey, come join us on Sunday.

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Throw that in the bag. Yeah. Or you can abstain altogether and you can decide that's something I don't want to do at all.

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That's acceptable too. That would be something that would be a matter of opinion. So remember passages like Romans 14 .1,

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as for the one who is weak in faith, welcome him, but not to quarrel over opinions. Verse five, one person esteems one day is better than another, while another esteems all days alike.

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Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind. The one who observes the day, observes it in honor of the

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Lord. Can you go trick or treating and do that in honor of God? Certainly you can. The one who eats, eats in honor of the

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Lord, including Halloween candy. There's nothing about that candy that's inherently bad.

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This was the argument that Paul laid out in 1 Corinthians 8 -10. Bad for you, but not necessarily bad.

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I know, I've got some parents out there going, oh really now, candy's not bad for you. So Paul had talked about food that was offered to idols.

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If you go and eat that food, have you somehow defiled yourself with it? No. Just as Jesus said in Mark 7, the food goes into your stomach, it's expelled, it doesn't do anything to you.

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So there's nothing about an idol, an idol being an empty thing as Paul says, but eating that food, that sacrifice to an idol, if your brother sees you doing that and his conscience is defiled, oh well

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I can eat food that's sacrificed to idols. So then he goes and eats that food and now he feels like that he's participated in something pagan.

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Now I've done something idolatrous and his conscience is defiled. Well Paul says you've sinned against your brother.

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And so for the sake of my brother, it would be better for me to not eat at all. So you have to think about that even with regards to would a

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Christian observe Halloween or not? Is it okay for us? What kind of message are we communicating to somebody else?

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This is another one of those things like I had talked about last week that I probably just would not broadcast that we're doing this if we do it.

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Now we've talked about it here of course. But you asked. We broadcasted it. So that's how it came up here.

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But whatever it is that you do, whichever way you go, do it in honor of the Lord. Be convinced in your own mind.

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Don't cause somebody else to stumble. The one who eats, eats in honor of the Lord since he gives thanks to God while the one who abstains, abstains in honor of the

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Lord and also give thanks to God. For none of us lives to himself and none of us dies to himself.

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If we live, we live to the Lord. And if we die, we die to the Lord. So then whether we live or whether we die, we are the

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Lord's. For to this end, Christ died and lived again that he might be Lord both of the dead and of the living.

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So even though there's a lot of celebration of the dead that's going on around Halloween. So just because a person has a bunch of skeletons in their yard is a kind of a different take on a bunch of skeletons in their closet, which is where they go when they're done with them.

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If you think about it, throw all my skeletons out here during Halloween and then hide them in my closet when all this is over.

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But if you go to that person's house and you knock on the door, are you participating in the occult somehow? No, nobody's going to stand before God in judgment and hear

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God say, you went trick or treating that one Halloween in 2021 and you're going to be judged for that.

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I just don't think that's going to be the case at all. So let a person be convinced in their own mind. Don't quarrel over opinions.

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Whatever you do, do it in honor of the Lord. Amen. And respect one another.

18:32

Yeah. Yeah. Our kids play dress up all the time. They do. So why not get some candy out of it? And meet your neighbors.

18:41

That's right. You get to meet your neighbors as well. Definitely good if you're new to the neighborhood.

18:46

All right. This next question comes from Rachel. You ready for this one? Okay. Here we go. Hello. My name is

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Rachel from Ohio. I love listening to your podcast and thank you guys for all you do in your ministry.

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I have an eight -year -old son who I've been working through a Bible devotional book with him that kind of takes you through the

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Bible in a year. It's not very in -depth. It just kind of touches on the highlights.

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But he seems to be losing interest in it and I don't know if I should just force him to do it with me or how to necessarily keep his interest in it without forcing him.

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I don't know. I just want to make it something that he looks forward to doing and enjoyable. But all this is kind of new territory to me.

19:38

I guess what do you do with your kids to keep them interested in Bible time together?

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You're the homeschooler. Yes. How do you keep it interesting? Well, I mean, we're both homeschoolers.

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We are. You kind of lead the education side of that. Yeah. I try. The thing about my personality anyway is that if it's not working,

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I dump it and I try something else. Yes. Now, as far as the subject, I keep that going.

20:13

Well, with homeschool, I mean, you have to stick with your subjects. Yes. Yes. But what

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I'm saying is that for the Bible, I don't switch it for something like art.

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I don't do that. But if I combine art with Bible and they do some sort of crafty thing while we're reading the or draw the story or something like that, yeah, something like that.

20:41

It depends on the child as well, because the child could be easily distracted. And it's just easier to focus on the one thing than it is to try to keep them involved while they're doing something else or listening to music in the background or whatever could be hundreds of different distractions depending upon the child.

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Yeah. And then there's also where they try to find their own boundaries.

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And if you see that it was working in the beginning, then I'd say keep it up.

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But do talk with your child about how some parts of the Bible are not interesting to us at the moment, but they will be interesting later on in life.

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So it's good to know the entire Bible, because that is all God's word and how important God's word is to us.

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Even the boring parts. You still have to learn. Right. Yeah. And so it's good that they understand that it's good for them to even be bored through it.

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And at this moment, you know, I don't know. I think we've kind of lost. We've lost the

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I don't know. I won't say joy or importance, but the value, I guess, in being bored.

22:04

Yeah, that's true. We have so much entertainment and so many different doodads to keep our attention that sometimes it's good to just be bored.

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You think about other things than what's in front of you. That's not necessarily a bad thing.

22:20

Right. And then when you keep at it, he'll come back around.

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Right. Like most of the time they're like, oh, OK, that's not going to work. So we can't give that up.

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So then they'll they'll come back around to enjoying it. And it's like it's a cycle.

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You know, they'll they'll find some places not so entertaining, but that's OK, because life's not always entertaining and the important stuff is important.

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So you got to do stuff that's not the most fun stuff to do sometimes. Yes. Yeah. So I would say if he was entertained in the beginning, just keep at it.

22:56

Right. Keep trucking. With the kids, like at family devotion times, we'll read sections of scripture that may not be as interesting as the week before.

23:05

Yeah. I'll go over. Or big words. Yeah. That's hard. Especially with the younger ones.

23:10

Yeah. Because we're all doing devotions together. It's not a certain devotion for the 16 year old and a different one for the seven year old.

23:16

Right. We're all doing the same devotions. So working through with one another on what those big words mean, what is being communicated here.

23:24

I ask questions. So everything with the kids is engaging, like reading the passage. What are we talking about here?

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What what's the subject? What's the theme? What's the aim? Yeah. Is there a lesson that we're supposed to be learning here?

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Is this just information that we're being given or is there something that is being said to us to do?

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Is there a promise being made that we can we can realize that God is promising us something through this?

23:50

Yeah. All these different kinds of questions that you can ask regarding the passage. And when we go through the church history stuff, again, sometimes not the most interesting section of church history that we might be covering.

24:01

Right. But nonetheless, you go through it, you ask the kids questions and yeah.

24:08

Like what did this just say? Even if that's your question and they repeat back to you, right.

24:13

Like it was a bunch of names like that's fine. Good job. You were paying attention. Yeah. That's right.

24:19

And give them like that encouragement of yes, that's exactly what it's like, you know.

24:24

Well it was a bunch of names. Dad, can we do something other than First Chronicles next week? That would be great. It's all relevant.

24:34

I have to study all the names. Yes. Regardless. And even if you like push the play button so you don't have to.

24:41

Oh, that's right. I don't have to struggle through all of that. Mutter through all of those names.

24:48

You probably have an app on your phone that's got an audio version on it. Yes. You just hit play and that'll take care of that for you too.

24:55

And then that also shows your child that even though you struggle through reading the

25:02

Bible out loud, you still use resources. Yeah. To help you.

25:08

To help you. Yeah. And that's great. That's a great example. There doesn't have to be a magic formula. It doesn't have to be, you know, the most engaging

25:16

Bible study that you're using. When I do devotions with the kids, it's just opening up the Bible and reading it. Right. And then asking questions about it.

25:22

It doesn't have to be complicated, but I understand wanting to do a lesson that's keeping the child engaged.

25:28

Sometimes it might just be messing with your own methodology more than whatever the material is.

25:36

Oh, yeah. Uh -huh. So in what way are you trying to be engaging? Right. Not just is this study engaging, you know, that kind of thing.

25:44

I had another question here that I did not write down and I can't remember where I put it, but somebody had asked me, oh, they said that they saw a live stream of our church service and that in the announcement portion, the guy doing the announcements, which is usually

25:59

Chris, he mentioned a book of the month. Yes. So could you mention the book of the month that your church is doing on your broadcast?

26:09

Oh, cool. Yeah. The book of the month for October, which we just finished up with, was

26:15

Church History by Simonetta Carr. That is a great book. I have a couple of copies of it personally.

26:23

Yes. So I'm holding on to one that I might be able to give away to a friend and the other one we're going through together.

26:29

So that's a terrific book and it is written on a level that families can go through it together. Yeah. You might find it personally engaging, maybe if you've just struggled with reading interesting church history and you need it on a simple enough level with pictures and everything else.

26:46

Yeah, lots of pictures. This book might even be good for adults, but it's written for the whole family to be able to enjoy.

26:53

So that was our book of the month for October and I'll wait until November. I'll tell you what our book of the month is then.

27:00

That's this week. That's right. It's coming up. I want to say thank you here to Robert and Lisa from Elgin, South Carolina, who sent me this book,

27:10

Handbook for Praying Scripture. Oh, wonderful. They sent this as a gift and they said,

27:16

Pastor Gabe, your ministry has been a blessing to me and my wife. We are praying for you, your family, and your church, especially for the sale of your house.

27:24

That will be next week. Lord willing. November 6th. Yeah. So pray.

27:29

Please pray. Pray that it all goes through and it actually closes. That would be amazing.

27:34

So he says, we hope that you find this edition of Handbook for Praying Scripture a blessing. I recently heard you say that you were going back to the

27:41

ESV. Yeah, that's just in the podcast because that's the translation that I'm preaching from at church.

27:48

So I went back to the ESV on the podcast. Doesn't mean I'm not reading the LSB anymore. We still do the

27:54

LSB. So that's great. If you would like to gift this to someone else, we're okay with that. I'm going to keep this for myself.

28:00

So blessings, Robert and Lisa from Elgin. Thank you guys so much. Thank you. For sending this gift.

28:06

Sure. Appreciate it. And if you would like to send a financial gift to us, you can do that through the website www .utt

28:13

.com or through PayPal. The email address is whenweunderstandthetextatgmail .com.

28:21

For the second half of the program, for those of you who are listening to the whole podcast, we're going to talk a little politics coming up here in just a moment.

28:30

For the rest of you listening on the radio, just catch a half an hour. Thanks so much for listening. And don't forget to check out our website, www .utt

28:38

.com. I think the thing that distresses me most is the war on children.

28:53

Last year, my 11 -year -old daughter was in elementary school and her elementary school transitioned her from female to male behind my back.

29:00

This culture is weaponized to destroy children. Who wants to be a drag queen when they grow up?

29:08

I think our culture wants to turn the whole world upside down.

29:14

And the way to do that is to go for the children. Hitler understood that. That's why he would say things like,

29:19

I don't care about those who are my detractors. I have your children in my schools.

29:25

In 30 years, you'll be gone, and this is the only community they will have ever known. A controversial children's book teaching graphic acts, complete with illustrations, making the rounds in school libraries.

29:36

If you don't want to hear it in a school board meeting, why should children be able to check it out of the school system?

29:42

Every human being matters. And our culture fails to see that human beings are the crown of creation.

29:47

When the family returns to the scriptures, then there's hope. Rebecca put a teacher's creed into words when she said, there's no such thing as someone else's child.

30:01

Our nation's children are all our children. The war that rages is real, but it's not beyond the power of Christ.

30:10

All right, that is a new book from John MacArthur entitled The War on Children.

30:15

I got a copy of it. Oh, it's down here. Yeah. So speaking of books, so we were talking about books in the first segment.

30:22

The War on Children, Providing Refuge for Your Children in a Hostile World by John MacArthur.

30:28

So thank you very much to whichever publishing company sent this to me.

30:33

It just says John MacArthur Publishing Group. I didn't realize that. There you go. You know, he's had several different publishing companies with his books, but this one appears to be specifically his publishing company.

30:46

Awesome. But I was contacted by somebody, asked if I would play that ad. And I said, sure, I'll throw it on there. I did not expect that they were going to send me a book.

30:53

So I appreciate you sending me that. I got two of them to read here. That's an awesome surprise. Handbook for Praying Scripture by William Varner and The War on Children by John MacArthur.

31:04

So thank you so much. I believe it was Abraham Lincoln who said, a good friend is the man who can give me a book that I've never read.

31:14

That's true. Because in this mess of books, just in this room alone, let alone a garage, and out in the other room.

31:22

I do acknowledge I got to get rid of some. And then in your office at church. Office at church.

31:28

And... I don't have the book space that I used to. No. I used to have way more. Our two previous homes, we had more book space than I have now.

31:37

Yes. But to be fair, we did put in some book space in that last house.

31:43

And then... Did we? Yeah. Oh yeah, that's right. We built that whole shelf against the whatever wall that was in the living room.

31:52

And then this one we're renting. So it makes it a little different.

31:58

I'm using shelves that I've made. Yes. And haven't really taken the initiative to make many more.

32:04

And then at the church, I don't have the office space that I've had in previous offices. That could change in the distant future.

32:12

It could. Yeah. We are currently... We're working on a new building project to build a larger building.

32:18

The current building that we're in is only like 22 to 2400 square feet. Yeah, something like that.

32:24

It's about the size of a house. Yep. It's not much bigger than that. And so we're looking at a much larger facility, something that the seating capacity would be 200 to 250 or something like that.

32:34

And currently in the process of doing all the paperwork and the minor land survey and all the pre stuff that you have to do before you actually get to the building of the building.

32:44

Yes. And I am so done with all of this. The paperwork. Yes. Oh, man. That's why

32:50

I became a pastor. So I wouldn't have to do paperwork. And yet you've had so much this year. I've had a lot of paperwork this year.

32:58

And I misplace it and I move it around and people ask me to fill out their stuff for them.

33:04

And when you got into an accident back in August, that created more paperwork for me.

33:12

Yes, it did. I wasn't upset about losing the vehicle. I was upset about all the paperwork that I was going to have to do.

33:19

That's not true. I was upset about moving that vehicle or yeah. Moving that vehicle? Yeah. Losing the vehicle.

33:25

Losing the vehicle. Yes. I was upset about moving it too, but losing it definitely. All right.

33:30

Well, I mentioned Abraham Lincoln. So coming into some politics here. Oh, yes. We got an election right around the corner.

33:37

We do. I hate hearing about it. I hate that we're still talking about it. But nonetheless. And getting flyers and flyers and flyers and flyers in our mailbox every day.

33:47

And I feel like they're the same flyers, so they must have an endless supply. I know.

33:54

The flyers are so much alike that if I'm just kind of casually looking at a flyer.

34:00

They all look the same. Right. They all look the same. So I mean, really, I can't even remember looking at any of these candidates' flyers.

34:07

And I'm just talking about the local election stuff. Yeah. That we've had going on. Now, of course. Thankfully, they give us a book.

34:16

We have. They give us a book. Yeah. An election book. Oh, well, yeah. Of everybody who's anybody in there.

34:23

Everything that's going on. That you're going to vote for. And yeah, it's a substantial book.

34:30

I get two votes. I get my vote and your vote. Oh, yeah. You do. Yeah. Because Becky just asked me what to vote for.

34:38

Yeah. I'm like, we think of like any way that I trust his research. Yeah.

34:43

I mean, obviously. You do very well research. I stay up on the issues.

34:49

Well, speaking of which, I'm going to play some clips for you here that you may not have heard. Oh, boy. So we have made fun of Trump in the past.

34:57

I do not keep up with politics. We've made fun of Trump in the past for, you know, claiming to be a

35:05

Christian and then saying some things that are rather biblically ignorant. Right. So we've made fun of those things.

35:11

Well, we've got to give Kamala some air time, too, because she'll say things that are even dumber than Trump.

35:18

So here we go. These are some recent town halls. And my goodness, this woman's ability to craft an answer is so incredibly lacking.

35:31

I think our three -year -old comes up with more interesting answers than she can come up with to a question.

35:37

Well, our three -year -old has us in stitches every time. Every day we're cracking up at whatever he says.

35:42

We are. Yeah, definitely true. And he means it for being funny. That's the amazing part. He does what for being funny?

35:49

He intends for you to laugh at it. Oh, true. Yeah. He's doing it so you laugh.

35:54

But he's not trying hard at it, like to the point where he's pushing it and it sounds fake or whatever.

36:00

Right. It's just still hilarious. Whatever he says. Totally. Yes. This is going to be pretty funny, too, but on a completely different level.

36:07

Oh, boy. So here we go. This is Kamala. Now, if you're aware of this, it was about a week ago or so at one of her rallies.

36:15

It wasn't even a very large rally. But she had some hecklers in the audience that on the subject of abortion started crying out against what she was saying.

36:26

Of course, Kamala being very, very pro -abortion. And one of the persons that was speaking over her comments shouted,

36:35

Jesus is Lord. And she said, oh, you're at the wrong rally. You want to go to the smaller rally that's down the street.

36:43

Okay. Which if she was talking about Trump's rally, his was way bigger than hers. But anyway, with this comment, of course, she got into a lot of hot water with Christians because of making that statement.

36:56

Okay. Speaking back on the guy that said Jesus is Lord. Of course, a lot of people tried to cover for it and said, oh, she didn't really hear him.

37:03

But when you saw the video clips from multiple angles, it was pretty evident what he said and what she responded to.

37:11

So anyway, then in a town hall interview that she did on CNN, she was asked about her faith and the conversation that she had with her pastor.

37:22

So here you go. This is Kamala Harris. Her pastor? The first phone calls you made after President Biden announced.

37:29

Okay. Well, let me stop it here because you're asking me a question before coming into this. Well, you just kind of left it as like that.

37:36

She goes to church? Yeah. She's Baptist. In her upbringing. Oh. Yeah. She goes to a

37:41

Baptist church. Her pastor's name is Amos C. Brown. Okay. He's the pastor of San Francisco's Third Baptist Church, where he's been since 1976.

37:51

Oh, wow. Yeah. So he's been there for a long time. Not quite as long as MacArthur has been at Grace Community Church.

37:58

Yeah. But he's still been there for a long time. Now this man is...

38:04

Did I say a heretic? Did I call him a heretic already? Because he's a heretic. Okay. Noted.

38:10

He is... Black liberation theology is typically what he will preach. Okay. If you go to YouTube and you search for him, like you're intending on pulling up sermons of his or something like that.

38:22

There's none that are on there, which makes me wonder if they try to keep them off because of how controversial it will be, considering that Kamala was the attorney general of California, then she was a senator, and then she became vice president.

38:36

So to avoid all the different attention that might be brought to her because of some things that he's preached.

38:43

Sure. They don't make the sermons public. Okay. They did the same thing with Jeremiah Wright, who was Obama's pastor when he was running for president.

38:51

It was like people weren't even... They couldn't figure out what kind of teaching was

38:56

Obama under before he became president. And then all that stuff came out after Obama was president, and we're like, oh, okay.

39:04

That's the kind of stuff that this pastor would preach. Of course it did. So the same kind of thing comes from Amos Brown, and he's partnered with all different kinds of stuff.

39:11

There's one video that you can find on YouTube where he's partnering with the president of the

39:17

Church of Jesus Christ of Latter -day Saints. So the president of the Mormons. And they're just praising of each other, how wonderful each other are.

39:25

And Amos Brown will claim that he's a Christian man. Mormon. The Mormon president who thinks of himself as an apostle, who's over the

39:34

Mormon church. The man is through and through a heretic in himself because he believes in a false

39:40

Christ. Yeah. But Amos Brown believes that they're brothers and working together. The one sermon, I'll say this, the one sermon that I did find on YouTube, although the audio is very muted, and I haven't had the chance to record it and modify it so I can actually hear what's being preached.

39:57

But it's Amos Brown preaching in a synagogue. So he's been invited to come and preach in a

40:05

Jewish synagogue. If you as an evangelical preacher can go into a

40:11

Jewish synagogue and preach a message that Jews like, then you're not preaching the gospel.

40:17

Right. No joke. So that just kind of tells you something there about Amos Brown.

40:24

But anyway, so Kamala talks here about how the kind of relationship that she has with her pastor.

40:31

Okay. And talks about her faith habits and things like this. All right. Have I kind of covered that ground now? Yep. Okay, here we go.

40:36

Let's move on. First phone calls you made after President Biden announced that he was dropping out was to your pastor.

40:42

And I'm wondering, if it wasn't a confessional, if you could say what that conversation was like.

40:47

Well, my pastor, Reverend Dr. Amos C. Brown of Third Baptist Church, it was an extraordinary day that Sunday when the president called me and I instinctively understood the gravity of the moment, the seriousness of the moment.

41:12

I didn't predict or know exactly how that day would play out. And obviously now it's been three months since I've been at the top of the ticket, actually three months as of yesterday.

41:21

But I just called him. I needed that spiritual kind of connection.

41:29

I needed that advice. I needed a prayer. And there's a part of the scripture that talks about Esther.

41:39

There's a part of the scripture that talks about Esther. That cracked me up.

41:48

There's a part of the scripture that talks about Esther. You know, there's a whole book, in fact, that actually talks about Esther.

41:54

Well, that's part of it, I suppose. Yeah, believe it or not. And a time such as this, and that's what we talked about.

42:02

And it was very comforting for me. So Amos Brown told her that she's the

42:10

Esther of our time. I mean, that's basically what we're gleaning from that. Yeah. Oh my goodness.

42:15

So I had to talk to my pastor and get some - How is that Esther? She didn't become -

42:25

Where Esther was forced into a situation of becoming a pagan king's wife.

42:31

Right. And this pagan king is manipulated into a situation where he's - So she's becoming a pagan king's wife?

42:39

I'm confused. This King Xerxes is now in a situation where he has unknowingly signed the death warrant of a bunch of Jews.

42:47

And now Esther is trying to defend her people and using her position as queen to save the

42:54

Jewish people. Maybe that's where it comes from. Okay. So protecting her people kind of thing.

43:00

And it was Esther's cousin Mordecai tells her, do not think to yourself that in the king's palace you will escape any more than all the other

43:09

Jews. For if you keep silent at this time, relief and deliverance will rise for the

43:15

Jews from another place, but you and your father's house will perish. And who knows whether you have not come to the kingdom for such a time as this.

43:25

In other words, the implication there being that God has put you here for this position that he would use you to save the

43:32

Jewish people by what you are able to influence the king to do.

43:39

That's where that passage comes from. So Kamal is kind of playing it out here as if she's a queen

43:47

Esther in the position in which she's been placed. Okay. So going on.

43:52

And do you pray every day? I do pray every day. I do pray every day. Sometimes twice a day.

44:07

Oh, goodness gracious. I do. I do pray every day. Sometimes twice a day.

44:15

Oh, well done. Oh, I can't remember what else is in here after that.

44:21

I, you know, my, I grew up. So we grew up a little neighborhood church in Oakland, 23rd

44:30

Avenue Church of God. And I was raised to believe in a loving

44:36

God, to believe that your faith is a verb.

44:43

You know, you, you, you live your faith. Faith is not a verb.

44:48

Faith is a noun. Believe is a verb, but faith is a noun.

44:53

And, and that, that the way that one should do that is that your work and your life's work should be to think about how you can serve in a way that is uplifting other people.

45:08

That is about caring for other people. And that guides a lot of how I think about my work and, and what is important.

45:19

After she shushes out people who said, yeah, Jesus is

45:24

Lord, right. And in none of her faith questions, do you ever hear her say anything about her relationship with Christ?

45:32

She never says anything about it. I can't think of one place where I've heard her say something about that.

45:38

And Psalm 66, 18 says, if I had cherished iniquity in my heart, the Lord would not have heard my prayer.

45:44

Oh, she claims she prays sometimes twice a day, sometimes, sometimes, but this wicked woman who is like a

45:56

Jezebel is encouraging people in sin that God has promised that he will judge.

46:02

It is her central platform issue to protect the right to abortion. No one has been more pro -abortion running for president than Kamala has been.

46:12

It astonishes me every single presidential cycle. Like, I don't think that the liberal candidate can possibly become more liberal than the previous person, but oh yeah, they managed to find the one who can be more pro -abortion than the previous guy.

46:30

For sure. And it's every candidate is more barbaric than the one before. So listen to this.

46:36

This is same week, different interview. Listen to this answer that Kamala gives.

46:41

She's being asked, like when it comes to the right to abortion, are there concessions that we can make here?

46:48

Is there something in which we can say this person does not have to participate? Oh, right.

46:54

And and really what's behind this is what about doctors? Can a doctor get out of having to be forced into a position of having to perform an abortion?

47:04

And really kind of what's behind the question. That's true. Yeah. Well, listen to what she says.

47:09

What concessions would be on the table? Religious exemptions, for example, is that something that you would consider? I don't think we should be making concessions when we're talking about a fundamental freedom to make decisions about your own body to Republicans, like, for example,

47:22

Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, who would back something like this on a Democratic agenda if, in fact, Republicans control

47:28

Congress. Would you offer them an olive branch or is that off the table? Is that not an option for you? I'm not going to engage in hypotheticals.

47:35

So essentially what she's saying here is your freedom of religion and your freedom of speech are not higher than the right to abortion.

47:45

Yeah. You will be forced to participate and you cannot abstain for any reason.

47:52

I just I find it interesting that she's so pro your own body. And yet there's another body that they're destroying.

48:00

Of course. Like how how does that make logical sense when you apply it to both beings?

48:07

That's not the way a Democrat thinks. Well, obviously, that child in the womb is the woman's body until it's completely removed from the woman.

48:17

And even then there are. Yeah, no joke. Even then there have been laws passed in various states that would permit a doctor to still kill the child, even though the child has been fully brought to term.

48:29

Sick, fully delivered. It is it is incredibly barbaric. It is the sacrifice of children.

48:37

If they want to sacrifice their child, they can give it to me. Yeah, we'll take children. Yes, absolutely.

48:43

Yes. But even that has been difficult. I mean, I've known families that have tried to reach out to mothers.

48:50

Yeah. Who were going to abort their children and the mother deciding to go ahead and go through with the abortion rather than carry the child to term and hand the child over for adoption?

49:00

Yeah. But this this is how monstrous, how bloodthirsty the Democrat agenda is.

49:07

Several weeks ago, there was a pastor in Stonebridge or sorry, Brentwood, Tennessee.

49:12

The name of the church is Stonebridge Bible Church. Johnny Artavanis is the name of the pastor.

49:18

And he shared these things with regarding what a Christian should vote for.

49:24

How should you be thinking about your vote? How should you be thinking about this election for twenty twenty four?

49:31

Let me play his comments. I've had a few people send this to me in email, so thought it'd be good to go ahead and play it.

49:37

Here we go. OK, I think in many ways, a lot of people in the church today have a misconception about. The mission of Jesus, and I wrote down a few thoughts, and this is not an aside, but I think it is something that is fitting because of the text we're in that many people confuse

49:52

Jesus's mission. I saw a pastor this week, very well -known pastor that said.

50:00

He tweeted or something, I'm never Trump. This year,

50:06

Harris, always Jesus. And by the way, that was Ray Ortlin. He's not going to mention

50:12

Ray Ortlin's name. I'll throw him out there. That's exactly who it was. And it wasn't on Twitter. But I understand, you know,

50:18

Johnny probably doesn't care what social media platform it was. But it was through threads, which is like the

50:24

Twitter side of Instagram. Oh, OK. That was where Ortlin posted it.

50:30

And he got so much pushback for it that he eventually deleted it. Ah, interesting.

50:37

But this is a man who very, very wickedly is promoting Kamala Harris and that Christians should vote for Kamala.

50:45

He's going to have to answer before God for that. And Johnny is going to illustrate that as he continues on here.

50:52

I just want you to understand that that is one of the most foolish things I've ever seen. And here's why.

50:59

People have asked me this week if I have opinions politically, I have opinions, a lot of them. I'm not a political commentator.

51:06

I'm a preacher of the Bible, but certain things politically are more theological than they used to be.

51:12

So let me just give you some things about where I stand, because people have texted me a few things and I'll just.

51:19

This stuff is not hard for me to say, number one, the Democratic Party is a demonic death cult under the power and influence of Satan.

51:28

Hold on. No, I mean, I'll explain why I say hold on.

51:34

To vote for the Democrats is to vote for a platform that is building their platform upon everything

51:41

God hates. The mutilation of bodies, the annihilation of babies in the womb and the sexualization of your children, that is their calling card.

51:50

That is what they want to do. They don't hide that they have abortion facilities outside of the

51:56

Democratic Convention. This is who they are. It's the most radical party in our country's history.

52:03

So I don't see how you could be a Christian and vote for a party who promotes everything that God hates. That's the first thing.

52:10

Secondly, you have a responsibility and privilege to vote for the option that best stems the tide of evil.

52:17

I want you to also understand that there are no perfect candidates in this election. They're both broken people, but one of them presents a far better option at the preservation of life and the upholding of the family than the other.

52:29

A failure to vote is a failure to express our gratitude to the men and women that have died for our country and given us the freedom that we have today.

52:38

It's also a failure to, I believe, obey the calling that we have to uphold the righteousness in our land.

52:45

Now, stopping there for a moment. So where he made the comment about not where not voting would be an insult to those people who gave their lives for the freedom that we have here in this country.

52:57

That's something that you and I can really relate to. Yeah, because we spent 10 years in a church that was greater than 60 percent military.

53:04

Right. And I regularly brought up what an honor it was to serve in a church with people who have actually they're pledging their lives for the freedoms that we enjoy here in the

53:16

United States of America. Many of them even gave their their own health and their bodies for the sake of the freedoms of people in other countries.

53:23

Yes, very true. And then to take the right that we have to vote to select our political candidates and just decide, you know,

53:32

I don't like either of these guys, so I'm not going to vote at all. I agree.

53:37

It's a slap in the face to those people who have given their lives for us to be able to have this.

53:43

And I've said this many, many times before. There's many other things on the ballot that you need to be voting for, even if you don't like the presidential candidates.

53:54

I think who we need to be voting for as president is very clear, frankly. But even if there's there's a conscience issue for you,

54:04

I can't vote for either one of them because they're both pro abortion. Yes, you can say that about both candidates.

54:09

But ideologically, there's still a vast chasm between the two. Right. You can decide that president.

54:15

Yeah, maybe that's the one that I'm having the most trouble with my conscience in putting myself toward investing in one candidate over the other.

54:22

But there's many, many other things on the ballot to be voting for. Yeah. In 15 states, there's an abortion measure.

54:29

And so it's important that we get out the vote and block any of those right to abortion measures from passing.

54:37

Yes. So know what they are in your state and be aware that it's on your ballot and how you need to vote for it.

54:43

Here in Arizona, it is Proposition 139. Yes. And we need to be voting no against that.

54:48

Yes. So continuing on, I have to like the personality. You just vote for the best option between the policies.

54:56

And one of them is far less worse than the other. I think that's obvious. And a vote just in general, it comes from the

55:04

Latin word votum, which means to make a choice. You're not voting for a pastor, you're voting for a guy that as best we have as an option upholds righteousness in the land.

55:15

Number three, and this is why I said, hold on, because. There are certain people that are going to amen the political thing, but I also want the amens just to be as loud as when

55:27

I say this, our hope is not in a political party. Who is in the White House is far less important than who is on the throne in heaven.

55:36

And I want you to also understand, because I've watched some videos this week that contradict this idea.

55:42

The advancement of the gospel isn't reliant a single ounce upon who is president.

55:48

I want you to understand that where Christianity spreads the fastest and the farthest are in the nations that are persecuted the most.

55:55

Not where there's the most religious freedom. The reason our world is crumbling, the reason we're under the judgment of God is because we've turned our back on God.

56:02

And if you want to see political reform, you need to see a spiritual revival. It's not the other way around. You don't pursue political reform so that there can be a spiritual revival.

56:09

So when people say things like we need to get this guy in office and then there will be a spiritual revival in our land. No, there won't be.

56:16

No, there won't be. That's not the way it works. And that's never been the way it works. Number four, which

56:21

I really appreciate him saying that because I know quite a few guys out there who have been saying we need to vote for this guy because it will lead to spiritual revival in our land.

56:31

Oh, really? Yes. I've heard it many times and it will not. You have to be out preaching the gospel.

56:38

Yeah. There's never going to be a change of heart in our land without the gospel. Right. It's got to be out there.

56:44

And you can be preaching that now. You don't have to wait until November 7th. Right. To find out the outcome of this election before we're out there spreading the gospel.

56:53

So this is number four. We should speak out against the evil of our day. But you should never turn the mission field into your enemy, you can call out the policies, call out the issues,

57:08

I can speak against the horrors of abortion. Makes God weep.

57:14

The trans agenda. Whatever it may be, I have a heart for those people. And you ought to have a heart for them.

57:21

And you can get riled up on Twitter and you can live in your insulated bubble and start looking at them, them, them, them.

57:28

No, that's why you're here. And if you don't understand that, you don't understand what your mission is as a

57:34

Christian. Number five, if you are more likely to promote your political views than you are to proclaim

57:41

Jesus Christ. If people know you more for being a Republican than they do for being a Christ follower, your priorities are way out of whack.

57:48

So I disappointed both people. So like, that's where we're at today. But I want you to understand those truths.

57:56

You should go vote. And it's not a it's not a difficult decision for me. But I also want to but then

58:03

I also want you to know that our hope is not in who's in office. There's ditches on both sides.

58:08

You have the people that say Jesus 2024 I don't know what that means. Yeah, I hate that too. And the origin of those signs are it's from right now.

58:17

It's from right here in Arizona. It's Mark Driscoll. It's been handing out those signs. Okay. It says

58:22

Jesus 2024. There's probably somebody else that's been making those signs, too. But I know Mark Driscoll has been doing it.

58:28

Jesus 2024. That's silly. You're you're going to vote for. Yeah, you're going to vote for Jesus. He's not on the ballot.

58:35

Right. He's ruling no matter what. Right. Amen. And so it kind of it kind of feels like a

58:40

Jesus Duke sort of a thing. Yeah. Kind of feels like that. I'm above both of these. I'm beyond all of this.

58:47

Just Jesus 2024. That doesn't do anything. What is accomplishing it?

58:52

It doesn't even share the gospel. Now, somebody might think I'm proclaiming Christ. No, you're not.

58:58

You're making a political statement. And that's what people see from that. They they're not getting the gospel out of that.

59:06

Nobody has an understanding of their sin and need for a savior. That doesn't accomplish anything. Yeah. So honestly, it feels like a vanity project.

59:14

It feels like you're vainly using the name of Christ to kind of signal your own virtue. That's what it looks like.

59:21

Because he's been Jesus and he's been king for the last 10 ,000 years, and he'll be Jesus for the next 10 billion years.

59:29

I don't know what that means. But then you have pacifists and then you have people that are putting all their hope.

59:37

And what happens in November? Listen, Stonebridge Bible is going to go on because the church is going to go on and we're not on defense.

59:44

The gates of hell will not prevail. We're on offense. Yeah. So Christ saying in Matthew chapter 16,

59:51

I will build my church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it. And as as John had said there, he said, we're not on defense.

01:00:01

We're on offense. That statement that the gates of hell will not prevail. That doesn't mean the gates of hell are advancing against us.

01:00:07

Gates don't move. Right. We're advancing against the gates of hell. Right. Whenever we preach the gospel and a person comes to the conviction of their sin and need for a savior in turns to Christ, we've just reached in through the gates of hell and grabbed a person out of the flames and pulled them into the kingdom of God.

01:00:22

Amen. So we're on offense, not on defense. I agree with Johnny. I think the choice, the option here in this election is very, very clear.

01:00:32

As Becky and I have already said, we're both voting. Yeah. God willing, it'll be this next week.

01:00:37

Yes. We're trying to do the early voting. Get ahead of that before things get crazy here in Arizona, you know, because you probably remember in 2020, this was quite a battleground.

01:00:48

Oh, my goodness. Maricopa County. We're not in crazy. We're not in Maricopa County. I wasn't even living in Arizona at the time.

01:00:55

We were still in Kansas at the time. We were. Yeah. Well, no, I take that back because we voted early.

01:01:01

Yes. And by the time we got to Texas, the election hadn't happened yet. Right. That's true. And so then we got to see the election from Texas.

01:01:09

Yes. We had joked about voting in both states. Right. We didn't do it. Nobody come after us.

01:01:15

We did not. But then all of the drama with Maricopa County in Arizona, I was like, what in the world?

01:01:21

And now here we are. We're right on the outskirts of Maricopa County. But prayer all the way around.

01:01:27

Pray for this election that's coming up, that God would be merciful to us, as said in the book of Ezra. For a time,

01:01:33

God has shown us grace. May he be may he be gracious to us. And this this doesn't get too crazy, because I think no matter who wins, there's going to be quite an uproar to that.

01:01:46

Yeah. There's been some quiet elections, quiet results. I've experienced that somewhat in my lifetime.

01:01:54

Hasn't been in the last eight years, though. No, it's definitely not been the case. Well, let's take a moment here to pray at the very conclusion and remind folks that if you want to find us, you go to our website, www .utt

01:02:06

.com. Don't forget that you can leave us a voicemail as well.

01:02:13

The voicemail tab that's right there, it's about a minute and a half recording or something like that. Yeah, you can do that from your computer or from your phone.

01:02:21

Thank you so much for listening and for telling others about this broadcast. Thank you for letting us be late with the publication of this broadcast.

01:02:28

Thank you so much for forgiving us. And we'd love to hear from you via email when we understand the text at gmail .com.

01:02:36

All right, let's pray. Yes, let's. Heavenly Father, we thank you for continuing to be patient with us and for showing your love and kindness to us through Christ, our

01:02:46

Savior. We know that he reigns. He is seated on his throne. He is not up for reelection.

01:02:52

Nobody is going to remove him from that place. We also know by what is said in Daniel 2 that you are the one who sets up kings and tears down kings.

01:03:01

And so for this moment, you have the president in place. You have put him there for a particular reason.

01:03:07

This wicked country is under the judgment of God because of the sins that are so celebrated within its borders.

01:03:14

But Lord, we pray that you would show us mercy and that the the most bloodthirsty of the candidates is not the one who ends up becoming president.

01:03:23

We ask, Lord, too, for these measures that are going on in these different states regarding abortion, that they would be struck down.

01:03:30

Those that are trying to push a more open abortion agenda on the states that would make it more legal to kill more babies.

01:03:39

Lord, I pray that the people in those states would understand the duty that is upon them to go to the polls and vote to prevent this from passing and happening in their state.

01:03:49

We hope that that we see the justice of God prevail in our land and even if it doesn't happen within our lifetime,

01:03:59

Lord, we entrust ourself to you and make us strong and bold out there on the mission field, knowing that transformation and change cannot happen except by preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ.

01:04:10

We can have great legal reform that would happen in our land, but the hearts of the people would still be for wickedness, if not for the transformation that happens only by the power of the spirit.

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When we hear the gospel of Christ, turn from our sin and believe it. May there be great revival in this land and Christ would be glorified.

01:04:32

We ask these things in Jesus name. Amen. Amen. Well, before we get into some questions here, we got to come back to our study of Proverbs.

01:04:48

We're in Proverbs chapter six. I finished chapter five without you. Yes, but it was it was probably for the breast because we talk about breasts.

01:04:56

Oh, dear. And it was the it was the passage on let her breast satisfy you at all times.

01:05:04

Yeah. Yeah. I'm sure I'm red right now. I even said on the

01:05:11

I don't know if you listen to the episode, but I said it's probably better than I did this by myself.

01:05:16

But you're quite red, too. Oh, this guy's laughing so hard. I might be red for a completely different reason.

01:05:24

It's true. Breathe, babe. I won't leave this in there. I'll I'll clip this out. Yeah, right.