Apologia/CrossPolitic Discuss Abolition

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00:07

Hey, it's good to be with you. This is a we're in Lebanon, Tennessee. You can see in the background that our conference is going on.

00:14

I shouldn't do a joke at the beginning because it just totally messes Toby up. Of course, this is a cross politic crossover.

00:21

Yes, with our brothers from apologia. Jeff, the ninja, Luke, the bear.

00:27

Do you guys still have you guys still have a platform? Or is that? Well, we're probably borrowing your YouTube station.

00:33

Yeah, I'm pretty sure. And our face, if you're watching this, an apology of studios. I don't know because right now we're swallowed up.

00:42

I heard one of our elders. I think

00:48

I think Dr. White came on our show and he intentionally said, like, Ivermectin like five times.

00:56

Yes, because we baptize babies. Horstie Wormer. That's right. He's like, they baptize babies. We'll find some way to take this off.

01:03

We love you, Dr. White. I do. That's something he did on purpose. And for those who don't know, our YouTube channel has been suspended twice now.

01:09

Strike two. Strike two. I think it's 30 days. So strike one, seven days. Oh, wow. Strike two. I don't know if it's seven days or 30 days.

01:16

So we can't live stream on our YouTube channel. So we're. But, you know, guys, I mean, I can't I can't tell you how many people have told me that they found cross politic through apology.

01:26

Amen. Praise the Lord. You guys have been O .G.'s from Jump.

01:34

And so, you know, I mean, if we're just streaming off of a bunch, it's going to be just fine.

01:40

I mean, what's the difference? I just want to get this on camera. I want some apology of swag. I want to. I got you.

01:46

I got you. I want a shirt. He's got some right now. Yeah. No, we don't. And you know how I know we don't have it.

01:51

Because every time I see Jeff on the show, he's got a rowdy Christian shirt on. I know it looks good on you.

01:57

I can't wear that shirt like you do. Yeah, you gave it to me at the conference last year. And you can ask my family, ask him, ask everyone in the studio.

02:04

I probably wear that shirt two or three times a week. He does. And when I see it, I'm like, I don't have any swag. Yeah, I really it's comfortable.

02:11

You should probably give him another one. It's so comfortable. Are you using the same T -shirt brand for the new ones you have back there?

02:19

He's like, I don't want it if you did that. Some are, some aren't. OK, yeah, I'm going to get the ones that are. You can check them. You can try them on right there.

02:24

Just look at the tag. We look for size, no brand. The brand to make sure it's good. How come Knox doesn't have a mic like us?

02:31

He's special. You know what? I just noticed that. I'm serving my brothers. I let y 'all have the mics. I take the lapel.

02:36

No, but we've got eight of these. I know, but we can only, look, stay in your lane, player. That ain't your lane.

02:42

That ain't your lane. You don't know that. I don't ask you like, hey man, how do you sing horribly?

02:48

What's this shirt? Is this one of our shirts? This is the one I have this year. I thought I played safe this year.

02:54

Then last year is a little bit more. What was last year's? No, I didn't have a shirt last year. I'm just saying. You didn't wear a shirt at all?

03:00

This is a little more easy. Woke is broke. You know what I mean? Yeah. Not going to get as much negative attention.

03:05

Well, I might get negative attention. Yeah. In a good way. Here's my problem. Here's the thing. Woke is broke, but the problem is, is that they're all communist, so they take our money anyway.

03:14

So they don't make any money. So we're broke. So they just leeching off of us. That's my biggest problem with the woke.

03:21

This means broken ideology. But they actually have. Yeah. I know the financial part of it too.

03:27

Well, the leaders aren't broke. Well, that's true. They got cash. Even the evangelical ones.

03:35

Again, our friends. I feel like we only get to see, we see you guys either at our conference, or when you go to UL's conferences.

03:42

Like next year, ReformCon 2022. ReformCon in May. We're excited about that.

03:47

So since we're also on your YouTube channel, I want to get an update on what you guys are doing. Yeah.

03:53

Since your YouTube channel don't really need this, but I need this. Right. What's been going on with you guys?

04:00

Oh, man. It's crazy busy. What hasn't been going on? You just got off sabbatical. I know that. Luke got off sabbatical.

04:06

That's why you're glowing right now, looking all fresh. Like you done been with Jesus. I feel tired. It was like sabbatical, then immediately went to Salt Lake, then came here, and then we're going to Pennsylvania this month for a rally in Pennsylvania for a bill of equal protection in Pennsylvania, September 25th.

04:28

So this year, it's been big events. Salt Lake City. We're planting a church in Salt Lake.

04:35

Apology to Utah. October 3rd. That's our first worship service.

04:41

We had our open house last weekend, and we had like 130 people there just for the open house.

04:47

Who wants to be a part of this? Was it Sandy? South Jordan.

04:53

I feel like Salt Lake City and Arizona are exactly the same.

04:59

A lot of Mormons. Built by Mormons in many ways. Very organized, very beautiful. You have the proper city center, which is

05:06

Phoenix, and then the valley around it. That's how it is in Phoenix. Phoenix, the valley. Everything is within 15 -20 minutes.

05:17

What technically is the place? Is it Draper or South Jordan? I think South Jordan. 130 people showed up for the open house.

05:26

First day to worship is October 3rd. Very good. I anticipate probably like 150 people, 200 people maybe, being there for the first worship service.

05:36

There's that. Why Salt Lake? Are there good

05:41

Christian churches there already? There are some faithful guys in Utah, but it's a typical nominalism you see across the board in Evangelicalism today.

05:52

You see it dramatically in Utah because there's a lot of resistance. What's the population in Salt Lake?

06:00

Salt Lake of Mormons. Wade said it. It's insane. I don't even remember it. So professing Mormon, Utah is massive.

06:09

The Evangelical churches that are there are typically not engaging with Mormons the way they need to be engaged.

06:17

Like most Mormons in Utah have claimed to have never heard the biblical gospel. How do most

06:22

Evangelicals engage with Mormons in a way that's not what they need? Friendship. Or they don't.

06:29

Or, we're fine. Or, there's just not a lot of... Ignore that there's a problem. No confrontation of this is...

06:35

Or just friendship and maybe one day I'll tell them about Jesus. Yeah, if I earn the right sort of a thing.

06:40

I think, for example, we've always gone to in Mesa the Easter pageant, so there's 150 ,000 people that come through over two weeks at the

06:51

Easter pageant. They max out at 15 ,000 people a night and literally it would be like us.

06:57

As far as Christians who are preaching the gospel. Here's the fish. Go get the net.

07:03

And no one wants to even go. No, it's massive. Utah, there are some very faithful dudes that are very grateful that we're out there with them.

07:14

We're serving alongside them. They've been so excited for us to be there. One of the churches that is basically hosting us, allowing us to use their building for worship.

07:23

They are really, really solid and they need help. They've even gone so far as to say to pastor

07:29

Wade, they're like, you know, you come be a co -pastor here until you plant. They're just like, take people with you if you want.

07:35

We're like, no thanks. No, we're not going to do that. They're just very much like we need help.

07:41

There's a massive mission field that's just ripe right now and we need people willing to engage.

07:47

So, obviously we've always had a heart for the Latter -day Saints. It's one of our primary areas of focus.

07:54

It was a perfect fit. They need a good solid church there. We need to reach those people.

07:59

It's perfect for us. We have a guy who we've been raising up for years and years to do this work and his heart's for the

08:06

Latter -day Saints. We're like, this is what God's doing. It's funny. I was talking to somebody last night and they said the first time that I ran into Jeff Durbin, I realized that I hadn't really heard really what the gospel was.

08:16

So, I typed into YouTube, what is the gospel and your video popped up of you witnessing to a

08:22

Mormon. I'm just like, I know that. Was that the old video? I think it might have been black and white. It's so encouraging even thinking about what

08:31

God does with this content. So, we were doing this evangelism and outreach thousands and thousands of hours before we ever had a camera or audio recording.

08:39

It's just what we were doing and then God blessed us with first a very cheap handheld recorder from Radio Shack. The videos were terrible but people got saved listening to those and came to Christ.

08:49

Still some of our most watched videos. Some of our most watched stuff and then God blessed us with a mid -range camera we just would turn on and we're out there doing our thing.

08:56

This is really cool. So, just a cool story to bless people in terms of God's providence and just being faithful. We were coming to you guys.

09:02

We were coming to Moscow. Oh, that's right. I didn't tell you this yet. You're going to be so blessed by this. We were coming to Moscow years ago and it was

09:11

Luke and Marcus and I. That was it, right? That was it, yeah. So, I remember distinctly Luke comes into my house.

09:17

It's like 5 o 'clock at night or in the evening and he brings his bag. We're getting ready to leave to the airport and then we get a message on the phones that the flight is canceled to Moscow and I remember we were doing something with you guys and with Doug but Doug could only do it like in the morning or something like that and so we called the airline.

09:33

We're like, we've got to be there by tomorrow. We have to and they were like, well, you can't really tonight and maybe tomorrow and then we're like, what can you do for us right now to get us as early as we can and they said, well, you can fly to Salt Lake City tonight and then catch like a 6 a .m.

09:47

flight in the morning. I remember this. And so, it put us in Salt Lake at like 1 a .m. So, we were like 5 hours.

09:54

We even got a hotel just to like hang out for a little bit. Anyway, so we land in Salt Lake and as we're driving to the hotel, we see the temple and it was like, we're in Salt Lake City.

10:03

We don't need to sleep tonight. Let's just go ahead and drive over there and let's film something. What are we going to film? I don't know.

10:08

Let's just have the temple behind us and let's film something for Mormons. And so, we go to the hotel. We grab our gear.

10:14

It is freezing in Salt Lake at this time. He doesn't do well in cold. It is so, so cold. I was fine.

10:20

We get to the temple. We park up the street. It is so cold. We turn the heat on in the car to like bake me.

10:26

Marcus gets outside with the camera ready to go and it was like, ready? Go! I run out and I didn't have anything planned.

10:32

I just preached the gospel to Mormons and then we get in the car. We come to Moscow the next day. It is what it is.

10:37

We put the video out. It has been shared around the world so many times. So many

10:43

Mormons have come to Christ watching that video. People use it as a tract. But at the open house,

10:48

I had a guy walk up to me Two people said they came to Christ by watching that video. But I had a guy walk up to me and said he was from the

10:54

FLDS. Hardcore, pipe hitting, real. This is an open house in Salt Lake.

11:00

He said that he was FLDS his whole life. Deeply in that movement. And FLDS, that is classic

11:07

Mormonism. That is for real. That is like polygamy Mormonism. He said, I just want to let you know that I came to Christ watching that video, the gospel for Mormons.

11:17

He said then I was able to use it to lead ten of my brothers to Christ. One video. In the providence of God.

11:25

No plan to make it. And nothing. God used that to bring a bunch of Latter Day Saints to Jesus.

11:31

Praise God. God uses this stuff to change the world. I was at Starbucks this morning,

11:37

I'm way over. Sorry, I'm derailing this. I was at Starbucks this morning grabbing some food for my son.

11:42

And I'm standing there and this woman next to me goes, Hey, does anybody ever tell you you look like somebody? I said, yeah, sometimes.

11:49

And she said, Are you Jeff Durbin? Are you Dennis Sarfato? Yeah, yeah.

11:55

She says, I watch you and Paul Washer.

12:01

I'm watching your sermons. I can't even begin to explain to you. She started tearing up. She said how your sermons have completely transformed my life.

12:07

I'm a different person now because of your teaching. And that's always really encouraging. Because sometimes doing this sucks.

12:16

You're in the trenches. You're in the trenches and also it's a constant threat of being cancelled and you're being vilified.

12:23

You're in trouble constantly with the culture. And God's using this stuff in tremendous ways. In a supernatural way.

12:30

So now ReformCon. You guys were off a year for ReformCon. Now we're back on.

12:36

May. What's the topic of the conference? What are we going to be doing in May? He's trying to get a lead in.

12:41

He's trying to get a lead in. So what do we prep for? You can go to ReformCon .org.

12:48

By this standard? Toby will be there. What are we having? Do you remember? No.

12:55

No, not culture. Justice. Apologetics. And Ninja Bonson.

13:02

So he'll be there. You guys will be there obviously. We should have a thing. Pedo Baptist Justice. That's a good way to get cancelled.

13:12

We already are in Baptist circles. You guys are the only Baptist line hanging out with us. We should play a game for ReformCon where however many times you hear

13:19

Bonson's name dropped you have to take a shot. David will be there. David will be there.

13:25

He'll be speaking on economics. Uncle Gary who I just saw. He'll be there on government.

13:32

Obviously Jeff, James White, Joe Boot, Andrew Sandlin, John Sampson.

13:39

He might not be able to get back, which I'm okay. He can stay with us. James has got a trailer for him now.

13:46

That's true. That's true. That's true. So why by this standard?

13:52

What are you guys trying to hit with this? So obviously with all the cultural decay up front right now you can just see it.

14:00

Everyone's just happy to display their opposition to God in every realm. We want to bring back

14:07

Christendom. We want to bring back the truth of the gospel that Christ has all authority. That he has the final say over everything in heaven and on earth.

14:15

That's the whole goal. By this standard is God's revelation of himself. His word is self -disclosure.

14:20

It's a standard for all of life. Whether it's personal, family, church, state, it's everything. We want to at least have something that's a conference.

14:30

This isn't a church service. We're planning on it being a blast and being beautiful and fun and lots of fellowship.

14:37

Not just being like you guys do. Not just being talked to for 10 hours but having a good time, connecting with people, fellowshiping.

14:43

The goal is by this standard. We want to really highlight in the area of justice, in the area of education, in the area of government, in the area of the arts, in the area of beauty.

14:54

Whatever it is, Christians need to engage in all those realms for the glory of God and worshipfully by God's standard of how we do things.

15:03

Christian media needs to not suck. We need to own that again.

15:09

That's ours. They took our gold from us. It's time for us to reclaim it. You kind of gave it away.

15:15

Exactly, for sure. Andrew Sandlin said something I think wonderful in one of our videos we did with him, just 60 seconds.

15:23

He was talking about the fact that during the Reformation one of the glories of the Reformation was not just in the area of justification by faith, the

15:30

Sola Scriptura, but also the fact that it really engaged with the false notion propagated by Rome and the priesthood that over there is where worship is happening.

15:40

That's where worship happens. That guy over there with that costume on, he's the guy that's the most spiritual.

15:46

He's doing the worshiping of God, really. The priest had the higher calling. That's the place over there where worship takes place.

15:54

Sandlin brings up something that stuck with me. He did it so succinctly. All of life is to the glory of God.

16:01

All of life is worship. If you're the architect, you do that to the glory of God. You're worshiping God in that vocation.

16:07

If you're playing basketball... It's a priestly service. You play basketball as worship to the glory of God.

16:13

We are planning some elements of ReformCon that are going to mix in some of the let's do a righteous, hostile takeover of these other realms as well by what standard?

16:24

By his standard. We're going to play basketball? You can bring... You're dressing up as basketball right now.

16:30

A vocation is a calling. It's your calling.

16:36

Your vocation is your holy service to the king. That's how you build the kingdom.

16:42

It's unto him. That's fantastic. You just did a sermon recently. We watched it on the way to California.

16:48

My family did. I was driving. I heard you. It's a good thing you didn't watch it. Andy was watching.

16:54

I was listening. That was the point of when someone's asking I want to do ministry.

17:01

That was beautifully done in terms of you really started at the roots. In terms of this is your ministry.

17:08

Your first ministry to the glory of God isn't necessarily going out and doing what Apologia does and going out on the street corner.

17:14

Maybe you need to not do that because you've got to focus first over here. This is your calling. This is your ministry over here.

17:20

You can do it worshipfully and it's as spiritual as hitting the sidewalk to preach the gospel to a Mormon.

17:25

Do that too if it's appropriate. This is as spiritual and worshipful over here with your family.

17:33

That's the theme. The word of God for all of life. Next May you're going to make me wait that long?

17:40

Is it going to be warm? It'll be perfect. It'll be probably one or two days during the day.

17:48

I'll get my tan on. You will be able to get your tan on. All year long you'll get your tan on.

17:54

The topic of By the Standard is really great timing. One of the reasons is because I did a doc called By What Standard. We were out at the

18:01

Southern Baptist Convention together. We haven't had a chance to really talk at all so we're just going to have it now about your perspective on Southern Baptist Convention and being there.

18:11

I want to hear that. One of the things that I just want to say when I was there, I'm filming. I'm doing my thing.

18:16

I'm running around and then I see you out of nowhere come out and it was like, help is here. It was literally like...

18:24

There's a moment where it was so great. I can't talk about it but there was a moment where help really was there. I got to film something.

18:31

Praise God. It was just being in battle and knowing what was going on there and seeing it for yourself.

18:39

Seeing how everything operated. What was your take on the Southern Baptist Convention this last year? That's where I got

18:44

COVID so I have bad memories. I wonder if that means anything. Y 'all sick.

18:51

God's law, if you're sick quarantine. Stay away from me. It was my first time.

18:58

I don't know, man. I really felt the same way. I saw you and I was like okay, I feel safe.

19:06

There's some safety here. I felt exactly the same way. There was elements to it that were...

19:12

On the issue of the abolition resolution, the abortion situation, I really felt like as I watched all that take place, this is a room filled with believers.

19:23

They know the Lord. They know the truth of this issue. Many of them just didn't... There's so much political stuff going on and confusion that while they have one commitment on the one hand to feel a certain way about the issue of abortion, there's political stuff going on that sort of influences and impacts their ability to make the right choice, either left or right.

19:45

In the room. Even with this situation with all the woke nonsense, I felt like it's the same situation.

19:52

You've got these solid believers who know the Lord, they know His word, they know something doesn't feel right. They know where they should be going, but there's political stuff going on and influence and it's sort of like a manipulation.

20:04

That's what I was going to say. A manipulation of words. Let me redefine things to see maybe you should really be coming in this direction.

20:10

I feel like they really know. I think we're supposed to believe this about this situation.

20:17

That was disheartening to see that kind of level of manipulation. It's a lot of honesty with one another about this is what we really believe, where we should be going.

20:29

I feel like there's just a lot of manipulation. That's happening across the board, of course, all over the world. That's how I felt.

20:35

I felt like there's a room full of faithful people that know the truth, but maybe feel like I'm not able to actually stand up for the truth because of the environment that I'm in.

20:43

A lot of people are trying to play it in the middle. Do you think that it's that because of the manipulation, even though people know the standard, they don't have the courage to act on it?

20:54

Or that they feel like, well, I guess we can't achieve this standard or engage it, so therefore, this is the best way to get to there?

21:03

I feel exactly that way. I'm not the expert in Southern Baptist life and how they do things.

21:10

That'd be Tom Askle. Yeah, Tom. I just felt like being able to view it all taking place,

21:15

I felt like these people know what's right. The first time I went to the

21:21

Southern Baptist Convention, I felt like there was a lot at stake that I never really knew was at stake until I came here. The reason there was a fight over the abolition bill or abolition resolution was because there was a lot at stake, not only for the

21:37

Southern Baptist Convention, because what was the word that kept ringing out? The world is watching. That was the word everybody was saying.

21:44

CNN is watching. The world is watching. And because of that, there's an influence there that comes from what the

21:55

Southern Baptist Convention actually decides to do. So they know that, but they're concerned about, as they're kind of manipulating the stage, the culture on the outside is also saying, yeah, what y 'all gonna do?

22:06

They're kind of being manipulated at the same time. But it was interesting to me, the first time for me going there was like,

22:12

I wonder, we don't know all the things that are going on. Some people, we're not Southern Baptists.

22:17

I don't think any of us are, right? But the things that they're doing and the decisions that they're making still have some sort of impact on American culture.

22:24

Because you see how large they are. Right. Because of the size of them. And even with any of,

22:32

I mean, the fact that that abolition resolution got on the floor was a cool ninja move.

22:38

It was. Was it Bill? Bill Aspel. The other one who knows

22:44

Southern Baptist culture well. Mixed opinions about the slight amendment that was made to it, but when it got passed,

22:51

I mean, the way that people lit their hair on fire and ran around screaming like the sky was falling,

22:57

I mean, was glorious. And so many solid things were adopted in that resolution.

23:06

I mean, but that took a guy holding a baby and a microphone

23:13

Put flesh on it. Running a play that probably most of the people you're talking about there just don't know to run.

23:22

Right. I know that we need to end abortion. I know we need to stop killing babies. Or I don't believe in whatever this critical theory stuff is.

23:33

But not knowing how to, I mean, this is one of the ways classically liberals take over denominations is through bureaucracy.

23:40

Yes. It's through like bylaws and administrative rules. And then they just run circles around normal people who are like, but that's wrong.

23:50

You need to wait your turn to speak at the microphone. Right. You know, please stand in line. It's like these stupid rules.

23:56

And meanwhile, why? Because the world is watching. Who cares about babies being murdered?

24:03

That's pharisaism. You're swallowing camels and straining out gnats. Yeah. We talked to Carol Swain actually earlier this week.

24:10

She was there also. She was at the mic waiting to speak on critical race theory.

24:17

And apparently had submitted the paperwork ahead of time and said, you know, I'd like to speak on it. Went through all the hoops and everything. And didn't try to do it all.

24:24

And then they're like, we're sorry. We're out of time. We can't let anybody else speak now. And she was like the next one up.

24:29

And it was like, maybe that was an accident. What was her line? It's Carol Swain, y 'all.

24:36

She said, I think her line was, don't quote me on this, but I think it was surely these good white folks would let me speak.

24:42

These good white folks. Because that's the big thing right now is like.

24:48

Are we supposed to let all the voices speak? Hear the black people. Right, right, right. Aren't you a minority voice that needs to be heard?

24:54

Nope, not you, Carol. You're not allowed to speak. Right, yeah. I felt like there was some,

24:59

I mean, if you look at the resolution we would all agree. When you're looking through there, you're like, yep, it's about the gospel.

25:05

Yes, it's a sin. Yes, you know, national sin. You look through it all, you're like I think everyone that saw it was like, yeah, that's what we believe.

25:12

This is good. And so when it, I think that was the big victory in that moment was like if you looked at it and on the fundamental principles this is murder, we need to make it about the gospel, call people to repentance, all of that.

25:25

Every Christian in the room goes, we all believe this, so yes. And the response to it

25:30

I thought was just so troubling was like, you know, hey, if we pass this thing we're gonna have to go back to our churches and tell everybody that we've done this wrong the whole time and that's the basis.

25:44

We couldn't admit any error. Like we're in a battle, we can't admit error. That's how you know you're sick.

25:52

Which is amazing because they haven't had a problem apologizing for slavery for 20 years. At every convention.

25:57

We've done it wrong. The roots, as a matter of fact, let's do a research paper by the Shining Beacon of the

26:03

Southern Baptist Convention Seminary on how the founding of our seminary is racist.

26:08

And then let's release that to everybody. That's because the world is watching. And what the world said is that what you need to repent of is your racism.

26:16

You have permission to repent of that. But they don't want you to repent of maybe the ways in which you have not been faithful in ending the bloodshed of little ones in their mothers' wombs.

26:30

That's probably one of the main things I think that I take issue with and want to sort of war against with how people generally might fight against this inconsistently as we come up against the issue of abortion in our culture as Christians knowing we're all believing the same thing.

26:44

We know this is murder. We want to fight against it. We want to save lives. We want this to be ended. We want to make this about the gospel. But oftentimes you'll see these major organizations fighting against it in such a way that they make the move depending upon how

26:57

I think these people are going to respond. How's this court going to respond? How's the culture going to respond?

27:03

How's CNN going to respond to us? And so they're really making moves based upon how do you think this is going to go down afterwards rather than just saying, look, whatever the cost, just be faithful.

27:14

Just do this on principle, not pragmatism. And you'll see when we were in Ireland the

27:20

Lord providentially got us to Ireland crazy circumstances, no plan whatsoever to do anything with abortion in Ireland.

27:26

God brought me out there as the keynote speaker for the Covenanter denomination when they,

27:31

I think I told you guys, did I tell you this? The Covenanter denomination? The Presbyterian descendants.

27:39

Yeah, these are your people. You guys would trip.

27:45

These are the best Christians, I mean seriously, in the world. So faithful. Do they carry battle axes?

27:51

Dude, they are so strong. These are like blue blood

27:56

Presbyterians. These are like the real... They called me years ago and they were like, hey, we'd like you to be the keynote speaker for our denomination's national conference.

28:06

They come from Scotland, Northern Ireland, the Republic. And I was like, okay, you're

28:11

Presbyterian. They're like, yeah, we'd like you to be the speaker for... I was like, well, you know that I'm Reformed Baptist.

28:17

They were like, yeah, we know. I was like, oh, yes. Glory to God. I love this unity.

28:23

I'll tell you, it was one of the greatest blessings of my life to have this legit, for real

28:29

Presbyterian denomination say, we want you to be... I went to do apologetics and evangelism.

28:35

While I was there, I was going all over Ireland, their seminaries and their churches. The issue with their leadership kept coming up, the issue of abortion.

28:43

It was criminal in the North and the South. It was considered murder. That was

28:49

Christianity's deposit to Ireland. When they fought against it all these decades, they've been fighting against it as murder.

28:57

Murder. That's how they fought. What took the ground out from underneath the church in Ireland was when the pro -life industry leaders started getting into Ireland because word was like, they're probably going to try to fight to have it legalized there.

29:13

They started training the Irish church to speak against abortion on their terms, like abortion kills love.

29:22

This is not good for the mother. When we went to the Republic when they were going to do the vote, the pro -life industry from my nation was there set up to help them in all the signage.

29:34

All the signage was, this is bad for the mother, this will hurt the mom, which we don't want that either, of course, but it was like, you know, abortion kills love.

29:44

It was all the pithy slogans. Okay, but I just got a question. Why would they use the language abortion kills love?

29:51

Who wants to kill love? It's still not good. Right. But what person's like, well, it's just love.

29:58

Exactly. So, it was disheartening for us because he and I were there the night before the, were we there the night before the vote?

30:06

Am I right about that? The big vote that happened there on abortion? It was very close to it, yeah.

30:12

I can't remember if it was the night before. And we're looking around and we're like, this is what the Irish church had, murder.

30:19

God's word. This is sinful. It's a crime. And that's what kept it a crime in the north and the south.

30:25

And then all of a sudden you have this neutral industry step in and take the ground out from underneath the church.

30:32

So we praise the Lord. I'm telling you guys, what's happening in Ireland right now, Luke and I were sitting in houses surrounded by Presbyterian leadership in all over Ireland and we're, you know, we're in awe of them.

30:46

But they're like literally crying. This leadership in Ireland is literally crying because we're calling them to repent of the neutrality and to resist the temptation to not make this about the gospel because the pro -life industry was literally this is wild, guys.

31:01

You're hearing stuff no one's ever heard before. The pro -life industry made contact with our people out there because they found out that they're willing to fight against abortion and they were trying to convince them.

31:13

We were having battles where we would meet with the leadership through Zoom to respond to the arguments of the top people in the pro -life industry that were being sent to them to convince them do it this way.

31:26

And I'm not going to mention names, but you know who I'm talking about. Oh, no, no, no. You've got to tell me. I've got to know who.

31:32

Basically, it was like they were talking to them, then we would talk to them and rebut their arguments and now the group in Ireland in the north and the south that is fighting against abortion with the gospel calling it murder the only group is this

31:48

Presbyterian denomination in the north and the south. And they are firmly rooted. They are saying we're calling this murder.

31:55

That's what kept it against the law in Ireland the whole time. This is a crime against the child.

32:01

And now you've got the Irish church being influenced to say, no, no, no. Mom's a victim too.

32:07

Don't call it a crime. We will get rid of this one day somehow.

32:15

We've got 50 years of it in the U .S. and they want to say, we'll give you instruction. Thank God. The Irish church now, the

32:23

Covenanters in Ireland, they're the ones right now they are like the last man standing fighting against it with the gospel calling it murder.

32:31

They shut down a hospital one day. They do the abortions.

32:37

They call them the gynewards. I laugh every time I hear that. It sounds funny to me. They do births and abortions in the same building.

32:46

It could be the rooms next to each other. They were out at one location the first weekend they went out and it got shut down.

32:54

They're preaching the gospel. What is it that American pro -lifers gain by shutting you guys down in Ireland?

33:02

Money? Yes. Is this national right to life? And then some.

33:11

I'll say they sent in their big guns. I know for a fact because we know who they were talking to.

33:17

I even saw their big gun talking about us on a thread. Super upset that we destroyed their ability to get their foot in Ireland.

33:29

This person was very angry. He was like, you're either with Jeff or with me. There's no middle ground. I'm like,

33:34

I like that. No neutrality is what it sounds like. That's what's been going on for years.

33:41

The pro -life industry has been trying to set up shop in the north and the south. This is the issue.

33:47

The issue of incrementalism and abolition. We're all in agreement it needs to be abolished. Murder. Need to make it about the gospel.

33:57

They are approaching this from the issue the foundation of neutrality and they want the church in Ireland to approach it the same way.

34:06

That gets to my whole concern. It's like non -religious when you say neutrality. Don't use biblical language.

34:13

Don't say it's about Christ. Don't call this murder. Don't do that. Scott Klusenow.

34:19

Okay, you said the name. That was him. Scott Klusenow. We'll take a backdoor approach.

34:25

I told you you would know who he was. We'll take a backdoor approach. Like, for example, in apologetics, evidentialism purely wants to appeal to the reason of the unbeliever.

34:45

Supposing that we can meet on some neutral ground. They want to take that approach.

34:53

Very much so. If something is offensive, we don't want to use that because that shuts down the conversation. Rather than having a gospel -centric presuppositionalism, whatever you want to call it.

35:06

Proclaiming that the lordship of Christ over all of this, he gets to define the terms. The whole way.

35:13

This is murder. You're in sin. You need to repent. This would be my concern.

35:20

That's exactly right. The worst end of that would be like a William Lane Craig where he'll say with Lawrence Krauss, you know,

35:28

Lawrence Krauss, are you certain God exists? No! Or he'll say things like, have you heard me defend the

35:35

God of the Bible once? I'm talking about general theism. I'm not trying to point you to the God of the Bible. He'll literally say that.

35:41

Somebody might say, hey, look, I came to Christ listening to William Lane Craig give the historical evidences of the resurrection.

35:49

I would say what we always say as Ventilians, is God strikes straight blows with crooked sticks. Thank God for his sovereignty and that he works through people who are a mess.

35:57

Sometimes God speaks through the mouth of an ass. He does. But that doesn't mean that I need to go looking for crooked sticks to hit people with.

36:04

I think one of the ways you see it come out, we've already been going for a while, but just as a quick burst for people to just maybe think about, with the issue in Texas, recently, there's a number of things that can be said to it in terms of, look, ultrasound technicians that work for the assassin sometimes have a hard time finding a heartbeat.

36:22

So there's ways around it. But at the same time, what we've done is, I think, two things are showing here.

36:27

One is when you fight against this and say, yeah, let's go ahead and put all of our stuff into a heartbeat bill, what are we abandoning at the bottom of that?

36:37

That's not even our definition. As Christians, our definition of a valuable life isn't a working heart.

36:45

Now, down the line, that's going to get you in trouble when someone turns 70 and has heart problems. Are they no longer valuable?

36:50

They don't have a heartbeat? Why do we still bury human beings with dignity whose hearts are no longer... Why don't we just toss them in the trash?

36:56

Well, they're starting to. Yeah, being human is more than that, than just a heartbeat. But also, when you think about it in terms of, what does this remove for us as pastors and as believers when we fight against these issues, if we say, yeah, let's put everything into the heartbeat one, there's a million ways around it, again, practically speaking, but we're also removing the fundamental aspect that we want to keep up front, and that's we want this to be about Christ.

37:19

I don't want to fight against injustice just taking wild swings. I want to fight against injustice as a

37:25

Christian pointing people to Jesus the whole way through. And so, what tends to happen, and you see it come out with Governor Abbott, he just made a statement, was it yesterday,

37:35

I think? He made a statement yesterday, and basically, what the left pushes against us, like, horrified, are you saying a heartbeat?

37:44

Oh, my goodness, you're the Christian Taliban, you're this, you're that. And what does he do, is he finally says, no, no, look, you can still kill your child via abortion in Texas, you've got to do it before this time.

37:57

He was challenged on the rape and incest front, and he said, hey, you can still get rid of the baby before six weeks.

38:04

Do you see the point? Is that when we think about what an iniquitous decree is, something that's an unrighteous decree, something that leads to the death of others, you see it really even come out in the cowardice from these leaders, is when the left rises up and says, no, we're going to fight against this, how dare you?

38:22

Like, what should the Christian response when someone says, what about rape? The Christian response is actually quite simple.

38:28

Why would we kill a victim of the crime? Right, exactly. I mean, I don't want to kill the child of the criminal.

38:34

Why would you want to kill the child of the criminal? We should kill the criminal. We should kill the criminal. What's funny, too, is when you talk to all these leftists who say, what about rape?

38:42

I'll ask, because it always comes out, what do you think should happen to the rapist? Well, I think they should die.

38:49

No, I don't think anybody should get the death penalty except the child. You think the child should get the death penalty.

38:55

Every time. I haven't ever had that not work. Exactly, because there's no way out of it. But with the issue in Texas, again, notwithstanding the errors and the ways to get around this, it's not even our definition.

39:07

As Christians, our definition of a life and value and the image of God isn't a working heartbeat. So it's almost like we're pretending the whole way through as we fight for a bill like this that it somehow is in accordance with our worldview, but it's not really in accordance with our worldview.

39:22

And I think one thing Doug said in his last when he talked about this, it was something that really got me excited.

39:29

He said, if we overturn, if Roe is overturned, it goes back to the states where essentially we're going to fight against it like abolitionists.

39:38

State by state. And I thought, so let's do that. Yeah. There's a, you know, which is,

39:45

I wish we can get back to some of the we were just talking about this 19th Amendment. We got to talk about that.

39:51

That's a whole other thing. The 19th. I didn't get much sleep last night.

39:57

You need to go Chick -fil -A. Chick -fil -A? It's amazing. Kanye all got us.

40:04

As if Chick -fil -A wasn't good enough. Kanye is single. Single to it.

40:09

There are so many things when I start, every time I think about abortion,

40:15

I keep on thinking we didn't get here overnight in a particular situation where we woke up one day and abortion is legal.

40:27

I'm not saying that to say that we should not have our principles in place. It's that we are at the tip of the iceberg of a problem of judgment that has a far more robust war to fight in it.

40:44

It's kind of what I see happening right now with some people as it relates to critical race theory. They are going in the school boards and fighting with great arguments, principal arguments, biblical arguments against critical race theory and yet their kids are in a government school.

41:04

In a socialist school. In a Marxist critical theory school. Where they've been learning it for a long time.

41:11

Exactly. Part of me that is praising them, as a matter of fact,

41:17

James Merritt got up on the stage and said listen, you guys are all if we cared about the gospel the way that we cared about critical race theory, have the world be one to God.

41:31

It's a valid point. They're teaching evolutions in your schools. Y 'all are all upset about critical race theory.

41:38

It's a great point, except it doesn't work the way he thinks it should work. It's actually like, right, so let's ban all this.

41:46

Abolish the schools, period. We are so broken on a foundation level as it comes to even engaging day to day life that the issue of engaging abortion is not even within our sphere to be able to do in some ways.

42:01

Right, and so I am, and I'm not saying that we don't engage it. There's some things that people need to be doing and that they're not doing and they can end abortion without ever having to argue for it or pass a bill.

42:13

Right, like we are missing the beauty of the home, the gospel smell that comes out of our dining rooms when we sit here and have

42:22

Sabbath feasts and invite people to come in and taste that is going to do a better job of permeating the culture with the gospel.

42:30

Some of the things that we think we're going to do from the top down. And so I don't mind having the conversation up here. I love it. We can have a rhetorical conversation up here.

42:37

But the problem is, is that you can change all the laws you want and if people's hearts aren't changed, the laws are not going to even stay in place, which is how we got to this place in the beginning with abortion right now.

42:47

End abortion in San Francisco and see what happens. You're saying the right thing because that's fundamentally when we fight against this fight the way that we are, that's our point.

42:59

Is that we can't do this playing around the edges just trying to get little victories here or there.

43:05

I know people have disagreements over that. But your heart, the way you express that is exactly the heartbeat behind it.

43:12

This has to be about the gospel. The problem is bigger than abortion. It has to be both and. It is.

43:18

It's bigger than the issue of abortion. That's where a lot of times I have a problem with, and I'll say it publicly, I've had a problem in the past with a lot of people who call themselves abolitionists where the issue of abortion becomes idolatrous.

43:30

It's all they think about. It's the only thing there is. And the truth is, no, it's not. It's an evil.

43:36

It's a massive injustice. It's one of the premier issues of injustice. However, it comes from what you're talking about.

43:43

There's something lower underneath it that's feeding it all. There's a reason why when Rovers' Wade passed all, whatever, was it like 39 states or whatever that had outlawed abortion?

43:54

Yeah. There's a reason why all of them just folded.

44:00

Why was there not an immediate explosion? It took 10 years or something like that for the evangelicals to get going.

44:09

The Catholics were more robust in the beginning. Early on. Francis Schaeffer is like this one lone voice in the wilderness making old school movies.

44:16

It was Schaeffer and Sproul that got the evangelical church awake. Yeah, that's right. It seems to me, too, one other thing is if I'm in Ireland, based on what you're talking about, they've got all this law, old school covenanters, it's murder, it's illegal, and they get a ruling that overturns it,

44:33

I am full throated abolitionist in Ireland. No questions asked because of where I am in the story.

44:43

And the difference, though, I think is what Knox is getting at is here we have 50 years of bloodshed, 50 years of faithlessness, 50 years of rebellion, stiff neckness on our part.

44:59

Now, do we need to repent and stop it now? Yes, absolutely. But I guess my one little quibble on the heartbeat bill type stuff is

45:10

I never give them that ground. Even when I'm saying, pass it, pass the heartbeat bill.

45:16

You know that life begins at conception. You know Jesus is Lord over all of this.

45:23

And it's like, I'm throwing sticks in the spokes of this bicycle, trying to get it to stop.

45:28

We need to end it all. But I don't give them that ground. I don't tell them it only starts...

45:34

I want to collab it on the floor. It's all murder. But if I'm trying to pick away at this, wanting it all gone, and you know those

45:47

Mormons, Mormons themselves have doctrines that say that it's fine to kill a baby, apparently.

45:53

Which is wild, because they believe they're... rape and life of the mother.

45:59

They've adopted a leftist stuff. Here we are, if I'm in Idaho, and the majority of our legislature is

46:06

Mormon, or Mormon influence, or Mormon spot. A lot of Arizona is the same. You know, I'm not going to ever concede that their position is moral.

46:19

Or just. I don't. But if there's a bill on the floor that the Mormons will vote for, that would end most abortions,

46:27

I'm going to do it, and I'm going to be back next year, and I'm going to tell you we need to do more. And I think there's a way of doing that, and if you're a legislature and you're voting for it, put out a statement.

46:38

It's all murder. It needs to all end. I'm voting for this today, because that's the best thing on my table.

46:44

But I don't want anybody to think that I think that it's fine to kill a baby before a heartbeat, or I think it's okay to kill a baby because of some life of a mother, which is the psychology,

46:53

I think I'm going to feel bad after I have a baby, kind of thing. I think they're...

46:59

Maybe I'm giving too much credence to your run -of -the -mill pro -lifer, but Doug says he's smash -mouth incrementalist, or whatever.

47:16

That's what I mean. I'm not giving them any of that credence. So the problem is,

47:21

I think, we have to recognize, we always find the heart of the problem, because I feel what you're saying completely. The issue with the pro -life industry and how they fight against this, the dirty little secret, is that they don't ever want this to be a crime for the mother.

47:34

So when you fight alongside them, you have to recognize... Is that where Scott is, too? Yes. They don't believe what we believe in terms of this is murder and it's a crime.

47:44

They don't ever want that. Ever. Even if it became illegal, they would never want to enforce the law.

47:51

I'll give you an example. In Arizona this year... Then why would you guys consider some people like us in that camp?

47:58

You know what I mean? That's the thing. Whatever Toby's talking about, Scott would hate that. That's my point.

48:04

I think we all believe the same thing. And of course, you guys think I'm inconsistent in areas. I think in this area you've adopted some inconsistency.

48:13

I think we're incrementalists. So I don't think you're inconsistent because you're an incrementalist.

48:19

I love Doug. I think he made a mistake when he said his last thing.

48:24

He said, you know, they're incrementalists, too, because they think it should start in Oklahoma. There's a big difference between starting a small step in a state, faithfully, without compromise, versus a compromised move.

48:38

Like, for example, I'll give you something to work with. This year in Arizona, when the pro -life industry, which is what fought against our bill, it wasn't the pro -choicers.

48:48

They didn't have to lift a finger. It was the pro -life industry. So it's totally shameful.

48:53

And I know we all agree on that. We're on the same page. So we wanted equal protection from the moment of conception, and we're trying to be consistent the whole way through.

49:00

They killed it, and they put their bill in that said you can't kill the child for the expressed reason of genetic abnormalities.

49:09

And they were, like, patting themselves on the back and saying, look how many children we're going to save from this. And the answer is, well, the way around that bill, very easily, is the mother says,

49:16

I don't want to kill it because it has Down syndrome. I just hate it. And they'll say, you can kill your baby. Well, they were claiming victory, and they said you had to give the child a proper burial.

49:26

They said this is going to save some lives because it's going to force mothers to think about, I've got to pay for this child to be buried within the abortion payment.

49:36

Well, the problem is, what is it the whole way through doing is it's actually allowing for murder to still take place under conditions, and you're saying ultimately kill the healthy children and not the handicapped children.

49:49

But, more sneaky the whole way through, Toby, was all these different bills that were just honestly easy to get around.

49:59

They were ridiculous and they were essentially saying kill these ones but not these ones. They snuck in Arizona -13 -3604 or three one of the two.

50:09

Arizona said, since Roe, that abortion is a crime, you'll go to jail for it, for the mother and the abortionist.

50:16

Well, Kathy Harrod snuck in repeal of Arizona statute 13 -3604 which was what makes it a crime for the mother.

50:25

Here's why. Because the pro -life industry does not ever want this to be a crime for the mother.

50:31

That's the way they fight against it. I do have a quick, really important one. I'm going to go use the bathroom real fast and run back up here.

50:40

I drank too much. Just quickly, you made a good point. If I was in Northern Ireland, Republic of Ireland, the culture says, murder is against the law.

50:50

Don't give up any ground. In the United States of America, since Roe, in all these states like mine,

50:57

I think even in Idaho, where it's called murder, it's been against the law since Roe. That is our context.

51:03

Because we don't believe in judicial supremacy. We don't believe that the Supreme Court has the right to create law.

51:09

Now watch this. We are in one of the best positions ever now, guys, because Jen Psaki, twice in the last two weeks, went before the

51:16

White House press briefing and she said, in response to the Texas law, that Biden's response is, we need to make

51:22

Roe the law of the land and codify it as law. Why? Because it has never been law.

51:29

It is not the law. So, brother, brothers, our context right now is, this is murder and it's against the law.

51:39

Roe is a court opinion that we can very easily just say, I ignore everything you're saying.

51:44

I don't disagree with you at all. I'm just looking at the battle and saying that we can't get people to think that health orders aren't law.

51:51

No, I'm with you. I'm with you. I had a good line,

51:56

Jeff. Okay, so here's what I was going to say. One. Are you holding back?

52:03

One. Jeff's gone. Why are you touching my knee?

52:10

Because I love you. Alright, that's a little too much. We're about to get serious this one. Praise God for the babies that have been saved.

52:17

You know, because obviously there's and we talked about this a little bit. I would even put a little bit of a dichotomy within the abolitionist camp.

52:24

We're coming at it like, hey, we're Christians that want to abolish abortion. I don't go around calling myself an abolitionist because that's not who

52:32

I worship. My identity is not an abolitionist. You're a Christian. So praise

52:38

God for the babies that are saved, however many are saved through this law. I'm thankful for the creativeness of the heartbeat bill.

52:46

Kudos for being creative on that. And to kind of get what you're saying, that's why we have an abortion now.

52:52

That's our gospel -driven, prophetic side of things. Then we started restate reform and Action for Life, which is the legislative.

52:58

So we're coming at it from two. Because you're right in what you're saying. It has to be gospel. But a lot of our abolitionist friends don't see that dichotomy.

53:06

They only see it as prophetic only. So there has to be two ways around that.

53:12

As far as the bill in Texas, here's part of my beef. I forget the lawyer's name.

53:18

What was the lawyer's name you guys had on last week? I can't remember his name. From Texas. The scorecard guy.

53:27

I've listened to that. Michael Solman? Yeah, Michael Solman. He praised...

53:33

This is where I was like, because he praised Texas' right to life for being behind this bill.

53:38

And I was like, time out. Hard time out. Because these are the same guys that squashed the abolition bill in Texas.

53:47

Texas had an abolition bill they could have put to the floor. You had Governor Abbott, who promised a dying boy that we would abolish abortion in Texas.

53:56

And they're the ones that said, don't vote for this bill. But look at us, we're doing the heartbeat bill. And they're getting all the praise.

54:02

And I'm like, you didn't have to be creative. There was no need to be creative because you could have just ended it.

54:09

Part of what's going on, when we see an abolition or an abortion bill run...

54:15

I don't like abolition, by the way. I don't like the name. We get a new name. We call it equal rights.

54:21

Equal rights. Equal protection. And then you end up with a heartbeat bill.

54:28

That's the scorecard for your state. That's where you're at with your people. We ran this inabortion bill and no one had the stomach to pass it.

54:38

And so I know where my cowards are at. Every time an inabortion bill is brought up in our state of Idaho, we all sign on to it.

54:47

But what is going on there is you're getting tested and you can see the score in your people.

54:54

Where are we spiritually? It's a feedback loop and it's a really good feedback loop for where we're at.

55:00

And that's why we end up with a second class bill. And the prophetic message...

55:06

I know that the comeback sometimes is if politicians have the option between an end abortion and a heartbeat bill, they're going to pick the heartbeat bill because it's more politically correct or whatever.

55:15

And I feel that and I hear that. But the issue is... The prophetic message needs to be if you are a believer in Jesus Christ, you need to do the right thing.

55:26

You need to repent. And you have an option here to compromise or do the right thing. Which is why part of me...

55:33

I don't mind the option. Are you going to do the right thing or are we going to get the scorecard that tells us we're still compromised, we're still idolaters, we still don't love...

55:46

Okay, hold on real fast. Just to make sure it's clear. You're saying that a heartbeat bill is idolatry and compromise. For the one who knows better and who has that option.

55:57

For that option. I'm glad you brought that up. And the other thing that the lawyer said...

56:02

I forgot his name already, sorry. He said we need to be faithful as Christians. And I'm like, amen, amen, amen.

56:07

That's what we're saying. We're being faithful, we're being principled even if we lose. Stand before God and say we were faithful with this, we stood on biblical principles, we stood on God's definition of justice.

56:21

And that's why we're starting the legislative side. Because if a legislator is a coward and doesn't do the right thing, we say, you're a coward, you're not doing the right thing, you're not getting revoted, we're going to replace you.

56:32

So this is where our post -millennialism comes into play. Because we are playing the long game. And if you suck and you're not doing your job, we're going to replace you with someone that's going to do their job.

56:41

And that to us is what it means to be faithful and to stand on God's principles. So let me come around on the other side of this.

56:47

You're a legislator. And someone proposes an abolition and abortion bill.

56:54

And then someone proposes a heartbeat bill. The heartbeat bill is the only thing that can get to the table. What do you do?

57:00

That's the only thing. You're in a state where it went through all the Republican ranks and we ended up with the heartbeat bill.

57:06

Call them to repentance on an idolatrous and compromised bill. Sure, but what do you do?

57:11

Do you vote for the bill? You're a legislator. I think someone like Joseph Silk in Oklahoma did the right thing in terms of calling the other legislators out on their compromise.

57:24

You're all saying one thing behind closed doors to me. You believe that it's at conception. You believe this.

57:30

You believe the Supreme Court has no right to define this for us. We can resist it now. But when you come up here to vote, you vote the opposite direction with just compromise because the issue is cowardice.

57:39

Cowards go to the lake of fire. That's in principle our position. You're the legislator and you're stuck with the heartbeat bill even though you were for an abortion bill.

57:53

This is all you got that year. Do you vote for the heartbeat bill? That's a good question.

57:59

I try to think of it in terms of a contrast. If I was a legislator in a situation where, say, sex trafficking was legal in my country and somebody put forth a bill and I'm a believer,

58:14

I'm a legislator. Someone put forth a bill that said you can continue to sex traffic girls over the age of 12.

58:25

But not under. I would use that as a moment of prophetic witness to say we've got this all wrong.

58:31

This is all sin. How do you bring someone to a place of repentance? By impressing the law of God and God's standards in their life.

58:38

Do you think Wilberforce was wrong in the way that he operated? I'm not an expert in the historical stuff of Wilberforce but I can say that what

58:47

I have read of that time period I know we look at abolitionists like John Brown, things like that.

58:52

Not someone that I... That's why I also hated the title abolitionist and everything else.

58:59

I look at abolitionists like Frederick Douglass. There were a lot of consistent Presbyterian and Baptist abolitionists who were saying this is about the gospel.

59:10

We have to apply God's standards here. God says man stealing and enslaving is a criminal offense. It's a capital offense.

59:16

We need to get back to God's standards. Those people were solid and right on the money. But I think ultimately what was the transformative force any time in history where we've abolished and ended slavery or any other evil in our culture, it's been because the word of God was being impressed on people.

59:34

Grant, are you going to probably interview Grant any time this... We interviewed him already this week once.

59:40

Have him tell you the story because it's wonderful. It blew my mind. It was right after the

59:46

Civil War I believe. The abortifacient industry started picking up steam and it started actually growing and it was becoming a danger.

59:55

A bunch of pastors got together to fight against the abortifacient industry with the gospel, with the word of God and they created a publication to disseminate their information, their gospel center information against the issue of the abortifacient industry.

01:00:10

It was called the New York Times. Crazy, right? That was the paper created by these pastors to fight the abortifacient industry, but they killed it.

01:00:19

They did defeat it as pastors with the word of God and pressing that upon the culture. That's for me, and I know we are in complete agreement here on the fundamental issues here.

01:00:32

The issue is, my question is, how do I do what you said? That's addressed the fundamental issues that are at play that are leading to the critical race theory, abortion, homosexual mirage, all the rest that's going on.

01:00:45

I have to do this with principle and the word of God to make sure the word of God is the force that's changing hearts and minds and not do it in a way that's compromised where I'm taking away the element of the biblical world view and God's standards that will be used by God to open their hearts to the truth.

01:01:01

I just want to approach it faithfully. If I can jump in. I was going to say my answer to your question,

01:01:08

Gabe, I know you didn't ask me, but I think actually it would depend on the state I was in.

01:01:14

Would I vote for the bill if that was the best thing they had? I think, because I know that there are some states and I know this is part of the frustration.

01:01:21

Maybe this is the way it is in Oklahoma. Maybe this is I don't know, where like 99 % of the legislature are professing

01:01:28

Bible believing Christians. In that room, I'm going to go

01:01:34

Jeremiah. I'm going to go Ezekiel. And so I can get it there.

01:01:40

I'd like to see that. I can imagine myself in that situation saying if I vote for this heartbeat bill in this context,

01:01:50

I am going along with complete like we know better. Now, does everybody know better about murder?

01:01:57

Yes, ultimately they do. If I'm in Boise and 90 % of the legislature are

01:02:03

Mormons and I'm preaching the gospel at them. They're all human beings and so on and they're all like, but I'm a

01:02:09

Mormon and Joseph Smith and I've got holy underwear and we're not going to save the baby. This is the most

01:02:14

I'll give you. I probably would vote for the heartbeat bill if that's the best I could do. But I would be doing it prophetically the whole time.

01:02:22

I would vote yes. I would be saying this is not enough. This is not sufficient.

01:02:28

These are babies and it's not okay. Right, so two things. One is am I grateful to God that in His providence some baby's lives may be saved in Texas through this.

01:02:38

Straight line, crooked stick. God in His providence does what He wants. Am I celebrating any life saved?

01:02:43

God does so in that way. Absolutely. But I don't think we should look around for crooked sticks to do our fighting with and I think we should be doing it faithfully.

01:02:53

But just an encouragement. The person who ran our bill in Arizona was Mormon. That's a lot of our abolitionist friends.

01:03:02

I want you to know we did take heat.

01:03:08

People were like Jeff how could you have black men running your bill?

01:03:13

He's a Latter Day Saint. He's a beautiful strong black man with the last name Blackman. And you're like have you seen my

01:03:20

Mormon evangelism videos? No he had. Him and his wife had. We talked about it and there wasn't one point in our conversations ever and we had countless hours where we ever compromised on the issue of the gospel versus Mormonism.

01:03:34

They watched the videos but when we impressed it upon him, we impressed it with the word of God consistently.

01:03:40

And I even tried to take him at the common ground we had. I even did things like you know

01:03:45

God's word says this and you know what? According to your belief system I said you guys borrowed from Christianity these concepts but actually your system says that Heavenly Father created these children as spirit children in the pre -existence so they're coming as spirit children into bodies in the womb.

01:04:05

I said you guys should be against this as much as I am with your belief and they were like that's absolutely right.

01:04:12

And I said also it's weird your church actually compromises on this issue and says rape incest life of the mother but they believe they're pre -existent spirit children so they're killing spirit children even through rape.

01:04:23

And they were like our church is wrong about that. And they tried to stop him. They had a bishop call him and try to stop him and they hung up on him and said no.

01:04:31

So it is possible if you're a Mormon. I appreciate that. That's good work. That's a good work. As a

01:04:37

Mormon who's working on becoming a Christian and having an answer. I agree with that entirely. I think to the extent that pro -lifers are pretending that there is common ground that Jesus is not

01:04:51

Lord over the whole thing to hell with that. My only tiny little plea even if it's a small space of reality because you guys are more on the ground and I totally respect that.

01:05:06

My only small plea is to the extent that someone can tell the truth the entire time and not give an inch on it and they're in a place where I don't know.

01:05:18

San Francisco. Massachusetts. You're in New York City. Where they just lit the towers on pink.

01:05:24

I don't know. I would be willing to be prophetic there even for, I don't know, just saying you have to have an ultrasound or something like that.

01:05:33

I don't know. Something dumb like that I know that's probably doing very little. Like the ERLC is doing.

01:05:38

But in New York City if in New York City. It's like you're going deep tribal Africa and trying to talk to people and just have one wife.

01:05:49

I'm going into deep New York City. I'm not going to give them an inch. It's a baby.

01:05:55

It's made in the image of God. This is murder. It's a crime. And meanwhile if this is the best

01:06:01

I can get and a bunch of bloodthirsty people are like okay sure you have to have an ultrasound. I'm going to vote for it.

01:06:08

See the image of God. I feel you. This is the challenge. What you just said just now

01:06:13

Pastor Toby in terms of this is the image of God and this is murder. You would not be allowed to speak at National Rites of Life.

01:06:22

So I'm just saying you're not allowed. I don't think people know. My point is there are two roads right now that are moving this direction.

01:06:33

We should propose a breakout session for the next Rites of Life conference. So there's the

01:06:38

Christian prophetic road and then there's the road that's the neutral pro -life industry that says don't you dare say this should be criminal.

01:06:49

That's not what we're going for. We don't ever want that. And you and I would be hand in hand speaking to them saying how dare you and this is wrong and inconsistent.

01:06:59

So that's one aspect. But you mentioned as I went up to use the bathroom you mentioned the issue of the mask and the health mandates.

01:07:06

People don't even resist that. That's kind of my point that I'm concerned with is that we've given up so much ground and compromised so much in terms of law in our country because we're not prophetic and consistent speaking against the state on the issue of their limitations.

01:07:23

We have all this tyranny across our country and people yield to it because they assume the state has that much power and the answer is no they don't.

01:07:34

It's a beast and it's lying to you because this still is a nation that was developed by the

01:07:39

Covenanters and the Huguenots and the Puritans and pilgrims and everything else. They came to this nation with a historical understanding of a national covenant and they came with an understanding of common law and biblical law.

01:07:52

They gave us these blessings and they're all dissipating now because not enough men of God are speaking consistently and prophetically in these areas to say actually you know what even in Massachusetts you guys may completely suck and destroy everything and murder these babies anyways and do these little pithy little bills but here's the real truth.

01:08:11

You don't have the power you think you have and that's not how law works in this country. Supreme Court does not have the power to create law in this country.

01:08:18

Jen Psaki recognizes it, Biden knows it and so I'm with you. If you're in Africa and you got law about polygamy or whatever the case may be you might be in that space going

01:08:30

I just got to be consistent with the dudes around me because I can't even get in that legislature but right now we're in a situation in our country until Congress determines to make a law about abortion where abortion is not the law of the land.

01:08:43

Jen Psaki knows it, Biden knows it and they're I think shaking in their boots now and so we're in a context where I think we can maintain consistency and say you don't have that right anyways.

01:08:55

Part of that covenantal heritage you're talking about, I'm actually speaking about some of this tomorrow morning in my talk but part of that heritage means that there are certain laws that even if when you try to pass them are not laws.

01:09:16

If you pass a law in our country that says it is okay to murder babies it's not a law.

01:09:22

I'm resisting it anyways. But it's not a law. Because you don't have the authority to do that.

01:09:27

The right to life is given by the creator. It's the same thing as Obergefell, which isn't a law either because it's just Supreme Court activism.

01:09:41

That's the word I like. It's activism but even if Congress passed a law that said sodomites can marry that is like saying gravity doesn't exist.

01:09:56

It's like saying water, we voted that water is going to run uphill now. It's like saying a man can be a woman.

01:10:03

It's irrational, it's insane and it is not a law. This actually goes back to your 9th

01:10:10

Amendment point the whole point of the 9th Amendment we were talking to a guy earlier this week

01:10:15

David Fowler he's got a book coming out on this but the 9th

01:10:20

Amendment says explicitly that there are other rights not mentioned in this constitution which are retained by the people.

01:10:29

Not even by the states. What that was was anti -federalists were concerned that the federal government was going to get too big for their britches and think that they created rights.

01:10:42

Which is what we've done more and more which is called positive law rather than the idea that there are actually pre -political like before the state even exists there are rights that we have directly from God himself that no man no woman, nobody if you try to say no against it it's like voting against gravity.

01:11:00

It doesn't matter how many hands put up, it doesn't matter what the percentage was. It's not a law. And that needs to be kept firmly in place.

01:11:09

Right. I just wanted you guys to know that I think he knows already but anytime somebody comes to me and talks to me about abortion and how should they get involved

01:11:18

I'm always sending them to you guys. Thank you guys. Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. People don't know how crazy the pro -life movement is and you guys have been the forefront of it.

01:11:30

I love how you guys have spent so much time preaching the gospel at the abortion mills.

01:11:38

I love that. Front and central Christ has to change hearts and reformation, we're talking about reformation.

01:11:48

What kind of insane people are we that we kill our own babies? We are mad.

01:11:55

And we are that man in the tombs. And we have to have

01:12:00

Christ heal us. We're going to Pennsylvania this month do

01:12:06

I think that the Equal Protection Bill is going to pass in Pennsylvania? God is the master and owner of the entire story and universe.

01:12:14

He could do that. He could perform a miracle in Pennsylvania. But in the one sense we're going there with the word of God proclaiming prophetically the word of God and if they turn away from it, we know it's just judgment.

01:12:28

And at the same time I know that we're sowing righteous seeds of the gospel and the word of God in all these states.

01:12:34

We've got Arizona we helped with Oklahoma in terms of just being there and sending people there but they did all that in Oklahoma.

01:12:42

We got Texas going this year, South Carolina, now Pennsylvania our next two states we're working on are Louisiana and Florida.

01:12:49

And so it's huge. In one year, so this gets to my point, 50 years of Roe, let's do it neutral.

01:12:58

Let's do backdoor approach. Let's not make it about Christ. Let's not make it about the word of God. Let's not call it murder. That's not going to work.

01:13:04

In 2021 how many states is that? Five? Six states?

01:13:10

In one year alone. In one year alone, equal protection, calling it murder, making it a part of the homicide code.

01:13:16

So in one year, this is not towards us because it's Christians around the country doing this with us. But in one year alone with the prophetic witness of the church, we've got legislators going, yeah, they're right.

01:13:27

We need justice now and equal protection. So five, six bills of equal protection in a single year because the church gets involved?

01:13:36

And Saki and those guys are like, yeah. Right. And also I will say, important element here in terms of how the church begins to actually challenge people is that you know the national right to life.

01:13:49

This is in Babies Are Still Murdered here. They resisted heartbeat bills up until a couple of years ago.

01:13:56

They said do not go for heartbeat bills. They will not get behind them. It wasn't until Christians started coming to legislators and legislators were like, no.

01:14:04

Crime. Equal protection. That the pro -life industry started saying, yeah, let's try a heartbeat bill. And so it is ultimately the prophetic witness of the church and the word of God that's even pushing these inconsistent men and women to a place of, yeah,

01:14:19

I guess we need to do more and be more courageous. So again. We appreciate you brothers so much.

01:14:24

We love you guys. And yeah, keep up the good fight. Thank you, brother.

01:14:31

See you guys in May. That's right. ReformCon 2022. It's a mouthful.

01:14:36

ReformCon 2022. We got our venue now. It's a really nice place.

01:14:42

It's going to be a lot of fun. It's going to look very beautiful. We just want it to be something where people come. Like you guys,

01:14:48

I think really blessed by doing conferences with solid teaching but also a chance for people to get connected and have fun together.

01:14:58

Christian conferences generally suck because you get so wore out. You're there for like 8 hours a day, 10 hours a day.

01:15:05

How do you really feel it, Jeff? Well, I'll give you an example. You know, I won't mention a name, but some conferences

01:15:10

I've even been invited to speak at, by the end of the day, you're like, I am destroyed. I'm annihilated because every guy that's going up is trying to preach the next sinners in the hands of anger

01:15:20

God sermon. And it's back to back to back to the point where you just get so wore out.

01:15:26

There's no chance to interact with anybody or to connect. And I thought last year's conference you guys did, that I had the privilege to speak at, that was such a blessing because everyone got to get to know each other and network and fellowship and it was fun.

01:15:40

It's a conference. It's not a church service. It's a conference and so people were having a good time. And we got