Ahmaud Arbery, Woke Evangelicals, and Biblical Justice

Conversations That Matter

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Welcome to the Conversations That Matter podcast. My name is John Harris. It is good to be back today in my wife's laundry room, which is where all the serious hard work gets done around here, recording this podcast.

00:12

You know, I don't have the cool stuff. You know, some guys who do my kind of commentary, like A .D. Robles, right, he's got a really cool setup in his basement.

00:20

He's got a bunker, basically, with, he's got cool music, grungy effect on his camera, supplies in the background, he's raising chickens, and I'm living here, temporarily, at least.

00:30

I mean, that's kind of where I'm at, by the way. I mean, I like that stuff, but I'm here living the suburbanite, impoverished academic lifestyle.

00:39

And so my wife graciously allows me to use her laundry room for this podcast. So here we are, and you know, it was a good trip, though, and I appreciate your prayers.

00:49

I was gone for a few days, I'm back, and I will tell you more about this.

00:55

You will find out in the coming weeks what I was up to, but it's not cheap to fly to the location

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I flew to, hotel, rental car, food, all of that stuff. It was totally worth it, by the way, and you'll find out more later, but I just wanna thank you for your prayers and for those who contributed.

01:11

Enemies Within the Church paid for my hotel. He hasn't given me permission to say his name, but you know, a certain donor paid for my flight, and then, you know, your

01:21

Patreon support really helped me with the other expenses, and so I'm just beyond grateful to you guys. I see it as the

01:27

Lord providing, and by the way, I thought I would take a big hit with the

01:33

Patreon stuff in this COVID -19. It's gone up the last two weeks. Viewership has gone up, people giving has gone up, and donating, and guys, it's paying off.

01:44

I just wanna tell you, I'm excited about this project and a few other projects happening, and you will know more very soon about that.

01:51

So a big thank you to all of you, and I do try to be as frugal as I possibly can.

01:57

I take the income, whatever income that I get from that, I put right back into the work that I'm doing here, and I know that's what matters to you, and so this is a team effort.

02:08

You know, I know to put me in front of this microphone, in front of this camera is a team effort.

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It's not just me doing this, and so I acknowledge that. So while I was gone, this is the topic for today, and oh man, this really has been sticking in my craw here.

02:28

We're gonna talk about the Ahmaud Arbery incident, and while I was gone, this whole thing blew up with woke evangelicals especially.

02:36

I mean, it's the whole woke crowd, but of course, I keep an eye more on the evangelical left, and I got in some trouble on Twitter.

02:46

Some of you might know what I'm talking about. I'm gonna address that, but you know, guys, I wanna give you a big picture here for a second.

02:54

You know, Joe Carter had put out an article, I believe in the Gospel Coalition recently, last day or two, about conspiracy theories.

03:02

Conspiracy theories are just so bad. We shouldn't believe them. We gotta be careful. It's just so bad. Evangelicals or Christians, we have to distance ourselves from that, and I've talked to you guys before about conspiracy theories.

03:16

Well, if you wanna talk about an unsubstantiated conspiracy theory, it's the way that woke evangelicals are spinning this

03:23

Ahmaud Arbery situation. It's racism, it's white supremacy. He was just jogging while black.

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None of this, none of the evidence points to any of this. In fact, it points to the opposite of most of this.

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This interpretation is wrong, guys. It's just wrong, and based on what we already know, and we haven't even let the due process take its course, but I want you to think about all the things that these woke evangelicals aren't talking about that aren't problems.

03:54

I mean, there's prayers across the country now, because I've heard some of them. I'm gonna show you some of them in churches, where they're just praying for this horrible, crummy

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American society that's racist and kills people because they're black, and it's just, we demand justice.

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Someone who's as far away geographically in the country from Georgia as they could possibly be praying for this horrible country because of this local incident that took place in Georgia that hasn't even been, or verdict hasn't even been reached on what are they not paying attention to?

04:26

They're not paying attention to our civil liberties being taken away. In fact, it's others.

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It's political conservatives who are fighting for those. It's not the evangelical industrial complex.

04:37

And what I mean by that, Big Eva publishing companies, the moneyed evangelical, the moneyed class, those who constantly say that we gotta be so concerned about oppression, but they tend to be the ones that are actually powerful, the ones in control.

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They are the ones pushing this narrative, hardcore, and those who listen to them. And they're not paying attention to other things.

05:00

They're not paying attention to this whole situation with Michael Flynn and Obama's complicity. I mean, you wanna talk about corruption on a national level, it's just, it's sickening.

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What about all the verified shootings that have taken place? I mean, there's, I'm gonna show you some of these, but in the last two years, there's been at least two joggers

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I know of, actual joggers, not like they're saying they're jogging after the fact, but they were jogging, who have been killed by illegal aliens in this country, and not a peep, not a peep from this crowd.

05:30

But now we're gonna raise the roof about this Ahmaud Arbery situation. And granted, guys, this is a very sad situation.

05:38

It should break our hearts. When you see a video like that, that's the natural, if you don't have that reaction, then maybe you've watched a lot of movies, that's possible.

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We've been desensitized, but there should be something. There really should be something of, man, what a horrible thing.

05:54

I can't believe that would happen. I think that's a normal thing. And of course, we can't believe in a sinful world that would happen, it will always happen.

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But it is a tragic thing. So there's someone who's dead. And so we're gonna talk about this.

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I'm gonna give you the facts that we know of the situation that I think are relevant. And then we're gonna talk about the reaction, the woke evangelical reaction.

06:17

And last but not least, we're gonna talk about biblical justice. I wanna give you kind of a guide for dealing with situations like this as much as possible.

06:24

And I'll start it off this way, guys. Resolution 9, we talk about it quite a bit, but it got a lot of press because it was the first time the

06:35

Southern Baptists had endorsed critical race theory and intersectionality as analytical tools. And I think a lot of people still think that this was some kind of future direction that the woke guys wanted to take the

06:46

SBC. It was not. And I know that 100%. I graduated from Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary.

06:54

This was justification for what was already taking place. At least two of the guys on that committee,

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Whitfield and Strickland were professors at Southeastern. The chairman was

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Curtis Woods. I was using critical race theory in his dissertation. They were already using critical race theory.

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That's the point, or worked for institutions that did. And this was a way of justifying what was already taking place.

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And guys, this situation with Ahmaud Arbery and the way that this is being handled and interpreted by evangelicals who are woke is using critical race theory as an analytical tool.

07:32

This is a good exhibit A. If you really wanna know what that looks like. And it's the subversion of justice.

07:38

It is antithetical to biblical justice. And the guys who are taking this side and not recanting or repenting of it, not realizing.

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I understand sometimes you get taken in, you hear wrong facts. But if you are confronted with the facts, and I mean, to be honest with you,

07:54

I almost don't wanna say that because it's so cut and dry. You shouldn't attribute false motives.

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But for those who are attributing these false motives, and maybe you heard it from somewhere else, and now you're confronted with the facts and you don't change.

08:08

I don't know why anyone should ever listen to you again. It's the height of dishonesty. It's the subversion of justice. It is antithetical to scripture.

08:15

And we're gonna look at all of that. So let's start with the situation here.

08:24

February 23rd in the afternoon, it's around two o 'clock, Ahmaud Arbery is killed during an altercation with Travis McMichael.

08:35

And if you're watching, I have some maps here.

08:41

I wanna show you, because I think this actually is important. I haven't seen anyone else looking at it from this bird's eye view, but there's a 911 call before this whole incident takes place.

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Out here, there is a guy in the house right now, is what someone unidentified, but someone who calls 911.

08:56

He says, it's a house under construction, 219 or 220 Satilla Drive in Brunswick, Georgia.

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So this is, it's one of these houses here. If you're watching, and I'm just gonna describe things to you if you're listening, but you can see that in the one that's zoomed out here, it's kind of like a little peninsula here.

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It's just a residential area with a peninsula. Like it's kind of off the beaten path.

09:23

We'll put it that way. And I know it's over two miles from some reports I was reading from this individual's home, which is,

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I mean, if you're jogging, that is within, you know, you jog two miles or more, but that's where it is, but it's completely residential.

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You think, you know, a place where everyone would probably know each other and it's bordering this kind of inlet from the ocean.

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And the house that Ahmaud Arbery had broken into was bordering the water here.

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And so if he went in there, first of all, you're gonna see this in a minute. It was going to the bathroom or something.

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There's actually a port -a -potty right outside the house. So he's not going in there looking for, I need to go to the bathroom, which would be wrong anyway, but in case someone wants to float that theory.

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But he's not taking a shortcut either. He's not, you know, I'm gonna cut through this person's yard because there's no reason to do that.

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It's bordering the water. He's not trying to go for a swim. Wasn't wearing swimming trunks. And it doesn't get you to any other road.

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It's really off the beaten path completely. So this guy who's across the street comes out, a neighbor, says there's a guy in the house right now.

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It's under construction. And you're gonna see the picture in a minute. It's not under construction and like half built. It's actually, it looks like someone could be living there, but no one is because it's under construction.

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And you know that because there's a port -a -potty outside and there's, you know, on the window, there's a notice that it's under construction.

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So 30 seconds after this 911 call says, and he's running right now.

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It was a sense of urgency. And he says it like three or four times. And there were two 911 calls. And you hear,

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I think it's in the second one, you hear a guy, another guy who calls in yelling stop. Hey, stop. You know, trying to get this, trying to get

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Ahman Arbery to stop while after he starts running. All right, so envision the situation.

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You're a neighbor. You're looking across the street. You see a guy walk into a house and then he comes out and he notices you, which the video seems to indicate that's probably the case.

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He's noticing that, hey, there's someone watching me and he bolts it. I mean, it looks suspicious, right? He's been caught on camera a bunch before at night.

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Kind of an ongoing thing out here is what the 911 caller says. And then he says, he's done back run through the neighborhood in our front yard.

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So he's in this guy's front yard. Now, that's setting up the situation.

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So this guy's under the impression that, hey, this is a robber. This is a burglar who's been casing joints and taking things and we've caught him on camera or at least he's been intending to do that.

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And we've already caught him. And here he is in broad daylight. I caught him finally. And he's calling 911, which was the right thing to do, right?

12:23

To call 911. So here is a video of the situation.

12:29

And I'm gonna just walk through this with you because this video is 2 .08

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p .m. in the afternoon. It starts and this is the one that's not being shown a whole lot, but this is the other video.

12:42

So you see a man, believed to be Arbery. He's walking down the street. He's not going for a jog. He's just walking. And he walks right up into the garage, walks into the garage.

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And then a minute later, he's walking around. He walks around the back. And what's he doing?

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He's checking the place out. He doesn't have an intended mission going into it.

13:07

And so he's in there a few minutes. This is a surveillance camera from a house right across the street.

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You can see the port -a -potty right outside. You can see how there's, it looks like a little permit on the door.

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And then you see an unidentified figure enters the upper left frame. And here's what's going on. It's unclear what he's doing, but the police report says a neighbor called 911.

13:30

It's probably the neighbor. And he walks out to the street right in front of the house and he's watching the house.

13:36

He's just watching, calling the cops, most likely. And it's hard to tell in the video.

13:44

And then Arbery walks out of, it looks like the garage, and he runs and he sees the guy, presumably, who's calling the police.

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He just runs. And I mean, you can't tell me that doesn't look suspicious in some way, right?

13:59

So then you see, this is really hard to tell, but it's sort of the upper left -hand corner of the camera.

14:07

Two identified figures appear to move near a parked white truck in the vicinity of Traffic McMichael's address. And the truck then drives down Satilla Drive.

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And so, there's some guys that also saw it where they were called and notified, and they get in their car and they're gonna go after Arbery.

14:27

And the guy who made the 911 call just walks back to his house, presumably. And so now it's 2 -17, and I know

14:38

I've watched the video before. So a police car is about to come barreling down on Satilla Drive. And I'm just gonna let you watch this because I want everyone to see this before you see the other video, you should probably at least see this one if you wanna get a more complete picture.

14:58

And so nothing's happened yet. It's been a few minutes now. And then a police cruiser drives by the construction site.

15:05

It's now 2 -19. And so there's the police cruiser, almost 2 -20, coming by the construction site, going down Satilla Drive, responding.

15:19

So it's been a few minutes. This is during the time that Arbery is being confronted, and perhaps he's already been,

15:26

I don't know, he may have been shot at this point. And let's see if I can skip ahead here a little bit.

15:36

I know another, there's another vehicle, another cruiser, another police cruiser I know comes barreling down the drive at like a really fast speed towards the end of this video, a couple minutes later.

15:48

And there it is. 2 -22, after 2 -22, another police cruiser comes by.

15:58

And there he is. All right, so that's what we have from this particular video.

16:07

Now, here's what the police report said the day of. I'm gonna just read this to you. And guys, this might be boring for some of you, but it's important.

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If you really wanna weigh in on this, then you need to know what actually happened. Here's what the police said.

16:19

Upon my arrival, I observed Officer Minshew setting up a perimeter. I began speaking with Gregory McMichael, who was a witness to the incident.

16:25

McMichael stated that there had been several break -ins in the neighborhood, and further, the suspect was caught on surveillance video. And I guess that's a typo,

16:34

I'm not sure. In his front yard, and saw the suspect from the break -in.

16:39

So McMichael is identifying this guy as the suspect in the break -ins.

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And he says that he's going fast. He was really running hard, like he had done something wrong is the implication there.

16:54

Down Satella Drive, toward Burford Drive, McMichael stated he then ran inside his house and called to Travis, and said,

17:01

Travis, the guy is running down the streets, let's go. McMichael stated he went to his bedroom and grabbed his magnum, and Travis grabbed his shotgun, because they didn't know if the male was armed or not.

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Michael stated the other night, they saw the same male, and he stuck his hands down his pants, which led them to believe he was a male, the male was armed.

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So look, for all the people that are weighing in on this and saying, well, how in the world did they think it was okay to have a gun while confronting?

17:30

It doesn't say they pointed the gun at this guy, doesn't say that, just says they had the gun, they had guns with them.

17:36

And the reason was because they thought this guy might have a gun. If he's the guy that's robbing houses, and we saw him reach for something the other night, and that's how they identified him, then it stands to reason, well, we better be protected if we're gonna confront this guy, because he may shoot us, fair enough?

17:54

So whether you agree with it or not, think they should have gone after him or not, it was for protection, as we presume, we need to give benefit of the doubt as much as possible that they brought the gun.

18:05

Now, McMichael then states, he and Travis got in the truck, drove down Satilla Drive towards Burford Drive.

18:12

McMichael stated that when they arrived at the intersection of Satilla and Holmes Drive, they saw the unidentified male running down Burford Drive.

18:18

McMichael then stated, had Travis drive down Burford and attempted to cut off the male.

18:24

The unidentified male turned around and began running back in the direction from which he came, and Roddy attempted to block him, which was unsuccessful.

18:34

Michael stated he then jumped into the bed of the truck. He and Travis continued to Holmes in an attempt to intercept him.

18:39

So this guy's already evaded them stopping him. They're calling out to him, they're saying, we heard this in the second 911 call, but they're saying, hey, stop, and he doesn't stop, and he tries to evade them.

18:54

Well, if you're already suspicious, you think you saw this guy on camera, you think he might have a gun, you saw him go into this house, and now he's trying not to be caught, then you think, well, he probably did something wrong.

19:07

McMichael stated they saw the unidentified male and shouted, stop, stop, we wanna talk to you. Michael stated they pulled up beside the male and shouted, stop, again, at which time

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Travis exited the truck with the shotgun. McMichael stated the unidentified male began to violently attack

19:20

Travis, and the two men then started fighting over the shotgun, at which point Travis fired a shot, and then a second later, there was a second shot.

19:27

McMichael stated the male fell face down on the pavement with his hand under his body.

19:32

McMichael stated he rolled the man over to see if the male had a weapon. Now, this is consistent with the video.

19:42

The video shows the same thing. He's jogging down the street, and by the way, I'm not gonna show that video because I think everyone's seen this video.

19:48

Next time you watch the video, though, I want you to watch for something. Look at how Ahmad is dressed, especially his shoes.

19:58

And look, people can run in boots, but he's running in, he has boots on.

20:04

These aren't running shoes. And the video, the surveillance video doesn't start off with him. He's not running. He's walking into the house.

20:10

He only starts running when he notices that someone's watching him. That's what it appears to look like, okay?

20:17

And I'm saying appears, but from the evidence we have, that seems to be what's taking place.

20:25

So to say this guy's just a jogger. Joggers, they generally, they're not wearing those kinds of boots.

20:31

They're not just walking and going into people's houses, and they're not trying to evade like that, just by nature of them jogging.

20:43

His running had a motivation to it. Now, let's keep going here.

20:51

Here's, this is from DA report. I'm just gonna read this.

20:57

Travis McMichael, Greg McMichael, and Brian William were following in hot pursuit a burglary suspect with solid firsthand probable cause in their neighborhood and asking, telling him to stop.

21:06

It appears their intent was to stop and hold this criminal suspect until law enforcement arrived under Georgia law. This is perfectly legal.

21:13

Arbery was running along the right side of McMichael truck and then abruptly turns 90 degrees to the left and attacks

21:18

Travis McMichael, who was standing at the front left corner of the truck. A brief skirmish ensues in which it appears

21:25

Arbery strikes McMichael and appears to grab the shotgun and pull it from McMichael. This was the beginning, or almost immediately became a fight over the shotgun.

21:33

Arbery initiated the fight at the point Arbery grabbed the shotgun. Under Georgia law, McMichael was allowed to use deadly force to protect himself.

21:40

There's insufficient probable cause to issue arrest warrants at this time. And this is George Barnhill, who has over a hundred homicides.

21:46

I mean, he's been in the force for years and this is his opinion on it. Then this is an important, now this is, he has all the laws are cataloged in this.

21:57

This does look to be perfectly legal. And even if you watch the video, it does seem to, it corroborates with this.

22:04

You have McMichael standing there with a shotgun and they're saying, hey, stop. And then you have this guy,

22:10

Ahmaud, he does make a 90 degree turn. He's on the other side of the truck.

22:15

He runs over and he starts hitting them. And he grabs the shotgun. And so to say that this guy is just a jogger and unarmed is not true.

22:23

He was armed, or at least he was trying to become armed. He had his hands on a shotgun. That doesn't mean, if someone's trying to grab, you have a gun and someone comes and they try to, they're punching you and trying to grab your gun.

22:34

Are they unarmed? No, they're not. Because they're trying to take your weapon and presumably kill you with it.

22:41

So let's just dispel these two notions right now, that this guy is a jogger and we know that for a fact and that he was unarmed.

22:50

Well, at the beginning he was, but as soon as he grabbed that shotgun and started initiating force, he wasn't unarmed anymore.

22:58

And I'm sorry if you don't like that, but, you know, and it's a horrible situation, guys.

23:03

I have to emphasize, it really is. I'm sure the McMichaels feel bad about it, but there's more to this.

23:09

I'm gonna keep going here. So Greg McMichael had investigated Arbery before.

23:17

These two were not strangers. They knew each other. In his letter of recusal to Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr, Waycross Judicial Circuit Court District Attorney Roger Barnhill wrote that his son, a prosecutor in the

23:30

Brunswick DA's office and McMichael, then an investigator in that same office, both helped with the previous prosecution of Ahmaud Arbery.

23:39

So Arbery was prosecuted before? McMichael, a former Glynn County cop, told Glynn Police he recognized

23:44

Arbery, 25, from surveillance video that captured a recent burglary in his mostly white neighborhood.

23:50

He said he planned to make a citizen's arrest. So that's, you know, that's another important facet of this.

23:59

These guys are being called vigilantes. What they did was perfectly within the law. That's not, vigilantes operate outside the boundaries of the law.

24:07

These guys were not doing that. And so the crowd that wants to make out, oh, this is just vigilanteism, which frankly it's, you're tarring and feathering these guys and you don't understand the law.

24:17

You don't understand what actually was taking place. Now, was it wise for them to do this? I happen to,

24:22

I'll just give you my gut opinion, no. I think they should have just called the police and let it alone. But now that you are getting this extra information, you might understand a little more why they went after him.

24:35

The reason is, is because McMichael, Greg McMichael, was a retired officer.

24:44

He was the police, recently. It's probably his, just that's the way he operates.

24:49

He's used to that. And he knew this guy. Now, maybe, I don't know whether he recognized him or not, but, you know,

24:57

I'm sure once Ahmaud Arbery got close enough to see Greg McMichael, he would have recognized, oh no, this is the guy that I sat across a table from and was investigated by.

25:08

And what was he investigated for? It says, when he was in high school, Arbery was sentenced to five years probation as a first offender on charges of carrying a weapon on campus and several counts of obstructing a law enforcement officer.

25:18

He was convicted of probation violation in 2018 after he was charged with shoplifting, court documents show.

25:24

McMichael, who retired from the DA's office in April 2019, made no mention of his work on that investigation to police, though it's unknown whether he remembered it at the time.

25:31

And this is reported from the star. This is really crucial information, guys.

25:38

So that would be another reason they might have taken guns with them. If McMichael had recognized that's the guy that was armed and had broken probation from shoplifting and now he's robbing our neighborhood, of course he thinks that Ahmaud will have a gun.

25:53

Of course he's gonna bring something to protect himself. And it would make sense why Ahmaud would have run, because he's noticing that's the cop.

26:01

He doesn't know he's retired, probably. And so this is information that you're not hearing out there, guys, and it's important.

26:09

It's really crucial for this whole entire case. Now, this is another angle, another facet of this you also,

26:18

I think, need to understand. The Brunswick County Judicial Circuit DA, Jackie Johnson, recused herself right away because of conflict of interest.

26:27

I believe it was a relationship with Greg McMichael or his son, there was some kind of a working relationship that had happened, so she recused herself.

26:38

There's a conflict of interest, I can't take the case. Well, look at the social media outrage. Burn the witch. Hi, Jackie Johnson, how long have you hated black people and protected killers?

26:48

You only protect white people. You are not a good person. KKK is hiding behind badges and titles.

26:53

You have blood on your hands. So, I mean, the list goes on. These are just a few examples. It's horrendous. I mean,

26:59

I just want you to see the picture of this person. This is a human being too, made in God's image. I know the

27:04

Russell Moores of the world and the J .D. Greers love to bring up humans made in God's image every time something like this happens, but everyone's made in God's image.

27:15

And there's more than, this is a bad thing too, to go after her for this, for not arresting them, essentially, initially, when she didn't have,

27:24

I mean, it would have been thrown out of court probably if she did, if she had advised that, because they didn't have grounds for it.

27:32

You think this investigator, McMichael, he would have known the law, right? And so, you know, anyway.

27:39

So, here's why the investigation was held up. There's really three reasons. Number one, on April 1st,

27:44

Georgia District Attorney George Barnhill receives a autopsy report. So, this is a new DA, right?

27:49

So, one DA recused themselves. Here's another DA, Georgia Barnhill. And that's when he receives the autopsy, not until April 1st.

27:58

You think COVID might've had something to do with this? Maybe. April 2nd, the DA states they were waiting on this important evidentiary article before finalizing their opinions.

28:06

Well, that seems wise. Wait until the autopsy report. So, this idea that we should have arrested him right away.

28:12

Well, they were waiting for more evidence. They didn't have enough evidence. The mother, though, wanted Barnhill off the case, the mother of Arbery.

28:19

However, since we were initially requested to handle the case, this is what Barnhill says, the victim's mother has clearly expressed she wants myself and my office off the case since my son works in the

28:29

Brunswick District Attorney's office where Greg McMichael retired some time ago. So, she believes there are kinships between the parties that are not, but has made other unfounded allegations of biases.

28:39

So, this Barnhill is saying, his mother is saying, wants me off the case. He recuses himself.

28:45

He also says this, and this is the third reason. Given the governor's current shelter -in -place order and Justice Melton's judicial emergency order,

28:53

I cannot venture a guess as to when they will move on this request. And once another is found, another

28:59

DA, when the district attorney will have the staff available to review the case file, I hope for all involved it will move along as quickly as possible.

29:06

So, guys, let's just be real clear here. This idea that, well, justice hasn't been served.

29:11

This has taken way too long. There's three reasons that it's been taking long. COVID -19 is one of those reasons.

29:18

Second reason is you have DAs recusing themselves, two of them. So, they have to keep finding

29:24

DAs. And so, I guess those would be the two reasons, the two DAs recusing themselves.

29:30

So, there's more to meets the eye here. It's not just, oh, the justice system is just a failure.

29:37

For all of you guys who are saying, well, you just gotta social distance and you just gotta stay home, but you want swift justice on this, think through that for a minute.

29:45

Think through that. So, this was taken from a February 23rd letter to Captain Jump, I believe is the name, from Barnhill.

29:57

Now, let's move on. DA's opinion.

30:04

I just wanna read these for you. There is an immediate pressure on your department as to the issue of arrest. He's talking to the police department here in this letter.

30:12

And he's talking about public pressure. There's public pressure now. I think public pressure getting involved has changed maybe the way that this is being handled.

30:21

Even the arrest, that it's possible. Now, I could be wrong on that. I don't really have evidence for that, but he's just acknowledging there's public pressure.

30:28

Myself and one of the senior trial attorneys have reviewed the evidence extensively concur in all points. The autopsy supports the initial opinion we gave you on February 24th.

30:35

We do not see grounds for an arrest of any of these three parties. Do you wanna live in a world where if someone attacks you and you're not, you have a gun in your hand, right?

30:47

Which is legal, right? It's legal in Georgia. I mean, it should be. Second Amendment says that's legal anyway.

30:54

But it's legal, you have a gun. And someone attacks you and starts punching you and trying to grab your gun to kill you that you can't fight back.

31:05

It's a little unclear. I mean, the initial police report said the shots were fired by McMichael, but that's even unclear in what the

31:12

DA said. He said, you can't tell from the camera to struggle over the shotgun and who knows who pulled the trigger.

31:17

Shots were fired in that struggle. But do you wanna live in that world? Where, I mean, put the shoe on the other foot for a minute.

31:24

Change the ethnic makeup. Let's say it's a white supremacist of some kind, like a real, not,

31:30

McMichael, there's no evidence he's a white supremacist at all. But let's say a real white supremacist is going after a minority of some kind.

31:37

And should that minority then, if they have a weapon, they just can't use it because they should just take the beating?

31:43

Well, I don't think we wanna grow up in a world, we want our kids to grow up in a world like that. I hope not.

31:48

That's not true justice at all. I'm gonna show you that in a minute, but that's the conclusion you'd have to draw.

31:55

All right, so Tom Durden becomes the new DA pro tempore, temporee, and he formally appointed, was formally appointed because the other

32:04

DAs have accused themselves, and he issues a press release. And he informs of his intent to try the case before a grand jury for consideration of criminal charges.

32:22

So once we get to the point of arrest, it's because a third DA has weighed in, and by now public opinion is just screaming.

32:32

And that could be part of it. Now, May 5th, the footage was released. So if we're looking at dates here,

32:39

I believe this letter's also May 5th, so the same day that Tom Durden says, hey, grand jury is the same day that the lawyer for the family, of Arbery's family, releases this footage, or makes known that this footage exists.

32:55

It had already been released on YouTube, I guess. And, you know, the lawyer just says, this is murder.

33:02

This is murder. Pursued by three white men. We're injecting race into this, so three white men.

33:07

Now, this is where race starts getting injected, guys. It's, the lawyer is depending on that.

33:13

Now, here's, here are the photos you see. This is the optics of it. May 7th, Gregory and Travis McMichael are arrested.

33:20

And here are their mugshots. Here's, I want to show you, this is Ahmaud Arbery. On the left is the picture that you've seen over and over again.

33:29

I think that's a prom picture, or something. It's a formal event, and it looks like it's a prom picture.

33:35

He's smiling and everything. Look on the right. This is another picture. This is a mugshot picture for when he,

33:42

I'm assuming this is from 2018, when he violated probation and shoplifted. Have any of you seen that picture?

33:49

And I want to ask you a question, why? Why is the one on the left the only one used? And how come, let me see if I can find it here.

33:57

I can't find it. How come the picture of Travis and Gregory McMichael, this is the picture you're seeing.

34:06

They're not going to their Facebook to find the best pictures of them. They're showing these pictures. And before these were available, they were showing a picture of them hunting.

34:12

Trying to make them look like a bunch of rednecks. I'm telling you, there's more going on here.

34:18

So what are some of the reactions? Here's just a few, and this is what you'd expect.

34:24

Action alert, end all of the ACP. Ahmaud Arbery was running in his neighborhood and was chased and murdered by two white supremacists.

34:34

That is an outright, I mean, it's a lie. It's a lie at this point. You have no, look, if it comes out that they're white supremacists and that's why they did it, and you know something we don't know, you better release it.

34:45

Otherwise, you're just accusing someone without actual evidence. Joe Biden, the video is clear.

34:52

Ahmaud Arbery was killed in cold blood. My heart goes out to his family. How do you know he was killed in cold blood?

34:59

How do you know that? It's time for a swift, full, and transparent investigation into his murder. I love swift justice, but the

35:07

Democrats seem to never want it when it comes to their side. They never called for swift justice with Hillary Clinton.

35:13

They tried to put every roadblock in the way of that. Time Magazine, Atlanta mayor calls

35:21

Ahmaud Arbery shooting a lynching and blames White House rhetoric for emboldening racists. So now it's Trump's fault and it's a lynching.

35:30

Here's a tweet I put out there. I'm gonna talk about this. I said, the entire country is losing jobs and civil liberties, but woke evangelicals like Costi Hinn, J .D.

35:38

Greer, and Russell Moore are virtue signaling about a shooting in Georgia before due process without complete evidence and with an unnecessary assumption of racism.

35:46

This isn't justice. And I stand by this tweet, guys. I've had some people upset at me for this, which is why

35:54

I wanna kind of address it. Let's start with J .D.

35:59

Greer's response here. J .D. Greer, this is just the tip of the iceberg. I'm sure a lot more.

36:05

I just found a few things with a little bit of digging. Our family is hurting with the news of Ahmaud Arbery.

36:11

Here's what we can do. And he puts out a video immediately. He says, part of our family is hurting right now. I know it's still an active case, but I know there are brothers and sisters that they fear these things.

36:20

They feel them differently. They just feel very personal. And it makes them ask, how long does these kinds of strife,

36:29

I'm reading his quote, questions stigmatizing a lot of the times go on. We pray for the end of this kind of injustice.

36:38

He retweets Justin Amash. Sadly, it took a video and public outcry just to get this far.

36:44

While we seek justice in this case, let's remember that millions of Americans continue to suffer injustices on account of race.

36:50

We must stop our, I think he meant our, our vigilantism in our communities and double standards in law enforcement.

36:58

This is sick. This is absolutely sick, what they're doing. He's talking about, they feel these things differently.

37:04

He's talking, in the context of the video, he's talking about African Americans. He's saying they feel things differently. They fear, they fear.

37:12

And look, it's systemic racism, just injustice. Millions of Americans suffer injustice, millions.

37:19

That's what he thinks. This is just one example of millions of Americans because of vigilantism and double standards in the law enforcement.

37:28

Let me ask you this, guys. What would cause someone in this particular demographic to be afraid?

37:36

Is it conditioning? Is it because they're told that if you run and you're black, that you're gonna get shot by white supremacists, possibly?

37:47

Or is it because of the actual facts of the case? It's because of conditioning.

37:53

That's so clear. And it is unfair, it is wrong to heap burdens, which is what they're doing.

37:59

They're putting a burden. During COVID -19, when we're all cooped up, you're telling, insinuating to African Americans that they can't go for a jog because you might be in danger of white supremacists coming out and shooting you.

38:13

Guys, this seems textbook racism to me. Racism against whites, I guess, that they're just so hateful.

38:21

They'll just shoot you for jogging. How about this? How about it's unsafe to break into a house and then suspiciously run and evade someone telling you to stop because they wanna talk to you.

38:38

Maybe that should be the message. That's the thing that is suspicious.

38:43

That's the thing you need to be careful of and don't do. That would be the takeaway. It'd be a helpful takeaway, it'd be a true takeaway.

38:51

But no, that's not what the president of the Southern Baptist Convention wants to do. This is where you start seeing the critical race theory being used as an analytical tool.

38:59

And they say, oh, that's not critical race theory. There's so many other things that, yeah, there's interest convergence and there's all,

39:05

I get that, guys. This is part of it. This is consistent with it.

39:11

You don't have to be a dyed -in -the -wool critical race theorist, but this is what critical race theorists will tell you. Their take will be the same exact take as J .D.

39:17

Greer on this. It will. It's systemic racism. And this is just an example.

39:24

And you don't need to know the motives. They don't have to say they're racist. You don't have to have any evidence that they're racist. They just are because that's part of the fabric.

39:30

And you'll find racism even on a McDonald's menu because it's everywhere. It's just part of our white supremacist society.

39:36

That's critical race theory. And that is exactly what J .D. Greer is doing. So we're already using it as an analytical tool and it's subverting

39:44

God's justice. I'll show you that in a minute. There's many examples of this.

39:49

I'm not gonna show you all of them, but check this out. Here's a letter to the Baptist state convention executives.

39:56

J .D. Greer put this out there. So this is going to the Southern Baptist Convention. The group asked state leaders to reach out to black pastors in their conventions to let them know you grieve with them.

40:06

Lament ongoing racial conflicts and disparities. See that word disparity there? With them.

40:13

And that you stand with them in this fight for justice and equity. Equity. Look up that word equity.

40:20

Not equality, equity. Letter to Baptist, this is a letter to the Baptist state convention executives obtained by the biblical recorder signed by J .D.

40:26

Greer, first vice president Marshall Osbery and second vice president

40:32

Noah Garcia. This is taking over your

40:37

Southern Baptist Convention. Literally taking it over right in front of your eyes.

40:45

Here's what Russell Moore said. Russell Moore's article, like it was so terrible. It was such, oh, the whole thing.

40:52

And I don't have time to, I'm just gonna read you a little bit. Here are his hot takes. Here's what he, you know, excerpts from the article that he put out on Twitter.

41:00

So we'll deal with those. The Bible tells us from the beginning, murder isn't just an assault on the person killed, but on the

41:06

God whose image he bears. Okay, he's right. The courts will decide whether the men who shot Ahmaud Arbery will be punished as murderers.

41:12

Pray that the courts are right and just in their verdict. Okay, there's nothing really wrong with that first tweet. Here's where he goes off the rails.

41:18

We must also remember many of our black and brown brothers and sisters were killed by mobs or individuals where there was no video to show anything.

41:26

Likewise, remember Jesus said nothing is covered up that will not be revealed or hidden that will not be known.

41:32

Okay, why are you injecting race into this, Russell Moore? There's no reason to. Why are you doing it? How do you know the outcome of this case wouldn't have been any different if it was a white guy breaking in?

41:43

Whatever is ruled in this case, he says, we know that the blood cries from the ground in countless matters of violence and bloodshed and God sees and knows.

41:51

That's a word of promise for those weary of seeing injustice done. Here's what Russell Moore's saying. Let's pray for a right verdict, but we know the right verdict because the blood cries from the ground.

42:00

This is just a pattern. He's saying this is what happens when you're black in America. And what verses does he use?

42:06

Well, he uses Genesis 4 .9, where is Abel your brother? Luke 12 .2, nothing is covered up that will not be revealed or hidden that will not be known.

42:13

Where's his biblical principles for justice? They're nowhere. This is just, it's Russell Moore's opinion when you read the piece.

42:20

He even, I mean, there's so many ridiculous things in this. I'm not gonna get into it, but just read the piece.

42:26

You'll see, I mean, he talks about the murder of Emmett Till and look, the sign that marks that this is where the murder took place.

42:35

It's got bullet holes in it. They had to replace it. Guys, I don't know if Moore's just a suburbanite, but to link this to the

42:43

Arbery case, I mean, it's a stretch anyway. You're injecting race. You're going full -fledged social justice war. You're saying this is all racism.

42:49

But secondly, I mean, look, I might be living my impoverished student suburbanite lifestyle right now, but there was a time growing up when

42:56

I used to do a lot of hunting and fishing and I used to go to a lot of rural areas and everywhere, including in upstate

43:02

New York where I grew up, everywhere you go in the country, there's bullet holes in the signs, just about.

43:08

If you're in an area where there's hunting and fishing, there's probably more bullet holes the farther south you go, just saying.

43:14

And it doesn't mean, because it's racist. It just means there's a sign in the country and there's bullet holes in it. So you have to assume that it has to be racist to shoot bullet holes in a sign marking out, this is the place where Emmett Till died.

43:27

Now, was the person, it could be one person. Doesn't mean it's systemic. But could whoever shot it be racist?

43:34

Yeah, it's possible. Do we know that? No, we don't. And this is the kind of, this is, look, this is resolution nine.

43:40

This is critical race theory. This is systemic racism when there's no evidence for it being applied to these situations.

43:50

Now, I got in a lot of trouble for this. And I'm gonna explain why.

43:55

One thing I've realized is that, I think for most of us, we've lost a lot of faith in the big pharma, if you wanna call it that, the government on various levels.

44:11

Now we've lost faith in many of our church, parachurch institutions, denominations, and the leaders that are leading them.

44:21

And it's more than most of us can take, to be quite honest with you. It's earth shattering to think that most of the authorities that we look to are not actually above board.

44:34

I get that. And when I said that Kosti Hinn was woke and that he's virtue signaling, along with J .D.

44:43

Greer and Russell Moore, I think that was a hard thing for some of us to take. Because if you went to G3 or you go to Shepherd's Conference or wherever conservative conference you go to,

44:57

Kosti Hinn was there. And Kosti Hinn says many good things and he's excellent on the word of faith movement, the prosperity gospel.

45:02

He's Benny Hinn's nephew. And look, I retweet Kosti Hinn. I appreciate Kosti Hinn, very much so.

45:10

But just because you're right on one thing doesn't make you right on everything. And that applies to me, by the way.

45:18

Don't believe it just because I said it, check it out. Make sure that what I'm saying, even in this video, go do your own research.

45:23

Don't just take my word for it. But I think we tend to platform heroes and we just really wanna believe in them.

45:33

We want something to cling to. Everything else seems to be falling in around us. And organizations that would platform them, we really...

45:38

Look, no one is above making a mistake, including myself. Okay? You just gotta realize this.

45:47

And it's good to realize it now. So I think it might've been better for me to ask the question.

45:52

I generally do that. If I'm trying to sort of lead down the garden path, you know, to get my audience to see, okay, here's a problem, let's take it to the next step.

46:04

What could be the outcome? I just sort of went ahead of all of that. And I just said, yeah, Kosti Hinn is woke.

46:09

And that was a little much for some to take. So I want to talk about this because Kosti did respond to me or go over his response.

46:19

But here's why I said what I said primarily. I have been hearing things about Kosti Hinn being woke for months now.

46:26

And I have not weighed in on any of that. I haven't done any research on any of that. I haven't... I've just been like, well, if it's true, it'll come to light.

46:34

Well, it came to light in this. And look, I'm not backing down from this because these are all...

46:40

And these are all public. It's not like I'm hearing this in private. These are all publicly said things. Here's what Kosti has said. Now, please lend me your ear if you're skeptical of this and just you decide.

46:49

And if I'm wrong, if I'm missing something, let me know about it. I want to know, I want to be corrected. And I'm not above apologizing if I get something wrong.

46:55

But here's the evidence I'm looking at. This is on the 6th. So it's the day after the video's made popular.

47:03

The video of the shooting. No one should ever die because the color of their skin. Period. Kosti Hinn.

47:11

On Twitter. What's the assumption there? It has everything to do with race.

47:17

It's motivated by skin color. The shooting. It didn't end there. He said later, about an hour and a half later, the same day,

47:26

I'm of the mind that we gotta be heartbroken and not ignore it. We gotta...

47:31

We can all at least say something. This is, honestly, this is where the virtue signaling comes in.

47:36

And this is why I said, look, you know, this only goes in one direction. Because if we don't say, well, we gotta say something against government overreach or about the

47:46

Michael Flynn case or any of the other shootings that have happened that haven't been used by the social justice warrior.

47:53

We don't say, well, we gotta say something. Usually we let people do what they want to do and talk about what they want to talk about.

47:58

But in this case, there's a bar that has to be met. If you wanna be a compassionate, heartbroken person, you gotta at least say something.

48:06

So he says, we can all at least say something. Let's be honest. It is what it looks like. So he's rendering judgment.

48:12

It is what it looks like. An unarmed black man was shot. So what's he assuming here? He's unarmed, which we've already said that's not true.

48:21

And race somehow motivated it. The fact that he's black is a significant factor here. There can be due process and investigation.

48:27

That's law. But man, no one should minimize this. So is it minimizing it for me then to point out the fact that he wasn't unarmed, he's fighting for a shotgun, and the fact that he was black doesn't necessarily have to factor into this.

48:42

Am I minimizing it? I'm not saying something. Does that mean I'm not heartbroken?

48:48

I'm ignoring it? That's the virtue signaling angle. But it doesn't stop there.

48:53

The next day, one of the great tragedies of the social justice war this past year is all the noise it creates that mutes opportunities to speak up.

49:02

Really, so, and I guess I'm part of this war. So really, have I muted opportunities to speak up? I don't think so.

49:08

I mean, I think I want people to speak up. If there's true injustice, I'm encouraging you now. I'll go on the record right now.

49:14

If there is true injustice, and I'll say this, if there is a racially motivated, white supremacist motivated murder that takes place or crime, then

49:22

I think you need to say something about it. If nothing's being said about it, nothing's being done about it, you need to say something about it, but boy, you better have your evidence.

49:28

You better know that that was the reason. Better have some, or at least a reason to highly suspect it, probable cause.

49:35

You shouldn't just go making false accusations. How's that? That would be the social justice war, right?

49:42

No one's saying that a true, authentic situation where racism is involved should not come to light. But he's saying, oh, that's what happened.

49:49

That's the casualty of the social justice war this past year, all the noise. I guess that's what we're doing here. We're just doing noise.

49:56

Mention racism, get called an SJW. White outrage, virtue signaling. Yeah, so if you mention racism, you're called an

50:03

SJW? No, no, no, no. We just think that racism doesn't know a skin color.

50:11

Racism, and by that, I mean the sin of partiality of thinking someone is less whatever, less worthwhile in some way because of their skin color.

50:23

They're not as important because of the melanin count of their skin. Yeah, that, that is wrong.

50:30

And I've said this before, I'll say it again, that is wrong. And for Kosti Hinn then to just say, well, anyone who mentions racism is gonna get called an

50:38

SJW, that's stupid. That's actually, you know what that is? That's accusing people like me and other conservatives who have been fighting this.

50:47

That's accusing us of wanting to hold back and he doesn't mention us by names, but it's the implication here is what people, what you're gonna, who's he talking about?

51:00

Who's he talking about? He's saying for those who are against social justice, we're holding back, we're somehow prohibiting or trying to stop real racism from being exposed.

51:13

It's disgusting to make that insinuation. This world don't need our camps.

51:20

It needs Jesus, get out, call it out. Ahmaud Arbery, so that's the virtue signal. You gotta call it out. Doesn't need our camps because I guess we're, we're a camp mob.

51:32

He takes me to the other, I think this is either a Facebook post, I think it's a Facebook post, might be a tweet.

51:39

He says, what if instead of popping off about social justice and acting like a camp mob, we just mourn with black brothers and sisters over the horrific tragedy that just took place and use this to highlight a serious issue that is ruining lives, be a light, hashtag

51:52

Ahmaud Arbery. So if you wanna be a light, if you wanna show that you're heartbroken and not ignore this, if you wanna call it out and shine a light on the racism, then you gotta put something out there.

52:05

You gotta talk about this. You can't be the camp mob, you don't wanna do that. You gotta mourn, you gotta show that you're mourning with your black brothers and sisters.

52:14

Why not just mourn with the family? Why not just mourn? Why not just, why does it have to be with black brothers and sisters?

52:21

You gotta mourn in the way Kosti Hinn wants you to mourn, in this particular way, this is the right way to mourn.

52:29

And it's a serious issue that is ruining lives. In the family or in the black community?

52:34

He just talked about the black community. This sounds like what J .D. Greer was retweeting from Justin Amash. It's just racism, it's systemic, it's in our country, it's ruining lives.

52:44

If you don't call it out, I guess you're not being a light. Guys, these are all, these four tweets, these four tweets or Facebook posts, these are all from Kosti Hinn, directly.

52:55

There's indirect stuff, I haven't even looked at all that. Here's one, Jesse Johnson wrote an article. Today I wrote about the killing of Ahmaud Arbery from the perspective of the question, what does the

53:02

Bible say about vigilantism, the sin of vigilantism? Now, I know probably a little more of who Jesse Johnson is just because I think

53:08

I had him for D -Lab when I was at Master's, at least he filled in. And I remember, back when

53:15

I was at Master's, he was an evangelism guy and then, I think it was CSUN, he was heading up that ministry and I remember visiting that.

53:23

I've had many conversations with him, but that was years ago. And so, I don't expect any of you guys to know who Jesse Johnson is, not many people do.

53:31

But he's, I'm just telling you, that's kind of the world he, he's not at Grace Community Church or Master's Seminar or any of that anymore, as far as I know.

53:38

I think he's pastoring in the D .C. area, last I heard. But he's going the whole vigilantism angle on this.

53:46

And Kosti Hinn, this is incredible perspective, well said. Guys, this wasn't vigilantism, they were within the law.

53:56

This is the thing, was it wise? No, I don't think it was wise. Would I have done it? No, I wouldn't have done it. I would have just called the police,

54:02

I think. That's probably what I would have done. But I don't know, I mean, I'll be honest, there's a story that I could tell you,

54:08

I don't wanna wax long about it. Years ago, I remember, there was a guy who hit our sign. We lived, my dad was in a parsonage, and there was a sign outside, it was on a church property, and it was like a drunk driver or something hits this sign.

54:25

And car is, anyway, he flees the scene. I went out, I got in my pickup truck, and I went after him, and I stopped him.

54:37

And I just questioned him, and I called the police, and I was trying to get him to wait till the police arrived.

54:42

And the police did arrive, and as it happened, he ran into the woods, they did a search party, they found him, and they had me identify him later.

54:51

There was another time when we had a problem on the same property with folks coming and doing drug deals, and there was one night, we had a little pop -up in our parking lot, and there was one night, it was like two in the morning, all of a sudden, it's kind of a comical situation, but my brother and some of his friends were sleeping out in this pop -up.

55:10

It was like a fun sleepover, camp -out kind of thing. And there was like maybe 15 or so teenagers throwing rocks at the pop -up at like two in the morning, and I get a call, there's people throwing rocks at us, and they were very afraid and everything.

55:25

And so I did not know what to think. I know there had been drug deals going down. I went outside to confront them, and I had a shotgun with me,

55:36

I did. And I don't apologize for that. Now, would I have gone to the extent of these guys getting in my truck and really chasing this guy down?

55:45

Probably not. With a shotgun, getting out of the truck with a shotgun, no. But I've been in similar situations where I don't know what's on the other end of the confrontation, and I wanna just be prepared.

55:57

I'm not gonna point it at them, but I wanna have it on me. And look,

56:03

I'm not a father yet, but some of you who are fathers

56:08

I think relate to this probably even more. That's the role that I think I have. I do need to protect.

56:13

It's not vigilantism. It's not vigilantism. And the police were called in both situations.

56:19

I called them. So at least in the second one I called them. I think in the first one

56:24

I told someone else to call. But to think that that's a vigilante move, no.

56:31

That's not a vigilante move to do that. You're actually trying to hold them. You're trying to get them to wait so that justice can take its course.

56:40

And there is something called a citizen's arrest. Anyway, not to wax too long, I probably did, but Kosti Hinn thinks, yeah, it's vigilantism.

56:48

Here's another tweet he liked. And look, I didn't do a huge deep dive. There's probably more. But Rachel Denhollander, let me offer an attorney's perspective.

56:56

This isn't self -defense, it's cold -blooded murder. And even if there was evidence he'd committed a crime which there is not, this meets no legal standard for self -defense.

57:02

So she knows that there's no evidence he committed a crime somehow. She magically knows this. And it's cold -blooded murder.

57:09

She just knows this. It isn't self -defense. Because I guess I'm Rachel Denhollander and I say so.

57:16

And Kosti Hinn likes this. Well, that's the reason that I said what

57:22

I said about Kosti Hinn. Now, people freaked out on me. Some people, how can you say that? Kosti Hinn is so right about the prosperity stuff.

57:28

And yeah, he is, but here's what I said. I'll read it to you. Look, guys, I don't hate Kosti Hinn one bit. I love what he's done against the prosperity gospel.

57:34

He's taking an anti -biblical stance on justice motivated by wokeness in this case. And I believe that. I'm sorry, but it's true.

57:41

I provided four recent examples from the last day on Twitter, and that only took about five minutes of digging. I've been skeptical of claims that Kosti is woke for the last few months.

57:49

He may not be characterized by it. Greer isn't completely characterized by it either. But they are, on a certain level, woke when they accept the it's racism interpretation of this.

57:58

That shouldn't be controversial. You can still like Kosti and support him. I retweet him too. Doesn't mean he's not wrong on this.

58:03

Even our heroes can get things wrong, including me. Scripture is the standard. And I totally, guys,

58:09

I stand behind that 100%. I hope if I'm wrong like this, and I publicly in multiple places make this error, and it subverts justice and it's anti -biblical,

58:20

I hope someone calls me out for it. Here's how Kosti responded to me. A few quick thoughts,

58:25

John, because I like Fred. There's a guy, Fred, who is in the comments here. And he says, so that's a slap in the face.

58:32

I'm gonna respond to you, John, but just because I like Fred. I'm not woke. The gospel is calling out racism.

58:38

It's repentance of sin and salvation through faith. So he's saying, yeah, the fact that I think that salvation is repentance and faith means

58:46

I'm not woke. So woke people, I guess to be woke, you have to believe the gospel is calling out racism.

58:52

That's not what woke means, guys. Number two, he says, I didn't like what I saw in the video. Black guy was targeted.

58:58

If you don't like my take, no worries, calm down. So that's the second slap in the face that I'm overreacting, calm down.

59:04

Well, I don't know, maybe falsely accusing people of racism when there isn't racism going on, or at least there's no evidence for racism going on.

59:11

Maybe that's kind of a bigger deal, guys. Maybe we shouldn't be calm when, and I'm gonna show you some other things that will make you realize why

59:19

I'm, maybe I'm not as calm as he thinks I should be. But look, here's the thing, here's the thing.

59:26

Kosti is not being calm. Kosti is saying we gotta call it out. Kosti's, I showed you the tweets, where he's saying we have to do

59:35

A, B, and C in reaction to this. Not in reaction to the Michael Flynn thing, not in reaction to our civil liberties being lost.

59:42

In fact, Kosti has put out tweets that say basically it's loving your neighbor to, you have to love your neighbor by not meeting.

59:48

So that's where Kosti is. But in this case, we gotta go do something. He's the one that's not calm on this.

59:56

And I pointed out, and I'm told calm down. Here's how I responded. I said, glad to hear brother. All the big evil woke guys say they believe in repentance and faith, which is true.

01:00:05

Wokeness is perceived awareness of alleged systemic injustice, like injecting motives of racism without evidence.

01:00:12

I hope you reconsider and calm down about racism when it's not substantiated. He probably didn't like that.

01:00:18

I don't know, but I, look, I'm open to talking to him. I'm open to talking to anyone.

01:00:24

I even texted someone who I know knows Kosti real well, and I'm like, am I on the right track here? But I've reviewed everything.

01:00:29

I haven't got a response back yet from that person. And I don't, I'm not seeing where I'm off on this.

01:00:36

Here's the definition of woke, by the way. Being aware of and actively attentive to important facts and issues, especially issues of racial and social justice.

01:00:46

And then there's in context. So it's not, if you believe in repentance and faith, doesn't mean you're not woke.

01:00:55

Now, I just wanna point out some things. Here's some things that these guys did not, were not up in arms about. And this is tip of the iceberg stuff.

01:01:02

But August 21st, 2018, Christian Bahena Rivera murders Molly Tibbetts. You remember this?

01:01:08

I just picked ones I knew of joggers. An illegal alien who has been living in the United States for four to seven years has been charged with a first degree murder in the death of 20 -year -old college student

01:01:17

Molly Tibbetts after she went missing in her small town in Brooklyn, Iowa. She was jogging, this guy murdered her.

01:01:23

And this case, actually, he hasn't even, I think he's gonna see trial this year. It's taken like two years for him to get to trial.

01:01:32

March 29th, 2019, George Rios murders jogger Carolina Cano. George Rios, 33, was deported from the

01:01:39

US, first in 2003 and then again in 2004, but snuck back across the border at some point after that.

01:01:45

They said surveillance video showed that Rios stalked Carolina Cano, 45, before she strangled her with a cell phone cord, raped and drowned her as she was out for an early morning jog in Jersey City's Lincoln Park on March 24th before he said.

01:01:57

So here's someone who's just taken a jog, murdered by an illegal immigrant. You remember those guys?

01:02:03

You remember the big evangelical guys saying, this is the bar we gotta set, we gotta go grieve, we gotta show that we're grieving.

01:02:10

This is systemic injustice and this happens. There's millions of Americans going through this. Illegal aliens are just ruining our, no, none of that, none of that.

01:02:20

And I don't think, I'm not saying illegal aliens are ruining our country. I'm just saying if you wanna compare apples with apples, that would be the kind of reaction.

01:02:29

Let me ask you a question about systemic racism. By the way, here's another one. I didn't put it on here, but it just came to my mind.

01:02:35

You remember there was a string last year of anti -Semitic attacks in New York City. And you remember how at first the media kind of came out and said, oh, anti -Semitic attacks, and then when it became clear that those who were committing the attacks were of a certain ethnicity, the media shut up about it?

01:02:53

You didn't hear anything from these, the woke evangelical guys about it either. Telling you, there are, the

01:03:00

Lord does not like unjust scales, weights and measures, and that's what we're seeing here. Systemic racism, here are the statistics derived from data submitted to the

01:03:13

FBI by more than 16 ,000 college and university, federal, state, city, county, and tribal agencies.

01:03:18

And I have the graph right there for you. You can look at it for yourself. This is the kind of stuff you gotta like, almost gotta go to the dark web to find it now, but it's a chart comparing black on white homicides to white on black homicides.

01:03:34

And I'll just tell you right now, the charts don't compare. If you wanted to say there's systemic racism, it would go in the opposite direction, in murder.

01:03:42

It would be more black people killing white people by a lot. FBI data shows that while 500 black on white killings and 229 white on black killings were reported in 2015, 2 ,574 homicides were committed by whites against other whites, and 2 ,380 by blacks against other blacks.

01:04:00

So by and large, people within their own communities kill each other. People that are white tend to kill white, people that are black tend to kill black.

01:04:07

But if you really wanna play this disparity game, the disparity exists in favor, or I said not to the advantage of whites.

01:04:15

Whites are killed by blacks more than blacks are killed by whites. And look, I hate even going over this because I don't care.

01:04:22

A murder's a murder, people are people, and who really cares what demographic is doing what?

01:04:28

But if we're gonna be accurate and we're gonna actually go to the data, it's the opposite of what the woke social justice warriors want us to believe.

01:04:36

This is from International Business Times. If you wanna check it out, white on black crime versus black on white crime. New statistics show more killings between races.

01:04:42

I believe this was 2016, which was the most updated information that I could find.

01:04:50

All right, I wanna show you some things here. These are some prayers of lament that went out.

01:04:56

And to show you how this is affecting the Southern Baptist Convention, take a look. The tragic case of Ahmaud Arbery.

01:05:03

And I know that for a lot of people in our church, especially our members of color, this is a very difficult and very fearful time.

01:05:10

And so I want you to hear me say something on behalf of the church.

01:05:16

And that is, we love you and we grieve with you and we lament with you that there still has to be this fear and this question of people being judged and stigmatized, discriminated against because of the color of their skin and violent reactions.

01:05:39

And we lament that and we're broken with you in that. We yearn for justice with you and we are praying for you in that.

01:05:47

We know that what it means to be a family is that we bear one another's burdens. And so as this case unfolds, as it unfolds, we want you to know that we stand with you and we yearn for justice right alongside of you.

01:06:00

And we want to be together in this and we wanna pray together.

01:06:07

We wanna pray that God will heal our broken society and that God will cause the gospel that begins in justice and then goes beyond that to mercy and love would shine especially bright during this time.

01:06:20

So can we bow our hearts as a church and we pray together for that? Father, we lament

01:06:27

God. We grieve the fear that some people have and even going outside and wondering,

01:06:35

God, what people are thinking or what they're gonna do. God, we feel those burdens of our brothers and sisters and God, we wanna stand alongside them like you would

01:06:46

Lord Jesus to take upon themselves those burdens. And we pray God for justice. In this case, we pray for God an end to this horrendous sin of racism, of discrimination.

01:07:01

And God, we pray that you would heal our society in a way that everybody from the unborn all the way through people of every different ethnicity and every different economic level would be recognized as image bearers.

01:07:17

So we hear a few things in that, that's from J .D. Greer, president of Southern Baptist Convention and that prayer and that setup that he said beforehand, he thinks it's racially motivated.

01:07:27

He believes in the holistic kind of womb to tomb pro -life and movement interpretation, that this is a pro -life issue just like abortion is a pro -life issue.

01:07:38

And we also hear him say that the gospel starts with justice in the context of Ahmaud Arbery.

01:07:43

So he's calling for justice in this case, assuming I guess we haven't, justice hasn't been served.

01:07:49

And so he's calling for justice and he said, well, that's where the gospel starts is justice. Right, right.

01:07:54

The gospel starts, actually the gospel starts with mercy, starts with love.

01:08:00

The justice is the law. The justice is what we talk about to get to the gospel, to get to the good news.

01:08:08

The justice isn't the good news. And that's the social justice interpretation right there.

01:08:16

Now, here's what James Merritt had to say. And I just cannot even in words tell you how grieved, how heartbroken, how angry, how frustrated

01:08:29

I was when I saw the video that I saw a few nights ago.

01:08:35

And as I saw that video, I thought to myself, that's not the America that we wanna be.

01:08:42

This is not the state that we wanna be. This is not the communities that we want to have. My heart goes out, especially to my

01:08:49

African -American brothers and sisters over the tragic situation that has unfolded down in South Georgia.

01:08:57

And it just reminded me again that Jesus is the only answer to any problem. It doesn't matter what it is, but even the race problem,

01:09:03

Jesus is the only answer. And on the one hand, I pray for God's justice to be done.

01:09:09

And thank God there is a God of justice and justice will prevail. On the other hand, my heart reaches out to the

01:09:17

Arbery family, especially to the mother on this Mother's Day. And I just pray

01:09:22

God's condolences and comfort on all of you and may what Satan meant for evil, may

01:09:28

God use it in some way, turn it into good. Now, he did a little bit better than J .D.

01:09:33

Greer. He links it to Mother's Day and the family, but of course he still assumes from the get -go that it's motivated by racism.

01:09:39

And I show you that to just show you, James Merritt's not considered as woke as like J .D. Greer, but here he is saying this.

01:09:47

This is getting into your average run -of -the -mill Southern Baptist churches, not just your quote -unquote, what we think of as woke

01:09:55

Southern Baptist churches. So this woke thinking is coming into everywhere and people that probably don't even understand what wokeness is, they're becoming woke on some level.

01:10:08

And let me show you one more just to show you how pervasive this is. We recognize, Lord, that this week many of us have seen terrible footage of even a young man out for a jog who was shot down by people in the neighborhood.

01:10:26

And we grieve the death of Ahmaud Arbery. We grieve for the entire situation.

01:10:33

We grieve with his mother who has lost a son and his father who has lost a son.

01:10:41

We grieve for the entire community, Lord. We just pray for truth and justice in this situation.

01:10:48

We don't know all the facts, but Lord, we do pray that you would work in this situation to bring truth and justice.

01:10:57

Along these lines, we pray for our country which has been so broken year after year, decade after decade, century after century, especially with the history of putting down those that don't look like the majority culture.

01:11:18

We think about our African American brothers and sisters, black men and black women that have been treated unfairly, been accused of things just because of the way that they look.

01:11:32

And we grieve with them and we call them your precious children created by you.

01:11:40

We ask that you guide us, Lord, to stand for truth and justice. We ask you that you guide us,

01:11:47

Lord, to lift up a government and elected officials that will stand for truth and justice.

01:11:55

So that is from a pastor who is a fairly recent graduate of the Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary where I went pastoring a small church.

01:12:03

And I just show you that to show you the fact that this stuff is getting out there. This acid cannot be contained.

01:12:09

And notice what he said at the end, praying for political figures so that they would implement what he thinks of as justice and forward that.

01:12:18

This is having political consequences already and it will continue to. And I said this a couple of years ago. I said, those who are graduating from places like Southeastern, they've been fed a woke narrative.

01:12:29

They've been fed this exaggerated and it really is critical race theory driven, this understanding of history that sees everything through race and cherry picks those things that fit the narrative of white oppression.

01:12:44

And then makes that, that's what American history is by definition. And that's, you know, exceptions prove the rule.

01:12:51

And of course we haven't progressed is the other part of that.

01:12:56

Any problems that there were have not been adequately addressed. This is critical race theory.

01:13:02

There's just no way around it. And it's already being used as an analytical tool. It's perverting the understanding of justice and it's happening everywhere.

01:13:11

And you don't, you may think that, oh yeah, J .D. Greer and Russell Moore, they're woke. Of course, you know, we all know that. Yeah, well, they're affecting a lot of people and a lot of other smaller churches.

01:13:19

Notice, you know, the praise team, you know, as he's talking about this, some of them nodding along and that's where we're going guys.

01:13:26

It's where we're going. And if you're in a position to speak out against this and you don't take it.

01:13:34

And I mean, I mean, not like a virtue signal speak out like you're actually in a church and you can say something about this kind of thing.

01:13:40

You can confront it and you don't take it. I wouldn't wanna be in your shoes. I really wouldn't.

01:13:46

This stuff has to stop. And it is creating division within the body. It's not healing anything.

01:13:52

It's just creating division. And it's subverting justice. How is it subverting justice, John? I'm glad you asked.

01:13:57

Let's talk about it. I wanna start with this. Samuel Say has a lot of good things to say.

01:14:04

Samuel Say is a blogger and he put out an article I just really appreciated. And he,

01:14:10

I don't even know if he's aware of all the things that I just talked about. But he seems to, like he thinks that this was a horrible situation, which

01:14:17

I do too. But he seems to think that the facts suggest that McMichaels are guilty of murder. And I don't think that's the case, but here's what he says.

01:14:24

Nevertheless, in incriminating as the video appears to be, I know it isn't wise and righteous to rush to judgment.

01:14:30

That is the basis for my blog after all. I named my blog after James119 because I strive to be quick to listen and slow to speak, quick to read and slow to write.

01:14:39

Be quick to listen, slow to speak. Yeah, let due process have its course, wait.

01:14:46

Many white people routinely fail to recognize the level of anxiety they burden black people with because of their idle and careless words about supposed racism.

01:14:55

I fear Travis and Greg McMichael and many careless people, white, black and all people have made some black people, especially young black people afraid to jog in peace.

01:15:04

And I'm glad he said this because to blow this thing up to the proportion that it's being blown up to is making a lot of people fear and it's unnecessary.

01:15:15

So let's go over some verses here. Let's talk about biblical justice. Innocent until proven guilty, right?

01:15:20

That's what we believe as in Western civilization at least. He who justifies the wicked and he who condemns the righteous, both of them alike are an abomination to the

01:15:29

Lord. Proverbs 17, 15. There are six things which the Lord hates. Yes, seven, which are an abomination to him.

01:15:34

Haughty eyes, a long tongue and hands that shed innocent blood. Proverbs 6, 16 through 17. Deuteronomy 19, 15 says this.

01:15:41

A single witness shall not rise up against a man on account of any iniquity or any sin which he has committed on the evidence of two or three witnesses.

01:15:48

A matter shall be confirmed. There's due process. There needs to be some level of investigation of some kind to determine are the wicked being justified?

01:15:59

Are the righteous being condemned? This is the part of the fabric of the society that we live in.

01:16:05

And these are biblical understandings. Now here's something, this is really important guys. Motive, motive.

01:16:11

We're being told the motive is white supremacy. The motive is racism. Let me give you the four motives for murder, for homicide in scripture.

01:16:20

Well, they're not even all homicides, for killing someone. Here are the motives. Defense. If the thief is caught while breaking in and is struck so that he dies, there will be no blood guiltiness on his account.

01:16:30

Exodus 22, two. So if it's self -defense, thief or even if it's a thief who's breaking in and you kill him, you're not guilty.

01:16:39

You go free. That would apply to this case where you have a guy who's attacked.

01:16:45

He attacked them first, punching him, trying to take a shotgun and he shot in the process.

01:16:51

That would seem to apply. Here's another area. Now maybe you say this applies. Well, here it is.

01:16:57

Accidents. Deuteronomy 19, five. He who strikes a man so that he dies shall surely be put to death.

01:17:02

But if he did not lie in wait for him, but God let him fall into his hand, then I will appoint you a place to which he may flee.

01:17:10

Exodus 21, 12 through 13. And then Deuteronomy 19, five says, as when a man goes into the forest with his friend to cut wood and his hand swings the ax to cut down the tree and the iron head slips off the handle and strikes his head so that he dies, he may flee to one of these cities and live.

01:17:25

These are the cities of refuge. So he can escape the avenger of blood if it's negligent, or I'm sorry, if it's an accident.

01:17:33

If it didn't mean for it to happen, someone died, but it's not my fault. There's an accident took place.

01:17:39

Here's another motive. So we have defense, we have accident, negligence. If however, an ox was previously in the habit of goring and its owner has been warned, yet he does not confine it and kills a man or a woman, the ox shall be stoned and its owner shall be put to death.

01:17:53

So if an ox gored someone and you didn't know the ox did that, that's an accident. If it happens a second time and you knew, you had knowledge that the ox could gore someone and you just didn't pin it up and it killed someone, that's negligence and you're killed, death penalty.

01:18:07

And then there's the fourth case, premeditated murder. If however, a man acts presumptuously towards his neighbor so as to kill him craftily, you are to take him even from my altar that he may die.

01:18:15

So even if he's in the temple, in the altar, kill him. Kill him because he's acted presumptuously towards his neighbor, he's premeditated murder.

01:18:24

Now, of these four motives, what's everyone saying? Which one are they saying is the motivation here?

01:18:34

They're saying it's premeditated murder. They meant to do it because of racism.

01:18:40

Now, which one is it actually, now that you know the facts, which one does it actually fit in? Accident, negligence or defense?

01:18:47

I'll let you answer that question. We're making a category error here. Now, here's the last question

01:18:54

I have. Where's hate crime in any of that? Where does it say, well, if it was a Canaanite and you killed him or better, we should probably pick a different group.

01:19:02

You kill a different ethnicity. If you killed an Egyptian or something like that, man, then poof, that's racism.

01:19:09

You kill someone from a member of another tribe of Israel, you kill a sojourner, oh man, that's gonna be worse for you, because that's a hate crime.

01:19:17

No, you don't see any category for hate crime. It's a sin to kill someone. Premeditated murder is a sin.

01:19:23

Negligence is a sin, and if it kills someone. Doesn't matter if they're red, black, yellow, blue, doesn't matter if you didn't like them for whatever reason that you may have chosen, the fact is you did it and that's what you're tried on.

01:19:35

You're not tried for thought crimes. The only motivation that matters is to what extent did you plan it?

01:19:43

To what extent did you plan it, or was there negligence involved? So for all these guys who talk about social justice, who are so up in arms about this situation, have they even bothered to think through what the

01:19:56

Bible says about murder and motive in murder? It doesn't appear that they have.

01:20:03

There is a true justice in social justice, ain't it, guys? So I hope this was helpful in explaining some things to you about this case, and I wanted to really use this case as an example of how the woke movement goes way wrong, way off.

01:20:17

They try to cover their footprint, say they're not woke in some cases, say this is just justice, even say it's part of the gospel, and it's way off in left field.

01:20:29

This isn't biblical at all. We need to completely reject it, and we need, I have compassion, even for guys like Kosti Hinn.

01:20:36

Look, this may be something he just got pulled into, and he got wrapped up in the emotions of the moment, but there's a certain level of condescension he has that's keeping him there, and I would just encourage those who know him and are close to him, and if he listens, reconsider this, please.

01:20:52

Some of you guys that I've even mentioned in this video, some of them do some really good work in other areas.

01:20:58

Don't be pulled into this. Don't be pulled into this. It's wrong. It subverts justice, so there you go.

01:21:04

That's how even critical race theory can be used as an analytical tool, and it's being used right here, at least aspects of it.

01:21:13

Critical race theorists wouldn't disagree with these takes, and I hope you can clearly see that.

01:21:18

Now, there's a lot more coming, guys. I keep saying that, but there really is. Please pray. Please pray for me. Please pray for just in general some of the projects

01:21:27

I'm part of. Pray for the enemies within the church, guys, because we got some things that we wanna put out there, and they could be potentially important.

01:21:39

And just pray for humility for those in evangelical institutions who

01:21:45

I think are tempted to support the institution and circle the wagons and support the guy that they're friends with.

01:21:53

Pray that truth would trump tribalism. That's what I'm praying for, and institutionalism.

01:22:00

Truth needs to be the thing that we're concerned about, guys. And so, anyways, I appreciate all your support.