Special: Arrested While Singing To God In Public

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September 24, 2020

Join us for the newest Apologia Radio. We speak to the recently arrested and released member of Christ Church, Gabe Rench. He and a few others were arrested while singing Psalms in downtown Moscow. Spread the word. It's time to fight.

00:01: Non -rockabotas must stop! I don't want to rock the boat, I want to sink it! Are you going to bark all day, little doggie?
00:11: Or are you going to bite? We're being delusional. Delusional? Delusional is okay in your world view.
00:16: I'm an animal. You don't chastise chickens for being delusional. You don't chastise pigs for being delusional. So you calling me delusional using your world view is perfectly okay.
00:24: It doesn't really hurt. Is he hung up on me? What? What? Desperate times call for faithful men and not for careful men.
00:38: The careful men come later and write the biographies of the faithful men, lauding them for their courage.
00:45: Go into all the world and make disciples. Not go into the world and make buddies. Not to make brosives. Don't go into the world and make homies.
00:53: Disciples. I got a bit of a jibble neck. That's a joke, pastor.
01:00: When we have the real message of truth, we cannot let somebody say they're speaking truth when they're not.
01:26: Behold my servant, whom I uphold. My chosen in whom my soul delights.
01:35: I have put my spirit upon him. He will bring forth justice to the nations. He will not cry aloud or lift up his voice or make it heard in the street.
01:44: A bruised reed he will not break and a faintly burning wick he will not quench. He will faithfully bring forth justice.
01:52: He will not grow faint or be discouraged till he has established justice in the earth and the coastlands wait for his law.
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03:31: But that's it, guys. So ApologiaStudios .com. Okay, very important episode. We have to get started today real quick, go fast.
03:38: Some of you guys see through the title here that we have a very important broadcast today.
03:44: It's a special. Title is Arrested While Singing to God in Public. Arrested While Singing to God in Public.
03:52: We have a very close relationship with Christ Church in Moscow, Idaho. And we love
04:00: Doug, Pastor Doug Wilson, Pastor Toby, the whole crew at CrossPolitik. Those are our very close friends.
04:06: We love them. We're brothers with them. And we are going to be doing a lot of fighting with them and have done fighting with them for the cause of truth.
04:15: Yesterday, Christ Church was in downtown Moscow, Idaho, and they were part of a very peaceful Christian protest.
04:23: And what did it consist of? Singing songs to Jesus Christ in downtown
04:31: Moscow. And our good friend, Gabe Wrench, was arrested alongside,
04:36: I believe, just two other members of Christ Church. Yes, and there's a bunch of citations as well. That's right, citations were given out as well.
04:42: And so we have Christians in America today, in a very conservative state,
04:48: Idaho's a conservative state, definitely a red state, arrested for singing songs to Jesus, apparently too close to one another, is what the case is,
04:59: I suppose. So we have our good friend Gabe Wrench on with us today. He's going to give us the details, let us know what's going on. I want to encourage everybody who's watching this right now, get to know
05:06: CrossPolitik, and get to make sure you share this episode as far and wide as you possibly can.
05:14: We need to let the world know what's going on. Apparently, if you're not singing songs to Marx and burning down the city, rioting and looting, if you're singing them to Jesus Christ, the king of all the earth, then you're going to get arrested for that, but not for burning down.
05:30: If they would have just sang songs to Marx and burned some stuff, they would have been just fine. Or they would have done it in the name of Black Lives Matter. Or they would have yelled, defund the police, or F the police, or something like that.
05:39: It would have been all good. So Gabe Wrench, CrossPolitik, what's up brother? Hey man, thanks for having me on.
05:46: My friend Andrew Clavin this morning texted me and said if you would have shot a cop, everything would have been okay. Apparently, that is the world that we live in right now.
05:57: You can host weddings. You can participate in weddings as the mayor of Moscow with no face mask and no adequate social distancing.
06:06: You can protest downtown Moscow, the police. You can talk about defunding the police. You can hate on the police and not be arrested.
06:12: And your day will be smooth. But if you sing songs to Jesus like Christchurch did, you get the risk of arrest.
06:19: Yep. What's amazing about this whole order, so the mayor signed this resolution basically telling everybody that you have to wear a mask where you can't social distance.
06:30: And that started back in August. And then they voted on Monday.
06:37: So this is kind of what kicked off the second round of Psalm Sings for Us. The city council voted on Monday to extend that resolution through January 5th.
06:45: I mean it's just unbelievable that they did that. And that's just in Moscow, right?
06:51: That's not in all of Idaho? That's just in our county. So we live in, just to give you a little geography of Idaho, we're in Latok County, we're in northern
07:01: Idaho. We're one of only two counties that vote liberal here in the state. And so we have a very, the direction, the way the wind's blowing, everything's liberal.
07:11: Even some of the people who call themselves conservative in town are actually liberal. And so when they extended the resolution on Monday night,
07:20: I mean guys, everybody that went to that city council meeting was against the resolution and spoke out against the resolution except for two people.
07:28: They had hours of testimony from citizens that were against extending the resolution and only two people for it.
07:34: And so they aren't listening to the community. No. It's very tone deaf. It's unbelievable they're not representing their community.
07:41: Right. And so when they extended that resolution, our elders on Tuesday said, well, we should,
07:47: I guess, let's do another song thing on Wednesday. So we got it organized on Tuesday. It went out on social media.
07:52: That morning I emailed Chief Fry. So Chief Fry, he's our police chief here in the
07:57: Moscow PD, Moscow Police Department. I know him. We've had him on the show.
08:03: I've met with his office. I have a good relationship with him. He's a Christian man.
08:08: And I emailed him Tuesday morning when that resolution extended through January 5th, the night before, happened.
08:14: And I emailed him Tuesday morning and said, don't be a Peter and run away. Be a Daniel in this.
08:20: And this is your Daniel moment. And sure enough, God gave the opportunity when we did the song thing on Wednesday at 445 and it was at our city hall.
08:31: That's where the song thing was at. So we all walked over to the city hall. And when we did that song thing, he was there and pooched it.
08:40: Wow. So they put out those circles, right, when they knew you were coming. Is that how that kind of went on, went down?
08:48: Yeah. So the circles were there already before because city council meetings had been so contagious.
08:55: There's a bunch of people showing up and speaking out against the city council and all this. So they put the circles out already before that.
09:02: But what they did on Wednesday, they had gotten all the cars out of the parking lot.
09:08: They'd put up signs to not let any cars come in the parking lot. They were basically trying to give us every reason to social distance is what they were trying to do.
09:16: And then they had painted circles throughout the parking lot.
09:22: I mean, I don't know. I should pull a public record request on how much it costs to paint these stupid circles on the sidewalk or the parking lot.
09:29: And so they had six foot circles that are six feet apart. So they could also demonstrate that you deserve to be written up.
09:36: You deserve a citation because we have the measurements here on the concrete and we can see you aren't social distancing.
09:42: And so when we all started, you know, it's just funny watching all these, the whole crowd is about 150, 200 people.
09:48: And they just kind of came from all over town, parked and walking and everything. As we're all kind of walking up, the cops told
09:54: Pastor Wilson, hey, if no one's social distancing and not wearing a mask, then we will give people citations or possibly arrest.
10:00: And so, Doug, before we started our first psalm, Doug said that. He said he basically relayed the police's information to us.
10:08: And no one really moved. Everyone just kind of stayed. You got about 150, 200 people just stayed there.
10:16: No one really split up or social distance. And then we started singing.
10:21: And I was on the edge of the crowd. I was closest to the cops. I wasn't singled out. This isn't any sort of singling out thing beyond they're singling out my church and worship and First Amendment principles.
10:32: But they came up to me and asked my mom. My mom was standing to the right of me.
10:37: They asked my mom, are you with this man? My mom said, yes, this is my son. So my mom was like, this is my son. She grabs my arm.
10:44: And then the guy next to me was Tyler, my good friend Tyler. I put my arm around Tyler and I said, but this is my friend.
10:53: And so when I did that, the cop said, well, I need to see your I .D. And so my response to him was, you don't need to do this.
11:03: And then he said, please give me your I .D. And I said, officer, you don't need to do this. You're bigger than this.
11:08: You know the truth here. And then he said, I need to see your I .D. And I said, officer, you need to be out here for the citizens, protecting our constitutional rights to worship and not, you know, enforcing the mayor's edict.
11:21: And he said, I don't want to arrest you. And so I basically just kind of ignored what he was saying because,
11:31: I mean, it was a mute point. And so I just used that moment to kind of preach at him. I was like, you don't need to do this, don't need to do this.
11:37: And then he said one more time, if you don't give me your driver's license, I will arrest you.
11:44: And so I said, you don't need to do this. And you know better. You know better than that. And so he started cuffing me to the noise, to the beautiful singing of Amazing Grace.
11:54: That's right. You hear the handcuffs clicking on as my people are singing
12:01: Amazing Grace in the background. It was a pretty powerful moment. It was. Go ahead.
12:07: Well, I was going to let everyone see that, Gabriel, fast, and have you finish the story so you can sort of explain what happened afterwards. So here is the footage of that actually happening yesterday downtown.
12:16: He comes from heaven above us. And in the strength of glory.
12:28: Trust in chariots and others trust in horses. But we recall the
12:36: Lord our God. Strong past our own resources. Our enemies have fallen low.
12:44: But we are held in awe. So save us,
12:50: Lord, our God in need. As we in trouble call thee. As we in trouble call thee.
13:06: Yeah, I'm going to do it for this patrol car here. Didn't see this happening for BLM, Gabe.
13:14: It's unbelievable. Isn't that weird? Hey, just give us a little space, will you please? You guys should not be doing this.
13:24: And doing this kind of crap for the mayor. This is embarrassing. You guys are stronger than this.
13:30: You shouldn't be doing this. You guys are tough people. You're a cop.
13:39: All right. So there was that video right there. I love how the cop had to take the hymnal from you.
13:48: That's great. I just caught that. I didn't see that yesterday. Yes. Oh, my goodness. I was booked in jail, and they took my hymnal.
13:57: They gave it back to me as I'm leaving the courthouse. It was fantastic. That's great. Well, that's good.
14:03: Okay, so Gabe, what took place? Obviously, you get arrested. There were more people that were arrested there.
14:09: And so what happened as you got booked? How did this all end up? Yeah. So my friend
14:16: Sean and Rachel also got arrested. Wonderful couple. Pretty crazy moment for them also. And so they put me in the back of the police car, and they take me to the county jail.
14:28: And so both the deputies are involved in this situation, and the Moskopedi are involved.
14:33: The deputies booked me and put me in jail. The Moskopedi brought me to the county jail. And on the way to the county jail, you know, it's only three minutes away.
14:41: It's not very far. I'm just talking to the cop the whole time. I'm like, you know, this is unconstitutional. I have First Amendment rights.
14:46: I'm just preaching to him. I know he's not really listening. But just, you know, hey, man, I'm paying for a citation here.
14:52: I'm paying for a court date. So I'm going to use my money wisely here, and I'm going to preach to everybody I can. So we get to the county courthouse, and I'm getting out of the cop car.
15:02: And I just said, just so you know, I also have a medical exemption in all this. Right.
15:08: And you never asked. And I do. According to that resolution, according to the Moscow, the local
15:13: Moscow resolution, I have a medical exemption. I'm deaf in one ear. Deaf people don't have to wear a mask. And he's like, well,
15:18: I'll put that in the paperwork. Well. And so there's an unlawful arrest. Right. And then they book me.
15:25: I'm in jail for about two hours. You know, they're going through their process. And as they're releasing me,
15:30: Sean came in to – Sean later followed me in jail. And so me and Sean were singing psalms, praying, just having – it was actually a glorious moment in prison.
15:39: You know, this was no real Pauline crazy persecution. It was persecution light.
15:45: But it was still a glorious moment in jail with my buddy Sean. And so as they're releasing me –
15:51: I would say this is probably one of the most egregious, crazy parts about all this. They're releasing me. I'm sitting down.
15:56: They're taking my information. And I look across the hallway into another office.
16:02: And two deputies – there's three deputies in the room. And two of them are wearing no mask and not social distancing.
16:08: And as I'm leaving, I walked over. I walked right into the office. I said, hey, officer, you need to arrest these deputies.
16:15: They aren't social distancing, and they aren't wearing a mask. Officer, arrest them. And the officer told me – he's like, just go.
16:24: Just get out of here. Don't call out our hypocrisy. Leave. Yeah, exactly. And I said, no, you need to arrest them.
16:32: They're not social distancing. They're not, you know, wearing a face mask. You need to arrest them. So they basically – they didn't physically force me out, but they really pushed me out of the building.
16:40: Yeah. It was just an awkward and funny moment in it all. Oh, man. Well, hey,
16:46: I'm grateful to God. And you're right. I mean, this could be seen as persecution light, in a sense. But it's all meaningful because all tyranny, all major persecution, begins in seed form.
16:57: And here's a moment where you have Christians in this country who are protected by the Constitution.
17:03: It gives us the privilege, they think, the right before God to worship
17:08: God. It gives us the ability to practice our religion and to practice it in public.
17:14: And a key part of our religion is this, and it's you shall not lie. Thou shalt not lie. And you guys brought this up last night in your podcast, although it was very, very important.
17:22: The demand of the government for me to pretend like I'm sick and to lie about being sick is sinful.
17:29: There's a religious exemption there. And also in terms of the standard of God's law and how quarantine laws are supposed to work, this is a violation of God's standards of quarantine law.
17:39: So there's religious exemption across the board here. And then you have a medical exemption that is permitted within the order itself.
17:47: I had the same situation, actually, Gabe, happen to me fairly recently. I've just been going everywhere, of course, without a mask on.
17:53: And sometimes in Phoenix, I'm the only person in the entire store that didn't have a mask on. But I was told
17:59: I couldn't eat at a place because I didn't have a mask on. And I said, well, I have a medical exemption.
18:06: And I said, are you following the governor's directives here? And she said, yes,
18:11: I am. So you have to have a mask on. I said, well, if you're following what the governor said, I have a medical exemption, as well as a religious one.
18:19: But I have a medical exemption, so I don't have to do it. If you're going to follow the governor's directive, then I don't have to wear it.
18:24: And she said, no, you have to get out. And so there's an arbitrary application of all of these standards.
18:31: It doesn't make any sense. And, of course, you have the right not to wear one, but you are arrested anyways without even asking any questions.
18:39: And I want this to come out because you guys brought this up yesterday, and I thought it was a critical part of the whole entire argument in terms of the injustice here against Christians, who are the peaceful ones, the actual supporters of the police department.
18:52: You've got Black Lives Matter and protests against the police, defund the police protests that actually fairly recently happened in Moscow, Idaho, correct?
19:02: Yeah, in July. Three different Black Lives Matter protests happened in July under the governor's resolution, which there's some level of they were disobeying the governor's resolution.
19:18: But at the same time, they got a city permit to do their Black Lives Matter protests in downtown.
19:25: It's real awkward. And the whole partiality in all this, I think whenever you have petty law like this, it's impossible to actually enforce it without partiality.
19:38: But what's even more egregious on this is our own mayor on September 2nd was at a gathering of more than 50 people, not wearing a mask, not social distancing.
19:47: And then he did a wedding. He officiated a wedding on September 5th without a mask and without social distancing.
19:56: So here I am at a worship service and at City Hall, and I get arrested and the mayor doesn't get arrested.
20:04: Here I am at City Hall at a worship service, a First Amendment right. It's unbelievable.
20:10: First Amendment right. And the deputies at the county jail are not social distancing and not wearing masks.
20:16: Of course. It's absolutely maddening. It's completely arbitrary. It's completely unjust.
20:21: And Christians ought to care about things that are unjust and arbitrary because we believe in the Word of God as the objective standard of all truth.
20:27: We have a God who's told us what is just, what is righteous, and actually what the role of government is and the boundaries of government.
20:34: And so we ought to care about these things. Christianity is a comprehensive view of reality.
20:40: It's a comprehensive worldview. We should care about these. By the way, take a look real fast at my screen here.
20:46: This is an actual photograph of the wedding that Gabe is referencing there with the mayor of Moscow from Gabe's page.
20:54: And so I thought it'd be important to see that. I don't see appropriate social distancing going on there, but he's not the one who was put in cuffs yesterday.
21:00: But apparently if you're downtown singing with Christchurch, a little too close, that is worthy of arrest in the city of Moscow right now.
21:07: Okay, let me ask you, Gabe, because I know your time is short here. We're going to play some more videos when we get off with you, and I'm sure we'll have you on again soon to talk about this.
21:13: Gabe, I need you to tell us from a Christian perspective, why in the world wouldn't you just yield?
21:21: Why in the world you're out there singing songs of Jesus, but the police come and they say stop.
21:26: They don't like how close you are. It's totally arbitrary, I understand. But Gabe, why don't you just yield?
21:34: Yeah, there's a number of answers to that. I'll give you two. First of all, if you yield in a worship service to wearing a mask or social distancing, you're saying that the government has authority over the church, and that is false.
21:47: That is not true. That is not true constitutionally, and that is not true in the Bible. Jesus is king, he's king of kings, lord of lords, and the
21:54: Constitution also restricts the government making any laws or restrictions or regulations against religious worship services, against churches.
22:03: And so there's a constitutional and biblical argument on why wearing a mask is giving into the lie that the government has some sort of authority over the church.
22:13: Secondly, and practically in all this, there's no pandemic here in our county at all, period, zero, zilch.
22:20: No one's been hospitalized and no one's died to this virus, zero. Define me a pandemic where no one's died and no one's been hospitalized.
22:29: You can't. You can't. There's no emergency definition that you can come up with to define this as a pandemic.
22:36: And so you brought this up already, Jeff, but we've believed a lie, and then now we want everyone to pretend the emperor has clothes on.
22:47: And so Christians have a duty, whether it's a small lie, a big lie, and this is actually a big lie.
22:52: This is not a small lie. You need to wear a mask because of the pandemic. That's a big lie.
22:58: And so we as Christians have a duty to lead our culture against lies and the effects of the devil, and we are not doing that.
23:04: I mean, how many pastors are standing up besides John MacArthur and a couple pastors here and there nationwide?
23:11: Not very many. You can probably count on a handful of the pastors that you can trust in a foxhole right now. Yeah. That's right.
23:18: You know, it's interesting. You guys said on your podcast last night, I encourage you guys all to go check it out over at CrossPolitik.
23:24: Obviously, emotions were strong and I think worthy and good.
23:30: It was a great episode last night. It was phenomenal. They came fresh out of the arrest situation.
23:36: Gabe came into the studio and said he got to talk about some of that stuff. Very powerful stuff. One of the things that Pastor Toby had said yesterday was that knowing
23:45: Jesus makes free people, knowing Jesus saves people so that they actually have the spiritual divine gift of self -control.
23:56: And so when you have people who know Jesus, they're under his rule, they are a self -controlled population, they are a self -governing population.
24:03: So when you kick Jesus out of your culture, now you have people who have no self -control. Who steps in to actually maximize the control of a culture?
24:12: Well, it's government. They'll do it in unjust ways and irresponsible ways and irrational ways and completely arbitrary ways.
24:19: And so I think what's important for us as Christians in the midst of all of this is to actually face some of this stuff down with boldness and courage.
24:27: Speaking of, coming soon is the Fight, Laugh, Feast conference.
24:34: It's going to be in Franklin, Tennessee. It was supposed to be in Nashville, Tennessee. Franklin, Tennessee.
24:41: So Fight, Laugh, Feast. And you can see that they mean it when they say it in Moscow, fight. It's important for us to make sure that we're standing up for righteousness in a culture and justice.
24:51: So real fast, Gabe, let's get everyone to the conference. Tell everyone what's happening, how to get there. Yeah, make sure we actually can't take sign -ups anymore.
24:59: We're more than full. We've overfilled past demand. And so club members can livestream.
25:06: So anybody can sign up for a club membership and livestream. Livestream Jeff Durbin, Pastor Doug Wilson, Glenn Sunshine, Rod Martin.
25:13: So it's going to be a great time. The conference actually kicks off with a psalm sing, which is what I got arrested for last night.
25:19: And I can't wait to fellowship and hang out with everybody and just get into a crowd that wants to fight and wants to love
25:26: Jesus and wants the gospel to take over the world. I also want to make sure I invite everybody to a psalm sing tomorrow night at 5 o 'clock at City Hall here in Moscow, Idaho.
25:34: So please, if you're around the area, if you're in driving distance, get down here. I'd love to have 1 ,000 people at City Hall singing psalms to Jesus.
25:41: Woo! I love it. No, you need to do it. And there's two things happening in Moscow here with the psalm singing.
25:46: One, they're both legitimate. It's worship of our God. Two, it's peaceful protest.
25:55: And singing psalms is warfare, baby. So it needs to be done. And Paul says it's not against flesh and blood.
26:02: That's right. That's right. So, Gabe, I love you, brother. Proud of you. And I'm grateful to God for your stand. And looking forward to see the faithfulness of Christ Church, you, other members,
26:12: CrossPolitik, our boys. Tell everyone we said hi. And we're looking forward to seeing them next week. Hey, man, love you guys.
26:18: Thank you. Hey, bro, you can't see me, but your show last night inspired me to wear my rowdy Christian media shirt.
26:26: Awesome, man. I got you. And we will have a booth. Jeff will be speaking. I know Gabe mentioned that.
26:31: And we'll have an End Abortion Now booth at the conference. So come and say hi if you're coming to that conference.
26:37: But we'll be there anyway. So if you guys can't get tickets, definitely do what Gabe said. Make sure you guys live stream that.
26:42: Take a look at everything going on. Great speakers. Important stuff we're talking about. And Gabe, real fast, have you left yet? Nope, I'm here.
26:48: Okay. So I think with the message that I was trying to contemplate, like why did Gabe give me this message?
26:54: I think it's a great message. But it's something I would probably do over three. I was like he either hates me or he knows that if he split it into three,
27:04: I'd probably go for like hours. So he's like I'll make this where Jeff has to like squeeze. He has to condense.
27:09: You got 60 minutes, man. 60 minutes. He has to condense. I think the title is how Van Til would take down BLM, LGBT, and abortion.
27:20: Only 60 minutes? 60 minutes. You better have an air horn ready, Gabe. Yeah, exactly. I'm excited to do it, man.
27:27: I'm actually working on it, so I'm excited. Good. Man, yeah, we put that together. We know that's your lane, and we want to hear from you, man.
27:36: Good, brother. All right, man, love you, dude. I'll see you next week. All right, guys, love you. Later. Later. All right. Hey, everybody,
27:41: I want to show you more. I got more video. Gabe was short on time, so we weren't able to keep him on. We'd like to keep him on the whole time, but I wanted to show you some more video.
27:50: So I'll do it this way. This is a little gentler version. So here are two of the other members of Christchurch.
27:56: This was their interaction with the police. I won't play all of it because it is three minutes long. It's a little longer.
28:03: So this was two of the other members. There was just three arrested. Others were cited. If you see this couple, they're the most gentle -looking, gracious couple ever, and they're the ones being arrested.
28:15: So here you go. Here's the content. So you got all these people, you know, close together here, worshiping
29:05: Jesus, and here's the part where they get arrested. Why pick out these two people?
29:13: They look rowdy. They look like they're just up to no good. Singing the doxology, baby.
29:23: That's a powerful moment right there. You can tell that, like, these
29:30: Moscowites are used to this sort of thing because they're not even phased by it. Not even phased. They just keep singing like nothing's going down.
29:35: Good to go. They're focused on Jesus right there. Look at that. Singing the doxology while getting cuffs on. That's got to be, like, a pretty cool milestone in your life because, you know what
29:43: I mean? If somebody were to say to me, like, what would the context, what would you want it to look like if you were going to be arrested? I'd be like,
29:49: I'd love to go out singing the doxology. It's great. Pray for this young couple.
29:54: I can't remember their names. I know Gabe was saying that they weren't handling it as well as he was.
30:01: You can tell she looks pretty terrified. Yeah, it's hard. You know, it gets real when people put cuffs on you.
30:07: My goodness. Look, there's Merkel. That's right. My son, August, because at the end of church, we do the doxology at Apologia Church always, and everyone comes and raises their hands to do the doxology.
30:18: And so that's what he's been raised in since he was born last December. And so now when we go to the front of church, he has his hand up.
30:25: He's only nine months old, and he puts his hand up for the doxology and for the other songs because he sees everyone doing it.
30:30: So he loves it. Well, I wanted to show you that. That moment is, you know, they're all singing to Jesus.
30:39: Obviously, it's an intense situation. Nobody knows what's going to happen exactly. Gabe's arrested. This brother and sister are arrested.
30:47: And then I think when they cart Gabe off, that is where our boy
30:52: Darren Doan has some words. So you see here is going to be Chocolate Knox, and Darren Doan have words for the police.
31:02: And you should see this. I was going to say, if you go to their episode they did last night, like emergency episode they call it or something, there's another video between what we just showed you and between this one that they play on the show.
31:15: But I think it was Darren's raw footage that he's using for something else, so I don't think it's up anywhere. But there's a lot more going on there.
31:21: You guys need to check that out if you haven't seen it. All right, so this is the conflict after Gabe is taken off. This is Darren Doan and Chocolate Knox interacting with the police.
31:28: And I think you should listen to what's being said. I just want to sort of prepare you for this. Christchurch has the
31:36: City of Moscow Police Department. They have their back. They've encouraged them.
31:42: They've sent encouraging messages to them during this whole pandemic and rioting and looting and all the rest.
31:49: They've told them that we're here to encourage you, to bless you. When there was defund the police stuff going on,
31:55: Christchurch was making sure the police knew that we love you guys, we want to encourage you, we want to support you.
32:00: And now that same police department is taking away members of Christchurch for a completely arbitrary reason and for something that is not ultimately just in terms of an arrest and punishment.
32:13: And so this is an intense moment, but I think it's righteous anger. Everybody here backed you up when they said defund you.
32:24: And everybody came here to back you up. And you didn't arrest anybody over there.
32:30: You did nothing while they said defund you. And everybody here would back you up.
32:36: Everybody here would take a bullet for any of you. And everybody there that wanted you dead, that wanted you defunded, you didn't do anything.
32:45: My wife called you guys and said we had your back. We were with you.
32:50: Who's got your back? Everybody here. You crossed the line today. You crossed the line today.
32:58: You broke your oath. You're oath breakers. That's Aaron Wrench, by the way, the basemouth.
33:06: The basemouth. Gave his brother, you can shroom. What do you call him?
33:13: He's your favorite wrench? He's my favorite wrench. I love Gabe. I love Aaron. They're both awesome. It's an intense moment and an important moment.
33:22: What's difficult, obviously, for everyone to wrap their minds around here is how we can have riots and looting taking place across the entire country.
33:30: You can have people standing side by side together doing protests for Black Lives Matter, for Karl Marx, for all that they are doing.
33:41: That's called peaceful protest. And we say, guys, we really understand. You have a First Amendment protected speech right.
33:49: You have the right to gather, peacefully protest, all that. So you're allowed to do these things even in the midst of a pandemic.
33:54: But as soon as you have the same city that there was just defund the police and BLM protests in, as soon as you have
34:01: Christchurch, people singing songs to Jesus outside of City Hall in Moscow, Idaho, that's where you start seeing people getting citations and arrests.
34:11: Obviously, it's unjust. And obviously, we need to start caring as Christians. Because listen, here's the deal. If this can happen, and by the way, we love
34:19: Moscow, Idaho. Whenever I get a chance to go up there to film stuff with them, to speak with Doug, or whatever the case may be, they're like family to us.
34:27: Moscow feels like a second home in many ways to us because we go there and we know our way around. We get to stay at Darren's house most of the time.
34:34: It really is like family. You've got to understand, and Gabe's right, Moscow, Idaho, very conservative area, but at the same time is right next to the
34:44: University of Idaho, which is hyper -liberal. Liberal.
34:49: Maybe that too. Yeah, hyper -liberal and just dramatic in the sense of the commitments that they have and the worldview that they have and its opposition to the
35:00: Christian worldview. So it's a weird area because sometimes you're there and you're like, man, does Christchurch own this whole town?
35:06: They own the great businesses on Main Street. They own businesses all over town. You run into Christchurch members all over town.
35:13: You see the impact that church is having for the glory of God on their city and then globally. And sometimes you're like, man, this place,
35:19: Christchurch is doing it right, right? But there's this other segment of Moscow that is very liberal, leftist, unbelieving, radical.
35:30: So you see those two communities coming into collision quite a lot. And there's
35:36: Washington State right across 10 miles away. It's just right there. Yeah, it's right on the edge there.
35:41: And Pullman, yeah. Pullman, yeah. And so knowing the context of the area, you can see it's obvious.
35:47: It's obvious that the government and police department in Moscow, Idaho is really siding with a more leftist, destructive ideology in terms of what will be permitted within the city limits.
36:02: But what is apparently not permitted is worshiping Jesus too closely together.
36:08: And it is interesting too. We talk about government. In America, you can thank God for the
36:13: Christian worldview for the formal government that was supposed to be operating and is supposed to be operating today.
36:19: You should thank the Christian worldview for that, the checks and balances, representative government, understanding that, look, we have
36:25: Jesus. He's the king. We don't need another king. There's no king but Christ, that sort of a thing. There's a context that gave us this nation, and it's a
36:32: Christian context. It's a biblical context. Thank God for the Scottish covenanters who helped create this country, the
36:38: Puritans, the biblical worldview, those post -millennialist baby. They did a good job. It wasn't perfection.
36:44: It wasn't a utopia. But what was good was definitely good because it was from God's word. But when we hear about representative government, it means that from a
36:53: Christian perspective, that the government is supposed to be under God first and foremost, but it's supposed to represent the will of the people.
37:01: It's supposed to represent the will of the people. And you actually see this happening across the country, not just in Moscow. You have people knowing the data, knowing the statistics, knowing the facts, and in a place like Moscow, not one death from COVID.
37:15: Not one death. Not one death. And yet these people are having their businesses and livelihoods destroyed in many cases, and they're being told to pretend like they're sick 24 hours a day in public, even when worshiping
37:31: Jesus, singing songs, which is a constitutionally protected right, and they're doing it in public outside.
37:39: It wasn't even indoors. It was outside. And then they arbitrarily pluck certain people out.
37:45: You've got Gabe and the sweet Christian couple they pull out. Totally arbitrary. Totally nonsense. But what's interesting here is that you've got people, like Gabe said, going to the city council, and you've got the weight of the community saying, hey, stop.
38:00: The face mask thing, we know what the CDC says about it. This isn't doing what you're saying it's doing.
38:06: You're going to make us wear this until January of 2021? So the community comes out in opposition. It's supposed to be a representative government.
38:14: It's supposed to be a representative government. And this is what I'm getting to here, guys, is this. World view matters.
38:21: Nobody is neutral. Nobody's neutral. Nobody is neutral. Everybody has pre -commitments.
38:26: And watch this. Check this out. Do you want to hear the proof? Do you want to hear the absolute proof, undeniable proof, that everybody understands this and nobody is neutral?
38:37: What's all the fuss right now about the Supreme Court seat? Why are leftists, radical leftists, and unbelievers, and the liberals on this side over here, why are they freaking out so much about a
38:49: Supreme Court seat? Because wait a second, I thought it's just a nation of laws, right? Isn't it just justice?
38:56: Isn't it just, well, we have case law and we have laws. Does it matter? Like, if you're supposed to watch, if it's equal weights and measures, right, and justice is blind, then what's it matter who's sitting in that seat?
39:09: Justice is blind. Ah, because we all understand, and leftists understand it too, that world views matter, that nobody's neutral.
39:19: You cannot be neutral. And they know if you put a butt into a seat belonging to a human being in this world, they're going to own a worldview.
39:29: They're going to have a perspective through which they filter facts and they decipher issues of justice.
39:36: Nobody's neutral. And you have to understand, in the situation we're in right now, even with the
39:42: Supreme Court seats, everybody understands. Neutrality is a myth. It's a myth.
39:48: That's why everyone's freaking out about whose butt's in that seat, because neutrality is a myth. And here's the point.
39:53: Why say all this? Because worldview matters. And my challenge to all of us as Christians is just that.
39:59: Worldviews matter. And so that means that if you hold to the Christian worldview, if you're submitted to Jesus Christ as King, Lord, and Savior, and you're saved, worldview matters, and the
40:09: Christian worldview is comprehensive. I say to hell with the truncated gospel of the 21st century that says, oh, the
40:19: Christian worldview, it's just about a couple propositions about this person called
40:24: Jesus, and you have to pray this magic prayer, and you're going to heaven one day. I say to hell with that. And I mean that's where it belongs, in the pit of hell.
40:31: It's a lie. Jesus is King, and His authority is over everything in heaven and on earth, which means that those police officers,
40:39: God -ordained government in Moscow, those police officers are supposed to obey Jesus and not the mayor of Moscow.
40:48: That's a comprehensive view of the Christian worldview, guys. That's what we're supposed to be doing, right? Go into all the world, preach the gospel, you win the nations, you teach them to obey
40:58: Jesus. Well, in the case of what's happening in Moscow, Christchurch has a right to teach the police department to obey
41:05: Jesus. Your law is unjust, it's not in accordance with God's will, you need to not uphold this directive of the mayor or the governor or whoever puts this nonsense out.
41:15: And the police department in Moscow, Idaho, should obey Jesus and righteous standards of law.
41:21: Yeah, I was just going to say that I'm actually, I've been reading, I'm getting ready to teach a chapter on guiding governments from Gary DeMar, and it's on justice, and how do we issue the death penalty, and stuff like that.
41:38: It's a really awesome chapter. But Gary was talking about Germany, which, by the way, did you see the abortion laws there?
41:49: I did see that, yes. That's crazy. I was reading it, and I was like, so I'm trying not to get too far off track here, but Germany had anti -abortion laws prior to 1933, before Hitler came into power, and then they slowly eased out of those and started to allow abortions.
42:05: But I'm reading it, and I was like, man, this sounds so much like our laws already on the books in Arizona. And I looked it up, and they're almost identical.
42:12: But anyways, the point I was going to make was, Gary was saying that the
42:19: Germans loved Hitler's Germany so much because the state was
42:28: Messiah. The state was providing for them, giving them things. And so he made a great point that the
42:35: Germans as a whole were willing to overlook the Holocaust, were willing to overlook the
42:41: Jews being slaughtered because they knew if they said something, then they would no longer get the
42:48: Messiah, the state taking care of them. And so I'm just thinking through that, like even in this situation with the masks and so many people saying just, you know, like Hawaii, we're talking about this, was that kind of our last night?
43:01: With Hawaii, it's like people were just, whatever the state says, they'll take care of us. So whatever.
43:07: So they're just hook, line, sinker, eating tyranny, just like a buffet, right?
43:18: Because they know what comes with that. Unfortunately, they don't see far enough ahead to see the negative things that eventually come with it.
43:28: Right now, everything's great, but they're not smart enough to see that there's serious consequences, which history has clearly shown us.
43:38: That's why studying history is so important, because you just look back at what other tyrannical rulers have done.
43:45: That's right. And you look at a situation like happened in Moscow yesterday with our friend Gabe Wrench, and you see that he was arrested.
43:52: It was relatively cool. They were at least respectful in terms of they weren't abusive with him and throwing him down to the ground, that sort of a thing.
43:59: But it's over social distancing. Well, this video just dropped, I believe today.
44:05: It's the first time I've seen it. This video just dropped here, and it is a woman arrested at a middle school football game for not wearing a mask.
44:13: Now, I've got to warn you, I can't do any beeping of this out right now. So if you're watching this right now, or our own kids, we're going to turn it down just a little bit.
44:21: Don't leave us, but just turn it down for a little bit so you can kind of see the video itself. I didn't get a chance to really editing this video, but this just came out.
44:29: Again, a woman arrested at a middle school football game for not wearing a mask. Now, I'm going to point this out as you go to the video.
44:35: It seems like the people around her, the families are spread out pretty far apart in terms of the people watching this football game, but it seems like members of her family around her actually have masks on.
44:45: It's my understanding in reading some of the comments and some of the stuff that are reported on this, she actually has asthma, and she can't wear it for long periods of time.
44:56: And I want to point out that she's also outside. So, you know, talk about how far this can go.
45:03: Well, how'd you like to be at a football game with your mom or aunt or sister, and this happened to her. So there you go.
46:19: I just wanted to show you an example of something that's happening at a park near you or at a game near you.
46:26: The whole idea of arresting somebody for not pretending to be sick is,
46:34: I think, vile, and this sort of thing is tyrannical. It is unjust, and I think it's time for Christians to start calling it out.
46:44: Because, you know, here's the deal. Love your neighbor goes beyond one category of neighbor or one segment of neighbor.
46:50: It goes to love your neighbor. Well, I want to show love to this woman. I mean, if she's got a medical issue where she can't wear the mask for long periods of time,
46:57: I can't. I can't wear the mask for long periods of time. I get headaches. I get super dizzy. I start to get faint.
47:04: I start to lose my ability to think properly, breathing in things I wasn't supposed to be breathing in all day long.
47:10: So I legitimately cannot wear the mask for extended periods of time. It's very, very difficult.
47:17: Well, here's a woman. You know, she's out at a game with friends and family, watching a game outside in the open air, and other members who are next to her actually are wearing the mask, but she isn't.
47:27: She didn't do anything wrong. And you have a police officer manhandling an image -bearer of God over something that is completely and entirely unjust.
47:36: And you should care because we're Christians. We're supposed to love our neighbors. Loving your neighbor goes beyond loving the potentially sick person.
47:42: It goes into loving everybody and making sure we do that in a way that is meaningful and comprehensive. Luke, you want to add anything before we leave today?
47:51: Um, I'm hopeful that, um... If you watched the
47:56: CrossPolitik episode, they were saying, Toby kept saying, this is a good thing. And I agree.
48:02: I totally agree. It's a good thing. And I'm hopeful that this spurs on Christians to wake up and to quit just sitting around watching things go down and to actually stand up for truth and to stand against tyranny.
48:19: Um, and Toby had a quote that I'm going to steal from him. I have a lot of those. I've stolen from him.
48:25: Um, but he said that, um, the gospel confronts the culture.
48:33: It doesn't coddle it. Right. I was like, man. I love Toby so much, but I was like, it's so right.
48:39: Like, the gospel, it came to destroy all rivals. It's the two -edged sword. Like, it's not here to coddle the culture.
48:46: It's here to confront it. So, um, I hope that this just spurs on the church.
48:52: Absolutely. Hey guys, thank you guys so much for watching today. Make sure you spread this content far and wide.
48:58: We want to let people know what's happening inside Moscow. I agree with Pastor Toby and all the guys across politics. This is a good thing.
49:04: Whenever you have moments like this, it's actually good for the church. When John MacArthur is persecuted by Los Angeles, state of California for continuing to hold worship services,
49:14: I know that it's a painful moment, but it is a providential moment.
49:20: It's a powerful moment because persecution in the history, the whole history of the Christian church, persecution has done any one thing besides spread the gospel and grow the church.
49:30: Persecution actually opens the eyes of God's bride to her condition and her circumstances and it generally wakes her up and it emboldens her.
49:41: It sharpens her commitments. It puts a grip around them. And so, when we think about the persecutions going on right now and the difficulties and the injustice that's going on right now, it's a good thing.
49:53: God is sovereign over all of it. I'm looking forward to how God's going to use this, but here's the deal. When this persecution arrives and you see the evil and you see the injustice and you see all that's going on, my duty as a
50:06: Christian is to actually firm up my commitments to the Word of God, to His truth, and now start humbly and boldly proclaiming the truth in the public square.
50:16: So my challenge to you is this, pastorally. My challenge to my church is this. Go read the book of Acts.
50:23: Read the book of Acts. Look at how the early church, filled with the Spirit of God, engaged the culture with the good news of the kingdom.
50:32: Look at how they did it. They did it in a way that actually started riots. They did it in a way that actually started the process of them getting thrown into jail, being beaten,
50:43: Paul says, times without number, then danger constantly. People are taking oaths never to eat until they've killed
50:49: Paul. Those sorts of things are taking place. You know, Christians early on were proclaiming the truth in a way that, of course, it was gracious and compassionate, but it was bold.
50:57: They just told the truth, and they called people to repent of their sin and trust in Jesus Christ. Who is the king of the world? Well, that should be the message of the 21st century
51:04: Christian church in the West. Same situation all over the world. I understand that globally, but man, the West, we were so impacted by the gospel and the
51:11: Christian worldview, and now we've just stepped away from any concern for the culture around us, and it's devastating us.
51:20: And so my hope is that God, by His Spirit, uses moments like this to wake her up. To wake her up.
51:25: Yeah, and you and I talked about this earlier. I love something Darren Doan said in that show last night.
51:31: He was like, I love him. He's like, where's your pastor at? Where's your pastor at?
51:37: Because you got Doug leading the whole thing in the middle, and you got Toby over here, you know, supporting
51:44: Gabe, and he's right. Like, we need more Dougs, more
51:49: Tobys. We need more men like John MacArthur who say, you know what? I haven't been able to have a jail ministry yet, so go ahead and arrest me.
51:58: Let's get on it. I think we said something similar to that when we decided not to close worship ever for COVID.
52:05: It was something like, well, if we go to jail, we'll start preaching the gospel in jail. And so, yeah, we pray that God raises up godly pastors as leaders, but aside from that, we pray that God opens the eyes of His church and we start preaching the truth in love and with boldness.
52:21: Humble boldness, guys. Amen. All right, guys. We'll check you guys out next time on Apologia Studios, Apologia Radio.
52:27: Check out ApologiaStudios .com. Don't forget, God blessed us with something incredible.
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53:17: And so encourage you to sign up as soon as you can. Apologia All Access at ApologiaStudios .com. Pray for our friends at Christ Church, Moscow, Idaho.