Should Christians Obey Dumb Laws?

Why Christians May Need to Question Dumb Laws

How should Christians respond when the government imposes dumb laws? Well, that's what we're going to talk about on today's video. We have a guest, Joseph Granda. He has a new program that's coming out on Lore TV where he asks that very question.

How do we respond to dumb laws? We know the Bible tells us that we're supposed to obey the government, but it also tells us there are times where we obey God rather than men, and therefore that can put us at odds with the government.

But what happens when the government proposes a law or tries to enforce a law which doesn't necessarily tell us we have to disobey God, but it's just plain dumb? Well, that's what we're going to talk about today.

So, again, I'm welcoming Joseph Granda. He is the creator behind the new show on Lore. But, again, I want you to, if you would, Joseph, tell us what the name of the show is and what caused you to want to do this.

So the name of the show is Breaking Laws, and then the tagline in it is, What is it, Romans 13? And so, you know, I came about this during COVID where, you know, the joke at the time was I got quarantined and came out a Calvinist.

But so, you know, we had this experience, people of faith, where the government said you can't do this, you can't do that, while massage parlors and pot shops here in Colorado were still open. And so it really raised the question, where do we draw the line on obeying Romans 13, on obeying our magistrates?

So I came up with the idea of traveling across the country wherever I could and breaking the most ridiculous laws to see if I get arrested. In hindsight, in a world today where nothing is illegal, that's a very big ask to get arrested for something like episode one of Breaking Laws at Lord TV is it was once illegal to loan your vacuum to a neighbor down the street because there was a bed bug outbreak and the magistrates thought that's how the bugs were spreading.

So there's ridiculous laws all over the country. For example, you're in Florida where it's illegal to park your elephant in a parking place for a car unless you pay the fee that you would have to pay for the car.

And it's also illegal for a married woman to parachute in Florida.

It's illegal for a married woman to go skydiving, to parachute? Skydive, yeah. Now that's interesting. I know my wife would never want to break that law, but I'll propose it to her. I know I'm not going to be breaking that law because I'm severely acrophobic and I have no desire to jump out of a perfectly functioning airplane.

But that is an interesting reality. And it's neat that you mentioned COVID. I figured at some point that this would come up, and that is Romans 13, which is the passage which is always the conversation.

Obviously, it's the tagline of the show. Romans 13 is the passage which seems to have come under great scrutiny during COVID because the government was telling us to do things that on their face seemed to be not necessarily opposing Scripture but opposing reason.

And so we had to say, would a reasonable man do this? And one of the people I love in the world is Todd Freel. And Todd Freel said something that really bothered a lot of people. He said, hey, if the government tells me to put pinwheels on my head, I'm going to put pinwheels on my head just because it doesn't violate the word of God to put pinwheels on my head.

And a lot of people came after him for that. Do you remember that?

Were you part of that conversation then? I don't remember that, but there are similar examples out here, even at the church that I was at the time that I feel didn't behave in a way that was biblical when it came to the ridiculous nature of the things that were being imposed on us by the magistrate over COVID.

And this is long after we clearly realized that we were being lied to about a myriad of things. Absolutely.

Lore TV, Douglas Wilson, and Joseph Granda’s Film Background

And real quick, I know that you're connected with Lore, and we've had Marcus Pitman on our show. We've had Jason Farley on our show. So I know the guys over there. I love them a lot, good friends with them.

How did you get connected with them?

I got connected to them through Pastor Douglas Wilson.

Okay, that's not a surprise.

So a few years ago I was hired to adapt one of Douglas Wilson's novels into a screenplay. So I did that, and I don't know where that is. That's a whole different world. Was it Ride Sally Ride? Yeah, it was Ride Sally Ride, yeah.

Okay. So maybe someday I'll get to make that movie, but they don't have the bandwidth for that right now. So that's how I got connected to them because Marcus is up in Moscow, and then they saw my work and my resume.

I've been in the movie business for more than 30 years.

Yeah, you said you produced and directed movies. We talked about that before we came on air. What's some of the stuff that you've done that maybe people might know, other things that you've done?

Well, I mean, as an actor, I started out as an actor on Broadway in New York, and then I went to L .A., and I've appeared in more than 30 different movies, and I've written screenplays and sold them, and I've produced a bunch of movies for Merkle Films out of Tennessee.

I've got a great Christian film called The Healing Garden. If you go to josephgranda .com, there's links to all these movies that you can rent. The Healing Garden is a nice family film you can watch with your kids and grandma.

And then next year I have a film that I wrote, directed, and played the lead in called The Sasqualogist that'll be coming out, which is basically the story of a guy who's been searching for this one Sasquatch for his whole life, and he reluctantly takes a young kid with him to learn the way of swatching.

But what they discover on their journey is that they both come from broken homes, and what they're really looking for is their father. Oh, wow. Okay. It's kind of a coming-of-age story. But back to L .O .R .E.

So I had this idea. I didn't know where to take it, this pitch of breaking these stupid laws. So I got together with them, and we came up with the idea and put it together. It's their first pilot that was completely funded through their channel.

So what's important about L .O .R .E. TV is that it gives you control over what it is your money's going at. People don't realize when they pay for Comcast TV, $5 of that is going to CNN. That's just the way it is if your bill is $80.

So you're funding these things you don't want to be a part of, and it's really time that people of faith put their money where their mouth is and support outlets like L .O .R .E. TV.

Yeah, absolutely. And like I said, that's why I've had the guys on, believe in what they're doing, believe in what they're trying to do, and putting together content that is groundbreaking, is different, is not your standard sermon illustration movies, which is what I call a lot of Christian movies.

It's basically just a two-hour sermon illustration, and they're trying to do some things that are a little bit different. So that's great. Well, you said something a minute ago I want to go back to. You said that you went into COVID and came out a Calvinist.

Were you a believer before COVID and then became a Calvinist, or did you become a believer during COVID?

COVID, Calvinism, and the Search for Biblical Courage

So I was already a Christian. I had a baptized Christian. More of my life still, I got baptized 12 years ago, so more of my life has been spent as a secular person living in show business, which I don't recommend for anyone.

Hollywood is the only place where somebody can break your heart, and then you have to drive past a billboard with their face on it for the next three months. So we were going to a very large church that's near my town, and they didn't sort of move in the way that I would think if you read like the early church fathers and people like that, would push back against the magistrate or the law.

And so I was a little disheartened, and that's when I started looking for other things, and I started watching—well, the first thing I saw was this movie called Hardcore. I don't know if you know this movie, but there is a moment in this movie where George C. Scott explains Tulip to this prostitute because the director, Michael Schreider, is a Calvinist.

It's an old movie from the 70s. I can't recommend it because it's very R-rated, but there is a moment—you can look George C. Scott, Tulip, and he explains Tulip, and I thought that was interesting. And so that began my journey, and that led me to Doug Wilson.

That led me to Jeff Durbin. And so my spiritual journey continues, but it was a real awakening for me because I'm somebody who's curious about history and liturgy and Bible and whatnot. So that's sort of how it came about.

It's interesting how formative and influential those names you just mentioned, Jeff Durbin, Doug Wilson, have been, particularly since COVID because they were some of the strongest voices saying, listen, we need to not be so willing to give up our rights and to do the things that need to be done even if we're being told not to.

And I know that there are different camps with that. You have the more theonomy side, and then you have the—with that sometimes the label of Christian nationalist that comes onto that, and there's a lot of political stuff that goes into that conversation.

But I do like one thing in particular because I got to see the first episode, which I appreciate you sending it to me, letting me watch you run around with a vacuum cleaner, which was a funny part. But the part where you actually sit down with a pastor and ask him his view, and I assume that's going to be part of later episodes as well.

You talk to different pastors.

Government, Romans 13, and the Doctrine of Lesser Magistrates

In every episode, I'll present this ridiculous law that I broke, and oftentimes what I've discovered is I'm going to—the breaking of the law will be sort of a narrative feature of it because, first off, I couldn't get any police lawmakers to talk to me on film because they're just so afraid today of saying something wrong, and then it goes over the internet.

And there was no way I was going to get really arrested here in Denver for loaning my vacuum to a neighbor because, you know, I mean, they just have the pride thing here, and then people were running around naked in front of kids.

I mean, it's just—it's really—that's in Romans 1. Yeah. You know? So, yeah, yeah.

But, yeah, I was just saying you're talking to a pastor. Is the pastor that you spoke to in episode one, is he someone you knew previously or did you just make a phone call?

How did you connect with him? Yeah, so Chase Davis is the pastor of the Well Church in Boulder, and his kids and my daughter go to the same Christian school. Gotcha. And so he's on the board there and so is my wife, so that's how I know him.

And I thought he was a good example too of sort of somebody who really pushes back on things. But I want to get perspectives from, you know, all different kinds of— you know, maybe even I talk to a priest about it too to get their perspective.

And, you know, I think we should—as Christians in an overall dome of Christianity, we should be open to talking to each other about all our stuff.

Yeah, I would love to hear your—like if you get a chance to talk to somebody maybe from a more liberal side, like a United Methodist or someone, because where they may be all in on COVID restrictions, but they may push back against the government on other things, you know, things that would be more inclined to their sensibilities, whether they be something, you know, from an inclusion perspective or something, something that really connects with them.

I'd be—because it's interesting. When you think about Romans 13, and I did want to talk to you a little bit about this, if that's okay, because, you know, I don't want to, again—. It's your show. Go for it.

Well, yeah, but I don't want to spoil your series either. I know you're going to talk about this in the series. But in the question of Romans 13, it emphatically tells us that we are to obey the governing authorities over us and that those authorities have been placed there by God.

And prior to COVID, men like John MacArthur were pretty adamant that that passage was, you know, pretty all-encompassing, that the only time it was right to go against the government was if the government was telling you to do something that explicitly commanded you to disobey God.

For instance, you know, with the Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego situation in Daniel. But we found ourselves after COVID, even MacArthur sort of not necessarily changing his stance, but adjusting his position and saying, okay, there are times where, you know, we're not going to wear the mask or we're not going to do this because it's not that it violates God, but it's not something that the government should have the right to enforce because it's not right.

And I think this is difficult for a lot of people because the question becomes, well, what standard are we using? The government's not willing to use the gospel. The government's not willing to use the word of God.

So, you know, when you're talking to people about this, what are some of the pushbacks that you get from people when you're saying, hey, I think there's laws that are dumb. We shouldn't follow them. What do people say to you?

Well, first on the COVID thing, my position was, if I'm an image bearer of God, then I should be careful what it is that I'm putting into my body when the government wants to mandate it to me. So that was my stance.

And so for me, listen, we live in America. I think people should have had the right to say yay or nay on the vaccine. I obviously said no, but that was my starting point. If I'm an image bearer of God, what is it that I'm putting into my system that the government has just created at warp speed, you know?

So some of the pushback that I get, listen, to be quite frank, people are just spineless, and that's got to stop in the faith world. You know, the ability to just roll over is why we have nudity running through the streets of Denver once a year.

I mean, it's just... And I think the other thing too is that people don't understand is that telling people the truth is a loving thing to do. So when it comes to some of these laws that are really...

I mean, everybody has a ridiculous law. I've talked to some restaurant people. You can't believe the ridiculous laws that they have to go through. To keep the bread refrigerated in their store. You know, it's got to have a temperature, and somebody comes in and checks it once a month, and they can get fine.

So there's a lot in business that they're more willing to push back. But I think to answer your question in a general sense is that we just need to stop being spineless and at least ask the question why.

Where does that come from? Who made that law? Is it just specifically for me and my faith, or does this encompass everybody? So I think if you can just push back by asking questions as opposed to just saying, okay, I'll put whatever that guy said about the twinkly things on his head or whatnot.

Yeah, the pinwheels. Yeah. The pinwheels on his head. That's just a ridiculous comment. It makes me want to kick him in the nuts, people that talk like that sometimes.

Yeah. And to be fair, like I said, I love Todd. I think he ate a lot of crow over that. You know, there was a lot that he, even some of his best friends in the ministry, gave him a hard time about that statement.

And I'm not quite sure the heart behind it, other than I think he was trying to do what he thought was faithful to the text. And again, the text does tell us to obey. But the part that I would point people to is one, the issue, it says the government has a responsibility to do good or rather to reward those who do good and punish those who do evil.

And so when the government is not doing that, when the government is punishing those who do good and they are rewarding those who do evil, then we find ourselves in an Isaiah position where we're calling good evil and evil good.

And that's where I think as a minister of God, which is what Romans 13 says the government is, the government is a minister of God to reward good and punish evil. They're not doing their job and therefore they need to be called to repentance.

Would you agree with that, that the government, we have the responsibility?

Yeah, it's not a blind government said I should do this, so I do that. And yeah, them being appointed by God, God can appoint wicked people so that it can reflect the current condition of the nation, which is where we're at right now.

This is a wicked, wicked country. It's run by wicked people. Whether you're, no matter what your party is, the parties are an illusion. You know, this country, I don't want to get into it, but this country is run by the intelligence services for the most part and it's a wicked country.

And so that's one place that we need to start is realize, okay, these people are wicked. Are they doing the will of God? Are they in line with morals and Romans 13 or not? And I think that's a good place to start too.

Just because they're placed there, doesn't mean that we have to blindly follow them with their edicts.

Local Authority, Sheriffs, and the Power of State and County Government

Yeah. And that, and that leads me to the second thing. And that is the levels of authority. And you brought this out in episode one, again, not trying to spoil the whole show, but you talked about the fact that there, and I think it was the pastor mentioned the term lesser magistrates, which caught my attention.

Cause not, not a lot of guys use that phrase. You gotta be, you gotta be kind of, you know, at least have listened to some of the arguments from, you know, the post-millennial theonomy side to, to really I guess they're not the only ones who use the argument for, for lesser magistrates, but they're, they're typically the ones who refer to it.

And for those who don't know what that is, a lesser magistrate refers to the fact that within any government, with any governing structure, there are levels of authority. For instance, in the United States, there's a federal government and then we have a state government, and then you have your local municipalities, which all have their local governments.

And therefore each one of them has a sphere of authority that they're working in and the lesser magistrate, meaning he has a lesser sphere of authority. He still has a sphere of authority. And so if we have a governor that says one thing and a local mayor who says something else, who's really in charge, that's the question is what we, who do we listen to?

And then if you have a president saying one thing and a governor saying something else and the one that you pointed out, and I want to, I want to get your thoughts on this. You pointed out the sheriff.

Is the most important vote that you will make when that thing comes in the mail is voting. Know who your sheriff is. Know him, meet him. If you can find out what he, he, his, his constitutional ideas are because the sheriff in your town can say no to the federal government on almost everything.

And you met, you, you obviously know more about this than I do because I wasn't aware of that. And I want to ask you, why is it that way? Is this something that's built into like a historical reality?

Because I know, I mean, I'm thinking back to the old West. I'm like, who's the sheriff of this town, right? Like the sheriff did have a lot of authority at a particular time in history. And I know like right now, sheriff Bill Leeper is the sheriff of my County.

Cause I live in Nassau County, Florida, which is actually North of Jacksonville. I don't live in Jacksonville proper. I live in, in, in the County above it. And and, and Leeper seems like a great dude.

I mean, he does a good job and I'm, I'm thankful to have him as a, as, as our sheriff. But where does that historically fit in and why is it that the sheriff has so much power?

Yeah, that's exactly where historically it is. It's from the old West where, you know, you didn't have cell phones to call up DC and see what Abe Lincoln was up to. So, so the sheriff sort of oversaw and made off the time, the local laws also, and still to this day, run the, run the prisons, you know but the, it's why they said, you know, it's the sheriff of this town has the end, all be all the most.

Now, listen, the sheriff can say something, you know, about some gun laws and then the federal government comes in, they got to go to court and fight back and forth to come to agreement, but the sheriff can make these decisions.

There was a sheriff out here, West of here that, that said, yeah, people don't have to wear a mask and people don't have to this and that. We're not going to do that here because it's what the people want.

So yeah, they have a great, a great amount of power over your life.

Yeah. I think that's great and important for people to know, you know, we're fixing to go into a, an election cycle where we're in it. And even tonight I'm going to be, I'm on a panel that's going to be responding to the first Trump Biden debate to geriatrics are going to be, you know, you know, fighting over who's Jell-O is the softest.

It's going to be crazy. That was just, I know that's terrible, but that, I mean, I can't believe that these are the best guys that we have to put in that position to, to, to, to be president. But that, that's a whole other conversation.

But the reality, the reality is that the, the power they have over me as an individual is, is important. But, but what my local sheriff, like you said, what the local government has to enforce building codes, to enforce where I can and can't do things on my own property, where, you know, what I can and can't do in my own city.

That's so important. And oftentimes those are the laws that we find ourselves really asking, are these dumb laws? Are these laws, like you said, the, the law about the, the, the, the vacuum cleaner, which, which seems to have a reasonable like at one point they thought the vacuum cleaner was creating bed bugs.

And so they, they created this law. It was a dumb law, but at least it was reasonable. The reason like we thought this was why it was happening, but it doesn't make it right.

How Dumb Laws Often Grow Out of Ignorance and Bureaucracy

Yeah. A lot of the laws are just out of ignorance. Even today, you know, you, the pastor in the show, we're walking through the building of his new church and he talks about, he's in Boulder County, which is the most liberal place here in Colorado.

It's just nuts. And, you know, so they want, you know, green wall and, and sprinklers everywhere and all this stuff. And it's really just a grift. A lot of it is. So the, the whole overall arching idea of the show breaking laws at Lord TV is to enter into an episode with a very ridiculous law, but that leads us into a more serious conversation, similar to what we're having so that we know where we stand.

We know how we should, who we should vote, who should we should get involved with. And in the show too, you know, I visit a vacuum cleaner store and you'll actually learn a lot about vacuums that I wasn't aware of.

And so, you know, you learn that it's worth buying an expensive vacuum that you can use forever is one thing. And then I went and visited with a bail bond agents to find out what, what does a person do if they were to get arrested?

I'll tell you one thing that my, my father always said to me is that most, especially with the law, but also in life, there's only three things that'll get you in trouble. And it's your mouth, your mouth and your mouth.

So, so even if you're a completely innocent person and you get arrested, you should say absolutely nothing. Once you're handcuffed other than yes, sir. No, sir. Sorry, sir. The first thing I need to know is where did you get that from?

Did you have a lawyer? It's not because they're bad people, but it's because the way the system is built is that anything you say can and will be used against you in the court of law. Even if you're trying to explain why you didn't do it, you just say nothing and get a lawyer.

Yeah. You know, a lot of corruption in the system. And the reason for that certainly is certainly is very evident in the. Well, brother, I want to thank you for coming on the show and I want to ask you this question as we begin to draw to a close and that is how, how, how do we see the future for the show?

I know you've got, you, you, you've got the first episode. Is it, is it available on Lord now for people to see and go and contribute to? Is that how it works or when does it, when does it, the show is going to premiere July.

14th, which is a Sunday, a Sunday night. And after the premiering of it, I'm going to do a Q and a with the audience. Um, you can sign up for Laura TV, it's L O O R dot TV. You can watch the trailer for the show there.

You can sign up and get, um, uh, seven days free and they'll even give you what's called loot and you can spend that on some shows that you might want to see. I hope you spend it on mine. Um, the next episode that they're funding right now is, uh, I'm going to go to the state of Washington where it is illegal to harass a Sasquatch or any other unknown animal.

And my hope is to go out with some forest Rangers and learn about laws, the ridiculous laws in the forest out there and, and, and talk to a lawyer and then, um, you know, some local pastor. Um, another one that I'm going to do is it's illegal to hold a wrestling match without a license in Texas, unless that wrestling match takes place was in, within a theatrical performance.

So I'm going to go and go through wrestling school, hold a wrestling match, but as the cops show up, I'm going to break into Shakespeare, uh, which would make the wrestling match legal. Nice, nice.

That's hilarious. That's hilarious. Well, Joseph, thank you again for coming on the show today. I really appreciate it. And, uh, you said if people want to get the hold of you, they can go to your website, see your movie, see the things that you've done.

Uh, joseph granda .com. Am I remembering that correct? And, uh, and that is just like it sounds. G O S E P G O S E P H, uh, G R A N D A .com. Well, I appreciate you being on the show today. It's good to meet you.

The Gospel Presentation and the Call to Repentance and Faith

Hope to talk to you again soon. Yeah. Thank you so much. Yes, sir. God bless you. Hey guys, I want to interrupt the show just for a moment to remind you again about our sponsor, tiny Bibles. This is the smallest Bible on the market.

It is available in King James and new King James, and you can find it at tinybibles .com. Remember, if you read a tiny Bible, it'll make your muscles feel huge. So go get yourself a tiny Bible today. Also to remind you that if you want to support the show, you can do so by getting a tiny Bible or by going to buymeacoffee .com slash your Calvinist and leave a donation.

Lastly, the most important thing we want to make sure is that everybody who watches our videos, here's the gospel. The word gospel means good news, but the good news has to be predicated. By some bad news.

And the bad news is that we're all sinners, which means we've all broken God's law and we stand separated from him. But the good news is that God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him will not perish, but have everlasting life.

The Bible says God sent his son into the world to live a perfect life and to die a substitutionary death on behalf of everyone who will believe. So today, if you find yourself outside of Christ, the Bible says to repent of your sin.

That means turn from your sin, particularly turn from your unbelief and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. And you will find him to be a perfect savior. Thank you for listening to that gospel presentation.

And if you have any questions at all, particularly about your own soul, please send us a message at KeithFoskey .com.