Jeff Durbin Responds To Media & QAnon

Addiction, Kingdom, Victory, and Law

And condense it and bring it more into the realm of like, oh, because we're experiencing this, that's how that applies. So I've thought about this. So there's two specific things in my heart I'd like to do.

Number one, there's a book on addiction that I'm working on now, a biblical approach or response to addiction to drugs and alcohol and sex. This is the problem of addiction. So many Christians go for things like celibate recovery or AA, which I would argue are either lacking completely in some essential things, or are just completely hostile to the Christian message when you're talking about AA.

It's just not biblical, not appropriate, not helpful, ultimately. So there's a book I'm working on right now. I do hope to finish it relatively soon on addiction, but there's also a book that I'm working on that I want to do, and it's just on this idea of kingdom, victory, and law.

Kingdom, victory, and law.

Non-rockabodas must stop. I don't want to rock the boat.

I want to sink it.

Are you going to bark all day, little doggie, or are you going to bite?

We're being delusional.

Delusional?

Yeah.

Delusional is okay in your worldview. 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 worldview is perfectly okay.

It doesn't really hurt.

Is he hung up on me? Yes! Yes! Woo! What? What?

Desperate times call for faithful men and not for careful men. The careful men come later and write the biographies of the faithful men, lauding them for their courage.

Go into all the world and make disciples. Not go into the world and make buddies. Not to make brosifs.

Right.

Don't go into the world and make homies.

Right.

Disciples.

I got a bit of a jiggle neck.

That's a joke, Pastor.

When we have the real message of truth, we cannot let somebody say they're speaking truth when they're not.

You shall not spread a false report. You should not join hands with a wicked man to be a malicious witness. You should not fall in with the many to do evil, nor shall you bear witness in a lawsuit, siding with the many so as to pervert justice.

Nor shall you be partial to a person or a poor man in his lawsuit. What's up, guys? Welcome back to another episode of Apologia Radio. This is the gospel heard around the world. I am Jeff. They call me the Ninja.

That is Luke the Bear right there.

What up?

And right here is Pastor Zach Morgan.

What's up?

What's up, homie?

All right.

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And you're gonna get it absolutely and completely for free. So Bonson U, ApologiaStudios .com. Welcome back, everybody, to another week of Apologia Radio. Very excited about today's show. We actually just finished an interview with a large publication that we recorded.

We let him know we were recording, and he was recording us. And so we recorded that. We're gonna play that in just a little bit for you guys so you guys can see it for yourselves. So let's talk. It's been sort of an interesting last week and a half in the media for Jeff Durbin and apparently QAnon.

Who?

Yeah, it's been fun.

Yeah, it's been interesting. So to start this discussion, some of you guys saw the titles or you're here because of that. What happened was is that we had a visitor to our church, as far as I know, it was for two weekends, two weekends only, a visitor to our church named Ron Watkins.

We didn't know him. We are not his pastor. And not to say we don't wanna love the guy and all the rest is just say that that's the current state of where we're at. We're not his pastor. He's not a member of our body.

He was just a visitor. He visited during two sermons. One was a Christian response to mandatory cookies, and one was defending essential Christian truths. And it had a big impact on him. The sermon on Christian response to mandatory cookies had a big impact on him.

And so he announced, I think, his candidacy.

To run for Congress?

Yes, I think it's for Congress.

In Arizona.

Yeah, in Arizona. And so he announced that publicly, and he mentioned that it was my sermon that inspired him to do so. So because of that, apparently, he has a lot of people watching him. And we didn't have a relationship with him, know him.

I found out after I actually spoke to him that he was associated with QAnon,.

Or Q.

I don't even know all the details about it, because I'm not in that world.

But you're his pastor, though.

Apparently, I'm his pastor. And so what happened was a publication, a local publication known as the Phoenix New Times, one of the most leftist, liberal, trash publications in the history of this nation, contacted me.

And I know the Phoenix New Times. I know who they are. I know where they're at. I know their worldview. And so they contacted me to ask some questions about Ron Watkins, because he had visited our church and said that my sermon inspired him to run for Congress.

So apparently, that made me his pastor. And Phoenix New Times, I think, based upon the article that they put out and the questions that they asked and my responses, they already knew what they were gonna write.

And they were already prepared to write it. I think they were just checking the box in terms of, let me just talk to this guy. And so what happened was the Phoenix New Times published an article that was not fully honest at all with what I gave to them in terms of my full responses to their questions about how we feel about QAnon.

It's a destructive and embarrassing movement. We've called people to repent for the things that have been spread through QAnon. We've done a show repudiating QAnon before. We find it to be a deplorable, a destructive, and an embarrassing movement.

And I said some of these things to the journalist who was, that's too nice, to the woman who messaged me. And they just went running with an article. So next thing you know, this first article posts and then Rolling Stones picks it up and several other publications picked up stuff from the article.

Rolling Stones actually published it and they called me Ron Watkins' pastor. Ron Watkins' pastor. And so my assistant, we gotta love Christine, our assistant, she messaged Rolling Stones and she was like, he is not Ron Watkins' pastor.

Like you guys need to repent, lying is a sin. She said that. She did, she was like, you need to repent, lying is a sin. And so Rolling Stones was forced after they published the article to correct their own article because they didn't even bother to fact check.

Really? Yeah, didn't even bother.

Everybody else. Didn't fact check.

Everybody else needs to do it but them.

Yeah, didn't fact check. So they had to change it, you know, posting it. And so then it goes on and now across these different media platforms you have an attempt to associate the extremist far right pastor, Jeff Durbin, with QAnon.

And it doesn't matter how many times we repudiate QAnon. It doesn't matter how deplorable we think QAnon as a movement is. It doesn't matter how much I've spoken against it or call people even to repent of the slander that they've shared that's come from QAnon.

They had their story, they wanted to run with it and that's what we got.

And once it's said in the court of public opinion then that's what it is and doesn't matter.

It's believed without introspection or no, without scrutiny.

Yeah, scrutiny.

One of those words.

All those are good.

Those are all good.

So, you know, and this is interesting. Okay, let's talk about it. I'm gonna read some of the stuff that went on here. But let's talk about why this is important. It's important because from a Christian perspective, I just read you a passage from the law of God.

That's right after the 10 commandments where God actually calls people not to take party to false accusations, don't lie about people, don't lie about people in court, don't go along with the masses to lie about somebody in court.

God takes very seriously this, you shall not lie. And you shall not lie, by the way, is a Christian thing. It's not necessary in secularism or atheism. It's not necessary. You shall not lie is not an absolute standard in those worldview systems.

It's not. You can't say it's an absolute standard and a moral ought for human beings not to lie to one another in atheism. If all of us are just African apes descended from fish and bacteria, then there's no absolute standard not to lie.

So it's important to start this discussion to say from the Christians are the ones that own the ground here in terms of there's an absolute standard not to lie. And is it an interesting that these media platforms that are repudiating QAnon rightly when they see them lying or spreading slander and saying, you can't do that.

This movement's destructive, all the rest. I'm gonna say, yeah, put your hand in my hand. I'm with you on that. Then they go and they do the very same thing to a pastor like me attempting to associate me with this movement, attempting to make it look like I'm a pastor of Q or whatever the claim is.

And so you're doing the very same thing that you're accusing QAnon of.

Doing what?

Spreading conspiracy theories. Like QAnon's bad, why? Because it spreads these audacious and crazy conspiracy theories. So let me create one of my own right now by involving a pastor with a movement that he repudiates.

Isn't it amazing? But anyways, the Christian worldview has this at its basis, in terms of morality, you shall not lie. And that moves in God's law in spectacular ways. Like right after God says that, he begins to expand upon it.

Like you should not lie. What's it look like? Well, don't take part in where the masses are going to bring false accusations. Don't be a false accuser in a court of law. Don't bring false testimony in a court of law.

And then God actually has some case law examples of what it looks like when someone is lying in court. And he actually protects the court. And this is one of my very favorite things. And I wish we'd get back to it.

I truly wish we'd get back to it. Where in court, if you have a witness who's making a claim, the Christian worldview has cross-examination. Like that's in the court. Like God's standard says there must be cross-examination.

You can't just believe a witness. Because believe it or not, fallen world, people lie. They lie through their teeth. Just look at Joe Biden.

So

I was gonna say the same thing.

They lie through their teeth, right? So people lie in this world. People lie, and it should always be repented of. And you need to call out lies wherever there are lies. But in God's court system, he says that when you have someone that brings an accusation there must be cross-examination.

So if you like cross-examination in courts, thank Moses. You can thank Jesus for that. But there must be cross-examination. And God's law says that if you find out that that witness was lying, and they're accusing somebody and lying about it, then God says that the witness, who was a false witness, has to now get the punishment that would have been given to the accused had they been believed.

That's pretty awesome, right? God protects the court. How much protection does it offer to the court when the witness who's saying this happened knows if I'm caught lying, I'm gonna get the punishment myself?

That's a beautiful way to protect the court.

Such a novel idea.

It's such a wonderful thing, and that's all from God's law. So at the bottom here, when we are having this conversation, we're coming at it as Christians with commitment to Christ, with a love for God's law, and submission to Christ, and we're committing to God's law as the ultimate standard.

You should not lie. And that's why we repudiate so much that's come from Q and QAnon.

Why?

Because you've got false accusations galore that have been spread in that community. I mean, deplorably false accusations. Accusations about someone you don't even know actually accusing them of being a pedophile.

I mean, talk about the lowest of the low, that what I saw being spread in the QAnon community was accusations about particular people being pedophiles, baseless, no evidence, all speculation, and literally publicly accusing somebody of being a pedophile, like a person that molests children.

That sort of a thing is deplorable. It's lying. It totally rejects godly Christian standards about making accusations or even receiving accusations. And so we repudiate a movement like that because we believe you shall not lie.

God's law has high standards for accusations. You look like you wanna say something.

Isn't that the same video that said Jim Carrey was a clone? Was it Jim Carrey?

I saw so much stuff like that.

Remember that one you sent me that was like the cat lady or whatever, and she was like, wasn't it Jim Carrey?

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. It was that cat lady that was a Q, and they had one more day.

And they killed the original Jim Carrey and cloned him.

They cloned the Jim Carrey. Now, look, there's gonna be people who are probably associated with Q and QAnon stuff that are like, I don't believe any of that stuff. Okay, great, I'm glad you don't. I'm so, so glad you don't.

But the fact of the matter is, many people who got involved in that community were spreading all kinds of lies and slander and accusations in that community, and it was spreading like fire. We reject that movement because of its messianic character.

Whether it's upholding someone like Donald Trump as Messiah, or whether it was upholding JFK Jr., who died, and they were saying, no, he's alive, and he's gonna come back on Easter Sunday sort of a thing.

It's like, that's resurrection.

You're making him look like Jesus. You're detracting from the glory of Jesus, and you're acting as though the kingdom of God is America. It's not. And you're not gonna get any salvation through the American system of government.

You're not gonna get salvation because Republicans are elected. You're gonna get salvation because the nation turns to Christ in faith. And so, you got something you wanna say, Zach, before I?

No, no, I was just saying, it's just so destructive, especially for Christians to get wrapped up into the whole QAnon, right? Because they're, it's funny, I was out at the mill a couple months ago, and somebody's preaching the gospel, and then they're trying to save babies, and they're saying all the right things, and then they come up to me and say, hey, you know the 5G tower over there?

You know, Soros is behind that, and these nanobots are gonna come out of that tower inside of your brain, Pastor Zach, and it's gonna kill you, and Pastor Luke, and Pastor Joe. So, it's like, in one moment, you're preaching the truth, and then you say stuff like that, and it just sucks your credibility right out of you.

Why are they gonna believe what this Christian has to say when it comes to gospel proclamation, when you're thinking nanobots are gonna fly out of 5G tower?

Did that really happen?

Yeah, that actually happened.

Did flat earth come out in the same conversation?

Maybe.

Well, Pastor Zach, that's what I actually, I'm glad you brought that up, because that's one of the things that we have challenged people on before, is that if you're spreading this slander, and these lies, and what amount to basically false prophecies.

I mean, people are gonna say,.

Well, I don't say those sayeth the Lord. It's like you're still predicting.

Exactly right.

And if you spread that, right, and then all these things fail, it's shown to be slander, it's shown to be lies, you're shown to be a person that doesn't have very high standards for evidence and for truth.

Now go try to preach the gospel to an atheist that saw you doing that. They're just gonna be like, dismissed. Dismissed, why? Because if you're willing to believe falsehoods, and spread falsehoods so easily, I ain't trusting you about the Bible, I ain't trusting you about Jesus, and that's the danger of QAnon, is just that point.

If you spread lies like that, and you're shown to be so willing to believe things based upon very suspicious evidence, or no evidence at all, then the world looks into that and says, I'm not gonna listen to a word you say about Jesus, because clearly your standards are abysmally low.

And here's the deplorable thing about it, and the embarrassing thing about it, is that Christians were the ones who gave the world the high standards for evidence, accusation, cross-examination, truth.

We gave the world that, why are we now going to fall back, away from the public square, into this little community that is so willing to spread falsehoods? It's destructive. Now here's the thing, watch.

This is what Jeff Durbin, and Luke Pearson, and Zach Morgan have been saying for years about this movement. And lo and behold, the Phoenix New Times decides, I've got a story. Let's make this far-right extremist pastor look like he's this guy's pastor.

Let's associate him with QAnon. And just so you know, everyone, I've slept so well this last week, didn't bother me at all, why? Because I know that one of the tactics of the enemy is to slander you, is to spread lies.

They did it to Jesus. They called him a glutton, and a drunkard, and a friend of sinners, and all the rest. They did the same thing to everyone in the Bible. It's a tool of the enemy, accuse, lie, all of that.

So, I expect it, but I can still call it out when it happens. And just quickly, I wanna read to you something from the original questions that she asked. If you haven't seen this yet, go to my Facebook page.

I actually posted when I gave the response to her, before she published the article, I posted her questions and all my answers on my Facebook page. Actually, it was shared more by like maybe 50 times than theirs was, I think.

At least when I initially saw my responses. But she asked questions that, you know, I'll just say, I don't have proof, okay? But I'll just say, I have suspicions that these questions weren't really related to the main point she wanted to get to, because none of it was really, this didn't seem a concern in the article about any of this.

It just was about Ron Watkin. So the first question she asked was, when did you start Apologio Studios? Was it after you began work at Apologio Church? Number two, it seems like your work has gained a national reach far beyond the valley.

Why do you think that is? And then number three, last week, Ron Watkin said you inspired and run for Congress. Do you support his candidacy? That was the main question. And she asked the question, you've drawn some criticism for harassment at abortion clinics and arguing that women should face a death penalty for abortions.

Do you stand by those claims? It seems so, can I just say this? It is mind-boggling to me that leftists and pro-choicers and pro-aborts can't see this, but I'm gonna go ahead and give it to you right now.

Okay, I'll give it to you. Yes, I'm a Christian. Yes, I'm a minister of the gospel. Yes, I believe this book. And this book says through and through that anybody who murders another human being, and you kill a human in an unjustified way, you are guilty of murder, and that the appropriate move for the court system for anybody that murders anybody and is found truly guilty is to give them the death penalty.

So I'm a Christian who believes in capital punishment, and lo and behold, so do many of our states in the union right now. They believe in capital punishment.

For what? For murder.

So I'm not very unusual there, but yeah, I'm a minister of the gospel. I believe this book. Now, I also believe that what's in the womb is human from conception. Isn't that just standard, fair, pro-life stuff, right?

It's a human from conception. It's worthy of our value, dignity, respect. And so if a mother or father decapitates, disembowels, and dismembers their own child, what do I think should happen in a just society in a situation like that, whether the child was six years old, 10 years old, or six months old in the womb?

I believe that the appropriate thing would be capital punishment for any mother or father that decapitates their own son or daughter. Yeah, I do believe that, but I said to her, I said, I don't believe that our court system today can be trusted to have the death penalty wholesale, because they have very low standards of evidence, and you've got all kinds of people today who have been falsely accused and incarcerated for it.

So I don't trust our court system today to actually employ the death penalty wholesale. And however, watch this. This is what's so interesting about it to me. In this conversation, let's say that you put me up against the pro-choicer or pro-abort that's saying, you believe in capital punishment for mothers who disembowel their own sons.

Okay, but both of us believe someone has to die. See, this isn't a question of someone who believes that people should die and somebody who just doesn't. Both of us in this conversation believe that someone has to die.

You think that the innocent child should die. I think the mother or father who decapitates, disembowels, and dismembers their own son or daughter should, through the state, receive a just penalty for that.

And so both of us, though, both of us believe someone has to die. You just believe it should be an innocent child. I don't. And so there you go. So I hope that helps.

I actually appreciate the way she worded that, because, how would she say, calling for women to be executed for abortions, because the link that it goes to is in the New York Times where it says that you want to execute women.

Yeah, yeah, I want to.

Right, so I actually appreciate the fact that you changed the wording on that, because that's not usually the rhetoric. But no, you don't want to execute women.

I don't want to have anything to do with it. I'm a pastor.

It sucks. I mean, you're my friend, so I don't like lies being said about you, just on a personable level. Yeah. Love you guys. But the cool thing is they were just directed right to her stuff. So we got a big spike in our subscribers and our views, and it's got to be related to this.

So as much as they think that they're going to use you and what you believe to smear him, right, to throw dirt at him, to get him out of a potential political position, they're all hearing the gospel.

They're all hearing the truth. Well, I was able, thankfully, the fifth question she asked, and it's funny, because initially one day some of the questions, this question wasn't in there. The next day she sent this additional question, and she said, I'd be interested to hear how you describe Apologia Church's beliefs slash gospel.

And so I said, thank you so much for asking this question. And so I gave her the gospel, and I said, you know, I hope that you experience this gift of life as well. So her name is Katya, I don't want to mess this up.

Please forgive me if I get this wrong. I'm not trying to abuse you or your name, but it's unique. I've never seen it before. Katya, K-A-T-Y-A Schwenk, Katya Schwenk. So that was the woman who wrote the article, and I responded with this.

I wanted to read to you guys how I responded to her question about Ron Watkins, okay? Ron Watkins isn't a member of Apologia Church, and to my knowledge, he has only attended two services. I am not his pastor.

I do not have any specific knowledge of his beliefs, commitments, or convictions related to law or politics in our country. I only recently learned about the gut gentleman and the claims about his connection to QAnon.

Both myself and the other elders at Apologia Church have spoken against the QAnon movement. We find it to be a destructive and embarrassing movement that has repeatedly violated God's standards of critical thinking, accusations, and evidence.

We have spoken against it publicly and called people to repent of the shameful, slander, and abysmal thinking that has been propagated within the group. We believe that it represents a destructive and embarrassing element that distracts from the real issues and the real solution that our country needs, which is Christ.

We believe that God calls his people to uphold justice and to correct oppression, Isaiah 117. Legislative issues are issues that relate to public morality and moral oughts. We believe that God is the standard of morality and ethical absolutes, and that Christ, as the one with final authority, has something to say about law, righteousness, and justice in society.

So we bring the claims of Christ and God's law into these political discussions. However, we believe that it is wrong for a Christian church to engage in partisan political promotion related to supporting a particular candidate's run from the pulpit.

We do not have any knowledge of Ron Watkins' overall belief system. We would not promote anyone's candidacy officially as a church, and if the rumors about his involvement with Q were true and verified by us, we would confront that with him speedily.

So that's what I wrote, all right?

That's what I wrote.

Do you wanna see the article? Okay, Isaac, you ready for this? Okay, this is what appeared. Hold on, let me move that. It's just, the Mesa pastor who inspired QAnon promoter Ron Watkins' run for Congress.

A picture of me. Yeah, and that was, by the way, just so everyone knows, I was freezing there.

Except for your fingertips. Your fingertips were good.

No, no, my fingertips were definitely not good.

I mean, clearly they were warm because you didn't have them covered.

That's okay, yeah, that's a good call, yes. Oh man, that was cold. Oklahoma, that was our bill that we, not our bill, that was the bill that our friends in Oklahoma put together for equal protection in Oklahoma.

We went there to support them and encourage them and to help. The Mesa pastor who inspired QAnon promoter Ron Watkins' run for Congress. If QAnon's grip on the Arizona GOP wasn't clear already, Ron Watkins made it so last week when the Q figurehead announced that he was running for Congress in Arizona.

Let's see here.

I mean, hold on. Even that statement that QAnon has its grip on the Arizona GOP, like, who in the Republicans is like in the QAnon? I don't know any.

We know a lot of people in the Arizona legislature. Do you know anybody that's with Q?

No.

Or influenced by Q?

Like outspokenly?

Yeah.

No.

I don't know anybody.

Like, that's hilarious.

Because one guy says he's running and they're like, there you go, there's your proof.

Now Arizona's run by Q. Watkins' candidacy is far-fetched, to put it lightly, although he's built a major following online, he has never held any kind of elected office and it's not clear if he's ever lived in the state, but his campaign does appear to draw on local inspiration from Jeff Durbin, an extremist pastor in Mesa who has built his church into a sprawling media organization and national anti-abortion lobbying group.

That wasn't biased at all.

Yeah, I mean, very good. So as a journalist, an extremist pastor.

It just goes to show, right?

Anti-abortion.

Here's what it goes to show.

The myth of neutrality. The myth of neutrality. She has a worldview that she's promoting. I have a worldview. Let's have a worldview collision and let's see who comes out on top. How about that? That's how you solve these things.

It says this.

It says, in Watkins' initial video announcing his bid to unseat Democrat Tom O 'Halloran, the dirtiest Democrat in the D .C. swamp, Watkins said he cited a recent sermon that Durbin gave at Apology at Church in Mesa.

Durbin convinced him, Watkins said, to double down with God as my compass to take this fight to the swamp of Washington, D .C. So it says, a former karate champion, Durbin has been cultivating influence nationwide over the past decade from Mesa, the media arm of the church, Apology Studios, which Durbin founded in 2015, has hundreds of thousands of subscribers, 300 ,000 officially this past weekend, and millions of views on YouTube where it produces daily far-right political content and a late-night talk show.

So anyway, the article, here we go. He also occasionally has drawn national headlines for some of his most extremist moves, calling for women to be executed for abortions, for instance, and refusing to close his church's doors even in the early days of the pandemic.

And then she puts, of course, a note.

So extreme.

Durbin confirmed in New Times that he believes that women who get abortions should be executed, although clarified that he would not trust our current judicial system to mete out the punishment because it has led to someone needing to be falsely incarcerated.

Thank you for that. I'm glad you added that in there. But did you wanna?

I was just gonna say, I wonder how many changes she had to make. In this article post your answers to her questions.

I put them out publicly.

Because she was like, oh, shoot, I'm gonna have to change that answer, how I wrote that.