Don't get down when you're seeing the worst.
Because the last will be the first.
What a day, I'm telling you.
All things will be new.
Living up in a down world.
Yeah, we're living. Yeah, we're living.
Living up in a down world.
Oh.
This is Jimmy and not Annette today.
In fact, I have a special guest today.
We call him around here PB.
That's short for Pastor Brian Mendel.
But for the show's sake, it's going to be Jimmy and Brian.
Will that help?
It gets a little weird calling each other pastor all the time face to face.
Oh, yeah. Glad to be here.
Welcome to Living Up in a Down World.
Thank you for having me.
Super excited about having you.
Annette went on a birthday excursion with her friend Tina.
Yeah.
And she just got back yesterday and she said,
I'm not doing it. I'm not doing the podcast.
She's like, I'm off this week.
She stayed home this morning.
I'm back up here at the office and in the studio today.
So I knew that was going to happen.
So I'd reached out to you earlier and said, hey, man, can you, you want to be on the show?
And I'm pumped to talk with you on here.
Thanks, bro. We got a lot to talk about.
Yes, we do.
God's up. Aslan is on the move, as we say.
He is.
He's moving big time in our midst.
I mean, we had an amazing Easter Sunday.
Oh, my gosh.
Give a little recap of what we prayed for and what we ended up with.
Yeah. I mean, we've been praying big, hairy, audacious prayers in general here at the church.
But, you know, specifically we were asking the Lord to bring a thousand people to Easter services
in the little town of Fredericksburg, which is a, that's a big ask.
It is.
And he did. A thousand thirty-six people showed up over three services
and they spread out over three services.
That was a miracle in itself.
It worked amazingly well.
Everybody had an amazing experience with the Lord and it was just smooth.
And we both walked out of there saying, I think, man, that didn't feel any more chaotic than normal.
I literally left.
We drove out of the parking lot and, you know, a typical three Sunday day.
And I told Annette, I said, I don't feel any more tired or more stressed or anything
than we would on a normal Sunday because everybody executed and it went really well.
And like you said, we just believe everybody had a great experience.
And I know I did. It was phenomenal.
Oh, yeah.
And yeah, I mean, so grateful, so grateful for our team.
Well, it just reminded me that, you know, when you bring things before the Lord
and you ask him to come through and ask for wisdom, he has a way of just bringing peace over everything you do.
And that's what I felt that morning.
I was like, this is peaceful. This is great.
This is what we're supposed to be doing.
I think this is my favorite Easter service that I can ever remember.
Simply because I was so proud of how our people pulled everything off.
But two, we didn't try to do something like over the top crazy.
You know, a lot of churches, no knock on them, but there's a lot of churches that do massive productions and pageants and all that.
Oh, by the way, if you hear beeping, hammering, drills, yelling, it's the sound of progress.
They are continuing the construction.
This has been part of what's kept us from doing some of our podcasts or thrown us off
is because it has been super loud around here.
But we're getting all new offices, a whole bank of offices, but happens to be right next door to us.
So anyway, if you hear stuff beeping, don't worry.
Nothing's going to blow up. You're good to go. Your car's not on fire. You're great.
So, yeah, great weekend.
Also last weekend, just got to bring this up a little bit, Annette and I, and we also brought Tina Curry with us.
We actually were invited to go to a fundraiser for an organization called America's Future.
And it's an organization that does a lot of work in the area of child trafficking and rescue and just a phenomenal organization.
They're also very committed to raising up the next generation of leaders.
So a lot of next-gen type stuff that got our attention.
The other thing that got our attention is we were invited to go to Mar-a-Lago in Florida, West Palm Beach, for that fundraiser.
That's a big deal.
What? OK. And mostly paid for.
I mean, the people who invited us were very generous and blessed us with that trip.
And we're like, how could we not go even though it's two days before Easter?
It feels like stuff like this just keeps happening.
Things like this are happening. I'm telling you.
The way I say it is, is we don't generate waves. We just catch the ones that come by.
So I'm not trying to create anything or make something happen other than be smack dab in the middle of God's will.
Say, Father, whenever, whatever, wherever, we'll go.
And he just keeps bringing these crazy opportunities.
So it was really great. General Michael Flynn spoke. It was very compelling, very powerful.
Vivek, I cannot. Everybody says it.
I'm not even going to try.
Ram Swaney, he spoke as well. He was a guest speaker and he was compelling.
And the whole time they're saying this is not political, this is not political.
It might have been a little political, but it was mostly about taking care of the next generation.
And then, interesting enough, Donald Trump made an appearance.
So he shows up. This wasn't a large group of people.
There might have been 120, 150, maybe, max.
And they were also doing a screening of a movie, a documentary called Into the Light by Mike Smith,
who was a former Hollywood stuntman for 20 plus years.
Right.
And he broke his back and then ended up beginning to open his eyes and see the corruption in Hollywood.
Well, that led him down the rabbit hole, finding corruption in our government and everything else.
And he's really just given his life now to exposing darkness.
That's why it's called Into the Light.
We watched the screening of that together.
And right before we did that, man, there was this big commotion at the back.
You look and there's like all kinds of guards and definitely people that look very serious.
And Donald Trump showed up.
He had been in New York City that morning at the funeral of the fallen officer.
And so I thought he's not going to be here.
But man, he made an appearance. He got up. He spoke a little bit, shared some things.
And whether you're pro Trump or not, pro whatever, Biden, whoever happens to be the big ticket,
I think the presence of any either sitting or former president, they carry something big on their lives.
When they walk in the room, it's not just because of the bodyguards, security and all that,
but they just carry a leadership component that is palpable.
That makes sense.
Well, and I mean, the fact that people like that are in the room shows that there's some importance
and some weight to the things being talked about.
Absolutely.
And it's funny because we talk about things being political or not political.
But the reality is anything that matters at all is always going to have some political component to it.
Absolutely. How can it not be?
In fact, you really segued nicely into that because one of the things I wanted to talk about today
is the intersection of Christianity and culture.
Should churches and pastors speak into culture or do we just need to stay in our lane,
stay in our boxes, in our churches, and just lead people to Jesus and make disciples?
Yeah. Well, I think the easy thing to do is to, quote unquote, stay in our lane.
But what does that really mean?
I think that that turns into being code for playing it safe, doing what's comfortable,
doing what doesn't ruffle feathers, doing what is the least offensive.
And yet, my Bible constantly talks about how the gospel is offensive.
But Pastor Brian, what about the separation of church and state?
Well, yeah. Man, that is, I'd say, often misunderstood sentence right there.
Trust me, it's come up. It's already come up.
Well, you know, the separation of church and state was designed to protect the church from government overreach
and government reaching in and controlling and dictating what the church is doing.
It was never designed to keep the church from influencing the state, influencing culture, influencing government.
I mean, the entire New Testament from ax on forward is replete with story after story of how Jesus' people
were turning the culture upside down.
Yeah, they were even called those people that are turning the world upside down.
Exactly.
And that wasn't just in synagogues. They weren't just hanging out around campfire.
That's right.
They were engaging leadership.
John the Baptist speaks to the governor and calls him out and says, you're off the rails.
Your morality, your judgment is coming because this isn't the New Testament.
This is under the grace, so to speak, instead of law.
And yet, he calls out and it cost him his life. He paid a high price for that.
That's right.
But he spoke truth.
Jesus himself called Herod, King Herod, a fox in front of a group of people.
So Jesus spoke truth to power. John the Baptist, the baptizer, he's not a Southern Baptist,
John the baptizer spoke truth to power.
And then you've got another incident where the apostle Paul was brought before Felix and his wife, Jerusalem.
Felix wanted to know this stuff he's talking about, Jesus, come tell me about that.
Paul launches into this speech, talks to him about righteousness, about judgment and wrath.
And Felix loses his mind. He's like, okay, that's enough.
He actually tells him to be quiet. And he says, go away and I will call for you when I'm ready for you.
Because the scripture says Felix was scared in the NIV.
He was scared. So you've got these great people that we go, oh my gosh, Jesus, John the baptizer, the apostle Paul.
Now let's start down the list of the Old Testament prophets who spoke truth to power.
How about Esther?
Oh my gosh, what a heroine sounds bad, but she's a giant in the faith.
For such a time as this, Mordecai told her.
I heard a pastor say one time that the whole book of Esther is a political intrigue thriller.
That's brilliant. That's spot on too.
You got a woman of God called by God, given a position of authority to speak into government.
And she did nothing to get that position. God literally miraculously positioned her.
That's right. And it wasn't like she had an opportunity to do something good.
And it was sort of a take it or leave it opportunity.
I mean, it was everything fell on her obedience or her disobedience.
And it even says in one point in the book of Esther, you know, if you fail to act in this moment,
deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your family will be judged.
Was that Mordecai that was saying that to her? I think it was Mordecai.
He also is the one who said right at the next verse, if I remember that correctly,
he said, could it be that you were born for such a time as this?
So if you've ever heard that cliche for such a time as this, it comes from the book of Esther
as she was speaking to power and navigating the political scene.
And so it's so interesting how I remember being at a place in my life not that long ago
where I just thought, you know what, I need to stay in my lane. I'm a pastor.
I'm called the shepherd, the sheep, you know, but I forgot some important things.
One of them was the Lord's model prayer where he says this, and when you pray, say,
our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. And in the very next phrase, arrested me.
Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth. That as it is in heaven, that got all over me
and began to really, the Holy Spirit worked that down into me where I began to make these.
It's like I had a different lens on where I began to see the world as, oh, they're just lost.
They're broken. Or as my granddad used to say, they're going to hell in a hand basket.
You know, let them go. Let them go do their thing. And yet, Jesus' prayer,
when the disciples said, teach us how to pray, was a charge. It was a mandate.
And we see in Matthew 28, what's called the Great Commission or the apostolic mandate,
we actually see the answer to that prayer. And the answer to that prayer is you and me.
That's right. And everybody listen. We got to go. We got to put the go back in the gospel.
In that, he talks about, we are to go and make disciples of the nations. And there it is.
So your kingdom come, you will be done on earth. We're to go and disciple the nations.
You put those two together. That's a powerful mandate. And does that involve politics?
Everything in life involves politics. And really, let's get it straight, right?
I mean, politics has inserted itself into all of the meaningful things in our lives.
Nailed it. And then tried to kick us out of those things.
And so really, it's not about, it's something political. It's like rather than the politics
and agendas of parties coming in and dictating to us what we should think and why we should think it,
it's time for us to speak back what God is saying, what the Bible is saying,
and bringing truth into those environments so that we're not let off course.
There you go. So where do you think, where did the breakdown come?
Because you know, not 50, 60, 70 years ago, which in historical terms is a spot.
I mean, it's like a barely a mark on a page. It's a very short time.
So in a very short time, there's been a massive reversal where at one point we understood
because of the Declaration of Independence mentioning God four times,
the Constitution having biblical principles throughout it, even though they can quote the Bible,
the principles are there, and then you've got the Bill of Rights.
I mean, you go down the list, which are protecting separation church and state,
which again is to protect the church from government overreach,
not protect the government from the church or the culture from the church.
So in a very short amount of time, we didn't just go down a slippery slope.
We fell off a cliff. We did. What's your take on that?
That's a big question. I think like most things, it wasn't one big event.
It was death by a thousand cuts. There you go.
And little by little, pieces of ground being taken away from the church and from believers
and us being convinced as followers of Jesus to be quiet about things that we needed to not be quiet about.
And like, oh, it's just prayer in schools. It's not that big a deal.
You can pray in your churches. You can pray in your homes. You can pray anywhere else.
But we just don't want to offend anybody at school.
We're going to take the Ten Commandments off the walls.
We're going to redirect the founding documents of our universities
and begin to change the kind of core tenets and curriculum.
And we're going to take creation out of science, and we're going to insert evolution.
And so, one by one...
Not to mention the murder of millions of babies.
Murder of millions of babies.
We're going to change our view on when life begins.
That's right. That's right.
And then mixed in with that, I think we've been sold a bill of goods about this idea that we're a democracy.
And that's not actually the truth of what we are.
It's not truth. In fact, I hear that language on the news and in news feeds nonstop from the left saying,
we're a democracy. And I'm like, dude, you need to go back and read the documents.
We are a constitutional republic. We are not a democracy.
That is such a misrepresentation. And they're trying to reframe the Constitution.
That's right.
And you say something loud enough, long enough, strong enough, people will begin to believe it.
For example, climate change. Do we want to open that can of worms?
Climate change is a scam.
Do you know that since the 1930s, globally on average, we are only one centigrade warmer than we were in the 1930s?
Right.
We are not warming. The planet is not warming.
We are actually still in the end of the recovery of the last ice age.
That's right.
I mean, we're still there.
In the broader scheme of long-term history, we're actually on the cooler side of things.
We're cooler side of things.
Yeah.
So that kind of stuff. So what happens is I'm thinking about climate change because that's all you hear now.
Right.
Oh, the climate, the climate, we've got to, you know, so here's what we're going to do.
We're going to talk about government overreaching control.
You're now going to be driving an electric car 10 years from now.
Yeah.
Everybody's going to be driving, notwithstanding how much power, how much it takes to build an electric car, what it does with the batteries.
All the man, it is such a scam. And all it is, it's a leverage for overreach.
And there are trillions of dollars swirling around into people's pockets.
Well, they've created industry around it.
Yeah.
Complete industry. But the sad part for me is not just the industry has been created, but now it's being forced on the American people.
That's right.
And globally, actually, this is around the globe. This isn't just America.
And so we've got this slippery slope that turned into a cliff.
Like I said, death by a thousand cuts. But suddenly you look up and like, we're dead.
I mean, like we're bleeding out.
Yeah.
And so anyway, wow.
We've given up a lot of ground. And we live in the most probably, maybe apart from Israel, the most unique nation in the history of the world.
Where freedom was given from the beginning.
Yeah.
And one of the longest standing constitutions that's ever happened, we've ever had.
It's miraculous. Well, I mean, the whole idea of being a constitutional republic like you brought up, I mean, it's unique in the world and in the history of the world for a country to be formulated that way.
You know, because the difference between a constitutional republic and a democracy is that you've got a country that was founded on the idea that our rights come from God.
God, there it is.
Unalienable.
Unalienable rights that are given by our creator to the people. And it's a government that's run by the people and for the people.
Supposed to be.
Supposed to be. Let's be real.
But it's not designed to be a government that's run based on popular opinion of the time or majority consensus.
It's the idea that the basic tenets and foundations of what's right and wrong, of who we are as a people, of what our rights are, we don't determine that.
And it's not based on our whims and feelings and the way culture changes over time.
It's permanently established by God. And that is what governs us as a nation.
But what's happened, and man, you just nailed it, but what's happened is that we've, not we, but people have come along, groups have come along, powerful interest groups have come along, and said, yeah, but there are no true absolutes.
So let's do away with absolutes. Let's make sure that we're relevant to the times that we're in.
And then you have now situational ethics. You've got relativism. Then you've got the influence of Marxism, socialism, communism, Maoism, all coming in.
And again, death by a thousand cuts. That's a great line that you said a minute ago. I really want to just accentuate that.
Death by a thousand cuts, where now this is so seeped into the culture. And what they've done, which is brilliant, but Satan is very smart.
He's a liar and the father of it, and a strategist. What they have done is they realized, and cigarettes and cars did this years ago, where they build brand loyalty with the next generation.
They start advertising marketing to kids. Now that's an old trick. I mean, one of the oldest tricks in the book, because you look up a generation from now and look who's running the country.
So now we've got it. Hey, there's the hammering. Bring it on. So there, now you've got, you've got this grooming of a culture, grooming of the next generation.
And now they are all beginning to come into their upper teens, into their twenties, and they're still living at home. They don't want to get a driver's license. They don't want to work, by God.
We want the government. We want to depend on the government for our sustenance.
Well, you know what makes me upset when I think about things like this is there's no end or shortage of Christians out there who are upset about these things or upset about what's going on with the next generation,
and can rail about it online and on social media and things like that. But I see very few who are willing to do anything actually courageous.
Yeah, I'll call those keyboard Christians. They're sitting behind their computer spewing stuff online, but not getting up off their blessed assurance and doing something.
Yeah. I mean, I love what Pastor Alan Jackson says when he talks about this.
The answer to this is not finding the right leader or another politician. Exactly. The answer isn't a protest that's going to happen.
But really the answer starts with every Christian pointing the finger at themselves and going, where do I need to repent?
How do I need to commit to discipleship in a deeper way personally? How do I need to live out my faith more authentically?
Because we know that whenever a body of believers are walking closely with Jesus and they're filled with the Holy Spirit, it changes things. It transforms things.
The power of God shows up. The miraculous happens, and He can change hearts and minds.
I mean, the Bible says that the heart of the King is in the hand of the Lord, and He can turn it any way that He wants.
But He's waiting for us as His people to take our place before He's going to move on our behalf.
I love the line I heard a while back. We are not without great hope. That's right.
And so, you know, the idea that a small group of people turn the world upside down in Jesus' generation, His disciples, it can happen again.
And it's happened classically and it's happened cyclically over the years, generations. And so we can turn this around.
And that's why I started speaking out from the pulpit. I've had some—I wouldn't say I've had bad blowback,
but I've had some people just caution, caution, be careful. You know, you don't want to get political. And I'm like, too late, too late.
The world is political. And if we as leaders do not speak truth to power and speak truth to culture from a prophetic standpoint,
like the prophets of old who spoke to kings, the prophets who addressed the ills of the culture and how we've moved away from God,
I think about, man, one of the—Nehemiah going to Artaxerxes. Now, they had a good relationship.
So he was speaking truth to power not in a combative way or a conflictive way, but he came in a spirit of appeal.
That's right. And because of his relationship and his standing, King Artaxerxes said, yeah, and here's a blank check.
Do whatever you need to do. And he went back and rebuilt the walls of Jerusalem, brought the glory of the city back.
And I believe that can happen today. I'm not saying we're going to go buddy up to government,
but I'm saying we should never be afraid to step into these arenas and speak truth to power. But don't go with a fight.
Don't go with a mentality of, you know, they're my enemy. There's only one enemy that you and I have, and every listener listening.
And that is Satan. That is a very real power. And the prince of the power of the air, he's called in Scripture.
And he works through fear and intimidation tactics. If he can get you to sit down and be quiet, he'll leave you alone.
That's right. Because I'm so at peace because it's just me and Jesus. I'm just going to go, man, just Lord, it's you and me, me and my papa, me and my father.
And it's like God's going, yeah, it's good. Now go do something. Go put the go back in gospel.
That's right. When I, Book of Acts has always been such a powerful thing for me. And when people say, hey, we just need to stay in your lane.
You know, don't get outside. I mean, you know, you're a preacher. You should be preaching the gospel.
But then I look at the Apostle Paul, who was compelled, who was motivated, who had visions of a man from Macedonia saying, come over here.
Come across the lake. Come over here. How about when he goes to that city and disrupts the entire economy by getting a fortune teller delivered evil spirits.
Got him killed. And got nearly got him killed because when you start touching money out of people's pockets.
Follow the money, touch the money. And boy, you to follow the money is one thing.
But when you touch and expose, that's when the enemy's like, oh, we got to stop this right now.
Yeah, because really this applies not just to thinking about government and local and national government, but a lot of times this is where you work every day.
I mean, I exactly prior to coming to the bridge, you know, about four months ago, I came out of the corporate world for nine years, you know, working in a entrepreneurial, fast growing company that went from about 30 employees to a thousand over nine years.
And got to see a lot of change and development as more and more money began to come into the company. Things like COVID happened. Things are shifting in culture.
And I remember there were some moments along the way where I felt ill equipped to reckon with how I was going to live my faith authentically in the midst of some of the pressures that were coming even through my work environment.
For example, when the whole pronoun mess started coming out, you know, and there started to be this pressure nationally and corporately that, you know, hey, if you don't call somebody the pronouns that they want to be called, regardless with whether they line up with reality or truth or not, that, you know, you're a bigot.
Yeah, hate speech. Yeah, you could lose your job over this. You know, you could be reprimanded. You could get demoted. You're a denier.
And I mean, I felt some of that even in my job. And there were moments as, you know, more of these situations began to arise where I really had to reckon with myself. Like, what am I going to do? Am I going to do what is more comfortable in this situation?
Or am I going to be truthful? And I had to realize, man, there could be a cost to this thing. You know, there could come a moment where doing the right thing means I lose my job.
Wow. And what am I going to do? Speak into that, Brian, because man, I'm just so with you on this right now. And I'm just feeling you. But I'm also feeling the angst of people who are listening to us.
Speak into those who are on the other side of these microphones or driving down the road, maybe driving home from work, you know, to listen to this podcast. What would you say to them? I mean, these are people who are doing life. They're trying to make it do it the best they can. They're trying to keep their head down.
What would we say to believers and new and young believers who are caught in some of these situations in culture?
Yeah. Well, I think there's a reminder of what it really means to be a disciple of Jesus, first and foremost. He said, you should count the cost before you follow me. And the implication is there is a cost, you know, and that while the blessings eternally outweigh anything you'll ever go through in your life,
there are moments along the way where sticking with Jesus isn't going to be comfortable. It isn't going to feel like a blessing in the moment. But if we believe that God is our source, if we believe that we're sons and daughters, if we believe he loves us and he's for us, and we believe what the scripture says, then we know that he's going to see us through every situation.
It may not be the way we want or how we want, but that's really where the rubber meets the road of like, why am I even following Jesus? Am I doing it because of something I thought I was going to be able to get from it? Or am I doing it because he's holy? He is God.
And that's all I need to know. And it's not easy because I've had to reckon in my own heart at multiple points over the last six to eight months of just realizing like, wow, I'm kind of following Jesus in this area of my life because I thought it was going to get me things I wanted, not purely for just who he was.
And I think God's had me, he's had me working on that and he's put me in some uncomfortable situations to say, what are you going to do here? What are you going to do here? But he's never left me. He's never failed me. He's never dropped me. He's never abandoned me.
And that's, I mean, that's, I'm walking through that right now. We're trying to sell our house still in Nashville.
Hey, here's a prayer request folks, prayer alert, prayer flair. Yeah, we moved to Fredericksburg on a word from the Lord from Nashville and put our house up. It's a crazy time to sell a house. It hasn't sold. It's been six months.
I've got two houses now and two payments and it's crazy. And it's been tempting to succumb to the fear and the anxiety that could arise from that. But I find that every time I bring it back to him and say, God, I know you told me to do this, the peace comes back.
Yeah.
And I may have to keep bringing it to him, you know, five, 10 times a week. But every time I do, the peace comes.
Beautiful.
I know I'm doing what I'm supposed to do.
Man, that's beautiful, brother. Let's bring this down to making it real for real life.
Yeah.
You know, making it real for real people. There's a great quote of, for years, I have said this a thousand times and probably different aberrations of it. But Dr. Rice Brooks said years ago, and here I just, I have it written here.
For every step you take away from the cross, there will be a crowd of people cheering you every step of the way.
Yeah.
And I'm thinking about culture today. Culture today has moved so far away from our foundations as a nation.
Yeah.
You know, the pilgrims literally came over here because of tyranny and control and because they wanted to practice their religion freely.
That's right.
That was how it all started. You read the Declaration of Independence, you can't get away from it. And then the Constitution sets it up and then the Bill of Rights later brings these protections and boundaries over free speech, right to protect yourself, separation of churches, all that, all laid out.
Our nation has drastically moved away. Even some political pundits have said things publicly that the Constitution is just a piece of paper and it can be changed.
I think it's the next thing they're going after.
They will go after it. I don't know that they'll get it. I think it will create a map. So here's how I see things right now. The sleeping giant keeps getting poked. That's the church.
Can you imagine if the church came together? Mind you, the church is a wide spectrum of beliefs and people.
I've got friends that are pastors, that are leaders in churches, and they are so on the other end of the spectrum from me. Some of them are wondering if they should still be my friend, but I won't let them get away from me because I'm going to be your friend even if we disagree.
I'm going to love you anyway. You can't do anything about it. I just keep confounding them. And I'm going to stay with that because I'm going to love them no matter what, even if I disagree, which our culture needs to remember that.
Absolutely.
So, like he said, for every step you take away from the cross, there will be a crowd of people cheering you on.
There was a time in our culture where it was a small crowd cheering you on. It has become a roar of crowds.
A roar.
Massive crowds. Myriads of people who are cheering you on when you start taking a step away from the cross.
I've got some of my own family who have recently, and some over the last few years, have stepped away from their faith. Young. And we're talking next-gen.
And they have taken steps away even declaring, I don't believe in God anymore. They're angry. They've been hurt. They've had things happen in life that were not good or fair or just.
And so they extrapolated from that that God's not with them or he doesn't even exist.
And so as a grandparent, you know, it's a heartbreaker. Boy, that'll take you to your knees real quick.
But what happened is the moment they started taking steps away, there was a crowd of people around them.
They are surrounded by people saying, yeah, you're right. You're right. You're brave. Yeah, you're so courageous. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you for speaking your truth.
You know, man, that stuff's happening right now.
Man, it makes me think of the prophet Isaiah when he said, woe to those who call good evil and evil good.
And it seems like that's so much of what we're seeing right now is things that are flipped on their head, you know, things that God says are good are being called evil and hateful and bigoted.
And then the things that God clearly says are evil are being called good and loving and right and progressive and all the things. Right?
Yes. Yes. I remember where it started. It started with a word called tolerance. Do you remember this?
I mean, this is 15 years ago when this really started. And I remember us being a little alarmed at the time.
Like, man, we're hearing people talk about tolerance, tolerance. And it became a replacement or an extension of the definition of love.
But the reality is love is not tolerance of things that are harmful.
Love speaks truth, and the scripture tells us in Ephesians 4, speaking the truth in love.
That's right.
But what happens is they get out of order, they get out of sync.
If I love you and the bridge is out and you're careening towards that bridge, you know, in a car, I have a responsibility to get out from your car, wave you down.
Warning, there's a bridge. You're going to drive off a cliff at the rate you're going. And for me, that's not love to go, I don't want to offend them.
I don't want to get in their way. I don't want to impose my knowledge upon them that the bridge is out and that they're going to die.
Because that would be selfish. That'd be self-serving. And so is that love?
No.
So, if we sit down and be quiet, if we say we know the truth and we believe it's truth, because really what this reveals is how many people really believe this is the truth and name the name of Christ.
Because if you're not convinced, you will be quiet. You won't speak up. You will succumb to the culture.
Yeah. I mean, it really breaks down whether it's become religion or if it really is a relationship with a living God.
There it is.
Joyce Meyer coined this phrase years ago, believing believers. Are we believing believers?
Because you can name the name of Christ, you can get baptized, you can get your certificate, you can attend church, you can do your U-version Bible, 15 devotionals every week.
But it comes down to will you stand or will you lean?
That's right.
The culture is leaning. Christianity stands. Jesus stood.
You know, in the book of Revelation, Jesus is speaking to seven different churches at the beginning of the book.
And one of them, he's rebuking the church. And what he tells them is you tolerate that woman Jezebel. And Jezebel is the spirit of the age.
Right.
Or you could say the spirit of Antichrist. It's the spirit of the world that was creeping into a church. And Jesus said, you can't tolerate this.
Yeah.
That was his instruction.
False gods, idolatry, overreach and control. I mean, go down the list on that.
Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah.
So we have work to do.
We have work to do. One of the, I heard I was listening to or watching a podcast with George Barna, who's just a brilliant statistician.
I can only take so much of him at a time, to be honest, because his stats are so scary that I can only take so much bad news.
But he was on this great, great podcast, Pastor Alan Jackson. And he said this, he said, we are in a war.
Now he's referring in the context of that was referring to the next generation, youth and children, that if we don't wake up and reorient ourselves to raise up the next generation, we will lose this thing.
Ron Luce of Teen Mania said many years ago, we are one generation from absolute...
Paganism.
Paganism. Thank you. I lost the word. It was a P word. We are one generation from total paganism. And he said that years ago, years ago.
But listen to this quote. Hold that thought because I know you're about to rip. Here we go.
This is the quote from George Barna. We are in a war and we are losing the war because we are not raising up warriors. We're raising up spiritual pansies.
And he was referring to the next generation. But the indictment isn't on the next generation. The indictment is on the now generation.
How we've instructed them and raised them up.
Do you know I heard that quote and I started a text. I didn't finish it because we started this. I'm writing my grandkids right now. I'm going to write them say, just want you know, I prayed for you today. Love you guys.
You guys are champions. I'm just going to build them up. So I started it. I've already got it just set up. I'm waiting on one phone number from one of my granddaughters.
You know what I've seen is we've gotten to this place where we treat each other, we treat everyone like they're so fragile. They can't hear anything that's not pleasant. They can't hear anything that's difficult.
I have a quote for that. I do. This is from Alan Jackson. He says, I'm not in favor of churches who want to deliver a message that is predominantly grace.
He says, I believe in grace. If you look up grace, you'll find my picture. I love that.
He says this, but I think our message has to begin in truth. It's like going to a doctor who only wants to give you good news. That's called malpractice.
That is. If all the church does is say smile and be happy, you're not helping people.
That's not. Wow. I mean, the most transformational moments I've had as a believer were also the hardest moments with the hardest things to hear that I needed to hear.
And if there wasn't somebody who loved me, who was willing to tell me what I needed to hear, not what I wanted to hear, I would have never been the man that I've become.
Absolutely agree. 100%. I can go back on my life and remember when someone said something to me and I was offended by it. I'm so offended.
Now, back then you couldn't do much about offense. You didn't go on Facebook and type out something.
You just took it and you're like, well, I'm so upset. I don't want to be their friend anymore. And then you get down the line and go, they were absolutely right.
I needed that. I look back on every... Now, this is going to be really anti-establishment. My dad spanked me profusely. And you know what? I earned every one of them.
I mean, there was only one time that there was an unjust thing because I got blamed for something I didn't do. And when my dad found out, he apologized to me. He repented of it.
And so, I earned every spanking I got. But you know what? I was taught. And the struggles that we endure, the things we go through, they actually build resilience in our lives.
I'm so thankful I played sports and that I had coaches in my face. They were bringing the best out of me by getting in my face. They were bringing better performance.
They knew that I was capable of more than I was giving. And they knew how to pull it out of me. Now, today, if a coach just says that, they'll quit the team. You hurt my feelings.
And yet, how much do we need resilience today?
Oh man, more than ever. So, we see what the enemy has done in setting up the next generations for failure. And they're going to be the next leaders of our country living in mom's basement.
Well, the George Barnistad on this current upcoming generation, Gen Z or whatever it is now, what I read is 1% of them have a biblical worldview. 1%.
That's from ages 8 to 12, that generation. The next one is like 2%. Gen Z I think is 3. So, it sort of staggers in those little time blocks.
It's almost flat lined.
It is. And he said it will get below 1% if we don't act now. And so, one of the things he talked about was reorienting everything back down to your family.
Because here's what's under attack. There's three fronts that we're on massive attack right now. The first one is faith. The second one is family.
The third is freedom and liberty. Freedom. It's three F's. It's easy to remember. But these are what are under attack. And that's not political. This is a spiritual war.
In fact, the whole thing, because we have to bring politics in it because that's our culture, that doesn't mean we're political in that sense.
But it's about, because Jesus, God, the kingdom is all far beyond the red and blue. And whatever the independent color is.
So far.
Because they haven't figured out what RFK's color is.
It's purple.
Whatever the third color is. It's so far beyond that because this is a spiritual war. It comes right down, right back to that.
Our battle is not against flesh and blood. It's against principalities and powers and dominions and spiritual forces in heavenly places, Ephesians 6 talks about.
Well, and we've been called to a two-part response. I mean, the first part of our response is to get on our knees and pray.
There it is.
Because we can't do this on our own. If God's not with us, if he's not leading us with the pillar of cloud and the pillar of fire, then we have no hope of turning the tide.
So it starts in prayer, but it doesn't stop there.
Because then we got to go out and we got to do.
The book of James says, you know, faith without action is dead.
There it is. I'm going to steal from my sermon for this Sunday. I don't like to do this, but I'm going to do it anyway because I can't help myself.
I wrote down this quote, and it's basically this.
We go into our closets to pray. Jesus said, go in the secret place and pray. But we come out in the power of the Spirit to engage and to act.
The book of Acts has in it as a root, act. I mean, that's what it is. We put the go in gospel and we put the action into acts.
I mean, we do what we're supposed to do. Don't be hearers only of the word, be doers of the word, James says.
And so I think that what God is trying to do in a lot of us is stir us to action.
And I think there's a shot over the bow. And I'm going to say something that's very unpopular right now.
But our nation is already in the foothills of judgment.
You can't deny that because everything that's happened recently has happened so fast.
Transgender movement, I mean, LGBTQ, RST, UNV, I mean, it's gone so off the rails.
I forget how many my daughter, who's Gen Z, told me how many pronouns there are now.
And they can't even keep up with them. They keep inventing like 91 or something was the last count.
So, I mean, everything. 70 million babies killed. Oh, man. Sheesh. Murder. 70 million.
Just mind bending there. Mind bending. You know, I had someone tell me yesterday, and this really, he's a believer and a friend.
And he said, you know, he said, ever since the Republicans, you know, we overturned Roe v. Wade.
We did our victory dance, but we've lost almost every significant election since then in primary.
He said, I think we're going to need to give ground on this. And I said, at what cost?
At what cost? At what cost do we give ground to the left to give them back their choice for abortion?
And because what's a few million babies in the bigger picture? See, see, and I wrote him, he was by text.
I said, this is a massive ethical dilemma. Well, just the spirit within me, even when you said that, it's visceral.
It's impossible to do that, no matter what the potential gain could be.
When I read that, it was during our staff meeting, I was like stunned. So if I went out for a minute during staffing, it was because that popped up.
Wow. And he was like, you know, just first trimester kind of thing. I was like, OK, where does that logic train end up?
Wow. You know, we either stand for truth or we lean. Yeah.
And boy, I restrained myself because I could have got real involved in that conversation, could have turned into a debate, but I'm not going to do that.
Yeah. I will speak to it. I did speak to it. I said, where does this end? Where does this logic train go?
That we start winning the election, we start we get a majority in the Senate and House again, we get the president, you know, American Idol, if you might say, that we want.
You know, does you think that's going to matter in the bigger thing when this is not that problem?
This isn't a political issue. This is a moral life, righteousness issue, spiritual war.
Anyway, sorry to go off on that. That just really that was yesterday while we were in while you were leading our staff meeting.
I'm going, what? I mean, like almost out loud. What? That's where we're going.
Whereas believers, we can say we're going to compromise now and give some ground. Well, you know, apply that to everything.
You're on not a slippery slope. You're back off the cliff. You hear these things, you know, and I think this is for a lot of people out there.
And I know some of these people, it's easy to just get angry. Right. And then to just come across as angry. That's not helpful.
No. You know, we need to be wise and we need to be prayerful. We need to be discerning and we need to be following the Lord in these things and not just flying off the handle.
There it is. Because that doesn't fix things. It's OK to be passionate.
But when you go out online or you go through a text or you're in a conversation, you have to you have to curb your enthusiasm.
Yeah. In a sense to say, OK, if I come out with what I'm feeling right now, I'm going to overwhelm and it will not be productive in a good conversation.
So when I wrote him back, I didn't write everything I just said. I'm thinking a lot.
But I wrote back, this is a massive ethical dilemma. And I left it there because I thought if I start writing now, I mean, I might as well leave the staff meeting and go do this.
Because I thought, no, this is for another time. And I don't want to do this by text either.
But so what do we do? I think, you know, rather than rather than getting angry, I think what we do is we resolve that we're going to be immovable.
Yes. You know, that as all these other things are trying to move us further down the shore, that we're going to be on solid rock here.
We are not going to be moved off of truth. Good, PB. And I've got a word for that.
Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God so that you may or you can take your stand against the devil's schemes.
So there's what we're standing against. We're not standing against political pundits. We're not standing against…
We have to speak truth into that. But the stand is a spiritual stand. And I even say, I tell men, get on your knees and fight like a man. Man up.
You want to man up? Then get on your knees and fight this war in your prayer closet. But then get off your knees and go do what God tells you to do.
It says, for our struggle… This is in Ephesians chapter 6. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities,
against the powers of this dark world, and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.
Wow. You know, one more thought I have. I think it was Elijah, you know, when he… after he called down fire on the prophets of Baal,
and then he gets threatened by Jezebel, and he gets freaked out, and he runs into the wilderness, and he's hiding, and he's scared for his life, and he wants to die.
And God comes to him to comfort him and refresh him and get him ready for the next go.
Right. And one of Elijah's complaints to the Lord was to the effect that, you know, he was the only one left.
Yeah. That there was… there's nobody else out there that follows you, Lord. There's nobody else like me out there.
I'm the only one. And God's response to him was to say, I got people everywhere.
Seven thousand, in fact. That's right. Thousands.
Yeah, thousands. And I think it's easy to feel that way ourselves, like, gosh, does anybody stand for truth anymore?
Does anybody believe the Bible anymore? Does anybody follow God anymore?
And the truth is, they are far more than we realize, and most of them are waiting for somebody to give them permission to speak up about it.
That is true. You know, I would encourage you as a listener, so good, PB, as a listener, I mean, there are resources out there.
I mean, I wouldn't recommend a couple right now. Go online, go on YouTube and put in the search box, Alan Jackson.
A-L-L-E-N. He's a pastor in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. Great church. And he has even short videos.
If you don't have much time, but you just want to catch something quick, he's got short videos on the border crisis, on abortion, on every topic.
He's so good on that stuff.
He is one of the clearest, I would say he's a clarion voice. His voice is piercing the darkness and bringing wisdom, common sense, and clarity.
And I would encourage you to do that. Also, other great sources. Somebody I've really come to appreciate, I read a book by Eric Metaxas.
Oh, man, he's so good.
That book is called Letter to the American Church.
Yep. There's a documentary that goes with it, too.
Fantastic. Yeah, that's a great, you don't want to read the book, watch the documentary, then you'll want to read the book.
And whatever works for you. So, Letter to the American Church by Eric Metaxas. He also has a radio show and podcast, which you can look up.
His name spelled odd. I used to think it was Metaos, but it's Metaxas. It's M-E-T-A-X-A-S, Metaxas.
And, or maybe X-E-S. Either way, you can find him easily. Letter to the American Church.
Another resource that's come into my orbit in this last year is actually a family that started coming to our church, Rick and Kara Green.
They're great.
So, he is a fantastic podcast. He had Ricky Schroeder on his podcast this week.
Really?
He had Ben Carson last week. He had Kirk Cameron the week before.
Oh.
So, and he's also a part of the wall builders team with David and Tim Barton.
Barton, yeah.
He's on that team. He's one of those. He's a constitutional expert, former attorney, was a legislator in Texas.
And he started an organization called the Patriot Academy where they are raising up. They're doing exactly what we're talking about.
They're raising up the next generation of warriors, constitutional warriors.
Wow.
Who, and they take a gap year. They come and they spend a year on campus, and their campus is right here in Fredericksburg.
They're moving it from Dripping Springs, Austin, to Fredericksburg. That's how they ended up in our church.
We became friends. And they'll house these students. They got 40 tiny homes they're building to house students.
And then they've got, they're reproducing the original legislative halls. So, I mean, it'd be like you're walking into the Capitol.
That's so good because, I mean, the war is most heated on the college campus. Would you agree with that?
Absolutely. Absolutely.
And so, we need to be arming our kids before they get to college to know who they are.
They're prepping them in that gap year for what they're going to walk into.
Yeah.
So that we don't lose kids. You know, it's such so, it's become strange for me. We pay hundreds of thousands of dollars now for an education.
And then we send them off to get them educated in the culture's world view.
Indoctrinated.
Moved away from God. Moved away from decency and morality. Moved away from a moral spiritual compass.
And we're paying them to do it. All for a piece of paper.
I mean, at the end of the day, what's more worth your while?
The next thing you know, you got college students doing sympathy rallies for Hamas after they attack Israel.
Man. But, okay, we're trying to land the plane here.
Sorry. Oh, I just opened up the can of worms.
That doesn't help. Man. That may be next time. Maybe we'll do a part two. And then we'll gladly head it over again.
So, Pastor Brian, thank you for being with us. We didn't even get into your amazing carnivore journey because you are a fellow carnivore.
That's right.
And for our carnivore friends. My gosh. This man, he's got a story. We'll pull that up next time.
Thank you for having me today.
But we're going to have you go. A couple of things. Yeah, absolutely. We'll do this again.
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But we also want to help you realize even though it's a down world, it's not a hopeless world.
There's always great hope. And our Lord Jesus Christ is in this thing. He's working the plan.
By the way, this is all prophesied going to happen. So don't be surprised at the way things go.
But in our season of life, we have a responsibility. And that is to be the answer to Jesus' model prayer.
Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
Man, we love you guys. We're so thankful for your time with us.
Thank you, P.B., for being with us. Man, I feel like we just got started.
We barely hit the tip of the iceberg. I think we got a lot more to talk about.
All right, man, we'll have to we'll get Damon on here.
We might throw another mic on here and get all of us on. Come on. We can do that.
All right, man. Much love to you, brother. Thank you. We are out.