Tucker Carlson Is COSTING JD Vance the Presidency | 7/16/26

Summary

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Steve Deace Show | July 16, 2026

Episode: Tucker Carlson Is COSTING JD Vance the Presidency

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Overview

This episode centers on a controversial interview featuring Tucker Carlson, whose recent comments on the GOP, Israel, and the ongoing intra-party divisions are, according to Steve Deace, threatening JD Vance’s viability as a future presidential candidate. Deace and his co-hosts dissect Tucker’s rhetoric and its reception in conservative and evangelical circles, then transition into a discussion of legalism as the next “deadly worldview” in their Theology Thursday series. The episode also features a segment with former NFL player and pastor Paul Blair about equipping pastors for modern challenges.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Tucker Carlson’s Critique and Its Fallout

[00:42–04:29, 12:49–29:00, 52:25–63:30]

• Tucker’s Position:

  • Tucker Carlson expresses disillusionment with the Trump-era GOP, asserting that the party, MAGA included, has subordinated America’s interests to Israel, particularly following recent wars in the Middle East.
  • Carlson laments that the “America First” promise was betrayed, including by JD Vance, whom he otherwise praises personally.

  “The truth is, after this war, it's impossible to say the Republican Party, Trump's Republican Party, MAGA, is acting on behalf of the United States; it's acting on behalf of Israel. And that's just a fact.”
  —Tucker Carlson [01:23]

  "You're disloyal. You sold out the country to a foreign nation. It's just too much. And I don't think I'm alone in feeling this way.”
  —Tucker Carlson [03:08]

• Deace’s Analysis:

  • Steve Deace argues that Tucker’s rhetoric is toxic for Vance’s presidential prospects, particularly in the eyes of Donald Trump, whose endorsement still defines the GOP.
  • Deace considers any impression that Vance is “the real MAGA” while Trump is the imposter to be political suicide for Vance.
  • Asserts that Tucker’s remarks serve as a “cosmic albatross” around Vance’s neck.

  "Getting that kind of endorsement is a little bit like getting Arius's endorsement for Pope Before Nicaea and then wondering why Constantine is suspicious."
  —Steve Deace [11:55]

  • Tucker as an Unwitting Saboteur:
    • Deace speculates Tucker might be “trying to nuke JD Vance on purpose,” describing his commentary as a "death knell" for Vance’s 2028 ambitions unless directly repudiated.

  “You can't have your friend saying that you're the real one and the guy who got you where you're at... is not the real one. That's just a nope.”
  —Steve Deace [26:26]

• Karlson’s Extremes:

  • Tucker equates assassinating the Ayatollah to religious extremism and likens it to assassinating religious figures like the Pope or Chief Rabbi, drawing sharp criticism from Deace for inaccuracy about Islamic leadership and inflammatory analogies.

  "You killed someone else's religious leader? The head of a world's religion. Do you get to, like, I don't know, do they get to kill the Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem now? Or the Pope? What are you doing? ...Nutcase."
  —Tucker Carlson [20:55]

• Insight on Trump’s Dominance:

  • Deace insists that Trump alone determines the future of the GOP and its candidates; all influencers, including Deace himself, are now “irrelevant” in the nominating process.

  "Only opinion that is relevant is Donald Trump's... The inevitable destiny of a Trump primary endorsement arrives just the same. It doesn't matter."
  —Steve Deace [25:26]

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2. Evangelical and Conservative Reaction

[06:41–08:29, 52:25–63:30]

• Shift in Sentiment:

  • Deace notes a growing reluctance among conservative Christian leaders to associate with JD Vance because of Tucker’s positions, observing that the same audiences that cheered Tucker a few years ago would now “boo him off the stage.”

• The “Audience of One” Problem:

  • Vance’s fate is tied to Trump’s favor; any signal of disloyalty or competition—especially from a figure as polarizing as Tucker—could doom his aspirations.

• Prescriptive Solutions:

  • Deace argues JD Vance must quickly, publicly and unequivocally, repudiate Tucker to avoid being politically destroyed by association.

  "JD's just gonna have to put this down. And it can't just be like a nebulous comment... He's going to have to very specifically put Tucker Carlson down."
  —Steve Deace [28:35]

• Responsibility of Pastors and Leaders:

  • Deace urges evangelical leaders to address the “Tucker problem” head-on by openly discussing policy issues and theological arguments, rather than relying on slogans or avoiding controversy.

  "Speak up publicly and definitely speak up in your pulpits... Make the theological case. Come now, let us reason together."
  —Steve Deace [58:09]

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3. Pastoral Leadership in Deconstructive Times

Guest: Paul Blair | [31:33–46:58]

• Paul Blair’s Background:

  • Former NFL player, now pastor, runs Liberty Pastor Conferences to train pastors for cultural leadership and courage.

• Pastoral Challenges:

  • Blair describes a generational reluctance among pastors to be bold and the need to overcome a culture of “trembling pastors.”
  • Stresses that “Jesus is Lord of all” necessitates discussing issues of civil government, economics, and cultural sin from the pulpit.

• Equip, Encourage, and Engage:

  • The conferences are designed to give pastors a sense of historical purpose and the theological tools to meet contemporary challenges.

  “Either Jesus is Lord of all or Jesus is just Lord of things you can talk about in Sunday Morning. But we know that Jesus is Lord of all.”
  —Paul Blair [39:57]

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4. Theology Thursday: Legalism – The Second Deadly Worldview

[63:30–98:00]

• Defining Legalism:

  • Legalism is presented as the excessive elevation of works or traditions above the sufficiency of Christ’s saving grace.
  • Examples: Rabbinical laws, Pharisee traditions, and modern “seeker sensitive” church practices.

• Warning Against Modern Legalism:

  • Steve dissects how today’s American churches, particularly the “seeker sensitive” movement, have become the new legalists by making Scripture insufficient without “human ingenuity.”
  • Declares the ubiquitous use of out-of-context “life verses,” e.g., Jeremiah 29:11, as a prime example of modern legalism masquerading as inspiration.

  “Taking Jeremiah 29 and 11 and turning it into your life verse of inspiration is the most legalistic teaching in America today because you've taken it completely and totally out of context.”
  —Steve Deace [86:50]

• Legalism as Self-Centered Faith:

  • Critiques church culture obsessed with aesthetic comfort, entertainment, and catering to individual tastes rather than calling believers to sacrifice and service.

  “In a seeker sensitive church, they make, they cater to you. In a savior sensitive church, they disciple you to live for Him.”
  —Steve Deace [93:09]

• Repentance and Discipleship:

  • Re-centers the Christian call to repentance, perseverance, and outward service as the antidote to legalism in every form.

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Notable Quotes & Moments

| Timestamp | Speaker | Quote/Highlight | |-----------|-------------------|-----------------| | 01:23 | Tucker Carlson | "After this war, it's impossible to say the Republican Party, Trump's Republican Party, MAGA, is acting on behalf of the United States; it's acting on behalf of Israel." | | 03:08 | Tucker Carlson | "You're disloyal. You sold out the country to a foreign nation. It's just too much." | | 11:55 | Steve Deace | "Getting that kind of endorsement is a little bit like getting Arius's endorsement for Pope Before Nicaea…" | | 20:55 | Tucker Carlson | "You killed someone else's religious leader? … Do they get to kill the Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem now? Or the Pope?" | | 25:26 | Steve Deace | "Only opinion that is relevant is Donald Trump's… The inevitable destiny of a Trump primary endorsement arrives just the same." | | 28:35 | Steve Deace | "He's going to have to very specifically put Tucker Carlson down." | | 39:57 | Paul Blair | "Either Jesus is Lord of all or Jesus is just Lord of things you can talk about in Sunday Morning. But we know that Jesus is Lord of all." | | 86:50 | Steve Deace | "Taking Jeremiah 29 and 11 and turning it into your life verse of inspiration is the most legalistic teaching in America today…" | | 93:09 | Steve Deace | "In a seeker sensitive church, they cater to you. In a savior sensitive church, they disciple you to live for Him." |

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• [00:42] — Tucker Carlson’s interview clip and initial response
• [06:42] — Deace on internal conservative/Christian debates over Vance and Tucker
• [12:49] — Deep dive into Tucker’s comments and their implications
• [24:52] — Deace’s assertion on Trump’s singular control over GOP succession
• [31:33] — Paul Blair interview: equipping pastors for the modern era
• [39:57] — The role of pastors in civil government and discipleship
• [52:25] — Analogy of Rubio’s ‘Gang of Eight’ moment portending dire warnings for Vance
• [63:30] — Theology Thursday: Introduction to Legalism as a deadly worldview
• [86:50] — Modern legalism in churches; misuse of Scripture as ‘life verses’
• [93:09] — Challenge to seeker sensitive churches and call for sacrificial faith

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Tone & Language

• Snarky, candid, provocative: Deace and his co-hosts employ a direct, no-nonsense tone with humor, cultural analogies, and evangelical references.
• Passionate, urgent: Especially in addressing JD Vance’s predicament and the issue of emerging legalism within modern church practices.

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Summary Conclusion

Steve Deace warns that Tucker Carlson’s post-Trump war rhetoric—framing MAGA as beholden to Israel and portraying Vance as anti-establishment “real MAGA”—is disastrous for JD Vance’s presidential future. Deace insists that, in today’s GOP, only Trump’s endorsement matters, and any hint that Vance represents a challenge to Trump’s legacy will be fatal, especially when intertwined with the views of a polarizing figure like Carlson. The panel calls for Vance and conservative leaders to confront this head-on. Meanwhile, Theology Thursday continues the critique of legalism, urging churches and pastors to resist both old and new forms of self-justifying, self-centered faith, and instead embrace uncomfortable but transformative discipleship that centers on Jesus rather than personal comfort or cultural trends.

Transcript

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[Todd Erzin]

It's the Steve Day show, and here's what happened while we were away, brought to you by something Steve Todd and I have discussed privately, but needs to be discussed in the open, and it has everything to do with this clip.

[Aaron McIntyre]

Is J.D.

[Paul Blair]

vance America first?

[Steve Deace]

Is he the answer for the Republican Party?

[Tucker Carlson]

I mean, I have. I mean, I, you know, this is, I think, publicly known, but I advocated very aggressively for J.D. vance both to get Trump's endorsement when he ran for Senate and for VP in the summer of 2024. And so, I mean, my views on JD Vance as a man, I think couldn't be clearer. I think he's a very decent person who loves the country, who has the right values and has pretty much the right ideas. I mean, I disagree with him on some things, but.

[Aaron McIntyre]

But do you think he can put America first?

[Tucker Carlson]

Can anybody? And at this point, in a political party that is dominated by Trump, I can't believe I'm saying this, because I've always liked Trump and I still like Trump. But the truth is, after this war, it's impossible to say the Republican Party, Trump's Republican Party, maga, is acting on behalf of the United States, it's acting on behalf of Israel. And that's just a fact. It's a fact. I mean, it's not. That's not a conspiracy theory. They said that Marco Rubio said that on camera. So we went into this war following Israel. So it's like that is the opposite of America First. That's America in the subordinate position, the female position, sorry, the bottom in this relationship. And that's the opposite of what we thought we were getting and what they told us we were getting. It's like it's such a betrayal that anyone attached to that is going to have a hard time reestablishing trust, even if he's a good man and J.D. vance is a good man. But I think it's hard. It's like, you know, you're. You're part of that I mean, how could you betrayed us? And it's the betrayal that makes it so bitter for people like me and maybe you who voted for Trump and I campaigned for and with him, you know, it's like, really, we really believe that you were going to at least try. And in the end, it's all about cryptocurrency scams and wars for Israel. I mean, I can't believe you did that. Hiding the Epstein stuff. Yelling at anyone who asked questions about the Butler shooting. Are you kidding? I'm an adult. I'm from this country. Like, I own this government. I own exactly as much of the government as you do because we're both citizens. How dare you speak to me the way you work for me? Like, that's how I personally feel about it. Like, I'm outraged. Yeah. That someone I supported would do something like this, would betray the country and his own voters, and then to whip around and say, I'm not loyal. I'm not loyal. I am loyal. My whole life is marked by loyalty. I'm married to my high school girlfriend. I believe in loyalty. Okay, you're disloyal. You sold out the country to a foreign nation. It's just too much. So. And I don't think I'm alone in feeling this way. And so anybody attached to that is going to have a pretty tough time. And by the way, I think it's really, really clear that Trump is for Rubio because Trump's donors are for Rubio. They're not for Vance. They know JD Vance would never have regime changed. Kill the ayatollah. You killed the ayatollah? Are you joking? What are you. Your nutcase. You killed someone else's religious leader? The head of a world's religion. Do you get to, like, I don't know, do they get to kill the Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem now? Or the Pope?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Right.

[Tucker Carlson]

Like, what are you doing?

[Paul Blair]

Right?

[Tucker Carlson]

Nutcase.

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yeah,

[Tucker Carlson]

And I'm not Muslim. I mean, obviously, I'm a Christian. Right, but we don't kill ayatollahs. We're not at war with religions. What the hell are you doing? Who's the religious extremist here?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Right.

[Tucker Carlson]

If you find yourself waking up and assassinating ayatollahs, you may be the religious extremist, actually.

[Aaron McIntyre]

So

[Steve Deace]

Tucker Carlson is poised to cost JD Vance the presidency if this is not addressed. And that's exactly why I want to address it next year on the Steve Day Show. And greetings. Happy Thursday. Welcome to the Steve Dase show, here live and on demand. I'm Steve Dase alongside Todd erzin and Aaron McIntyre. Coming up at the bottom of the program, we're going to help pastors get encouraged to be that next generation of black robed regiment. I saw my man Jack Hibbs, America's pastor. I watched his Independence Day message to his church out there at Calvary Chapel, Chino Hills, and he showed up in a, in the black robes of the colonial era. And I thought that was very cool. So we're gonna help you get equipped as a pastor to fulfill your obligation there. Coming up at the bottom of the hour and, and then next hour, Theology Thursday. We march on with the seven deadly worldviews. And this is how a culture deconstructs itself in order. And last week we talked about Gnosticism. We'll recap that briefly for you in case you missed any of that or you need maybe a refresher. And then we'll get into the next worldview that happens right after Gnosticism to deconstruct ourselves. And that is legalism. That's coming up your way, your way next hour here on Theology Thursday. But as Aaron tease there, there, there's some things that we have discussed privately amongst the three of us, things that, that, that I've been privy to in terms of private conversations that I thought were just really way too early to be concerned about. And you might recall, guys, one of the trips I took to D.C. earlier this year, I had a chance, it was for when I went there to do the Speaker Johnson tour and there was a dinner the night before, you remember, and I did talk about this on the show. And, and there were people at the table who were all very, very well connected within conservative, particularly Christian conservative circles. And I was the only JD Person there. And that blew my mind. Remember, I think I've mentioned this on the show.

[Aaron McIntyre]

I do.

[Steve Deace]

And I, I think I thought maybe the Tucker thing is causing even more damage than maybe, maybe I've underestimated it. Three years ago, actually, three years ago this week, Tucker Carlson made his first public appearance since he was fired by Fox News. It was at the Leadership Summit we broadcasted here on BlazeTV. I was one of the host of that episode. And it was the Leadership Summit here in Iowa with the presidential candidates, the organization that is helmed by my good friend Bob Vander Plots, who's a weekly guest with us here on the show most, most Mondays. And I said at the time that, and it remains true that there's just no way Tucker gets booked for that without me. Never happens because A lot of the people around Bob, frankly, were in complete opposition to Tucker getting booked because they thought he ended up doing to people like Mike Pence and the rest of those candidates exactly what he did, which is why I wanted him to be booked. Right. One thing I'll never forget Tucker said to us privately before that event as he talked about how he's studying the Bible for the very first time. He told us, I remember, I was very encouraged to hear that.

[Tucker Carlson]

Right.

[Steve Deace]

And three years later, I can tell you, you know, the Family Leaders Leadership Summit is tomorrow. I can tell you that if, you know, Tucker got a standing ovation when he was introduced three years ago, I can, I can promise you that if, in front of that exact same crowd, if, if he was brought to the stage today, get booed right from the stage boot, right off the stage, it's amazing what can happen in three years when you were in the process of deconstructing. Correct?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yes.

[Steve Deace]

And I want to make sure everybody understands why. I think it's very possible now that Tucker Carlson's going to cost J.D. carlson the presidency. It has nothing to do with any of our opinions, including my own. I, I, you could argue very strongly my entire career was based off of the ability to influence the Iowa caucuses, that it's how I went from Des Moines, Iowa, to a prominent national platform with, you know, and I didn't have to, like, bounce around to different radio markets and grow. It just provided me a national voice that you typically wouldn't have in the 89th largest radio market. And that influence is, is part of what's allowed me to grow and become successful and have the voice that I have today. I, I, as far as I know, maybe others have been involved in doing so. I don't know too many people that have beaten Donald Trump in a GOP primary twice. I did it with Ted Cruz in 2016. I did it with Zach Lane here just a month and a half ago. Now, I want you to understand, in between those two wins, I suffered about 700 beat downs. Okay? I'm not dead yet. Essentially, Dr. Strange looked at me and said, we have gone over all the scenarios where you could possibly defeat Donald Trump in a primary. This is the 1 and 10 million other in other circumstances, you lose, but this is, this is the one. All right, So I actually had two. Dr. Strange gave me two fingers, one for Ted Cruz and one for Zach Lane. Now, we barely won, man. Barely won. Both of those. Barely won. But we did. Wins a win. Right? Wins a win. Take the wins. Because Because I still have. I mean, I've been dog cussed off the stage by Donald Trump. I mean, I've been beat down, shaken down, ridden hard, put away wet. I've got bruises and scars. Okay. And bulging veins from the. All the other beat downs. All right. But I do have a couple of wins. And I'm going to tell you right now, my opinion in the Iowa Bob is going to kill me for saying this, but it's true. My opinion is completely irrelevant in the upcoming Iowa caucuses. My opinion doesn't matter. Nobody's opinion at all. None of your opinions matter. We're going to have a primary of one. Trump is king. He's the king you all wanted and chose. Kings, typically, as long as they're alive, get to choose their successors, do they not?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yeah.

[Steve Deace]

And Trump is good to choose his. And 99% of the time has our base not confirmed that Trump is their king by following along his lead. When he makes a primary endorsement 99% of the time, that's where our base goes. Correct?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yes.

[Steve Deace]

So, so that's, this is the reality that there's a group of people, and many of them are friends of mine, people I greatly like and respect, personal friends of mine. They've been frequent guests on the show over the years that are trying to kind of get a heads up jump on 2028 right now. We talked about this recently, too.

[Aaron McIntyre]

Right.

[Steve Deace]

By kind of creating this shadow preliminary primary online for 2028 with their preference for Rubio, particularly over foreign policy where Israel's concerned.

[Aaron McIntyre]

And you know how much I love to get ahead on the election.

[Steve Deace]

Yeah, I know. And I'm just going to say to all those folks, you know, because they're all very talented, very successful, very smart, none of their opinions matter either. What they're doing will have no relevance at all. And I say that from the guy who's built an entire career off of being relevant in GOP presidential primaries. My opinion irrelevant. Your opinion irrelevant. Only opinion that is relevant is Donald Trump's. And that's why I think it's time to address whether Tucker Carlson's going to cost J.D. vance the presidency or not. And it has nothing to do with any polling or any group of leaders, including many of them who are friends of mine, anybody else who is at that dinner table a few months ago, and I was the only JD Guy there, and they are all friends of mine, too, because we also all agreed that none of our opinions matter, that Trump is going to make the decision for us here. We also all agreed to that. And it's specifically because of my read of Donald Trump that I think Tucker has, if he's not already past a point of no return here as a cosmic albatross, that, that essentially getting the kind of endorsement that JD Gets from Tucker in that clip, and we're going to re examine that clip here in a minute. But getting that kind of endorsement is a little bit like getting Arius's endorsement for Pope Before Nicaea and then wondering why Constantine is suspicious. So let's get into this clip again. Aaron Rerack that clip and let's fire it back up from the beginning. Is J.D.

[Paul Blair]

vance America first?

[Steve Deace]

Is he the answer for the Republican Party? I mean, I have now freeze it right there. Freeze it right there. Does the question define what America first is? Do we know from the question what it would be? How would we know what the question would be? Right.

[Aaron McIntyre]

Probably know from the fact by asking, who the hell are the Hodge twins? Why are you on that show?

[Steve Deace]

Okay, well, Tucker likes to hand pick people that aren't going to really challenge him. We've seen the consistent pattern of that. So what's the premise? What's it mean to be America First? And you're going to see from the answer what it means to be America first is to lessen, to diminish, if not outright detangle, the alliance from Israel. That's, that's now the. And it's funny because these are the same people that will accuse others like Ben Shapiro and Mark Levin, for example, of being Israel Firsters.

[Paul Blair]

Right.

[Steve Deace]

And that, that we have to define whether or not it's meaningful to be conservative by how you view a foreign country in Israel. Right. They like to mock that. And yet that's the very standard that they're also perpetuating here. Correct?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yes, yes.

[Steve Deace]

And I have said previously, have I not, that you know, essentially branding Marco Rubio as the Israel first candidate will not be helpful to him? I've said that. Right. Because that's true. Okay. Unless they're going to go as far as the rest of this clip. Does that. See, that's what's going to change the calculus as I'm about to show you. Keep it going.

[Todd Erzin]

Can I get quickly, can I take a crack at defining what America first is by quoting Candace Owens? I don't know, but I just know. No, you know, there you go.

[Steve Deace]

That's as good an answer as any. Yes. Thank you. Profound.

[Tucker Carlson]

This is, I think, publicly known, but I advocated very aggressively for J.D. vance, both to get Trump's endorsement when he ran for Senate and for VP in the summer of 2024. And so, I mean, my views on JD Vance as a man, I think, couldn't be clearer. I think he's a very decent person who loves the country, who has the right values and has pretty much the right ideas. I mean, I disagree with him on some things, but.

[Aaron McIntyre]

But do you think he can put America.

[Tucker Carlson]

Can anybody? And at this point, in a political party that is dominated by Trump. I can't believe I'm saying this, because I've always liked Trump and I still like Trump. But the truth is, after this war, it's impossible to say the Republican Party, Trump's Republican Party, maga, is acting on behalf of the United States. It's acting on behalf of Israel. And that's just a fact. It's a fact. I mean, it's not. That's not a conspiracy theory. They said that.

[Steve Deace]

All right, freeze it right there. So, yeah, I looked into this particular clip, by the way, that he's talking about with Marco Rubio, and essentially what it is is it's a heavily doctored clip of Marco Rubio taken out of context. All right. By. By Tucker and Joe Kent, and that's what Tucker's alluding to as a fact. What? Marco Rubio. Marco Rubio made it very clear in this clip, if you watch it in its entire context, that, quote, the operation against Iran needed to happen regardless of Israel, because Iran was approaching a line of immunity with ballistic missiles and drones that could hold the religion, a region and. And world hostage and enabled unchecked nuclear pursuits. So this had to happen no matter what. That's the fullness of the quote. Rubio goes on to say that Israel's planned action may have influenced the timing and whether to join a joint or preemptive strike against Israel, but in terms of it having to, fundamentally, the United States is just doing the bidding of Israel. Then again, you had the clip from yesterday where Joe Rogan asked this very specific question of the vice president, and the vice president said, absolutely not. This is something the president absolutely believes in and wasn't influenced by Israel in any way, shape or form. So it's not a fact. It's taken. It's taken at least somewhat out of context. And I just wanted to clarify that. All right. Because this is also what deconstructors and heretics do. They state their heretical ramblings, and then they'll say, well, that's just a fact.

[Tucker Carlson]

Right.

[Steve Deace]

It's what we commonly call in a gaslight.

[Tucker Carlson]

Let's continue Rubio said that on camera. So we went into this war following Israel. So it's like that is the opposite of America first. That's America in the subordinate position, the female position. Sorry, the bottom in this relationship. And that's the opposite of what we thought we were getting and what they told us we were getting. It's like, it's such a betrayal that anyone attached to that is going to have a hard time re. Establishing trust, even if he's a good man and J.D. vance is a good man. But. But I think it's hard. It's like, you know, you're. You're part of that. I mean, how could you betrayed us? And it's the betrayal that makes it so bitter for people like me and maybe you who voted for Trump and I campaigned for and with him. You know, it's like, really, we really believe that you were going to at least try. And in the end, it's all about cryptocurrency scams and wars for Israel. I mean, I can't believe you did that hiding the Epstein stuff. Yelling at anyone who asked questions about the Butler shooting. Are you kidding? I'm an adult. I'm from this country. Like, I own this government. I own exactly as much of the government as you do because we're both citizens. How dare you speak to me the way you work for me. Like, that's how I personally feel about it. Like, I'm outraged. Yeah. That someone I supported would do something like this, would betray the country and his own voters. And then to whip around and say, I'm not loyal or I'm not loyal. I am loyal. My whole life is marked by loyalty. I'm married to my high school girlfriend. I believe in loyalty. Okay, you're disloyal. You sold out the country to a foreign nation.

[Steve Deace]

All right, now pause it right here. Pause it right here. Up until he says you sold out the country to a foreign nation. That minute or so of Tucker is maybe the best minute he's had since this entire deconstruction process began. If you turned into our. Our Jewish friend Daniel Horowitz's podcast, you'd hear on a daily basis from Daniel, much of what you heard from Tucker in that one minute there wouldn't sound much different at all. I'm not sure how much I disagree with any. By the vice president admitted yesterday they mishandled at least the messaging surrounding the Epstein files. Admitted this on Rogan yesterday. We were. We. We're very disappointed by the handling of this last summer. Were we not Were we not disappointed when it came up again earlier this year? We've, We've certainly aired our grievances where that is concerned, and we are not alone. That is a very important issue with our base, and they remain still unsatisfied. Is that not true?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yes.

[Tucker Carlson]

Yeah.

[Steve Deace]

Could you also even say no one ran on war with Iran and have we not pointed that out? No one ran that in 2024. No one ran on that.

[Aaron McIntyre]

Right.

[Steve Deace]

Have I also expressed that we simply cannot afford this? We are, we don't have what it takes for regime change, and they're going to hunker down and force us into that regime change. And so what's a win look like here then? Ultimately, if, if, if we can't bomb them to a point that they will commit to an agreement that they're willing to keep, and if, if, if we're not willing to go, what it would take to actually uproot and remove the regime, then what's the, what's the end game here? Have I not aired some of these exact same questions?

[Tucker Carlson]

Right.

[Steve Deace]

Is this, is this an extremely popular war with the American people overall?

[Aaron McIntyre]

No.

[Steve Deace]

No. So that one minute there is among the finest one minutes that Tucker's had the idea that, no, no politician, not Donald Trump, not anybody else, gets to decide what your loyalty is to a country. There's nothing government by the consent of the governed about letting a politician determine your loyalties. Correct.

[Aaron McIntyre]

Right.

[Steve Deace]

I mean, they do work for you. That's. I mean, that's the, that's the, that's the basis of populism. Right there is what you just heard from Tucker on, I don't owe you anything. You work for me. 10,000% agree. Praise the Lord. And, and, you know, pass the, the next. The next shot of bourbon.

[Aaron McIntyre]

Right? Yes.

[Steve Deace]

So all that sounds great. Now imagine if the clip stopped right there. And I would. And I envision that when this, when the clip aired for the first time at the top of the show, a lot of you probably were watching that and saying, why are you complaining about this, Steve? This sounds good. It's great to me. Solid to me.

[Tucker Carlson]

Right?

[Sponsor/Ad Voice]

Right.

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yeah.

[Steve Deace]

Yeah.

[Aaron McIntyre]

Blessings of liberty all around. Then you find out what they are.

[Steve Deace]

But then you've got to get to the end here, don't you?

[Paul Blair]

Yeah.

[Steve Deace]

He hasn't stopped there, does he? Nope.

[Paul Blair]

No.

[Steve Deace]

So let's get to the end.

[Tucker Carlson]

Just too much. So. And I don't think I'm alone in feeling this way. And so anybody attached to that is going to have a pretty tough time and by the way, I think it's really clear that Trump is for Rubio, because Trump's donors are for Rubio. They're not for Vance. They know JD Vance would never have regime changed. Kill the ayatollah. You killed the Ayatollah? Are you joking? What are you. Your nutcase. You killed someone else's religious leader, the head of a world's religion? Do you get to, like, I don't know, do they get to kill the Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem now or the Pope?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Right.

[Tucker Carlson]

Like, what are you doing?

[Paul Blair]

Right.

[Tucker Carlson]

Nutcase.

[Steve Deace]

Yeah, bunch of nutcase.

[Tucker Carlson]

Ayatollah. And I'm not Muslim. I mean, obviously I'm a Christian. Right, but we don't kill ayatollahs. We're not at war with religions. What the hell are you doing?

[Paul Blair]

Who.

[Tucker Carlson]

Who's the religious extremist here?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Right.

[Tucker Carlson]

If you find yourself waking up and assassinating Ayatollah, you may be the religious extremist. Actually, you're absolutely right.

[Steve Deace]

That right there, see, that's what this is really about. That's why he couldn't stop there. That's why he had to go there. And that's why that it has to climax there, because that's what the story is really about. That's how the story gets resolved. That's the climax of any good narrative or story is how the story gets resolved and therefore what the story was always about. Like, ultimately, the. The climax of the Gospels is the resurrection, right? The whole story was about that.

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yes.

[Steve Deace]

Correct. Everything was a lead through. All the various acts were to get to that climactic moment, right?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yes.

[Steve Deace]

Everything else you heard in that three and a half minute clip. And see, here's what we didn't do to Tucker. I did not do to him what he did to Marco Rubio by taking him completely out of context and made a clip go around to get him to say something in full that he didn't really fully say. I didn't do that because I don't have to. Because frankly, it helps my case to be honest about who Tucker has become and what he is saying and just let him speak in full and completely all on his own. So we didn't edit a second of that clip. That's the fullness of his answer in that interview. We're the psychos. The Ayatollah is the leader of a world religion, I would imagine. By the way, there's quite a lot of Sunni Muslims that are. That are shocked to hear that the Ayatollah in Iran is the leader of their religion. I would imagine there are quite a few sheiks and caliphs in places like Saudi Arabia and Jordan and Egypt that are shocked to hear such news. They were unaware of this.

[Aaron McIntyre]

I had the same thought.

[Steve Deace]

And maybe, maybe there won't be another invite to speak in Saudi Arabia next year from Tucker. After all, if he thinks the ayatollah is really the leader of the world, leader of the Islamic religion. See, we're at a point here. Now, this is all for an audience of one. And one of the things that the, that the, the, the Rubio folks that are friends of mine are trying to do online is they'll criticize the Iran deal as Rubio as, I'm sorry, advances Iran deal. Like Trump is just over here in the corner getting cooked or cooked in by his millennial VP who's really calling the shots. Okay, it's just a ridiculous statement. But to see they do that though. And, and I get it, I get it. You know, but they do that because they know they can't criticize Trump head on.

[Todd Erzin]

Won't work.

[Steve Deace]

He'll just do things to spite you if you do. So they're trying to create this bifurcation where it doesn't exist. Right? Well, this is actually what Tucker does. He's creating this bifurcation. Now Trump is really bought and sold by Israel. Rubio is bought and sold by Israel. And, and boy, J.D. my guy is trying to do his best. That stuff right there is poison in the Oval Office. And that is whose opinion really matters about all of this. Trump's grandchildren are Jewish. He's assembled the most comprehensive Arab coalition the nation's ever had. We don't see mass protests in Riyadh about bombing Iran some more.

[Tucker Carlson]

Do you?

[Steve Deace]

Do you guys see these masses mass protest in Cairo? I would assume if they were happening, they'd tell us, right? Yeah, we don't see any of this. The mass protest are the Hodge twins in Tucker and Candace Owens. And that's even for a war that's really all that not popular here at home. They're worked up more than the Arab world is. But this idea that JD Vance gets to represent true MAGA and Trump is the imposter. I'm going to tell you right now, that is, that's a death knell to J.D. vance, 2028. And it has nothing to do with what. And no matter. I'm talking influencers whose audiences are 100 times bigger than mine won't make a difference at all. Won't put a dent at all in what happens in 2028? I'm on the ground here in Iowa. I just proved a month and a half ago I can put out a two minute video and move potentially tens of thousands of votes. And I'm telling you, my opinion in the same state to the exact same voters that are going to go first here in this process has no bearing whatsoever when Zara Huthstra has spoken. That's the only opinion that matters. We all get to have an opinion till Trump, until Trump shares his and then there's no more opinions to have. That's just, again, dread it, run from it. The inevitable destiny of a Trump primary endorsement arrives just the same. It doesn't matter. But you can't have your friend saying that you're the real one and the guy who got you where you're at. J.D. vance is not a U.S. senator. Just like I've said, DeSantis is never governor without Trump.

[Aaron McIntyre]

J.D.

[Steve Deace]

vance is never a senator from Ohio without Trump. And he's certainly not Vice President United States without Trump. And then you want to have the local heretic go out and say to Constantine, yeah, this bishop over here is not the real one. One day he'll take your place and then I'll get what I want. That's just a nope. So here's what's gonna have to happen here. And I think it's gonna have to happen actually relatively soon. JD's just gonna have to put this down. And it can't just be like a nebulous comment. I don't think people try. He can't just like have a nebulous. There's people out there trying to divide. No, no. I now see much of the tension that exists now. We're threatening to disintegrate ourselves on the right, on whether you're a Nazi or hair or love Israel more than your own country. That's, that's kind of what much of the discourse is daily right now on the right. Right. At least on social media. We're threatened. We're, we're trying to disintegrate over whether you want to be a Nazi or you want to, whether you want to care more about Israel in your own country. That's essentially what we're self disintegrating over. And if, if J.D. vance remains a construct of that conversation, he's in trouble, maybe existential trouble. And again, it won't be because of either side's view of, of, of who should win the nomination, but because of what that means for the guy who is going to decide who's the king, the real king. And to come in and say, hey, June, the junior partner is the more is, is the, is the more credible version of you. Oh, my gosh. If I didn't know any better, I think I would think Tucker's trying to nuke JD Vance on purpose because you could not have, you could not prescribe a better message to hurt J.D. who I like. I've made this very clear. I love J.D. i am a J.D. guy. If Trump does not endorse in the 2028 caucuses, I'm going in and voting for J.D. if he does, then my vote doesn't count. All right, Decisions already been made. So part of my job is to tell you what I think is going on when it doesn't align with my preferences. I, I, that's, I signed up for that job, right?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yes.

[Steve Deace]

That's what I'm doing right now. This is not good for JD 2028. He's going to have to very specifically put Tucker Carlson down. Tucker Carlson is the fulcrum. He is the origin point of all of this tension. He's blown it all up. He is the singular point. He is the son of that solar

[Aaron McIntyre]

system,

[Steve Deace]

and he's going to have to supernova that son. Gentlemen.

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yeah. You know, I don't know what label ultimately JD Would have for Tucker in the best of days if it would have been friend. Legitimately friend. That's not just an idle concept. It shouldn't be any more idle than a husband or wife is. A friend is far more than acquaintance. It has characteristics that trust mutually shared values. When and if that is betrayed, that is a fall from grace that simply cannot be ignored. When the person who fell from grace plans on weaponizing the former relationship and using it to weaken and destroy, you must deal with it. I agree totally with Steve. And it must be done sooner rather than later. And it's going to come to the point where you just have to say, hey, Tucker, we're going to do this on your show, live and in person, and I'm going to win and you're going to lose.

[Todd Erzin]

James Winchester name, you know, if you're a Chiefs fan, the long snapper. He goes on a podcast and says, actually, Patrick Mahomes threw a couple of interceptions and I think the backup quarterback, Justin Fields, is probably going to do better for us next week. How's that going to play in the locker room? Not very well. Not very well at all. And the long snapper? A little bit replaceable.

[Steve Deace]

Indeed. He is more, in a moment, the Steve Day show. So I mentioned a few minutes ago my buddy Joe Jack Hibbs out there at Chino Hills Calvary Chapel. I watched his Independence Day weekend message to his churches, his church out there. And my man came out wearing the the robes of the black robed regiment from the colonial era. And he had the list of the various ministers that King George III had death sentences on. There was a collection of ministers, including a couple of black ministers in the colonial era that King George III had pronounced and a death sentence upon because he thought that they were really that black robed regiment. They were really the heart and soul of the American Revolution, that they are what gave it its heartbeat and its inspiration. And another pastor buddy of mine is Paul Blair who joins us now and he has been doing these liberty conferences or liberty pastor conferences all over the country. Now for Paul, first of all, good to see you again, brother. How many years you've been doing this?

[Paul Blair]

Dave we actually got started in earnest early on in Covid. It was just before the 2020 election. And we have done a couple of just comprehensive worldview camps in Orlando that were smaller in scale, that had been very successful. Then Covid hit, the world went crazy. We had some wealthy Christian businessmen in Houston that reached out and asked if we could do one that dealt with politics to some degree before the election. And we weren't sure. I mean, I'd never seen the world as crazy as it was when everybody's self distancing and wearing masks. Of course we didn't buy into it very early on. Stuff didn't make sense to us. So we were swimming upstream from the get go. But we had our first major camp with 175 pastors at the Grapevine Resort in Dallas there about a month and a half before COVID And then we have been working diligently throughout these last five years trying to awaken pastors and educate them about, you know, the great reset, what the World Economic Forum was up to and what was really all behind the insanity. So this is actually coming up. I think this is our 29th camp we're doing in the Chicago area. Of course, I've got a warm spot for Chicago and then we have one in Scottsdale next month at the end of August. So number 29 and number 30 before this November election. We'll see where we go from there. I'm getting older, but it's been very effective. Steve but you came to one kind of a special camp that we did in Dallas and you spoke and just hit it out.

[Steve Deace]

Charlie and I did that event together, as I recall.

[Paul Blair]

Yeah, yeah, that was a fantastic event there in the Dallas Grapevine area and had wonderful results. And so we have been doing what we can. Again, my day job is pastoring. I actually pastor a church that has two campuses, one in Oklahoma City and one Orlando. So that keeps us busy and this is something that we just do in our spare time. But it's been very effective and very much appreciated by pastors. So you mentioned this year it's been harder to get pastors to show up again. It seems like now that President Trump is in office and they think everything is going on in a better way and we no longer are dealing with COVID They seem to be not as motivated, whereas over the last four or five years they literally had the heck scared out of them. So they've been very active in trying to learn what was going on. But I appreciate you having us on today. We got a few spots to fill. Hopefully we'll fill them well.

[Steve Deace]

That's what we want to help you do. You mentioned your affinity for the city of Chicago. For those of you watching, you may have noticed some memorabilia there behind Paul, including stuff with a familiar bear look. So give us a remind us, Paul. You've got quite the NFL background.

[Paul Blair]

Well, interesting. I played for Jimmy Johnson in college. His first head coaching job was at Oklahoma State University. And so he recruited me and got my scholarship there. And then I was drafted by the Bears and Mike Nitkin in 1986 right after the super bowl. Sadly just missed it. But played with some of the literal hall of Fame greats of the game. Playing for two seasons with Walter Payton, played with Jim McMahon, Dan Hampton, Mike Singletary, Dave Dorsen, Wilbur Marshall, Otis Wilson, Richard Dent, literally a who's who of NFL hall of Famers. So I do not consider myself great as a player. I obviously was good enough to play pro football, but I was in the presence of greatness and played on a legendary team. And nice thing about programs like Green Bay and Chicago and even Minnesota and the New York Giants, they have such a deep history because we were the founding fathers of the game. So we would have Gail Sayers hanging around the office. We'd have Ed Abramovich showing up to see what was going on. I met Sid Luckman, goes all the way back into the, into the 40s. And of course, Dick Butkus worked for WGN Radio when I was playing, so he would travel with us. But it was just such a neat fraternity of all time greats that were part of this one family. And love the McCaskeys. An indictment on liberal politics is the fact that now the Chicago Bears are having to move to the suburbs in Indiana because the system in Illinois and in the city of Chicago is so bad. And other issues as well. But I'm honored and older I get, the more I appreciate what was handed to me and being able to play for five seasons in professional football.

[Steve Deace]

One of my favorite sports tweets of the last few years, Paul, is there's a tweet of the. The opening week of the, of the night. I think it's the 1978 NFL season opening weekend and the introduction to the old NFL Today with Brett Musburger, Irv Cross, Jimmy the Greek.

[Paul Blair]

Right.

[Steve Deace]

You were still playing. You were playing when that was still on the. And, and the opening intro to all those highlights. I think it's for the 1978 NFL season. And this tweet points out every one of these hits would be a penalty today. Okay. And so when I, when I asked this question, it's under the framework of the NFL you played in, maybe more so than the NFL it is today. Okay, but the NFL that you played in, how did it equip and prepare you for becoming a pastor?

[Paul Blair]

Well, I guess it's survive or die is the was. Was drilled into us. You know, obviously with that game, you're only one play away from being retired, whether it be by injury or somebody just outplaying you. So I mean that it does stand

[Steve Deace]

for not for long after all. Right. That's what it stands for.

[Paul Blair]

You know, playing through pain, ignoring pain and fatigue and injury, I think was a great life lesson for, for anything. You know, we obviously aren't warriors to the degree that the military is. I mean, that's certainly an extreme level above what we do. However, especially in the day when we played coaches and quite frankly, they were just doing what they were taught to do because most of them were players themselves and had been treated just the same way. But back in the day, it was not unusual to have a coach kick you in the backside, grab you by the face mask as if it was the handle of a Samsonite Carry on bag and jerk you around and get your attention. You'd run stadium stairs until dark or meet the assistant coach at 6:30 in the morning to run stadiums. It was a different day. And of course we were taught to lead with our helmet. Shoulder pads were almost unnecessary. I hit with the tip of the point of my helmet and I could see anything I was hitting. And that was the design. That's what we were talking to, you know, our defensive backs, linebackers, if you cross the middle on a crossing pattern, you know, you'd have your head knocked off of you. And quite frankly, a pro receiver would rather be hit high than hit that.

[Steve Deace]

Take out their knees. Yeah.

[Paul Blair]

And you can ruin his career. So they're trying to make changes to make the game safer. I don't know that you can make this game safe. I think the. The owners just need to realize they need to take care of these players as we get older, but we're going to suffer from the intensive use that we take. But there's really no way to make this a safe game unless you want to make it flag football and take contact out altogether.

[Steve Deace]

Well, I'm glad you used the word safe there. Charlie used to call these trembling pastors. Right. The ones who want things to be safe in the pulpit. And when I spoke at the last TPUSA Pastor Summit, Paul, the topic of my talk, I wanted it to be very subtle.

[Aaron McIntyre]

Okay.

[Steve Deace]

And so the topic of my talk to these to 1100 pastors was, be worthy of the bullet that Charlie Kirk took for you. Because in many respects, Charlie got shot for doing the job that pastors, that the pastors used to get shot or threatened to be shot with for doing. Right. He was actually doing a lot of that work on these campuses. He was literally invading dens of iniquity with the light of the gospel. Right. And so that. How do we. What's going to happen if someone comes to one of your events, either in Chicago at the end of this month or Scottsdale the end of next month? How are they going to go from a trembling pastor to a champion? How's that work out?

[Paul Blair]

Steve, we have had great success. And really, we just come at these guys on opening night with one very simple question. And almost across the board, this one question, you can just see in their eyes the lights of understanding being turned on every one of us. Use glibly, Jesus is Lord of all. Okay, I agree with that. But then they'll turn around and say, but I can't talk about certain subjects from my pulpit in church because they're controversial. Wait a second. You can't have it both ways. Either Jesus is Lord of all or Jesus is just Lord of things. You can talk about in Sunday Morning. But we know that Jesus is Lord of all. And we know that as pastors, we aren't called to build great churches. We aren't called to make church members. We're called to make disciples. And what does that mean? It means that we're going to be training our people to follow Christ in everything that they do. And that was really one of the big differences in the early church that they battled with. Many of the early church fathers, when you get into the second century, had backgrounds in Gnosticism. Well, it was just ingrained in them that the material world was inherently evil. And it was natural and easy to carry into Christianity the great view of compartmentalization rather than retaining and holding the Jewish understanding that whatever you do, you do to the glory of God. So we get pastors to think about that whole question and concept and realize that, yes, we've been lied to. If, if Jesus is not the Lord of all, then I need to make a list of everything that Jesus isn't Lord over.

[Steve Deace]

He's either Lord of All or Lord not at all. It's one of the two.

[Paul Blair]

And of course, as you know, I was on with Jim Garlo yesterday. Jim's written several books on this subject. Biblical worldview. God established the realm of civil government along with the realm of church government, family government and self government. And each are charged with certain areas of responsibility or delegated certain responsibilities. And quite frankly, it's not the civil government's job to do everything. We call that tyranny. It's up to me to decide whether I want to wear a mask or not, whether I think it's going to help my health. It's up to me to determine whether I should take a vaccine or not. That's not the mayor's responsibility or the governor's responsibility. That's my responsibility. But there are certain things biblically that are delegated to those realms of government. So when we think of government, we automatically think of the civil government. And that's an inaccurate portrayal. The civil government is supposed to punish evildoers, protect those of us that are doing the right thing so that we may live peaceably in all godliness. You look throughout the Old Testament, God's desire was for leaders to, to judge righteously or govern righteously, not show favoritism to anyone, whether it be the poor or the rich. So that whole concept has never been taught to this generation of pastors. You were talking about the founding era pastors, those guys that can literally trace their origin back to Pastor Robertson, who is the pastor of the pilgrims on the Mayflower. As they came over and established literally a new world. And their whole system of government was patterned after the design of their church government, where we the people. It wasn't something delegated or handed down from the hierarchy of the Archbishop of Canterbury, it was we the people constituted their own local church government. And then they voted for their pastor and elders. Well, when the Pilgrims hit Mayflower, they were off course. The charter that they had for England was, was of no value because they weren't in Virginia. What were they going to do? Well, they copied that their church government form that they had originated. And that was the first form of civil government in America as the Puritans came over. The Pilgrims had great influence with these other groups because the Pilgrims had been very successful in all of New England. Literally there are five or six states in the northern part of New England that all were built by the Puritans directly. So all of the form of government that we have enjoyed and take for granted here, where we are governed of by and for the people and we have a limited government, so called, that's delegated human design responsibilities that doesn't have the legal right to overstep its boundaries. That whole thing. We can thank the church for American exceptionalism. We can thank the church and we can thank Christianity.

[Steve Deace]

Amen.

[Paul Blair]

All right. The fact that we own private property, that one didn't come from old England. The king owned everything that came from the Pilgrims and how they viewed the world.

[Steve Deace]

Correct.

[Paul Blair]

So what we take for granted today was actually birthed and given to us by the great faith of those first fathers some 400 years ago.

[Steve Deace]

Well said. I got two minutes left. I want to make sure we get people to these events because, and you need to know, if I recall, you guys make sure you bring the wives, right? Everybody's treated well. It's a nice weekend away. All right, so where can people go if there's pastors in the audience or someone wants to bless their pastor with this, where do, where do we have them go?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Paul?

[Paul Blair]

Liberty pastorsu.com liberty pastorsu.com you can sign up there. See, this is. We're staying at the Oakbrook Hilton resort area in the Chicago area. It's a luxury resort. Three nights, six meals included, about a $2,000 value and only costs a pastor $99. And that includes he and his wife for all of this. Plus it continues all the training materials and all the continuing education that we provide for them. A generous donor named Art Ally subsidizes the difference. So pastors 99 bucks. All it takes to have a three day second honeymoon for you and your wife. And some great food, some great fellowship, and also an opportunity to sit down with other men of God and sharpen iron. Sharpens iron and learn a little bit about what the Bible does say about these elements called economics and civil government. We've got Bill Federer, we've got Tim Martin, we've got Kevin Freeman speaking on economics, Alex Newman, Frank Gaffney. We'll be talking about Islamism, communism, globalism. And then we'll also be looking at chapter and verse and learning what our founding fathers believe and why our original form of government is so different and why we are still blessed by it today. So don't miss it. 99 bucks. Libertypastorsu.com pastors, come and join us. Faith leaders, ministry leaders, elders. You can take advantage of it as well. Come, let's make sure this is a full house.

[Steve Deace]

Well, folks, again, I've done these events before. I can testify firsthand. They do. They treat you first class.

[Aaron McIntyre]

All right.

[Steve Deace]

Because they're going to challenge you, too. So they treat you first class while doing it. All right. So good to see you again, Paul. God bless you, brother. Thank you.

[Paul Blair]

God bless you, buddy.

[Steve Deace]

You bet. Thoughts?

[Todd Erzin]

You know, we have talked ad nauseam about the need for pastors to rise up, the need for pastors to be engaged. The need for pastors. And so I want to take a little bit different perspective. That thing he said at the end there, a donor stepped forward to subsidize the difference. I'm telling you, those types of things are going to be very, very important. A hundred bucks to stay at a really cool place and get the training that you need to get your bones, you know, get to get boned up on theology of economics, theology of the world around us and not just the head knowledge of faith, making that accessible. Those are going to be some of the things I think that are understated, extremely necessary for pastors so that it's things like this are just more accessible. And I really appreciate that.

[Steve Deace]

They spoil you, too. That's important. You and the wife are going to get spoiled as well.

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yeah. Whether it's Paul or that donor, who I'd imagine isn't a young man, you know, they play four quarters of football, they're going to finish the game. And I'm impressed with that.

[Steve Deace]

These are men in their third act finishing the race, which is something I've been harping on for the last year or so. Right. All right. We're going to harp on legalism as we continue the seven deadly worldviews on theology. Thursday next,

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[Steve Deace]

All right, back here with our two Live and On Demand on Blaze tv, Radio and podcast. I'm Steve Dase alongside Todd erzin and Aaron McIntyre. Let us know what you think about what we think via the stevedays.com inbox by emailing the program stevedace.com that's D E A C E Like us on Facebook Me, we and Gab. You can follow me at Steve Dash show on X Instagram and TikTok. Subscribe to our Rumble channel at Steve Dace on Rumble. Subscribe to the podcast by hitting the subscribe button. Or if you're on Apple, that's what I use to hit. Follow to make sure you never miss an episode because it's for sure every time in your podcast feed. Thanks if you've done that. Many of you have and tens of thousands of that many have left us five star reviews. So we'd love it if you would add yours. And thank you if you already have done that too. And thanks to our friends over at Miracle Made. Do you have a tendency to wake up sweaty or freezing or just uncomfortable? Well, you know the temperature in your bedroom can make or break your sleep. That's why you want to do what I've been doing for the last few years. Make the switch to Miracle made sheets. You guys know I love my Miracle made sheets. Inspired by NASA technology that uses silver infused temperature regulating fabric to help you sleep perfectly all night long. These sheets crafted with this NASA inspired fabric. By the way, just a little side benefit also happens to murder death kill like 99% of bacteria that gets on your sheets at the same time. So they're not just temperature regulating, but they're also fresher for longer too. Right? So if you want. Oh you know what, let me mention this as well. Let's not bury the lead here. They're comfy, right? Because you could regulate your temperature in Saran Wrap. You probably don't want to sleep in that at night. Okay. So no, these are very comfy sheets at the same time. All right, so where. Where do you want to go? Miracle Made or try Miracle I'm sorry.comdays is where you want to go. Go there, get a big discount. Try miracle.comdace again that's try miracle.comdace you won't regret it. Use the code [e-mail] days code days. I promise you you won't regret it. These sheets, well, not the same ones, but the sheets from this company have been the only sheets on our bed now for going on three years. Try Miracle.com dayscode days. In case you missed at the top of the hour, I, I think we are at a, at a tipping point here with Tucker and J.D. vance. And I say this as someone who's a pro JD Guy, but I will also say this in my evangelical circles, I'm a dwindling number. I would say in the last year there, there's been an increasing number of evangelical leaders who are either now have become skeptical or pro Rubio. And I think there's one man in particular to thank for this or blame and it's Tucker Carlson. And one of the things that I've, I used to point out, I think it's relevant to this moment, the most underrated political event modern American history

[Aaron McIntyre]

is

[Steve Deace]

when Marco Rubio went before a camera and stood next to John McCain and Lindsey Graham for the Gang of Eight and then later tried calling people like me to sell me on it that we needed amnesty. That event, if that event never happens, Marco Rubio is the golden child of the of the Republican Party. The Trump phenomenon never happens. Never occurs. Much of the events of the last 10 years never happen. Marco Rubio has already been president of the United States. His decision to stand there with Lindsey Graham and John McCain against his own base is what took an extraordinarily talented politician, maybe a generational talent politically in Rubio, inspiring personal story. Impossible not to like. Eloquent non white checks a lot of boxes of what a Republican prime. Fine. Talking about his faith. I mean, who gave a more eloquent address at Charlie's Memorial than Marco did? I mean, Marco Rubio checks a lot of boxes of what typically Republican primary voters are looking for, right?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yes.

[Todd Erzin]

Remember that speech in front of those European leaders earlier this year as well? Do you remember that?

[Steve Deace]

Yes.

[Todd Erzin]

That was incredible.

[Steve Deace]

Yeah. And so why did he finish third in the Iowa caucuses and he had to fight scratch and claw to finish that high, by the way. It's because he had just done the Gang of Eight and he couldn't outrun it. The shadow of that permeated the entirety of his brand and frankly took Donald Trump to resurrect his brand. The the Marco Rubio you're seeing today is not the Marco Rubio of 10 years ago, otherwise he would have already been President United States. So we may, we, I think we risk coming full circle here where we sit here 10 years from now if somebody is still stupid enough to give us a platform for that long. And we sit here 10 years from now and say, wow, can you believe JD Vance let this Tucker Carlson thing play out for as long as he did? Because like how that changed everything after that, Trump ends up endorsing Marco Rubio. The rest, as they say, is history. The whole Rubio story kind of comes full circle. I think we are in danger of this occurring. I could be wrong. You know, I tend to do the kind of analysis that I, I, I skate to where the puck I think is going, not where it is. So this is, this is based off a trend line that I think I can foresee we're heading towards. But I've been wrong on that stuff before, right?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Everybody has.

[Steve Deace]

Sure. I mean if, if you're doing forward facing and forward thinking analysis, you're often really, really right. And there have been times in my career I've been really, really right. Right?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yes.

[Steve Deace]

Like Covid for example, or you can often be really, really wrong. Like I misread the entire Trump thing phenomenon and it's out the first iteration of it anyway. Right?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yes.

[Steve Deace]

So that tends to happen and you live with the consequences of when you're really, really right, you take everybody's hosannas and when you're really, really long are wrong, you hide. So I, I could be totally wrong about this, but I am concerned and I am a JD guy and I am concerned and I, I think that this thing has got to be dealt with and I, I don't think it can be some nebulous, some people out there trying to say Trump. I think it's gotta be a head on thing because I'm just going to tell you right now I'm talking to more evangelical leaders than J.D. vance is. I can promise you this is true. I promise you that this is true. And man, I think JD is somebody just politically. How many times have we said this since Charlie's murder? We could really use this guy, could really use Charlie. We could really use Charlie. See, he's a relatively young Catholic, he's in recent conference the last few years. Right?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yeah.

[Steve Deace]

So he's not native to evangelical circles to begin with. But we are still the largest voting bloc in a Republican primary. Two of the first three early states are Iowa and South Carolina. Right. Where evangelicals Dominate, you know, and I, I, I've, if anything, I'm underselling how much damage Tucker has done. If, if I'm guilty of anything here is I'm underselling it to you because of how much I like GD individually. I'm underselling to you how much damage Tucker Carlson has done. He is a unique heretic. He is a Marion Aras level figure for many of our leaders and people around the country. And that is a problem. And I think the kinds of comments that he made in that video we played at the top of the show, I think kind of, I didn't know there were any more Rubicons for Tucker to cross. But now we're going to go with JD Is the real maga and Trump's the player, is the, is the imposter here. He's cosplaying. Holy cow. If you were, if you were, if, if you were secretly running Marco Rubio's under the, under the surface presidential campaign and you wanted to subversively plant an influencer to say something that would uniquely be damaging to JD because of what it would, the signal it would send to his boss and the king of the party, could you have planted anybody better than what Tucker polls in that clip?

[Aaron McIntyre]

No.

[Steve Deace]

I mean, it's almost like it's on purpose.

[Aaron McIntyre]

Oh, I think it is a brief follow up, other than moving on to a different political candidate that is available and viable and attractive. What, if anything, do you think these evangelical pastors you're talking about could be doing to just attack other than moving on to go in the other direction and deal with this Tucker problem? What could they be doing to help?

[Steve Deace]

Well, that is a very good question. The number one thing I think that they need to be doing is talking directly to their congregations about what's being fed to them and have answers beyond slogans that slayed in another era. If, if you truly believe that in, in, in a prophetic Israel, you should then walk your congregations through the word of God as to why you believe this rather than just kind of relying on assumptions and slogans because we are in danger right now of having I have to love Israel more than my own country or I'm a literal Nazi. This, this argument disintegrating us and one singular person is the provocateur of this, that now he's not the only one. But, but, but he is the, he's the, he's the primary engine here driving this and that's Tucker Carlson. And I think that what I would say to these Evangelical leaders, instead of just having quiet conversations at dinner tables, speak up. Speak up publicly and definitely speak up in your pulpits. You should. You should. You need. See, this is one of the big reasons why I'm a JD Guy. I really think that unless you have been around a lot of young men or you're in the process of raising one, as I am, you are underselling how close we are to just completely losing a generation to the abyss. You don't really get it. And you think that Nick Fuentes is deceiving people. You're wrong. You have it backwards. We're driving people to Nick Fuentes. You have it backwards. You have it backwards. Let me repeat. You have it backwards. We're driving people to him. You have to win some arguments. Make an argument. Lay out a hermeneutic, exegete the Scriptures, teach, preach, don't. Sloganeer, don't. Assumption. We don't have a. We don't have a. You know, the people in your pew should not require an Ovaltine decoder ring. If you think this is the rightly. This is how the rightly divide the word of God, then teach that and explain why. But just operating off of assumptions and slogans and then saying, if you don't agree with me, you must just hate Jews is a. Is ridiculous. We're driving people to Fuentes in this ilk. Make the theological case. Come now, let us reason together and see, this is one of the big reasons why I'm a JD guy, is I think that he might be. With Charlie gone, he might be the best chance we have. Some of the things about JD that make you nervous as an evangelical leader are some of the reasons why I'm the most strongly for him. Because in order to not just flat out lose collectively a generation of young men to nihilistic abysses, we better have answers for their legitimate complaints, their legitimate criticisms, their legitimate laments. And those answers have to be better than get a job. Oh, I'd like to, but an illegal. Does it get married? I'd like to, but every girl in my class has blue hair and has. Has. Has a, you know, a scratch ticket for every abortion they've either considered having or are willing to or already did. It's not that simple. It's not. Take the normal problems young men have that we all had as young men believing the world owes you something. Aaron, the story you told about working at Made Right yesterday. Right.

[Aaron McIntyre]

Okay.

[Steve Deace]

Every young man that's ever lived has believed at some point in their lives the world owed them something. For some odd reason. And then it was just up to, you know, having the right male role model or leadership or life circumstances to correct that assumption. I believed it. We've all believed it. Well, combine that natural condition of young men with all the external problems we have as a culture, do we have a long line of older men who can disciple the young men, by the way, that they're leading and living their lives right now and are eager to do so?

[Aaron McIntyre]

They're at the he man movie.

[Steve Deace]

Correct. And so since they're. Since that's where they are, guess who'll do that discipling instead? Nick Fuentes and Tucker Carlson will do it for you. The young men deserve to have their complaints and laments heard. They deserve some real answers for why the previous generation did some of the things they did and believe some of the things they still believe. And yes, you do owe it to them. You do. Yeah, you do. Most of all, that's part of your job. If you want your traditions and legacies and heritages passed on, pass them on. Does that answer your question? Pass them on then.

[Aaron McIntyre]

It'd be a good start.

[Steve Deace]

Pass them on. If you want. If you want what you believe to be passed on, pass it on. Anything else on this before we get to Theology Thursday?

[Aaron McIntyre]

There'll be plenty more in the future, Aaron?

[Todd Erzin]

I don't think so.

[Steve Deace]

All right, well, let's get to it. We've been looking at the seven deadly worldviews. We started last week looking at Gnosticism, from the Greek word gnosis, for knowledge. This idea that there's secret knowledge out there that either God is either withheld from you because he can't be trusted, or he only reveals to the ones he truly trusts. And this spirit is prevalent in our culture today, Gnosticism, dating back to the enemy himself. And did God really say just asking questions? Christianity is not the endless asking of questions. It is the ceaseless seeking of. Of answers. Now, the problem is when the enemy provokes us with gaslighting questions, right? He does this to the. He does this to our Lord after he comes out of the desert for 40 days, right? And so in his humanity is at his lowest point. He's. He's sleep deprived, he's malnourished, he's dehydrated, right? So in his flesh, because our Lord is the hypostatic union, he's fully God and fully man. His humanity is in its most anemic state. It will be in until he is tortured beyond recognition and hung on a cross, is at this moment Right. And then he comes to him with a series of temptations. And these temptations, he what? What does the enemy quote, guys, in all these temptations, do you guys remember what he quotes? Scriptures. But they're all out of context.

[Tucker Carlson]

Right.

[Steve Deace]

He essentially does to Jesus the second Adam, what he did to Eve from the first Adam. Did God really say, he tries this on our Lord too? Now our Lord responds back with the Word of God in its proper context, right? Yes, yes. And therefore defeats the enemy's temptations and is now called full time into his messianic ministry after passing this test, correct?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yes.

[Steve Deace]

Right. But this, this test happened before in history. Correct. And as a species, we didn't pass that one.

[Aaron McIntyre]

Right?

[Steve Deace]

Right. No, because we didn't respond with the Word of God in context. What we responded with instead of is our next deadly worldview known as legalism. Legalism is a religious system that puts more emphasis on works based righteousness than the saving grace of Jesus Christ. Which may also include the elevations of what Paul warns about in Colossians, human understandings as evidence of a person's level of holiness or moral purity. In other words, that it's up to us. And so the enemy comes and tempts Eve with, did God really say, are you sure he really said that you can't partake of this fruit? And Eve's response infamously is, well, God said not to touch the fruit. But is that what God said? No, he said, you're still not eating the fruit. Didn't say you couldn't look at it. Didn't say you couldn't touch it. Didn't say you couldn't toss it around, play catch with it. Hacky sack, hide the seat, hide and seek, capture the flag. Instead you'd capture the fruit. That's not what. He didn't say anything about anything about any of those things. Just said one thing. See, a lot of times we view the Word of God as like a burden, a bunch of do's and don'ts. There's actually not that many of them. The. The total of the entirety of the Levitical Mosaic law isn't like 618 commands. That's the entirety of it.

[Aaron McIntyre]

That sounds about right.

[Steve Deace]

How many? Isn't. Isn't the US code like 20,000 pages or something right now? So. No, no, no, no. It's in fact Jesus. God himself says, come to me, all who are weary, tired and heavy laden, take my yoke upon you, for my burden is easy and my yoke is light, meaning he carries your burdens. So the Word of God is not the burden. It's what we do when we disobey it and then how we, how we distort it. Where the burdens begin. Jesus's first public public sermon is often referred to as the Beatitudes and, or the Sermon on the Mount, which include the Beatitudes and the Sermon on the Mount begins with the following phrase. Several times you have heard it said, but I say he is undoing a few hundred years of rabbinical traditions that have just created an undue burden on the people. He's clarifying things. And what you see with Eve is when she responds with her own human wisdom, she's doomed because the devil and all of his minions are way better at this than we are. The good news is they have one Kryptonite. The bad news is it's the, it's the Kryptonite that we often in our, in our own sinfulness, don't want to pick up and wield as a weapon. Because here's the thing about using the Word of God as a weapon. It's a double edged sword. What does that mean? That if you get too close to that blade as you're, as you're wielding against others, cut yourself with it now hold you accountable too. So right away we talk about Eve's response. And in many respects legalism is the same as Gnosticism. What do I mean by this? Well, like last hour I talked about how the, those who want, and some of them are friends of mine that I, that I love. I just don't agree with them on this. I love Israel, but like I've talked about before, Israel is my cousin. I don't live in Israel, you know, it's where I live is my, Is, is, is my prime directive. And I would certainly hope the Israelis would view where they live as their prime directive. You know, I mean, I love my cousin Ange, I love my cousin Trisha. You know, we grew up together and I hope that they put their household ahead of mine because my job is my household. Right?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yes.

[Steve Deace]

You know, now when they need help with their households, if I can do it without forsaking my own, is my answer. Yes. Every single time. Sure. But you know, if my cousin Ange down there in Dallas says, hey, can you come down here and help us with something? And I say yes. And then my wife comes back and there's, there's been a, sadly, a serious health diagnosis in the home that I have to confront. Guess what I got to do. I got to call my cousin Ange. Back and say, I got to take care of my own house first here, right?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yes.

[Steve Deace]

Does that make me a terrible cousin or just a good husband?

[Aaron McIntyre]

The latter.

[Steve Deace]

Just the latter.

[Tucker Carlson]

Yeah.

[Steve Deace]

There's an order of loves here, to use a phrase that was debated last month or last year, right? Yeah. So it's not as simple as either we put Israel ahead of our own country or if. Or you're a Nazi. Or it's as if you, if. If you don't hate Israel as much as me, then you put Israel ahead of your own country. It works both ways, right? Yeah. See, you get into these kinds of dichotomies that are really two sides of the same Harvey Dent coin. Harvey Dent's flipping one coin. Just one is Harvey Dent and the other is two face. But two face is also Harvey Dent. Right. So they're one in the same, right?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yes.

[Steve Deace]

That's what two sides of the same coin means. The people who think that the vetting tool for our next champion is do you love Israel as much as America, if not more? Or do you hate Jews and blame all of your problems on them and you're a literal reincarnation of a Nazi? They're really not much different from each other, which is probably why you see them so angry at each other all the time. See, because Gnosticism says the sufficiency of God's word is not good enough. There's more. There's more he's holding out on. There's more he hasn't revealed. Right. That's what we talked about last week, right?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yes.

[Steve Deace]

Legalism comes along and says, we agree the word of God is not sufficient on his own. He needs an editor, he needs help. There's some things that he forgot to add. We got to fill in some blanks here. They're really making the same argument. Is the word of God sufficient on his own? Do human beings. The Gnostic says that human beings have a right to question God or have a right to make a claim on God. Like I, like I've ascended to a level of knowledge or specialness that you now have to give me the good stuff that you did that you just don't give to the rabble out there. Right. And the legalist says, I, I'm confident there's a third tablet out there that God forgot to give Moses and it's all of my opinions and thoughts. Now here's where I'm going to blow your mind. Okay. Because there's numerous examples of legalism in the Scriptures, particularly in the New Testament. You see This a lot. Jesus confronts it with beware the yeast of the Pharisees, The burdens, the extra burdens they put on you that God does not. But then Jesus says some interesting things too. He says, do as they say, but not as they do. Meaning they don't practice what they preach. What they preach is often right, but what they're living is not righteousness. So don't emulate that. There's also a moment where he confronts Pharisees and he says, you know, you guys tithe on every ounce of spice you use as you should. The letter of the law is good. The letter of the law is good. But you do it at the expense of the spirit of the law. Because man was. The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. Meaning that if you perfectly keep the Sabbath, but then there's someone laid out in the middle of the road dying on the Sabbath day, and you don't approach to help them because that could be construed as work. You missed kind of the point of this thing. And as silly as that sounds to us today, this was. These were real arguments that were made during that era. I mean, Jesus is literally accosted for. For healing on the Sabbath. How dare you. There was another group called Judaizers. These are addressed a few different times in the scriptures, but particularly in the book of Galatians. Paul addresses this. And this was a heretical sect of folks who came in, came into early Christianity who said that you also still had to practice all of the Jewish traditions and laws to truly follow Messiah. And they were obsessed in particular with circumcision, which seems kind of weird. I'd be a little suspicious of grown men can. That were obsessed with something like that, wouldn't you? It'd be kind of a bit of an aura of a suspicion like we right here.

[Aaron McIntyre]

It's her flag. Yeah.

[Steve Deace]

And in one of the snottiest moments that Paul has in all of his writings in the New Testament, he gets so frustrated with these Judaizers that he says, listen, if you're so. If you're just so obsessed with circumcision at this stage of prophetic history, prove. Prove how committed you truly are. Cut your entire instrument off and be even holier than you thought you would be by just removing the foreskin. That's a man after my own heart right there. I have. That's a ministry I've attempted to emulate many times in my career. I'm not as good at it, but I'm working. I'm working to get there. There's a level of divine snottiness that I have yet to achieve. But I am, I'm going to tell you, I'm going to finish that. That is a race. I am confident I'm going to finish that race. So we often see legalism with the furrowed brow crowd, right? The people that, that, that are never, you never see any joy in them at all. No contentment in them at all. No love, joy, peace, contentment. None of that. Right. You never see any of that. And so in our day and age, in other days and age, those people would have been considered the good guys. Just depends on what the, what the predilections and biases of the, of a culture are at a given time. Right. But in our day and age, where relevance and connection and authenticity and casual are all biases that we have, desires that we have in our era, we kind of see the furrowed brow crowd coming a mile away. Right. We can kind of tell, you know, John Lithgow's pastor character from Footloose. Right. We kind of see that guy come. Yeah, right, right. In other areas, that guy, they didn't see that guy coming now, so they had to be warned. All right. Hey, I know this sound. And so many times the new New Testament Paul's like, I know this sounds like holy and righteous because this guy's putting even more burdens on you. Or these, this sect is putting even more of a demand on you than Christ commands, but it's not actually. And by following their traditions and doing more, more than what Christ asked of you, in a strange way, you're actually denying what Christ has already done for you. You're saying that it wasn't good enough. I still have to do these, these, these, these, these, these things. In our day and age, legalism shows up in another place that is not as obvious. In fact, I, I would argue that. I know this is going to sound weird because we're kind of in this everyone does what is wise in their own eyes era. Right?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yes, we are.

[Steve Deace]

We're in a very morally subjective era. Right. Okay. So it would seem like maybe we could kind of use a little like legalism right now, if we're being honest. Right, right. You kind of be like, I kind of feel like shaming people back into doing the right thing if they don't want to. Maybe the previous generations might have been right about that. That's. We can be sympathetic to why you might look at our current culture and come to the couple of those conclusions. Right?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Sure.

[Steve Deace]

Right. But see I would argue that we are a. We are a culture awash in legalism. It just is packaged way different than maybe it ever has been before. I don't know of another era where in the history of the church where legalism looks the way it does in our era right now. And it's so subversive and it's so difficult to notice because it's so tantalizing. I'm going to get into that and maybe blow some minds and offend people. When we come back, The Steve Day Show.

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[Steve Deace]

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And you're gonna get roughly 160 insights about how your body actually works, how it absorbs nutrients, how you metabolize things like caffeine, how you process maladies like inflammation, whether that B vitamin you're taking is even the right form of that vitamin for your body. This data never gets sold, but it is used to empower you because it's, it's you. And that's who it should be empowering, not everybody else. All right, so you get with insights for life with just one swab the way it should be at gojevity.com code days for 20 off. That's Jevity, short for longevity. Jevity. G E V I T I G E V I T I go to gojevity.com use the code DACE for 20% off with the code [e-mail] so legalism, traditionally legalism has been shrouded in inquisitions and extra, extra burdens on the people. You know, I'm from a denomination where we don't do any dancing or we can't have certain instruments. And in and of themselves, those things may or may or may not be bad. Right? They may or may not be bad just as long as you understand that those are your, your, your, those are human things. The scriptures don't necessarily speak to that and they shouldn't be put on the same pedestal as the things the scriptures do. Right. So that's kind of easy to spot. But we're also kind of living in an era we're almost getting nostalgic for some of that old fashioned legalism, again, because we're also concerned about what's happening morally in the culture. Right, Right. So remember what I said last segment, that gnostics and legalists both are making the same argument. They're making it from opposite directions, but it is inherently the same argument. And that argument is the word of God is not sufficient. The gnostic says God is either held out or not revealed and only will if you compel him with by proving your own specialness. The legalist says God needs me and my take on things, my spin on things. We are rife with legalism today. And you know, the thing about legalism is to only see it in one form is in and of itself kind of legalistic, is it not? If you only see legalism in the form that offends you. Kind of a legalist. Right. Because again, you're kind of putting your own priorities and your own insights on a pedestal where only gods Belong. Let me tell you where the most legalistic teaching you're going to find in the church today is. Are you ready for this? The entire last generation of the seeker sensitive movement is the most legalistic teaching here you're going to find in America today. And it's some of the most subversive and clever legalism that's ever been preached because it agrees God's word on its own is not sufficient. It requires our human ingenuity. God needs me as an editor, needs me to make it clever, needs me to make it winsome. And without my unique abilities and talents, I mean, what would God's word ever do? So I need to franchise myself. I need to build my own brand. Because without my special sauce, God's burger just won't test. It just won't taste the same. A lot of seeker sensitive churches will tell you they have a. Their way of doing things because they've, they've figured it out how to fill an auditorium. I mean, dude, homosexual, Satanist, that can do a wicked guitar solo can fill an auditorium, right? Yeah, that's not a standard. They can fill an auditorium, they can put butts in the seats. They can make you see a third way, a different way. It's not just as simple as, you know, we're going to offend the culture by telling it what offends us, or we're just going to flat out just simp and surrender to the culture. There's a third way. We can trick the culture, we can outsmart it if we just don't preach that one little part of God's word there and just leave that verse out there. You want to know what the most legalistic teaching in America today is? You ready for this? Are you ready? Are you sure you're ready for this? Taking Jeremiah 29 and 11 and turning it into your life verse of inspiration is the most legalistic teaching in America today because you've taken it completely and totally out of context. You want to know when you cling to Jeremiah 29 and 11, when your loved one's in the hospice and so you know they're not coming out and you're thinking to yourself, I don't know how I'm going to live without this person. I love this person. My heart is breaking. What will we do without this person? And in the midst of that tremendous trial and suffering, that's when you cling to Jeremiah 29:11 because that's the proper context of Jeremiah 29:11. For I know the plans that I have for you. Plans not to harm you, to give you a hope, a destiny and a future. You ever read Jeremiah 29:10? How about 29:13? How about the entirety of the rest of Jeremiah? Have you read that? Because it's tragic. Divine corporal punishment is taking place. Jeremiah 1 begins with the Jews went down into the valley of Ben Hinnam, a place he calls Topith, which is a Hebrewed slang for hell. And they meaning that Jeremiah is saying they went down and reenacted the rights of hell. They emulated hell and threw their babies into the fire to molech. And because of this they compelled their heavenly father to once and for all take his belt off with a big brass n. Big brass buckle. And on it was emblazoned a name, Nebuchadnezzar. And what happened next? Dozens of chapters of suffering and torment all the way through, all the way to the end, except for like one verse, Jeremiah 29:11. You cling to Jeremiah 29:11 when you're in your darkest hours, not on your homeschool graduation card. That's not the time. That's out of context. What's another word for taking the scriptures out of context?

[Aaron McIntyre]

Lying.

[Steve Deace]

Well, I was going to go for another L word, but legalism, it's taking the scriptures out of context. You just don't recognize it because it makes you feel good. Well the furrowed brow guy, furrowed brow legalist, he's putting undue burdens on you because it makes him feel good too. Makes him feel self righteous and superior to you. Right, but see now we've kind of caught. We kind of have this like reverse self righteousness where now if we have like any standards, it's bad. Now you're called the legalist. If you quote the actual word of God to people and demand that if they're going to be believers, they live up to it. Now you're the legalist. Now that sounds very pharisitical to me. Why do you call me Lord but you do not do what I say. You know a tree by its fruit? That's pharisaical. Yeah, because a lot of you have been catered to in the church. Because churches aren't supposed to be seeker sensitive, they're supposed to be savior sensitive. Sensitive to the will and word of our Lord and then sensitive to the truth that when we cease being sensitive to those things, he will come to us and take away our lampstands and look at us and say, depart from me. I don't know you into the den of iniquity with. You do have a few denominations Today where it's pretty obvious that that has taken place.

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yes.

[Tucker Carlson]

Yeah.

[Steve Deace]

And so we do this thing where now we're going to also now not trust in the sufficiency of the scriptures that they couldn't possibly convict on their own. Well, if I. If I preach this one part, if this of this scripture, if I preach this whole book, people might leave, they might never come back. Might never cut me a check. I'm sorry. It's a song. Didn't know if I said that out loud or not. Did me too. Except I did. That's also legalism. Here, come here. Because you're not going to get the full counsel of God. But have you seen these banging apple fritters we've got over here? Perfectly crisp on the outside, moist on the inside. They slap. Brother, have yourself one of those come in sweatpants. Come as you, come as you are, do what you like. I'm all about being casual, but not when it's in the motif of come as you are to do what you like. Right. I kind of always felt like arguing about how to dress a church to worship a lord who in a glorified bathrobe in most the entirety of his earthly life, I've kind of felt to be silly. But if it's part of an overall motif of come as you are to do what you like, then I do kind of see the issue with it because it's about catering to you. If it's about removing it as a reason to argue and debate with one another, good. But if you think that the reason why we got rid of, you know, dress codes in the church is so that you can show up honey in a bare midriff with half your cle cleavage right down to the area, the tip of your AOLA showing. No, that's not why we did it. It's not because that draws it. When you dress like that, who's that draw attention to you? That's what church is for, right? To draw attention to yourself.

[Aaron McIntyre]

Not quite, no. Just a bit outside.

[Steve Deace]

See? But the secret sensitive church would tell you it is that it is about drawing attention. It is about you and drawing attention to yourself and how we can, more importantly, draw your attention and keep it. And the Lord just couldn't possibly do this on his own. I will sometimes get on. Protestants who act like Christianity began October 31, 1517, started that date. There's a group of Protestants who believe Christianity began with the publishing of the Purpose Driven Life. That it started the first time there was a Willow Creek Conference. That's when it started, Cultures were changed by sermons that you would never dare preach today. They're never changed by the sermons you would. And are you building a brand or are you building his kingdom? That one is every bit as legalist as the furrowed brow brigade. And it's subversive and it's deadly. And it is in particular itch for the itching ears of our time. There are expectations on you not to earn the approval of Christ you could not earn on your own, but to demonstrate that you have it. You should want to live for your Lord. You should want to suffer for Him. You should want to show off what he's done in your life. You should want the smoke because for you he took the cross. So no, you're not going to earn his approval with your own striving, but you are to demonstrate that you have it. Your life should be changed. You should want it to change more. You should be getting preaching, telling you where it still needs to change and why. You should be receptive to such teaching. You should understand that the whole of the Christian life is a life of repentance. And so there will be periods of your life where that change will be slow to take. Because you're at war in your spirit against the world, the flesh and the devil. So you repent when you fall and you get right back up how many times until you're dead. However many times that is. Repent and get back up until you're dead. That's the assignment. Repent and get back up until you're dead, however many times that is. I don't know. No one knows their own time, only the Lord. It's not about you and it's not about what you want and it's not about what makes you comfortable. It's not about what makes you want to go to church. It's about whether or not you want to live for your Lord. And if you don't, then you have to ask yourself, is he really my Lord? In a seeker sensitive church, they make, they cater to you. In a savior sensitive church, they disciple you to live for Him. There's all kinds of legalism behind all those coffees and orange juices. If after that stuff is served, you go into the pulpit and go into the sanctuary and the word of God is sanitized for your approval. That's as legalistic as it can possibly get. You just don't see it though, because it rubs your belly and scratches your itching ears. Gentlemen, you have any thoughts before we close this out?

[Todd Erzin]

Yeah, it's Quite ironic. We're arriving here this week and I think to sum this up, legalism being alive and well, it is this notion, spoken or unspoken, though often unspoken, that church, the building church or the, you know, the metaphysical church, has to look a certain way, has to sound a certain way. We've got to have the rock and praise band just right, just the right scriptures, not the icky ones. It has to sound just right. It has to feel just right. We can't have pews, we can't have things. I mean, it has to feel right, just has to be a comfortable atmosphere, has to sound just right, feel just right. The coffee's got to be just right, just the right way on all of these different things, on all of the senses, the things that we can touch, that we can hear, that we can see, and has to be just. Just right, just this way at the expense of the way. And I say this as somebody who goes to a church and our entire congregation just moved in to a brand spanking new beautiful auditorium with some of those same comfortable seats and the same amazing coffee that we enjoy at our church and the same amazing donuts that we give out for free at our church. And do you know what the topic of our sermon was this week? Pastor Mike spent the vast majority of it warning us against comfort.

[Steve Deace]

Good for him.

[Tucker Carlson]

Good.

[Todd Erzin]

Warning us against inwardly looking, saying he cannot wait until it starts to smell like the stale coffee that our old sanctuary started to smell like because he doesn't want the heart of this church to change with a new building. So that's kind of what we're getting at here, is that looking a certain way, smelling a certain way, feeling a certain way at the expense of the way is a way, maybe the big way, to the road of perdition.

[Aaron McIntyre]

Yeah, legalism, whatever brand it is, it's all box checking. It's a resume, something very outward.

[Paul Blair]

Who.

[Steve Deace]

Who will not wear the ribbon.

[Aaron McIntyre]

That's why Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. When it's time to pick the cup of Christ.

[Steve Deace]

Oh, that's a good analogy.

[Aaron McIntyre]

They want to pick the glossy one that look you didn't want to pick the one that was obvious. And there's always reasons for that.

[Steve Deace]

Yeah. What kind of cup would a poor carpenter drink out of? Yeah, great stuff. All right, back at it again tomorrow, noon to 2 Eastern, right after Glenn Beck, right here on BlazeTV. Until then, go hard. Romans 8, 28.