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Pastor David Engelhardt
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Pastor Rob McCoy
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Charlie Kirk
Hey, everybody. Happy Sunday. Back by Popular Demand, Pastor Rob McCoy and Pastor David Engelhardt. You're not going to miss this conversation. These episodes this weekend are brought to you by our supporters that help make our episodes advertiser free on the weekends at Charlie Kirk. Please consider supporting our program@charliekirk.com support. It helps cover the cost of production. Hire more people so that we can reach millions and millions of young people. Important episode here. Buckle up, everybody. Here we go. Charlie, what you've done is incredible here.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Maybe Charlie Kirk is on the college campus. I want you to know we are
Pastor David Engelhardt
lucky to have Charlie Kirk. Charlie Kirk's running the White House, folks.
Pastor Rob McCoy
I want to thank Charlie. He's an incredible guy. His spirit, his love of this country. He's done an amazing job job building one of the most powerful youth organizations ever created, Turning Point usa.
Charlie Kirk
We will not embrace the ideas that have destroyed countries, destroyed lives, and we are going to fight for freedom on campuses across the country. That's why we are here. Hey, everybody. Welcome to this conversation. An episode on the Charlie Kirk Show, Back by Popular Demand Pastor David Engelhardt and my pastor, Pastor Rob McCoy. Welcome, guys.
Pastor David Engelhardt
Thanks.
Charlie Kirk
We are here at Liberty University discussing all things America, faith, the Bible, and you name it. David, let's dive right into it. Why is Critical Race Theory unbiblical and BLM Incorporated what they stand for?
Pastor David Engelhardt
Yeah, I mean, so when we're talking about critical race theory, right, we're talking about the division of people groups based upon certain attributes, based upon either economic attributes or critical race theories is racial attributes. And then doing analysis. Legal.
Pastor Rob McCoy
There's.
Pastor David Engelhardt
There's critical legal theory, right? Which is the same kind of thing. We look at all, all of the law through this kind of system that's based upon certain power structures. And so we're talking about dividing people groups categorically and then determining or placing value upon those people groups categorically based upon where they stand in that structure. And when you're talking about division, the opposite of that in Christianity is what? It's reconciliation, right? And there is a method for reconciliation in Christ. And that method for reconciliation primarily and categorically is Christ himself. He's the great reconciler. And that's the division, right? The division between saved and saved, division between life and death. The division between God and man is reconciled in Christ. And I love that, you know, peace on earth, goodwill towards men, Right. That there's the great celebratory phrase, coming from heaven is one of reconciliation from God to man. So I think, you know, don't want to sound too overboard. I think it is exactly the opposite of Christendom.
Charlie Kirk
So since it's exactly the opposite, why do so many churches embrace it?
Pastor David Engelhardt
Well, I would say that our churches primarily have been hijacked, and not in a way that it says in the King James version in Genesis that the snake was the subtlest beast of the garden. And I love the old King James because of the word subtlety. You don't know it's sneaking up on you. Right. And so here's my primary drive. I got to get butts and seats. I got to get dollars in the.
Pastor Rob McCoy
What do we do?
Pastor David Engelhardt
Plates? We do digital in there. We don't do plates. That's archaic.
Pastor Rob McCoy
We don't either. So I guess I'm okay.
Pastor David Engelhardt
Yeah. But if that's the primary driver is growth of the body, then our now metric for success becomes what I say on a Sunday morning. And the more I appease people, the more people show up. So I must be saying the right things. There's this story of this little kid that walks up to a bodybuilder, and he says, sir, your muscles are huge. And he's like, what are they for? And he's like, well, they're for lifting weights. And the kid's like, but what for? And the guy's like, so I get bigger muscles. And the kid's like, but so what for? And he's like, and that is what our churches have become. They've been growth for the sake of growth. And in the physical body, that is cancerous growth. That is growth for the sake of growth, that it doesn't have a utility purpose to serve the body itself. And that's what's happened. And so we have this church that cares primarily about growth, secondarily about truth, which forms the inner man.
Charlie Kirk
Pastor Rob.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Okay, so the first time I got introduced to David was because I watched the podcast. He's in New York. I'm in California. I really think somehow, like I told you, my dad traveled to New York and had an adulterous relationship. And you're my half brother. It's not true. My dad was faithful, but.
Pastor David Engelhardt
Yeah, glad he was.
Pastor Rob McCoy
But the thing I absolutely am blessed by. I mean, seriously, he takes an Arnold Schwarzenegger kind of thing and describes the church.
Charlie Kirk
I'm really big. Look at me.
Pastor Rob McCoy
I've got muscles in places where you don't have places yet. It's unhealthy. Nowhere in any of the letters to the seven churches in Revelation does he ever speak of buildings, budgets or baptisms. And Those are the three Bs for growth. It's always about this idea of establishing love. And truth without love is hypocrisy and love without truth. Love without truth is hypocrisy. Truth without love is brutality. The Bible says, speak the truth in love. There's a balance. And if we're not driving culture as a church, which is what we're supposed to be doing, then the only thing left to us is to adapt to culture. And so you want to make sure everyone's going to stay in and it becomes about the bells and the whistles and the lights and the sound and the smoke. And I'm wearing skinny jeans at 56 years of age because my kids bought them for me. If it was up to me, I'd shop at Costco. I don't give a flying flip about clothes. But that's the idea is the substance. Truth does not return void.
Pastor David Engelhardt
Yeah, well, we have a pendulum, right? So beauty has a value, significant value. The sunset has an incredible value. It speaks to us of the promise, the beauty, the goodness, the sincerity of a beautiful God.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Right?
Pastor David Engelhardt
That's what the sunset says to me. So beauty has incredible value. But when we take an entire church and we say, let's all hang out in the beauty area and we. We abdicate the truth area, then we have massive systemic issues and. But we look beautiful. So it's a bad deal because we look pretty, but we're rotting on the inside.
Charlie Kirk
So I love what you said. It's sneaking up within the church and it's. It's worse than ever before. But this didn't happen. And the obvious phrase is overnight, but it didn't happen as quickly as people realize. I have been trying to warn against this. One of the reasons why Falkirk was started, because we saw the growing trends of this a year and a half, two years ago at Liberty, we were saying, hey, this is really troubling. And we're seeing this within Christianity, the kind of wokeism. And I think we need a better term for that. I think that's actually just a filler term right now. I don't like it, to be honest. I think it's using their words. It's the best other filler phrase I've been playing. It is kind of paganistic. There is another way, but let's just use that as a filler phrase right now. But just for the record. I don't like the phrase. I don't. I think it's kind of just very weak. But this kind of idea that we must atone for something you didn't do, you must apologize for something that you're not connected to. Right. So your skin color is your sin. So think that's really what it is, though. It's that the way that you were made is inherently wrong. Right. So, because. And, but first of all, it's so incredibly more complex than that. Even if what they were saying was true, because how do they know my family's history, your family's history, your family's history. Right. And they don't. It's just incredible overgeneralization. So there's no nuance at all. That's one thing that BLM Inc. And Critical Race Theory does not allow. No nuance. It is blunt force objects. What we say is true. It's pure totalitarianism. Right. It's like all these people are bad. You must comply. And if you don't, we're going to crush you. That's really a bad idea and very dangerous. But if you come from the presupposition that how you were made is therefore bad, something you can't control, then that of course is anti Christian, anti biblical. But then what I'm trying to figure out when I build out with both you guys is that now this is modern. This is now mainstream Christianity. The top churches in New York, who you mentioned, and feel free to mention them, top churches in California, they are mobilizing their congregation for BLM Inc. For Critical Race Theory. They're taking knees for these sorts of things. They're hiring diversity czars at, you know, certain places across the country.
Pastor David Engelhardt
Some of the churches are right. And they're having, they're having diversity teams come into their churches to tell you who's going to be employed at the church. Hold on a second. I thought the confirmation of the Holy Spirit, I thought those were the things that told us who's going to be determined, right, to be on staff at a church, to lead the church of Jesus Christ. I don't mean of Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints. I mean the regular church of Jesus Christ. But we don't use some kind of secular equity position. Sorry, like we don't have enough people of Maorian descent. So we're going to have to stop the whole ship and go on a search.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Right.
Pastor David Engelhardt
What's the craziness? Paul, as we know, was sent to the Gentiles and he was not of the gentile caste, he's a totally different people group. And they were like, sorry, brother, we need a Gentile. You go away. Don't write the Bible wrong. You're not allowed to write the Bible to us. Jesus came to earth. As a Jewish guy that I adore, I'm like, man, listen, I really hate the locks thing. So I'm going to be done with Jesus like it is, independent of those kind of surface level issues. And the problem, Charlie, is as it comes in, it's not that all people are corrupt. It's only that certain people are corrupt of a certain class. Right. The people in power are corrupt.
Charlie Kirk
That's exactly right. It's not as if they're saying everyone's bad. They're saying only these certain people of a certain descent. Mostly, by the way, white, Anglo, Saxon, Protestant, the kind of. I hate using that kind of metaphor. WASPy. But that's kind of what the focus continually is at.
Pastor David Engelhardt
And so if you said like all people are bad or negative or something like that, well, then you're way too close to original sin. So you don't want to say that because one of their axioms is that there's no original sin.
Charlie Kirk
That's exactly right. So how can the church entertain that, Rob?
Pastor Rob McCoy
That there's the idea that there's no original system?
Charlie Kirk
No, but they're entertaining this critical race theory blm. Not just entertaining it, they're endorsing it, they're teaching it. These are the biggest churches in America.
Pastor Rob McCoy
So the truth of the matter is there's been racial tension in the country. Now how do we process that? Because black Americans, historically, with the struggles we've gone through all this, and I look at black Americans as a pawn of both parties. And I can go through that with 1876 and all of it, but here we are and you've got a dynamic in the nation. There's some folks with white guilt. There's people who've been educated in schools by bad historians, revisionist history. And now you come into the church and as you were saying, Dave, do you want to keep butts in the seat? So you want to be empathetic, you want to be sympathetic, you want to be able to see what the culture is dealing with. And so you try to accommodate it. And that's where you floored me when you linked me to Dr. Anita Phillips video. And I watched that.
Charlie Kirk
Tell us about it, Rob.
Pastor Rob McCoy
So Dr. Anita Phillips is talking to Christine Caine. And Christine Caine, Australian woman with hillsong. She's just nodding in complete affirmation about what? Anita Phillips. And she's an amazing speaker and captivating. You know, just. I was enjoying listening to her. And then she gets to this dream about two different creations, the Nordic tribes and the African tribes. And these were created man and woman with a hierarchy and authority, and these. And you don't understand the African community because you're from this community. And then she says this. There's no such thing as a Christian worldview. And I just went, wow.
Charlie Kirk
It's like, wait, I'm sorry. So a Christian church. Hillsong pastor from there was agreeing with this.
Pastor Rob McCoy
She's a psychologist from Maryland. Her husband's a pastor.
Pastor David Engelhardt
Yeah. To be honest, Christine Caine, I don't think she knew what was happening. I think she totally has no idea.
Charlie Kirk
That's not an excuse.
Pastor David Engelhardt
I agree wholeheartedly with you, but this is so crazy. Crazy. Let me just do this real quick.
Pastor Rob McCoy
The one thing I thought about, that there's no Christian worldview. And she's using this idea of a dream of Nordic and African tribes. I'm like, okay, Christine Kane has no clue of history because the Nordic tribes are Scottish. Because she's just basically drawing it back. You're white, and this is your formation. No, I'm sorry. The Scots were pagans, polytheistic, and they ate each other. I mean, everybody is with sin. I don't care where you're from.
Pastor David Engelhardt
That's where we could communicate Christ.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Christ changes everything. What you're describing in your dream is a constitutional republic formulated by Christian biblical worldview and collectivism of communism.
Charlie Kirk
It's not from Stockholm, it's from Jerusalem.
Pastor David Engelhardt
I know.
Charlie Kirk
Which is the blend of all.
Pastor Rob McCoy
I mean, but she had a dream. Give her a break.
Charlie Kirk
She had a dream. I'm sorry. I'm just trying to understand. So a major. The biggest church in. This is one of the biggest churches in New York. This is what they consider to be truth.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Well, Christine King was eating it up when. Yeah.
Pastor David Engelhardt
Yeah. I mean, they consider their church, every campus, worldwide, the same church, essentially, they consider. Cain is not in New York. She's somewhere else around the world.
Pastor Rob McCoy
She's in Australia.
Charlie Kirk
But you're from New York and you've mentioned it before.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Yeah.
Pastor David Engelhardt
I mean, listen. Anita Phillis says to Cain, listen, the reason why you're such a deep thinker is because you're Greek. And don't you know that all the Greek people are incredibly deep thinkers? Because one time I've heard of a person called Aristotle and Plato, and therefore I'm extrapolating on all Greeks throughout the history of man. Deep thinking. And you want to say, like, do you not know the history of the world? That every culture that reaches an economic apex has the ability, because of economic softness in their economy, to have time to think deep thoughts. So it's not the Greeks have some
Charlie Kirk
kind of unique path, but that's how awfully eugenic argument.
Pastor David Engelhardt
It's incredibly eugenic. It's incredibly shallow. So only Greeks are deep thinkers, only African or communal people. It really is racism is frankly what it is.
Charlie Kirk
And so it's that application to reversion back to tribalism. And what's really interesting is that you look at what the. Oh, geez, the improbability of the west, which is this miraculous blend of reason and revelation. And you put those two together and if they allow to exist too mutually exclusively of the other society and civilization, you need that balance. You need that struggle, right? You go too far to reason, then all of a sudden you get way too secular Darwinist. And then if you go too far, obviously just for obvious reasons, no secular Darwinists, and I've challenged them publicly, I say, tell me why blind people should not be killed in a secular Darwinist worldview. Walk me through.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Or say, or give a moral reason why rape isn't wrong.
Charlie Kirk
Right. And so Sam Harris tries to. I think his reasoning's okay on that one because it's one of force and not of consent. And so. But I don't think it's perfect. I'm just saying, like Sam Harris addresses that in the moral landscape. But the four horsemen of the apocalypse of the. Not the apocalypse. Four horsemen of the atheist apocalypse, whatever they call themselves, right? Hitchens, Dawkins, Harris, and the fourth guy who I can never remember. Poor guy. Yeah, we'll pray for him. So. And if you understand those guys, it actually makes somewhat of a joke. So. But Harris can't answer the question, what do you do with blind or deaf people? What do you do with them? And they said, because in the social Darwinist hierarchy, there should be no. There's no utility for them. They are up against a. They are up against something they did not create that is a ceiling. Right? And so we take this for granted. The west was the first civilization to make houses for the blind, learning centers for the deaf. It was Christians that did it in year 300 in Jerusalem. In Jerusalem was Christians and churches that did it. And so we take this so for granted. I just love that example because all of us, in some capacity, we know someone who is either dealing with a severe mental disability, we know someone that has dealt with blind or, you know, being blind or deaf. Yet, no, none of us would ever say they should be executed. What do they do for blind and deaf people in India, prior to Christianity, before British imperial rule came in and common law, what did they do? They're used as sex slaves in Greece, sex slaves in Rome. Are they cast aside and basically brutally murdered by the age of four in India, there's no utility for them. So we take this like, oh, that's common sense in the West. You know, they would say. The Hillsong people would say, oh, of course it is. No, it's called Western sense. And you're in a capacity to articulate or defend it. Yeah. And this comes from the book Vishnu Mangda Gali. I can never say his name. Vishal. The book that built your world. If you actually look at everything from. If you grow up in an eastern world, India, and then you become a convert. This is why Ravi Zacharias and Dinesh d' Souza and Vishal are the most effective evangelists, because they come into the west and they're like, you have no idea what you guys have here. Like, go to Calcutta and go see 33,000 people on the side of the street that are thought of as insects. And we think of that, we're like, oh, come on. That's not true. That's just. No, it's because they don't have an ethic that is built upon truth.
Pastor David Engelhardt
Yeah, right. Well, and the caste system is. They should be there. It's not that we should take them out. That if you take them out, they're not able to live out their potential righteousness, that then maybe the universe will lift them in the caste.
Charlie Kirk
Well, and this is the problem with liberation theology in the Catholic tradition is because they actually think there's something admirable in the state of poverty. And this is where Mother Teresa, I think, got wrong theologically. She did some great things, but she actually thought, why would you want to break them out of the freedom they have in poverty? And I think that's just very troubling.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Yeah.
Pastor David Engelhardt
Theologically antithetical to every church father that we have of the patriarchs.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Right.
Pastor David Engelhardt
Like if you look at Abraham In Genesis 12, 1, 2, 3, the blessings that God promises for him, he says, leave this structure, leave this way of thinking, leave this way of being, of doing, and come out with me not knowing where you're going to go, and I will bless you in an incredible way. That's the archetype of faith. Faith.
Pastor Rob McCoy
When you see the moral knowledge Given by God in the Decalogue.
Charlie Kirk
What is the Decalogue?
Pastor Rob McCoy
The Ten Commandments.
Charlie Kirk
Okay.
Pastor Rob McCoy
The observation of that and a community that lives by that. Those are rules to live by. So the community is going to flourish. And with that flourishing, you're going to be as you described the Greek culture, you know, increasing in its significance. It's because they had time to have commerce and they create. And that's what happens when you have rules where when you shake someone's hand, you know, not going to covet, you're not going to steal, you're not going to murder, and you have rules to play by.
Pastor David Engelhardt
But we take this.
Charlie Kirk
So for. I just. I want to reinforce this.
Pastor Rob McCoy
We do. Because. Yeah, go ahead.
Charlie Kirk
For granted is actually the perfect term. As if it was. It was granted to us. Actually. I think that term actually need to dive more into it. We take it so built into us, we don't know a lot of Westerners and a lot of these, you know, Christian incorporated types, they only. They have no paradigm for looking at the world anything other than. Well, of course we're always going to have different ideas being discussed. Of course we have private property. Of course we have dignity for human beings. But if you don't have a civilization that is built around that and the civilization just explodes, something will replace that.
Pastor Rob McCoy
But they have to label it, or the evil has to label it in some capacity for another human being to kill that human being. So that's white, that's western, that's Nordic.
Charlie Kirk
I'm happy to call it Western. I mean, they use it as a pejorative.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Yeah, it's a pejorative. But the only way the enemy can survive is to pit us one against another.
Charlie Kirk
But that's what made the west so different, is that it was an admission, albeit a very clumsy and begrudging path. But we actually had an apex almost in the 1980s, early 90s, where we came up against the other ultimate totalitarian force, Soviet communism, and defeated Eber having to fire a bullet or fire, get into nuclear war. And early in the early 90s, where I was born, I believe, and I think your history is going to be very fierce to exactly what happened post. When I became about 18, where I hit the apex of post racial America, I really did. I went to high school from the years 2008 to 2012, right when Barack Obama was elected. It wasn't because of Obama, but I say this, and I went to a high school that was 53% Hispanic. I was the minority as a white kid in my high School. We had blacks. We had a hundred different countries represented in our high school. Think about that. It was like the United nations. Right. We had Arab kids, we had Iranians, we had Saudi kids, we had Persian. We had everything you can imagine. And I say this as honestly as I can, we did not look at each other as different. We didn't. It actually worked. It was, here's what it means to live a good life, even in our secular high school. It's about telling the truth, being full of integrity. And of course, these are biblical principles. But now that very high school I went to eight years later is a disaster. It is now white kids against black kids, Hispanic kids. It is a total racial mess because they've instituted. And so I've seen it in real time. We're going regressively in a very, very dangerous direction.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Yeah. You pointed out earlier when you remove dialogue.
Charlie Kirk
Yes.
Pastor Rob McCoy
All you have left is war.
Charlie Kirk
This is something that we take for granted. And I mean, I don't want to give Socrates all the credit for this, but the Socratic dialogue, which actually Plato wrote. Socrates never wrote anything himself. The Socratic dialogues were written by his student. Plato is something we take for granted in the west in a lot of different ways. You could make the argument. And this is. I don't want to cause too much controversy in theological circles. I can make the argument. Christ read Plato. I could. And I wouldn't be the first one to do that. Other people would say that too, because Plato was before Christ. And I'm not saying that it was in any way close to the Scriptures, but.
Pastor Rob McCoy
But Jesus didn't read Plato. He made Plato.
Pastor David Engelhardt
Go ahead.
Charlie Kirk
No, no, that's fine. I think that he understood, though, the. Look, it was under Hellenistic rule, though, right? I mean, you have to understand. The region of Judea and Samaria prior to Roman Empire had a huge Hellenistic influence. Right. So understanding the thinkers of Plato and Aristotle was imperative.
Pastor David Engelhardt
All the church fathers were right.
Charlie Kirk
Exactly.
Pastor David Engelhardt
Erudite.
Charlie Kirk
Exactly. Right. Of course, there was a superiority there. What I'm saying, though, is that this idea of dialogue, which Christ really was the embodiment of. Right. Where we can kind of talk out our differences in the public square, which the Pharisees were completely opposed to. They're like, what are you doing all this talking for? This is why they were so angry. But if you remove dialogue and you remove the pursuit of speech, and this is what happens in Far Eastern religions, Right. In Buddhism, a true Buddhist never talks. Think about that. An absolute Buddhist never speaks a word. He just says mantras. And he's quiet all day long. That is what living a good Buddhist life is. A good Christian life is actually speaking truth as much as you possibly can to as many people. It's the exact opposite. And Martin Luther deserves a lot of credit for this because he kind of liberated the scholasticism of Europe where people then were able to independently speak and independently pursue truth. And then the utility of speech is something we don't talk about enough, which is. And we know why it's moral to speak, but we don't talk about why it's actually utility good. It actually allows bad ideas to be made look foolish really quickly. Right? So if you allow to speak, you know, let's say we're having this beautiful conference here and some numbskull gets up on stage and says something incredibly sinful or foolish. We're gonna probably pull them aside and say this was a. What are you doing? What's that? All of a sudden these ideas are then able to cross examine and then people are able to make good decisions. If all of a sudden you remove all of that and there's just one size fits all and there's only one belief, well then people are going to resort to the only thing that they can associate with, which is tribal identity. And it's that simple. There's no bridge. Because there was this great leap forward from tribalism to the West. Right. This great leap forward was inspired by the Bible, spurred on by the Enlightenment, which. The Enlightenment in a lot of different ways, if I were to say it, and the seculars would totally disagree. The Enlightenment was just discovering what was already there, made by God. Right. Newton didn't discover force equals mass times acceleration. He just happened to articulate it. Right. I should say he didn't create it, he just discovered. I should say that's the better way to say it. But Descartes didn't come up with the idea of self identity because of thinking. Right. He just. And I actually think that Immanuel Kant really was. Honestly when he said we should dare to know. I think the more we know, the more it affirms the scriptures actually. I think the pursuit of truth actually affirms Christianity. Where am I going after all this? If you have get rid of dialogue, you'll have violence very quickly. It always happens.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Yeah.
Pastor David Engelhardt
We were talking about this in the beginning was the Word. And the Word was with God. And the word was God.
Charlie Kirk
John 1. One of the most important parts of.
Pastor David Engelhardt
Yeah, one of the most important chapters of the scripture is the significance and power of the wor. The spoken word of God. We've been in churches for decades that the parishioners don't even pray out loud. They've been so castrated in a way. They're so afraid that they can't even open their voice to pray at all. And when God spoke, was he hoping in a corner somewhere, or did he speak life and the universe into being with his very word and breath, creating the universe around him? So we created our realities with. And I mean, then you have guys like Wittgenstein that come in and they try to deconstruct language and word and all that kind of stuff. But for us as Christians, the foundations are. Words are incredibly powerful. And the Torah, the scripture, the word of God, right? Moses comes down with the words of God on a table.
Charlie Kirk
And this is why the First Amendment is freedom of speech and assemblies, because the founders recognized John Locke articulated it beautifully. That first given right, that first principle of speech. Without it, you have nothing else.
Pastor Rob McCoy
So my granddaughter, she was born the same day that my Great Dane was born. And they came into my life. And now she's three and my Great Dane's three. The Great Dane grew faster. It took liberty a long time to grow. My Great Dane doesn't speak very well. He'll tilt his head, doesn't communicate real well. I can tell if he's thirsty, if he wants food, wants to be let out. That's about it. She wasn't even two and she was putting five word sentences together. She is one of the most articulate kids I've ever met. And the minute she learned how to speak, it was for one reason to declare justice. That's not fair. That's not right. No, that's what makes humans different than all other creatures. Because God gave us the spoken word for justice, for truth, to be able to communicate that.
Charlie Kirk
So let's talk about that. So justice. Either of you could take this? Now churches are saying, we believe in justice, therefore we believe in racial justice, social justice, and environmental justice. What's wrong with that?
Pastor Rob McCoy
You don't put a word before justice.
Charlie Kirk
Why?
Pastor Rob McCoy
Because God is just. He is justice. He's the embodiment of justice. To put social justice means it's in man's hands. So if 51% of the people say that this is wrong, then no, he's the author of the universe. He's made the rules. You want to elaborate on.
Pastor David Engelhardt
I mean, justice is as to a system, right? It has to have a construct which it compares acts according to. And when you ask what is, when you. When you Say justice, you're implying, you're a certain, you're asserting a set of moral values and principles. And we're without moral values and principles. What are we talking about?
Pastor Rob McCoy
So they make them shifting with social justice. You get to make them up as
Pastor David Engelhardt
you go, you get rules. Isn't WAP the most famous song of our day? Right now you're going to talk to me about a system of moral values. Have you lost your mind?
Charlie Kirk
And if you dare question it, they come after you with mockery and with intensity. And we all have to listen to this pseudo brilliance allegedly of Cardi b who's a complete fool.
Pastor Rob McCoy
A lie is never tolerant of the truth. And the only way a lie can exist is to silence it.
Charlie Kirk
Truth, yes.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Thus censorship.
Pastor David Engelhardt
So the scripture gives us a system of moral justice. And so when we talk about justice, we have a system of way that we can take way that's separate from that system out of congruence. And can we say, does this match up with these actions or really ultimately the ethic of this system? And it seems to me that at the beginning God said, I've created you, man on this earth to be fruitful and multiply that life itself, the teleology, the purpose of man is this life multiplier. And we live in a culture that's. It's like the Hecubus, it's the snake consuming its own tail. It's consumption for consumptive sake, as opposed to giving life, sacrificing for life. Which throws back to your Calcutta blind guy story like why do we not get off him in Christianity? Because life has value. It's made in the image of God and we're called to not just protect it, but to multiply it.
Charlie Kirk
Yes. And I think that one of the issues though right now is that as Christianity has abdicated its role in the public square and in the communication to young people and has tried to water down the theology, we now have a very, a very attractive form of self indulgent nihilism that is taking place. And this was all very predictable, by the way. Not as if we're going to through a pattern right now that was unforeseen. Right. You remove the moral order, something fills that. And the most obvious is just trying to fill your body with the right chemicals or the right songs or the right feelings. Right. To be able to do that. Do you think that the church, the church that is pandering or is partnering with BLM Incorporated or with Critical Race Theory, not getting involved in politics, that is doing all these Sorts of different things. Are they equally. Do you think that there's also an issue with how they're not communicating even to the secular, nihilistic world that's growing around them?
Pastor David Engelhardt
Jesus says too. Totally. Jesus says contradictory stuff all the time. Christians don't like to talk about it. But at one point Jesus says, if you're not with us, you're against us. And then later he says, if you're not against us, that you're with us. Like, what are you talking about, Jesus? Well, in different contexts, different truths play out. There's a place where this culture is literally on a breakneck speed towards the cliff of absolute chaos. And we can see it all over the place. The pictures are to the French Revolution, to Rome, to the destructions of those great nations are here with us today, right now. We're waiting for it to happen. And if a church at some point is in the middle of some kind of semi normal culture and they're not getting engaged and involved, fine, you're doing your thing. You're talking about Jesus. Clap, clap, raise hands. But then there's a place where we're about to fall off the cliff. And who is called to stand for God and his way and his moral order. And if at that time you're still abdicating your voice in the community, then I think you're probably in trouble as
Pastor Rob McCoy
it was in the days of Noah and as it was in the days of Lot. And the reason why they add as it was in the days of Lot is you think about lots of Lot. He's in Hebrews, he's in Timothy, where it says righteous. Lot tormented his righteous soul by giving his eyes and his ears audience of things of this world. You put the word righteous in front of someone's name in the New Testament, I want to know who that person is, because I want to live my life after him. Well, this is a man that lived in Sodom and Gomorrah, offered his virgin daughters to be abused, And then had sexual relations with them while he was drunk and his wife was turned into a pillar of salt. Yet the New Testament says righteous Lot. And God actually removed him because Abraham prayed and said, if there's any righteous, would you spare the city? And they let him bring him out. Lot is the church of today as it was in the days of Lot. Oh, he's righteous. He's got his get out of hell free card, but he sits in Sodom and goes Gomorrah. He sits at the city gate. Nobody in that town even knows he's a believer. His family doesn't even know he's a believer. And he's willing to sacrifice his children and everything else, but he's still been saved by grace through faith. But nobody else has a clue. Yeah.
Pastor David Engelhardt
Genesis 19, that portion of lot hanging out, that city is called Place of Burning. The king that's over that city, his name means king of iniquity. So he's this king of iniquity over City of Burning. I think Gomorrah means place of drowning. But they're the same pictures of absolute consumed by your own iniquity. And it's the culture that we seem to be engaged in right now.
Pastor Rob McCoy
The church can be considered part of the bride of Christ. But just like Lot, who is righteous and is in the New Testament in that capacity, nobody in heaven has a clue. I mean, even the angels came to. We got to go. He's still lingering. And everything he loved about Sodom and Gomorrah is you can take Lot out of Egypt, but you can't take Egypt out of Lot. The church has fallen in love with the world and they don't want to leave. And they're going to accommodate until there's nothing that even defines them anymore other than what Christ did. There's no works. I don't know if that helps.
Charlie Kirk
No, it does. Absolutely. So speaking. Can you just give us an idea? You're seeing more and more pastors rise up to all this.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Yeah.
Charlie Kirk
You are too. Do you have optimism? What do you see in the landscape and what's your message to Christians out there? Church won't open is also pandering to all these things.
Pastor David Engelhardt
Yeah, I think it's. I think that we're gonna. There's gonna be a continued shaking. I do not think we've seen the end of it. I think there will, you know, like New York City the day after, like two days after riots, the street are filled with revelers again. Like, there's something, something more will happen, I think, before pastors really have a wake up call. And I don't know what that is. I have some friends that the lights are turning on. And it's incredibly encouraging because courage encourages courage.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Right.
Pastor David Engelhardt
Somebody said that to me recently and I'm like, that's amazing.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Right?
Pastor David Engelhardt
Exactly. But I'm not optimistic. I'm not optimistic for people. I'm optimistic for the kingdom. Because as the shake, as the pruning takes place, greater fruit grows. The real fruit grows. The real forward movement of the kingdom of God happens after the pruning takes place. And. And it seems to me that the pruning is not over yet.
Pastor Rob McCoy
I'm very optimistic in probably a very similar sense. And this is the part I want to encourage you with. I look at you, David, and I didn't know you a month ago, and now I'm like, thank you, God. And I'm wondering where the rest of the guys are. And I almost feel like it's Gideon's army. But there's a pride in thinking that. And this is how the Lord blessed me. Because in the community, I've had relationship with these pastors for 20 years, and only two of them have joined me, but they're still my friends. They still support me secretly, but they haven't opened. And the Lord said to my heart, he said, you know, yeah, I use Gideon. But the ones that went away because they wanted to go be with their families for whatever reason, the Lord brought them back in and they became part of the army. They'll find that inspiration.
Pastor David Engelhardt
And the whole nation was blessed because of Gideon standing in that hour.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Yeah. So pick who you want. But ultimately, let's all join together. I want to win them back. I don't want to lose my brothers.
Charlie Kirk
For Christians that say, you shouldn't care that much about your country, why do you care about America? What do you say about that? I get a lot of those messages.
Pastor David Engelhardt
Yeah. I mean, I would ask the question, why do you care about your family? Why would you ever care about your family? Why would you ever care about your brother or your sister or your mom and your dad? Because those are the people that he gave to you.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Yeah.
Pastor David Engelhardt
A country is made up of something that people don't understand. It's made up of cities that are made up of villages that are made up of families. So I love the United States of America primarily or axiomatically, because I love my dad and my mom and my brother and my sister. And from there, it builds out a love for a people that I deeply love. God has placed me. So listen, I'm all for Christ as king of the earth, 100%, like Christ is the king of the earth. He's not wearing an American cape right now. He's king of the universe.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Right.
Pastor David Engelhardt
He's the ruler of all these domains, but he set me a part of a specific family in a specific city, in a specific nation that I'm called to. That's why I care deeply about my nation.
Pastor Rob McCoy
I do love America.
Pastor David Engelhardt
America.
Pastor Rob McCoy
I love America not because of the boundaries, although it's a beautiful country. But every nation on the face of the earth has beautiful territory. I love America because of the idea. America's an idea. And when you come here, wherever you come from the world, and you become a citizen, you're an American. My relatives came from Scotland, yours came from Germany, I'm assuming, and you're an American. And the reason why I like the idea, why it's instilled in me, is because the idea is liberty, dedicated to the proposition all men are created equal, endowed by their creator. And this is given. And that idea has been defended for 244 years with men and women who valued it, bled and died for it. And so I have a commitment. Yes, I do love this country because this country is an idea. And it's the greatest idea mankind has ever known. And that's called library, because God gave it to us and it must be preserved.
Charlie Kirk
It's the greatest nation ever to exist. And it is the beginning of Western society, and we are seeing it in real time. You have nothing to replace this place with. It'll crumble quicker than you could possibly imagine. And we're headed that way. I mean, people say, well, Charlie, where do you see this thing going next? It's like, it's not good. I'm telling you. You just read a little bit about what happens when some sort of a center staple happens on a civilization, disappears, for better or for worse. It can be when a patriarch leaves a family, a pastor leaves a church, you know, a CEO leaves a company, or in a worst case, a dictator leaves a country. You'll have a power vacuum. And when the. When America leaves the west, there will be no more West. It's that simple.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Bob McKeown says from Scripture, when you bind the strong man, there's no one left.
Pastor David Engelhardt
And it's the weak and the vulnerable that are most harmed in those times. Says like, woe to that nursing mom who's, you know, with child. Because it's the worst to the weakest. And we have this movement that's like, what about the weak? What about the weak? And you're like, you're going to destroy them when you destroy the system.
Pastor Rob McCoy
They're doing it now. Black blm, you know, the Holocaust on the unborn black child in America. And they partnered with Planned Parenthood. It's a holocaust. They're destroying the vulnerable national. It is consuming. The devil is a roaring lion roaming about, seeking who may devour. And he comes to steal, kill, and destroy. And as you said, Charlie, the left can only deconstruct. They don't build.
Charlie Kirk
They've never built anything. The Left has never built anything in their existence.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Any donkey can knock down a barn door, but only a carpenter can build.
Charlie Kirk
But you know what's actually amazing. And I just want us. This is an optimistic point. How incredible of what we live in, because look at how hard they've tried, how much money they've spent, what they've done. And the west is still intact. It's actually rather incredible. They were able to topple Cuba in like, an afternoon when Fidel Castro and Che Guevara are like, let's go take over this island. Mugabe in Rhodesia was like, this is Zimbabwe now. I mean, even Lenin was able to overthrow the czars. Robespierre was able to. The fact they haven't yet tilted this thing over should just give you pause at how unbelievably durable what we have been given is. And special.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Yeah.
Pastor David Engelhardt
And I think part of that durability is actually the moral fabric is actually the church.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Of course it is.
Pastor David Engelhardt
Right. And so when we look. When we look at Abraham in Genesis 18, praying for the city that fire is about to drop on, he's like, God, just. If there's only, you know, a thousand. 500. 100. One, please. One. Come on. One. Exactly.
Charlie Kirk
He was kind of bargaining, you know.
Pastor David Engelhardt
Yeah. And that culture was on the brink of absolute chaos and destruction. The judgment of God. We have a vastly different place now. We have.
Charlie Kirk
You know what's so amazing is we're living in order. Generally, of course, there's plenty of chaos, but the general society going towards chaos. We've never encountered something like this before. And so the playbook is like, yeah, let's go make things uncertain again. Let's go back. Let's go back to just judging people on skin color because we're progressing.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Socialism has never worked in the history of the world, but this is democrat socialism. What's that? Well, it's socialism a turd. And democrat socialism is sprinkles on that. It's better this time. It's still a turd. Can I say that on your show?
Charlie Kirk
Yeah, sure you can.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Even as a minister.
Charlie Kirk
Yeah, you can do whatever you want. Okay, so, well, any closing thoughts, David?
Pastor David Engelhardt
No, thanks.
Pastor Rob McCoy
I think we covered the turd on my closing.
Pastor David Engelhardt
Oh, gosh.
Charlie Kirk
Well, Pastor Rob McCoy, Pastor David Engelhardt, thank you guys for tuning in. And we'll be back soon.
Pastor Rob McCoy
Thank you, Charlie.
Charlie Kirk
If you guys want to help save the Republic, get involved right now with Turning Point USA. Tpusa.com, tpusa.com get engaged get involved. It's time to fight for the gift that we have been given to live in the greatest country ever to exist in the history of the world. TPUSA.com if you want to win a signed copy of the MAGA Doctrine, show us you're subscribed on your podcast provider by typing in Charlie Kirk show to your podcast provider. Hit subscribe, give us a five star review, screenshot it and email us freedom charliekirk.com, freedomarliekirk.com email me your questions that you want me to answer tomorrow Monday on my Ask me anything episode freedomarliekirk.com and make sure you listen to the previous episode, the Coup to Displace Trump. Thank you so much for listening everybody. Big week in store. Talk to you soon.
Episode: BLM Inc Has No Place in the Church OR America
Host: Charlie Kirk
Guests: Pastor Rob McCoy & Pastor David Engelhardt
Date: September 20, 2020
This episode features an in-depth conversation between Charlie Kirk and pastors Rob McCoy and David Engelhardt, tackling the infiltration of Critical Race Theory (CRT) and the Black Lives Matter (BLM Inc.) movement into American churches and larger society. Broadcasting from Liberty University, the trio evaluates the ideological and theological conflicts posed by these movements, discusses the spiritual and civic health of America’s youth, and considers the role of the Church in shaping national discourse.
[01:25–02:54]
“The division, right—the division between saved and saved, life and death, God and man—is reconciled in Christ. ... I think it is exactly the opposite of Christendom.” — Pastor David Engelhardt (02:38)
[02:54–06:37]
“We have this church that cares primarily about growth, secondarily about truth, which forms the inner man.” — Pastor David Engelhardt (03:29)
[06:37–10:19]
“It's pure totalitarianism. ... You must comply, and if you don't, we're going to crush you.” — Charlie Kirk (08:35)
[10:19–15:08]
[15:08–19:38]
“The West was the first civilization to make houses for the blind, learning centers for the deaf. It was Christians that did it in year 300, in Jerusalem.” — Charlie Kirk (16:12)
[19:38–25:33]
“If you remove dialogue… all you have left is war.” — Pastor Rob McCoy (21:17)
[26:52–29:05]
“You don't put a word before justice… God is just. He is justice. He's the embodiment.” — Pastor Rob McCoy (27:07)
[29:05–32:31]
[32:31–34:43]
“The church has fallen in love with the world and they don't want to leave.” — Pastor Rob McCoy (32:56)
[33:51–35:48]
“Courage encourages courage.” — Pastor David Engelhardt (34:17)
[35:48–39:02]
“America's an idea... it's the greatest idea mankind has ever known and that's called liberty.” — Pastor Rob McCoy (36:57)
“A country is made up of families… I love the United States of America primarily because I love my dad, my mom, my brother, my sister.” — Pastor David Engelhardt (36:55)
[39:02–41:18]
“The devil is a roaring lion...he comes to steal, kill, and destroy. And as you said, Charlie, the left can only deconstruct. They don't build.” — Pastor Rob McCoy (39:29)
“They've never built anything. The Left has never built anything in their existence.” — Charlie Kirk (39:29)
[41:18–End]
“Any donkey can knock down a barn door, but only a carpenter can build.” (39:32)
“It's pure totalitarianism. ... You must comply, and if you don't, we're going to crush you.”
— Charlie Kirk [08:35]
“We have this church that cares primarily about growth, secondarily about truth, which forms the inner man.”
— Pastor David Engelhardt [03:29]
“You don't put a word before justice… God is just. He is justice. He's the embodiment.”
— Pastor Rob McCoy [27:07]
“Courage encourages courage.”
— Pastor David Engelhardt [34:17]
“America's an idea... it's the greatest idea mankind has ever known and that's called liberty.”
— Pastor Rob McCoy [36:57]
The episode positions CRT and BLM Inc. as antithetical to the Christian gospel, accuses modern churches of compromising truth for growth, and attributes American prosperity and social stability directly to Christian and biblical principles. The speakers urge clergy and believers to reclaim influence in both public life and spiritual formation, warning against passivity and the erosive trends of secular social justice movements. Despite the social tumult, the episode closes on a note of hope, citing the resilience of Western civilization and a call for renewed courage in the Church.