← The Charlie Kirk Show
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Hey, everybody. Happy Sunday. This episode is brought to you advertiser free by all of you that Support us at charliekirk.com support@charliekirk.com support. You are able to get behind the work we are doing. No advertisers at all. In this robust discussion and speech that I gave at the House Church in Snohomish, Washington. And I got some very interesting questions. This was done before I got married. So some of the commentary of me going to get married, you have to kind of just understand the context of which this speech was given in. But if you are inspired by our message and you want to get behind us, maybe you want to do what Ali did from Eagle, Colorado, and Support us@charliekirk.com support. Maybe you want to support us like Steve did from Fort Wayne, Indiana. Thank you, by the way. Maybe you want to support us like Adele from Shreveport, Louisiana, or Steven from Cincinnati, Ohio, or Daniel from Euclid, Ohio, or David from Marion, North Carolina. Thank you, all of you for supporting us@charliekirk.com support. It helps us grow and stay strong when you support us and get to new heights@charliekirk.com Support my speech at Pastor DJs Church, the House Church in Snohomish, Washington. Buckle up, everybody. Here we go. Charlie, what you've done is incredible here. Maybe Charlie Kirk is on the college campus. I want you to know we are lucky to have Charlie Kirk. Charlie Kirk's running the White House, folks. I want to thank Charlie. He's an incredible guy. His spirit, his love of this country. He's done an amazing job building one of the most powerful youth organizations ever created, Turning Point usa. 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. So, dj, you're a good man. Thank you for opening up this wonderful church. Seriously, thank you. I really don't have. Thank you. Look, I knew we were going to be in Seattle today. We had it on our calendar for quite some time. And, you know, look, Pastor Rogers, a very sweet man. And it's tough when the left comes after you. It's tough when they say they're going to burn your neighborhoods down and burn your homes down. And I really, I feel for him deeply, truly. And I sent out the video. I did. And I don't want to hear any nonsense about going after Pastor Roger because he's a good man. And until you guys have to deal with that in that neighborhood and we're Used to it at Turning Point, I would have handled things a little bit differently because of my opinion, when a terrorist comes to your door, you don't negotiate with terrorists. And so somebody who listened to our podcast or follows us, got us connected to this wonderful church and I said, I don't care if I have to fly out 40 armed guards. I don't care if I have to. We're going to go send a message to Antifa that we are gathering and we are open and we're not going to take it. That this idea of mob justice, that if you go into the streets with weapons anonymously, that you can somehow dictate the terms of engagement in our country, that is something I'm not going to put up with. Because, look, this is a deeper trend in our country, which is that we used to be a country and it's slipping out of our hands in a very, very troubling way of law and order, of rules, of the government coming to your defense when you want to worship your creator or have a guest speaker. But now if you get enough thugs in the streets or just the threat of that, then all of a sudden you can shut up a speaker and restrict an assembly from happening. And so it's just terrific to be here. So for those of you that follow us and what we do, thank you for that. We do a couple different things. Our podcast, our radio show, and also the most important thing that we do at Turning Point usa. Love the poster. We are the nation's largest pro American student movement on high school and college campuses across the. And if you want to talk about doing missionary work in America, go to college campuses. I mean, that is. That is as difficult as it gets, as you can imagine. But no, we're having a lot of fun. We play offense. That's our mindset. So everything we do at Turning Point USA is not just trying to manage the decline of America. It's not just trying to manage eroding terrain. Instead, it's, hey, we. Why are we not taking terrain? Why are we not saying, let's go to college campuses and spread truth? That's the mindset I have. And that's kind of why I'm here in the Seattle, the greater Seattle area. You're not supposed to be here as a conservative, right? It's a lost cause. Don't do it. But look, I know this. Cause I spend a lot of time amongst California believers and conservatives. There's a lot of similarities, which is that I will go anywhere there are truth tellers and people that have courage that want to stand for their beliefs. I don't care about the political outcome. Those things will change. You want to know how things will never change? When you shut up and you just give up on a city or a community? We're going to talk about that because we as believers, and let me just even go a step back, I talk about my faith openly. Not everyone is aware of it, but my faith is my most important thing in my life. And for those of you that are not yet, have not yet given your life to Jesus Christ, I hope I can give you a compelling reason to do that today. And it's the most important thing that any human being can do. I did it in fifth grade. And every year, every day almost, it means more than it did yesterday. This idea of unearned grace, a gift that has been given to you, made in God's image. And so. But we as believers, we have to understand that since we have the truth, then what do we do with it? So there's a couple competing philosophies and theories that have been happening in Christianity over the last year. One of them is, hey, we have the truth, but we're now going to become a YouTube channel, close the church, and they can go watch us on some live stream. Now, I think for a couple weeks, that was the right move. We didn't know what we were dealing with. Was this going to wipe out half of our population? Was this going to destroy everything? But after a month and two months, I think this church and many other churches across the country made the right decision to fully reopen. Because church is not just essential, it's the most essential thing in our country. True. And there are other. There are other churches that believe, hey, we're just going to continue to do the livestream thing. But it says in the Bible very clearly to never forsake the gathering of believers. There's something special when people gather in person. I've become a technology skeptic over the last year. In fact, I think those phones are largely destroying our humanity. And I could go into that if there's interest. But seriously, I think that, you know, When I was 8 years old, my parents did something that young kids have no idea what this is. They said, go outside and play. And then we use something called our imagination. And when I go into a restaurant and I see a family of six and everyone's staring at their screens, I say, I'm not exactly sure how to articulate it, but that's just bad for people. It's bad for our Country. It's bad for the soul, it's bad for the spirit. Because when I went out to eat when I was 8 years old, at the very least my parents would give me a piece of paper to draw on. That was like the limitation of keeping me at bay. If not, I had to look someone in the eye and have a conversation. Now it's just put the screen in front of them. That'll keep them busy for the next 30 minutes and then maybe give them a snack. So, anyway, I've become a technology skeptic over the last year, and I think the church should as well. I think there's something to be said when the church just voluntarily shut down its doors in most parts of the country, this church obviously, being an exception to that. And we saw a rise in mental health issues, drug usage, alcoholism, and all these other just unspeakable tragedies that have just increased. So we have to ask ourselves the question, what is the church? And that's a question that we really haven't had to ask our entire life because we've taken it for granted. The church is not a building. Obviously, a church can happen in a building, but church is also not just streaming in a message for 60 minutes and then closing it. Churches, as it says very clearly in the scriptures, it actually uses a word called ekklesia. It's a Greek word. We're going to explore that together. But churches, community, it's relationship, it's friendships. It's where the spirit moves. Because what's happened here today, after I'm done speaking, someone here has been wanting to go to talk to someone in this room for quite some time. And maybe that person is hurting. Maybe they need counseling. Maybe they need reconciliation. If you just become a YouTube live stream, you lose that for almost an entire year. Church is more than just a Facebook group. It's more than a text chain. It's being around other human beings. And after the last year, I believe it more than ever before that the people that wish to shut down and shut up the church, they want us just to become a ted talk on YouTube. And we can never let that happen again. The church can never close again. And so beyond an open church, what else is a church? Let's go to what the scriptures say. And just so you know, where I come from, I believe in the inerrancy of scripture. I believe in the triune God. I believe in the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. And I don't get into eschatology. I don't get in that there's people that do that, that are theologians that are much more sophisticated than I am. I believe the Nicene Creed. That's my starting point. And then you guys can debate all the rest. And I think that's a very. That's a very agreeable position in American Christianity because I see these pastors like, I don't talk to that pastor. Why? Well, because he doesn't have the same interpretation of 1st Thessalonians 5:12 is I like, really that. Maybe you're right, Maybe he's right. How about this? You probably are 99% on the same page, and maybe the enemy wants to divide you guys from actually having common purpose. And now we're going to talk about what that common purpose might be. So it says in the Scriptures, Jesus Christ brought up his disciples to the Caesarea Philippi, the mouth of the Jordan River. And he says, who do men say that I am? And this is famous dialogue. I believe it's Matthew 28. I might be misremembering, but it's this beautiful back and forth and eventually it gets to this place where we say it in English, on this rock, build my church. Right. Well, that word is actually a lot more complicated. In the original koine Greek, it's a word called ekklesia. Now, the original translation, they brought it to church. But what was an ecclesia? An ecclesia was a political gathering that used to happen in ancient Greece where the citizens of a local community used to fast and pray and come and gather for the welfare of the city around them. And there was two words that were the big unifying principles around an ecclesia, elautheria and isonomia, which are the Greek words for freedom and equality. I wonder what country has those two words as unifying principles? And so this idea of what is the church? Not every pastor agrees with this. And I'm happy to go toe to toe with all of them. In my very limited understanding of the scriptures, I actually read the scriptures is the church should not just not be afraid, but should be actively involved in the moral, civic and political issues of the day. The church should lean in on these issues. Now, some pastors say we don't do that. We just preach the gospel. Well, I believe the gospel too. I also know the most important thing you can do in your life is give your life to Jesus Christ. The second most important thing you can do, which we don't ever talk about, is making sure you can do the first thing right. You can't do it. Then we're all Going to be sharing the gospel from prison. And I am not exaggerating. That is a predictable pattern of despots, tyrants and dictators over the last hundred years. Just talk to a Soviet dissident. Go read Billy Graham's sermons in 1950s when he visited the Soviet Union, when Christianity was clamped down upon. And so for some pastors that say, we don't do politics, you know, it's too messy. It's not clear. First of all, that's not true. And I'm going to give you some scriptural evidence to show you that's not true. What they're really saying is one of two things. I don't want to offend my congregation. My congregation is not worth it, is what they're saying. My congregation is not worth the truth. What the scriptures say about these sorts of issues. I would rather do the altar call, do the gospel, build bigger buildings, get higher budgets, and do more baptisms. I love all those things. But it says very clearly to make disciples, not converts of all nations. Discipleship is hard. And discipleship, by the way, is comprehensive. And I gotta. I gotta credit American Christianity. They've been really, really good at financial counseling ministries, love Dave Ramsey, really good at marriage ministries, good at drug reconciliation ministries. But they don't talk about the one thing that you guys think about at least once a week and probably daily. How do I make sense of what's going on in the news? What does the scripture say about this? And if the pastor's like, hey, we don't do that. Well, then basically they're saying their church doesn't offer clarity. Where you might be a little confused. They're saying, basically, we as pastors, we as the church, we're just going to kind of take a neutral position. Go figure it out yourselves. When the scriptures say quite a lot. And so here's the very basic belief that I have for us Christians, that we should seek to influence all things for God's purpose. Music, art, schooling, education. Yes. Politics and government for God's purpose. Now, some people say, well, the scriptures don't ever mention anything like that. Well, that's just not true. All throughout the Old Testament, people that we view as heroes, Daniel, Esther, Mordecai, Jeremiah, Nehemiah, Joseph, they all influence secular government for God's purpose. They went after government and they were the counselor to the king. Remember that phrase? It's very important. They were the communicator of God's purpose to secular government to try to effectuate positive change in the region or the land of which they are in. And so let's think of that phrase, counselor to the king. This is on the founding fathers mentioned time and time again. Founding fathers were Bible believing people. Do not believe anything else you say in any sort of the nonsense or the drivel that you read in pop in popular culture. The founding fathers were prayerful and moral people. John Adams said it very clearly, our second president. The concept constitution was written solely for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the people of any other. He goes on to say that liberty is only possible when you the people know how to deal with that liberty. Think about it, you could screw it up in like 10 years because if you do not have the rules for yourself, the rules for your children, soon liberty will be less about the pursuit of virtue and more about chasing pleasure. Give me a check the next joint I'll stay up to 2 o' clock in the morning, you know, recklessly doing whatever you know that's not good for you. So liberty is a very hard thing. In fact, that's why what we're living in in our country, the short experiment in self governance with liberty is so rare. The normal way for human beings to live is to be dominated by another and being taken care of. And I could prove it to you in the scriptures. So Moses frees God's chosen people out of Egypt. They were all slaves, not easily won freedom, right? God had to intervene pretty dramatically to win freedom for the Israelites. Basically half the book of Exodus. So they're in the wilderness and they're starting to get a little bit antsy. Their regular human nature starts to kick in. Remember, we believe human nature, it's written into our DNA. Original sin. It's into our nature that we are fallen, separated from God. That's why we need Jesus Christ. The secularists, the leftists that run our country, they believe human nature is naturally good and society is bad and anything that's bad is a byproduct of society, capitalism, private property, whatever it might be. So their human nature kicks in and they go to Moses and they say, hey, we're not happy, we're here in the wilderness. So then they cry out to God and they say, we don't know who this Moses guy is. Totally forgetting what he did for them. But take us back to Egypt because we ate better there. At least we had meat. Kid you not, you could look it up yourselves in the scriptures. What they're saying is we prefer comfortable slavery. Take us back to Egypt where we can, we will work, but at least we'll be well fed because this in the wilderness taking care of ourselves thing, no this is too hard. That's not for us. And you've seen that replicate time and time again. So without a moral order which is then why Moses got the uploaded moral app of the ten Commandments which is six commandments us and the relationship of God for between each other is without those wise restraints you will not be able to stay free. So all throughout the Old Testament and the New Testament there's story after story of people of God being the counselor to the kings. The founding fathers said, look, insofar the church remains active and Christians remain vocal, they will be the counselor to the king. They'll be the one rising up, organizing their communities, running for office. They're the ones that are going to keep the constitutional republic in check. And this has worked till now. We don't teach this history to our children because we've decided to allow our secularists leftists run our entire government education system which it was up for me, I'd abolish the department of education like yesterday. It's a complete and total disaster is we were just talking about this DJ which is the black robe regimen. Probably one of the most important stories in American history that we do not teach our children about which is activist pastors before the founding of our country. George Whitfield, Jonathan Edwards, Roger Williams speaking clearly of the scriptures. And they caught the attention of one very, very wise man who is wrongly described as a deist. One of my favorite American founders. I wouldn't say he's a Bible believing Christian, but I have my suspicions that he was. We just don't have documentation of is Benjamin Franklin. I love. I'm a big Benjamin Franklin fan and not every historian I think gives him credit that he deserves. He wrote long, long essays on the need for virtue and he was captivated by the Billy Graham of his time, this guy by the name of George Whitfield. So he started following him around and this guy had a booming voice. How many sermons do you think you've given? 5,000, 10,000? He gave 25,000 sermons back in colonial times about microphones. Think about that. 25,000 sermons up and down the Eastern Seaboard for 15 years in the 1740s, 1750s, 1760s. And his message was very clear that there's a God who loves you. Liberty is God's idea, not man's idea. Start demanding it. Of course, all of a sudden you start saying that for 20 years people are going to start believing it. And Benjamin Franklin started to show up. He said, oh my gosh, this guy, he's sowing the seeds for an American revolution. He said, this guy is starting to get people to think differently about the form of government. That King George is far less important, but God is really the important part of a governmental structure. They were wrestling with these ideas that we take so for granted that we just kind of walk around and we act, we complain like, oh, we hate the police and you know, climate change is going to kill us all. You understand, first of all, a bunch of nonsense. It is happy to get into that if that's something that's interested. I guess we have it so good. We've been given such a gift. Of course we have problems and we should fix them and we could talk about that. But the founders designed a system that would fall apart if pastors did not rise up. So there's been four great awakenings in our country, some historians say five great awakenings. I would say there's four. So the first was the one that founded America. So Edmund Burke, the father of conservatism, who was a British member of Parliament, he wrote from afar, he actually told the king, king George, don't get involved in the American Revolution, you're going to lose. He was, he was a conservative, an Irish, English member of Parliament who told King George, don't do this. These guys want it more than we do because these are Protestant, Bible believing, liberty loving people and the world's never seen anything like this. They will sacrifice greatly. They will run up hills like we got. We've got basically a Prussian mercenary force and they're going to preserve their own and they're not going to fight as hard as we are. King George obviously didn't listen right and we ended up winning the war. But what he was getting at is that there was a special kind of a citizen that was kind of formed because of the Bible believing ethic that led into it. Second great awakening happened in the 1820s, 1815-1820s. America almost fell backwards. Didn't really get to the place that it did because of an alcoholism crisis and a moral crisis that happened in the 1850s, 1820s. Activist pastors rose up and caught America from falling. You guys have all done that trust fall before, where you just kind of. That's been America time and time again, that trust fall in free fall. And the pastors caught it, the church caught it and brought it right back into its position. The third great Awakening, which I believe was the second inflection of America, the first inflection was The Founding, the second inflection was the slavery crisis in our country. Now let me be very clear about this. America was founded on freedom, not on slavery. The year after the Declaration of Independence. Now I'm going to give you some facts and even some conservatives are afraid to talk about this because they just don't know the history. And that's fine because they don't teach it anywhere. A year after the Declaration of Independence, Vermont independently abolished slavery. In the original draft of the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson, in his own handwriting said, slavery is an unspeakable sin and we blame King George for bringing slaves to our country. Northwest Territories, not Seattle. The Northwest Territories back then was Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin and Iowa. This is the new first sovereign piece of land that was brought in front of George Washington as president. And they said, these will be free territories, not slave territories. Now if we were founded on slavery, why is that the biggest land expansion in American history was a free territory, not a slave territory? It's because the Founding Fathers were working to decouple and eliminate a centuries old sin. And they said, the least we can do is make these new territories free, not slave. If it was in the DNA of America, then those would have been all slave territories all the time. Of course not. Now there was the presence of slavery in America. But the only reason the Founding Fathers put up with it was because they believed that if there was a union without Southern states, they would never be able to defend themselves against a French or a British invasion. It was never about an apology of slavery. You read the writings of Benjamin Franken. Even the slave owner himself, Thomas Jefferson, who freed slaves throughout his lifetime, testified in front of the Virginia, the Virginia assembly, the Virginia House of Commons to abolish slavery. And then Thomas Jefferson, on one of his first act as president, as the third American president, signed a moratorium of no new slaves coming into the United States. Now this fact pattern, I could go on, right there's about 500 different little facts like this is almost completely absent from our public dialogue and discourse. It's a lot more nuanced that says, oh, slavery existed, therefore everyone that was there must have endorsed it. That's a sloppy, in fact pathological view of history. Only someone that has a desired outcome could believe something like that. It wasn't until John C. Calhoun, who was the Vice president for Andrew Jackson and John Quincy Adams, did the idea of slavery get back into the public discourse of something that was worthy of defending. I think he was a true villain of American history. As John C. Calhoun, who wrongly misinterpreted the scriptures. We've never seen that happen before. Just read first Peter, right? Talks all about beware of false prophets for a very satanic purpose of which is one person owning another person. Wasn't until John C. Calhoun did that start to actually regain traction. The founding Fathers generation was almost in full agreement that if we are. If we are serious, we have to have clauses to end this sin of slavery. And then John C. Calhoun brought it back to the top. But then the second, the third Great Awakening was pastors who rose up in a little schoolhouse in Ripon, Wisconsin, and they founded a political party based on one idea, which was abolishing slavery. One idea. It's called the Republican Party. That was it. They found it was a one party. I'm trying here, D.J. no, it's okay. One issue party. That's it. And we obviously fought a bitter civil war. There was a lot that happened after that. But the Republican Party was the party that looked as people, not based on skin color, but based on values and character. Sound familiar? Actually carrying. I'm happy to go handheld. Is it driving you crazy? D.J. that's better. Well, hello. Okay, that's fine. Sorry, guys. And the Republican Party was formed on this idea. And in the Dred Scott decision, which I'm sure a lot of you learn about, that seven of the justices who voted to uphold the unspeakable sin of slavery, all seven were Democrats. The two dissenters were Republicans. The first ever movie to be screened in the White House was a disgustingly racist movie called Birth of a Nation, which was screened by Woodrow Wilson, a Democrat, in the White House. Nathan Bedford Forrest, the founder of the kkk, was a Democrat. Anyway, I'm not trying to overly politicize anything. I'm literally just talking history. Everything I've just said is historically true. No, seriously, everything I said is a historical fact. So you guys can draw your own conclusions of whether or not it's applicable now. So then there was the fourth Great Awakening, which might be the one I think that applies to us the best. And every single person in this room had your life touched by Billy Graham. Every single person. Billy Graham had a way to speak the gospel in a cheerful, charismatic, public way that just motivated and captured a nation. But what a lot of people don't know about Billy Graham is that 1954 to 1955 and 1956, the number one topic that he spoke on was what he called Satan's religion, Communism. Billy Graham was the most outspoken anti communist the church had ever seen in American history. The man that every Christian says, I got nothing bad to say about him, right? That's the one where even the woke pastors, they're like, we like Billy Graham, right? Even the guy, you know, you know, I'm talking about the big BLM flags. Look how good of people we are, right? Those types of people, even they have good things to say about Billy Graham. Well, Billy Graham, the man who brought millions to Christ and changed the fabric of the country forever, he spoke out on moral and political issues. So that was the Fourth Great Awakening, right after World War II. Peace and prosperity. All of a sudden, America started to have a need for a moral and spiritual reawakening. But that was only made possible because there was a political attempt to take over the country by the Communists in the 1950s, and Billy Graham was largely responsible for stopping that. So now here we are in 2021. We are living on the coattails of the greatest generation. Let me say that again. We are living on the coattails of the latest generation and their sacrifice. For us, it's about running out. It's been about 70 years of peace, prosperity, and relative constitutional freedom. We're losing it year by year, but we still have this little glimpse of it. So the question is, now we are here in 2021, what does the left not completely control? They control our educational system, our corporations, our sports, our beverage companies, our airlines, city councils, Congress, the presidency, the bureaucracies, Hollywood, film and media, social media, graphic designers, whatever. They control it. There's only one thing, and it's the thing they want the most. It's a thing they're spending billions of dollars to try to take over. That has always been more powerful than any other institution. And that is the church, everybody. So what does that look like? It's their greatest fear. That's why they're always talking about it. You can't say anything as a pastor about politics. That's just not true, by the way. Just not true. Yeah, DJ said, whoops, or you're going to lose your congregation. Not true. How many people here today? This is not your home church. Anyone, raise your hand. That's pretty awesome, right? That's pretty cool. And in the most unusual way, talking about cultural, civic, and political issues is drawing people into the church. It's drawing people to find that kind of moral clarity. And if the church does decide to get its proper role in our country as counselor to the king in that fifth Great Awakening, all of a sudden all these other problems are going to start to fix themselves. The moral Decline the institutions that we say, why don't we control them anymore? It's because the church has been silent. It's because the left, they've been doing ecclesiastically, they've been doing the public square, they've been running for school boards, they've been educating kids, they've been building these massive mega corporations, and quite honestly, American Christianity. And I say this with all possible due respect to amazing pastors. We've been trying to be part of the dominant culture, not speaking truth against the culture. And this is the greatest untapped resource in the country and for the kingdom, by the way, is that, you know, I get a lot of youth ministers. They say, charlie, so many of my kids, you know, they're on fire for the lord when they're 16 or 17, and then they go to college and they become atheists. And I say, well, did you ever talk politics to your youth group? They say, oh, no, we stayed away from that. I said, well, then you're not talking about the religion that they're going to convert to. They're going to go convert to secular humanism. Now, if a youth pastor says, you know, we bring young people to the Lord, I love that. Trust me, I needed that when I was in fifth grade. I needed it when I was 15, and I needed it still to this day. But I also asked my pastor once, hey, what do we make about capitalism versus socialism? What does the scripture say about economics? His answer is, nothing, we just do the gospel. First of all, that's not true. Scripture has a lot to say about economics. For example, socialism violates 2 out of the 10 Commandments. Thou shall not covet and thou shall not steal. It's pretty simple. But what I'm getting at is I saw so many young people that gave their life to the Lord that are still trying. I'm trying my best to get them back there because they come in contact with a highly persuasive, emotionally driven religion of leftism. And if they do not have any understanding of how their faith and the word comes in contact with the daily news, or if they don't, they can't answer the why questions, it will be so fragile, it will shatter after one semester at University of Washington or Washington State University or wherever, University of Oregon, UC Berkeley, whatever. And let's just say not every kid comes succumbs to that, but plenty do. I'm sure you've seen that happen. The number one complaint I get from youth pastors is, charlie, we have these amazing numbers, and they come back when they're 20 and we don't know what happened. And it's because young people need to know how to. How their faith interacts with something that they are getting pushed forward every single day on social media, the mass movements, all these things. What does the Bible say about race relations? Well, it says very clearly that skin color is really irrelevant to. The Lord. Says clearly that we are all one in Jesus Christ. Neither slave, nor Greek nor Jew. We are all one in Jesus Christ. That's what the scriptures have to say. It says very clearly. Someone said, charlie, nowhere in the scriptures, which is. That's a really big statement, by the way, to say there's a lot of text there, okay? And this one, nowhere is what someone recently told me. Does it say that we have to go and get involved in politics. I say, well, how do you deal with Jeremiah 29 test? This is why I love the founding Fathers, by the way. They put Leviticus on the Liberty Bell. Like, I mean, again, you could put Proverbs or Psalms. Leviticus. These guys knew their Bible. Okay? Leviticus, let liberty proclaim of which in the land of which you are in. Like, those guys. Awesome. Like, I mean, if it was Proverbs, fine. Like, that's the. That's the cheat sheet, right, John? I get it. Leviticus winners. That's all I have to say, right? Jeremiah is close to that. It's like Habakkuk and then Jeremiah. Okay. Seek the welfare of the city where I sent you and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in the city's welfare you will find your own welfare. So this is what we call a timeless and eternal biblical truth. Let's go through this together. This one verse, seek the Hebrew word badrash, which means desire, demand. It's a heavy word, demand. Have Christians demanded a lot? No, no. We just kind of. We're just spectators. You know, we're here till Jesus zaps us up and house is on fire. And it's coming next Thursday, right? Not my. That is not. I'll let you guys figure that one out. That's. Which I always loved. And some of my greatest friends are really into the eschatology stuff. And again, I do not know the deep theology enough to comment on it, but I always joke around. I say, wait, if the house is on fire and we got to get the kids out, why don't you put out the fire? Like, I don't know, it's just. It's a metaphor that everything's terrible. We got to get the kids that. Get them saved, and then we're all going to get zapped up. I said, well, why don't you improve the condition of what's around you anyway? Badrash, demand, desire, the welfare. This is a word that we know, shalom or shalem, peace. Seattle been peaceful the last year. Ooh, the city. Now, that's a fill in which is. Could be nation, community, county, where I sent you into exile, where I sent you and pray to the Lord on its behalf. So you should be praying actively for the shalom. That's the first part of it, right? Is to pray actively. But then this is the best part, and I want you to think about this. For in the welfare of where you live, right, the shalom, your welfare is tied to what happens in the city. Think about that. That what the Lord is saying in Jeremiah is if you just are indifferent to the condition of what happens around you, then your own welfare, your own ability to get in contact with your Creator or to worship your Creator will be impacted. We know this to be true, obviously. Look at the Soviet Union, look at Cuba. If you're just indifferent, you allow totalitarianism the run amok, then your ability to worship your creator can very much get interrupted. In fact, it will. And that's where I want to end this part of our talk, which is it's a little bit of a call to action, which is the people that control basically everything, they are obsessed with you. They are. It always comes back to shutting down the church, but not the abortion factory. Shutting down the church, but not the cannabis dispensary. Why? There's a reason why Stalin and Lenin, they didn't shut down all the churches at first. They shut down the disagreeable churches. They wanted an obedient church. They wanted a church they could control. Because this idea of worship bothers anyone who wants to have a totalitarian state. Because when you're here worshiping the Lord, you're hearing a wonderful message. What you're really saying, whether you realize it or not, is that my connection to my Creator matters more than Governor Inslee. And this comes with a promise. It comes with a promise many times in James and in Matthews, which is that if you decide to take that bold step of inviting Jesus into your life and giving your life to Jesus, it comes with a promise of persecution. It does. Now, this is the least. This is the less popular part of the speech, but it's the true part, which some of us are built for a moment like this, right? Where it's like, hey, bring it on. And now let me just say, as Lovingly as I can. I've seen a lot of different pastors from across the country give the bring it on speech for the last decade. And then when it was brought on, they folded like a cheap suit. No, seriously, the Lord tested his church this last year, didn't he? He said, all right, you've been. I always get a chuckle. There's one pastor, I'm not going to say his name, he gives this speech every year, and it's this very dramatic, you know, sermon on Daniel. And I love the story of Daniel. It's phenomenal. And parts are very easily understood. Parts are interpreting dreams. But one part in Daniel, I think Daniel 6, is when Daniel intentionally defies the order of the king, when the king says, you are not allowed to pray or worship God, and if you do, you're going to go to prison. So what does Daniel do? He goes to his. His. I guess you could call it an apartment. That's not his house, I guess you could say. And he opens up the window basically towards the city for everyone to see him worshiping, saying, come arrest me. So this pastor would say, let us. This was like January of last year. Let us have our Daniel moment. Have them come and take us. And they have been closed ever since. Let me tell you. Now, I say that because words should correlate with action. And for those of us that are believers, actual believers, we believe there is a heaven. It's a real place, like Cincinnati and Colorado. It's a. It's a real place. Not an idea, not an abstract. It is a place we are going to. I want you to think about that. That's. That's a very serious truth. And it's forever. It's infinity. It's not a hundred years, not a thousand years. Then if we act prayerfully and in Christlike way, fear is not of the Lord, then it's not. It says 365 times throughout the Scriptures, one for every single day. Do not be afraid. Now, why would God have to keep on repeating it? It says in Joshua one like four times in nine verses. Like, beast, be strong and courageous. Got it. No, no, actually, be strong and courageous. I got it. No, please. Joshua 1:9. You literally gotta be strong and courageous. It's because fear is not of the Lord. But if you're experiencing a little of that fear, God knew that you were going to have to have that comfort. Because we all go through that. Of course we do. And fear is that little bit in the ear. Hey, you might lose membership, might lose tithes, you might Get a really bad Facebook post from somebody, whatever, you're gonna get a bad article written about you. But it says very clearly in James one to pray for wisdom. And what God doesn't just give it, gives it generously. That's an amazing thing to say. A generous gift from our Creator. We should run into that now. What is wisdom? That's a good question. Wisdom is knowledge of things that never change. There's practical knowledge and eternal knowledge. So practical knowledge is. The governor of Washington is Inslee, for now. Eternal knowledge is people in power always try to assume more control for themselves and don't want to be held accountable. That's an eternal truth, regardless of who the governor is. So the Lord gives eternal knowledge to his people when we ask, and we have an entire book on wisdom, Proverbs. A lot of the Bible is built on this type of wisdom. And colleges have no wisdom. Because where does wisdom actually come from? Says it very clearly. Says it in Leviticus, it says it in Proverbs over and over again, which is the fear of the Lord is the beginning of all wisdom. In college, there's no God, therefore there's no wisdom. And so what does that mean for those of us that want to see a change in our nation? Because boy, do we need. Means that we as Christians have to take an active posture. That's hard for us. That means we got to start running for office, become precinct committee people. This means you got to take the education of your children really seriously. It means that if you, if this is not your home church, you got to lovingly go get a meeting with your senior pastor and ask them to explain Jeremiah 29:7 and say, why are we not seeking the welfare of the peace, the shalom of our city right now? Why are we not seeking leaders that are biblical, as it says in First Timothy, pray for those in authority so you might live quiet and peaceable lives. One of the last things that Paul ever wrote before he was reverse, upside down, crucified, must have been pretty important when he said that to young Timothy. That's a call to action for a lot of you that might go to church, close here or far away from here, because this whole beautiful gift we've been given, this constitutional republic, it's going to fall apart if churches don't rise up and if Christians don't rise up and, and I'll close with this and we'll do some questions if that's okay, which is they know this. They're the most paranoid people I've ever been around. That's true. Have you ever seen such unhappy winners as the people in charge? They're the angriest winners I've ever seen in my life. They're always angry. I said, winners, whatever. You guys can fill it in. Which is they're worried. And they know this is why they're preemptively striking that people that, that don't share their values, that have been quiet and decent or all of a sudden going to say, you know what? The Lord is going to judge nations says that in the Bible that you are going to be judged based on how much you have been given. Parable to talents that I am going to contest. I'm going to get into that public square for the first time in my life. I'm going to do something to push for the moral good. And maybe I don't know how to do that, but that's where I'm the how guy. Okay. I will give you a list of ways. It's my full time job. And this is why I've spoken over 60 churches over the last year. This is why I wanted to add another reason just as many churches and believers I can get in front of, because we don't have enough believers in the fight right now. We don't. We have a lot of secular conservatives, God bless them, that are fighting for your right to worship. I want you to think about that. Secular conservatives that don't know the Lord, that are fighting harder than you are to make sure that the churches can be open. Maybe you are fighting hard and I don't mean it that way. But. But I'm saying that there are believers out there that have been on the sidelines. So this is the call to action. This is the time to get into it. And I'm telling you right now, if we do that, we are going to win. All right, let's do some questions. Okay, Very good. Charlie, thank you for coming. Big fan. Listening to your podcast. Hey, this is going to be an easy question for you. I'm senior pastor of a church in Marysville and we did not close. Thank you. God bless you. But as a lead guy, I can sure you appreciate the responsibilities I have to take care of day by day. Do you have a short list of like, cliff Notes of sources that I can go to that I could trust or any pastor could trust for information. And I'm like, I want to give you a gift to this book my son wrote. He's a sergeant in the US army and it's a dystopian. Thank him for his service. So we'll give that to him. So can I. Thank you. So we're actually developing that right now. We're kind of trying to create a sermon central for sermons that deal with the public square, kind of a resource database for pastors and particular on every single one of these issues. And so I'd love to stay in touch with you and help provide that. And that's a piece of feedback we receive a lot as pastors. Say, hey, Charlie, I want to speak out, but I need the information and I need the resources to be able to do that. And we'd be happy to help supply that for you. So thank you. Okay, sure.
- [46:45]
B
Hey, Charlie.
- [46:46]
A
So I'm Mac Martin. Stanwood is about 20 to 30 miles from here, and I founded our Stanwood activism hub for Turning Point. Thank you. I'm the pres.
- [46:55]
B
And then
- [46:58]
A
to my right is our chapter vice president. I'm the president. And then this is our chapter treasurer. So we're very excited to see you. So my question is, who should we as Christians and conservatives get behind in 2024? That's a great question. So it's, it's very early, obviously. So still too young. Okay. No, look, our first focus politically, you know, and I just want to reinforce this and thank you for your leadership at Turning point. Turning Point USA, we're a 501C3. Our political arm, Turning Point Action, deals with political and social. Social welfare. But those of us that want to see Republicans, you know, take leadership, and I'll say this on the personal basis, we need to do very well in 2022. We do. We need. And that needs to be the first thing that we have to focus on. Now, before we even get to that, though, we got to fix the way we do elections in our country. And happy to dive into what that looks like and whether it be voter ID and ending voting month in our country where you. I know that in Washington you guys have basically universal mail in voting at this point, which is. You guys have seen what happens. And this should be a warning sign for other states to not do universal mail in voting. And I don't know the details of Washington. I know Oregon quite well because I've spent a lot of time there and I'm guessing it's very similar where it's bail. Are you allowed to ballot harvest here? I'm guessing you are allowed to ballot harvest. No. Some states you aren't. So I just, I don't want to assume that's a disaster. Ballot harvesting should not be allowed, and it lends itself to paid full time union organizers that can go collect ballots and disenfranchise other people where their full time job is not political activism, okay? It lends itself to whatever party has a well oiled political infrastructure. Now, with that being said, the biggest issue though, out of all the issues, even beyond that, is the voter registration roles. This is the thing that no one ever wants to talk about, but it matters the most, which is when someone moves, when someone passes away, when someone no longer is registered to vote, whatever you need to clean the voting rules. Now this can actually get done even in states like this through lawsuits. It's very hard, it's very expensive. You'll probably still lose in the 9th Circuit for obvious reasons, but there's been some progress made Even in the 9th Circuit in Los Angeles where they got like 18, not 1800, I think 180,000 dead people removed off the rolls, which by the way, and that was in LA county, which helped make a small difference in some of these races that Republicans won congressional seats in. And so when you start cleaning the rolls, all of a sudden, mail and universal mail and voting, it becomes harder because that's the list that they're coming after, going after. Now you asked me specifically about 2024. Now, some people want Trump to run, some people really don't want Trump to run. Some people love Ron DeSantis, some people, which is seems to be a fan favorite. Here's the thing, let me tell you, things change a lot. And you Remember back in 2016, we thought it was going to be John Kasich or Rand Paul or Jeb Bush. And then a man came down the escalator and everything changed for good. Right. And so let me say this, which is, it's more about what the candidate believes, number one, and whether or not they have courage. It's a very important. Those are the two things I care about most. And I wouldn't have said that five years ago. The more I've studied, the more I've dug deep into this. I really don't care if you're a businessman or even if you're a lifelong politician, which is very rare for them to have these type of qualities. I care more about. No, seriously, I care. Do you believe the right things? Do you want to stop the erosion of American manufacturing? Do you think that we should put our citizens first? Do you think that the church is essential? Do you think that the Second Amendment is a non negotiable right in the United States Constitution? And so that's the first thing then. But this is the second thing. You might believe all the right things, but if you don't have courage, then all of a sudden those beliefs just wither away. And so I'm not going to get into names because we're far too early. I do like Ron DeSantis a lot because he has proven in Florida. Just to give you an idea of what Ron DeSantis has done. No vaccine, passports, critical race theory will no longer be taught in schools in Florida. They're a constitutional carry state. They passed an anti rioting bill that if you come out of state into the state of Florida that you could be locked up for nearly 10 years. They are going after the tech companies for discriminating against conservatives. They were one of the. They were the first major state to open their businesses. They never went after one church in the state of Florida for opening up. And not to mention Ron DeSantis has one of the. They have a booming economy. Their unemployment rate I think is half of what it is here in the state of Washington. I think you guys are near 6 or 7 or 8%. I could be wrong. Florida's 3.8%. And yet Florida has a lower virus death rate, a lower hospitalization rate and less kids with mental health problems, alcoholism and drug usage then the top 10, the top 10 lockdown states of a moving average of those together, which is Washington is Oregon is California. So if you aggregate the top 10 lockdown states and you find their virus rate, their hospitalization rate and their death rate, Florida beats the moving average of those 10 lockdown states because the lockdowns actually did the opposite here. Let me prove it to you. One very quick example. So Florida opens up their restaurants fully on May 20th. The pundits and the writers say he's going to. People are going to get slaughtered in the streets because of this. It's going to be a massacre. You know how they talk. This is what they said, right? But when you think about it, this is a logic. Ron DeSantis is very logical person and he has courage to act on his logic, right? He says, wait a second, people are going to meet with other human beings. Pretty fair thing to say that we are social creatures. So do I want them to meet in a restaurant where they go every other table with the windows open, or do I want them all crammed into a home? What's better to stop the spread of the virus? So in California, people kept on meeting in people's homes with bad ventilation. So that's why the ones that lock down, they continue to see rates that go up where Many of the social gatherings in Florida happened, in areas with open windows in places. The business that took that very seriously. What am I getting at here? This promise that you're going to be kept safe by the government actually did the opposite. It actually incentivized bad behavior to have you get closer to people, to get up close to them as quickly. And by the way, I'm a full believer in acting with responsibility, like something that we've decided to lose in our country. But that's. I don't know who's going to come on the scene, but I think Ron DeSantis, again, it's very early and he could, you know, he could fizzle out or whatever. And I know Ron very well, but I think we have to think of ourselves. Let's get out of the personality contest and say, are they going to fight for the issues and the values I believe in and will they have courage? Those are the two things that matter the most.
- [54:24]
B
Hi, Charlie. I'm so excited to see you. I live in King county, which is Seattle area. And unfortunately we. I have a church. Love the church. Great Bible teaching church. But they're making us wear masks now. I don't because I have csal, which is common sense and liberty.
- [54:50]
A
I love that. That is good. That is very good.
- [54:53]
B
And I'm.
- [54:54]
A
I was like, csal. I've never heard of that before. Sounds like a very serious condition.
- [54:58]
B
More people. Oh, it is chronic.
- [55:01]
C
Right.
- [55:02]
B
And unfortunately, not as many people have it. That should. And it is contagious. I'm hoping everybody here walks away having csal. Anyway, my question is how. Actually, my friend is telling me to tell ask you this. We love Jesus, we love our church, but we're looked at as rebels. And.
- [55:30]
A
This is a great question because I'm guessing they use Romans 13, but. Yeah, no, and I want to talk about it. It's very important.
- [55:36]
B
Yes.
- [55:37]
A
Christians don't know how to deal with it, but yeah.
- [55:38]
B
Yes. And I'm not. Well, I guess I am a rebel in a little bit. But I also want to do what is right. And it's making it difficult.
- [55:51]
A
Yeah. How.
- [55:52]
B
What would be your advice? Still honoring God, but standing up. I mean, I'm done with all this. I don't wear a mask anywhere and I have gotten in a lot of trouble.
- [56:04]
A
Yeah.
- [56:04]
B
But I just smile so.
- [56:06]
A
Well, because they can see your smile. That's why you smile so I'm not wearing a mask. Okay, let me start with Romans 13, because this is something a lot of pastors talk about quite often. And so I actually was just talking to Wayne Grudem, who is one of the top Bible scholars and theologians about Romans 13 because it's often quoted but very rarely misunderstood. Basically Romans 13, and I'm going to paraphrase, says submit to the rulers in authority. Right, because they are given, they are anointed by God for your good. So that's a very interesting verse, especially if you look at it from an American standpoint. So who's in charge in America? Well, God is in charge, but who's the sovereign? Let me be more particular. The people are. Yeah, well, the people. That's right. And so, and so it's a very. Whomever is in charge is not the sovereign in our country. So Inslee or Biden, that's actually not the ruler. If you take it from a. If a. If you look at Romans 13 through a correct political standpoint. Now from a Chinese example, I'm happy to go through that as well, because they don't have the same constitution, but we're not talking about that. And so these pastors say, no, we must submit to those people in authority. Well, the sovereign is the authority. And so if the sovereign's natural rights given to you by God are violated, then the people we put are violating our rights and they're in violation of Romans 13. We're not in violation of Romans 13. Now let me build that out even further, which is God said that they are put in for your good. Now, this is a, this is a very complicated thing. It's not complicated. It can get very heavy. Because what is good governance? Well, it's pretty easy to see when that starts to get abused. But never did Paul ever say an absolute in any of his writings whatsoever, that we should embrace or love tyranny, which is a Greek word, tyrannos, which is the ownership or the mastery of one another. Instead he used this Greek, I can't remember the Greek word ruler, which even if you look at it from an outside of the United States constitutional standpoint, let's say Chinese, is that if they are no longer allowing you to peaceably assemble or to worship the Creator, they have violated what Romans 13 is all about. I only say this because it is the most quoted verse of an inactive church. Would you agree with that, Pastor? Would you agree with that, dj? All the time. Now, insofar about you wearing a mask at your church. So Jesus Christ was 100% grace and 100% truth. So I will tell you, you have to pray about this, but do not seek conflict It's a very important thing. I do not seek conflict. It just happens to always come to my door. It's true. No, it's just. That's true. I don't. Blessed are the peacemakers. However, it also says very clearly in the scriptures that you could go throughout, that there are times for conflict, there's times for struggle, and that you should stand for truth when that does come for you. So you have to pray about it. I wouldn't try to make a scene, but I would also ask for a private meeting and say, wait a second, you know, what is it about the mandatory mask? Does it make you feel good or does it do good? So, two different things. And let me just say, as an aside with the masks, it is child abuse to make a child wear a mask. Let me be very clear. It is child abuse to make a child wear a mask. The media can't stand when I say that, so I just lead with that look. And look, let me be very clear. I am mask agnostic, which means agnosis without knowledge. I am not an epidemiologist, nor is Dr. Anthony Fauci. He's a political hack, okay? And so I tend to. To yield to people's own agency and decisions. So your church, in my opinion, should make it optional. There are some people in this room wearing masks. I'm not going to ridicule you. I'm not going to. I'm not going to say you're wrong. Maybe you have a condition or you know that that mask is going to work in a way that will help you. That's the sort of humility our leader should have and the people in charge. But instead, when you mandate the mask, it's the opposite. It. It's saying, no, I know exactly and precisely what's best for you. And there are plenty of examples where the mask has the opposite intended effect. And there are studies that show that, and there's studies that can show that under certain circumstances it can be helpful. That's why I'm saying, go look at the studies. Do your own research. I personally cannot stand them, and I speak out against it all the time. And I'll. And I'll also say this. If there's another just more sociological point when it comes to the masks outside of epidemiology. And by the way, that's always just one, that always should only be one of many factors when we make a decision. Epidemiology is a factor, but is it not? Should it be the only factor? How about this? Human beings deserve to be able to see one another. I think that the more masked we are, the more foreign we are to one another. The more masked we are, the more nasty we are. The less likely to have compassion and love, more likely to seek grace and mercy, to ask people how their day is going. I think it's more likely to make us cold and distant. And so that's a sociological question that I think that I can make an argument that the more we indulge in the masks at all times, it makes it harder to be a good Christian. It makes it harder for us to go heal those that are broken and minister those that need to hear about Christ. And God gave us a face for a reason. And this is the one thing that really, really bothers me, is that I went around the country five or six years ago speaking out publicly against the mandatory hijab in the Middle east because I said it was dehumanizing to women to make them wear a hijab because God gave them a face for a reason. And if you're going to mandate that, there's something wrong with that. And for whatever reason, we kind of lost that intensity of that argument in the last couple months, all under this guise of public safety and health. What I just presented to you was a mature, nuanced position. It wasn't one way or the other, but this kind of position is given no such platform, unfortunately, in so many places in our country. And so I would continue to push forward and don't give them a reason, just some advice to stylistically be able to critique you. Don't raise your voice. Be charming and loving, make them see the smile, because you're not going to be wearing a mask and just ask these sorts of questions. So I think it's really important. And then just on a more societal thing, I think a lot of this is about social conditioning to see if they can get an entire population to sit down and obey and do what they're told. Thank you very much. Thank you for being here. Is that on? Oh, good. Thanks for being here, Charlie. I wanted to ask a question which actually is in part an answer to the pastor from Marysville having to do with resources. Two that I think are a great resource are Patriot Academy and Wall Builders. And David Barton's really great. David. Yeah. And so is his son, Tim. He's terrific. Yeah. And what I wanted to ask you is how. Well, how close are you to the Bartons, as well as Rick Green of Patriot Academy? Are you collaborating with them at all in terms of putting together the resources that you're going to be developing. So I'm close to the Bartons. Not yet. Rick Green, but you're the third person that's mentioned him in the last couple of weeks. The Bartons are great. I spoke at one of their events in the fall, and, man, does that guy know US History. I'll tell you what, he's forgotten more about US History than I'll ever know. But no, I think you're exactly right. And I want to say one other resource, too, and I have found such value in the Hillsdale online courses. And so let me just say this, that and for parents, I'm going to say something that's going to be controversial. I don't care if you have a child under the age of 12, you should bribe them to watch the Hillsdale courses. No, seriously, you should pay them. Seriously. That's how important it is. The Hillsdale Edu online courses are beautiful when it comes to the Constitution on Aristotle. And if you, before you send your kid to high school or college, if you say, just take six of these, I'm going to give you 100 bucks. It'd be the best money you ever spend because it's very in depth and they take notes and they have quizzes after. And then we on our program tries to be a little bit more of an everyday version of some of those more distant ideas and we incorporate them. But I want to compliment you, the Wall Builders is terrific. I really agree with that. So thank you. Okay. Yes. Hey, Charlie, going along a little bit with what the gal was saying over there. I go to a church in Seattle. This really started to buy in and propagate the WOKE agenda and crt, and we're a largely white congregation. I've been told that as a white person, I need to do the work and do better, etc. Etc. I'm actually having a conversation this Friday with both of our leaders, pastors, and our worship leader. And like you said, I don't want to be combative. I want to represent Jesus as best as possible. Just any tips on that would be great. Yeah, thank you for that. And you know, I've done, I've done a lot of, a lot of research on this, and there's a really dangerous trend happening in a lot of churches across the country, which is a mixture of a couple things, white guilt, virtue signaling, and really bad theology. So I don't know if your church has good theology or not. So I'm not going to necessarily. It's okay. Well, there you go. So if your theology is A little bit shaky, then you start to view the scriptures or the biblical narrative as a means for massive social change, not for eternal life or for transformation. Does that make sense? So if your theology is a little bit more allegorical and less literal, then all of a sudden it's what you mean. Well, maybe Jesus Christ was a social activist is what they say. Maybe he was less of a savior and more of a community organizer. These are things they say, right? And it's true. So the race one is a very interesting one and one that I really have no tolerance for, quite honestly, because we are the least racist country ever to exist in the history of the world.
- [66:49]
C
And
- [66:53]
A
they do this in a variety of different ways. And again, it all comes from our universities. Almost all of this coupled with, again, shaky theology. The first thing is that they really think race matters. So the fact that they say, well, white people have to do better, like, whoa, whoa, hold on a second. Are you trying to just put some form of a preference on the melanin content in my skin? Which is. Yes. So their idea of racism is not what our view of racism is. Their view of racism is institutional, structural, systemic. It's everywhere. Where the correct view of racism is one person being awful to another person based on the color of your skin. Now, let me be clear. If that is any one of you here today, you got work to do. You got people to atone to, and you got to really get. You got to get deep into the scriptures and seek forgiveness. However, just because you're a white person does not automatically make you a racist. That harbors all of this resentment at all. This automatic classification of people based solely on their skin color is. It's beyond dangerous. It's destructive to a society. So let's just talk about the numbers, though, because they don't like talking about this part. If what they said was true, then the other prerequisites that factor into these sorts of outputs would have no bearing. And what do I mean? That's a really wordy way to say a very obvious thing. A black child in America that is raised by a mother and father is more likely to succeed through every objective metric imaginable than a white child raised by a single mother. So if you go through prerequisites, Right, because that's what we're talking about here. Again, now we're talking about things that are actually a little bit above the tribal screaming that we're seeing from the left, such as how many inputs go into the output of a human being. A lot. And discrimination is not the only input. In fact, the number one bearing is whether or not you have a stable mother and a father. But there's others, which is how many words does a three year old hear on a daily basis? So if a three year old is hearing more than 4,000 words on a daily basis, they're more likely to have a higher IQ and less likely to commit crimes. Now it also depends on what kind of music they're listening to. Are they listening to heavy metal and rap music or classical music with soft undertones? These sorts of things have really important bearings. And skin color is really irrelevant to those sorts of things, actually. But they're saying that they do and they do matter. I could get into some of the more specifics, such as, and you guys see that here in Seattle especially that Asian Americans are about 50% wealthier on average than white Americans in America. If we were so systemically racist, how could that possibly be? And so also why is it that the richest immigrant group in America per nation, is Nigerian immigrants? Nigerian immigrants that are black that come to America without money or resources are the richest immigrant group after a decade of living in America. I could go on. I have a litany of facts and data, science and statistics that go to show this. But basically their entire conclusion is this, which is a sloppy, pernicious, and dare I say, evil way to look at the world. Which is they look at a disparity, they look at a difference, and they blame the entire difference on discrimination. Instead of saying, oh, there's a difference, what are maybe the 50 other inputs that could be into this? Are the streets safe when they walk to school? Are the schools any good nutrition, all these sorts of things. Now they'll blame racism on all of those things. That, that is such a ridiculous argument when you get down to it. And, and I'll say this, I'm not going to say that there was no discrimination ever. I'll actually, I'll even give them that anything leading up to 1965, just, just take that as a norm. Okay, let's say that. So, for example, the black, the black motherhood, the black single motherhood rate in 1965 was 22%. Okay, so in 1965, 22% of all black children were raised without a father. I will say, okay, that's the legacy of slavery, Jim Crow, kkk. I'll give them that legitimately. Okay, then they have to explain why I went from 22 to 77% as America got less racist. So I'll give them the premise they got to explain the 50 point jump since 1965. And they don't want to have that conversation that as America got. Oh, that's interesting. As America. As America got significantly less racist. And yeah, I know, it's. It got. All of a sudden those conditions worsened. The final thing I'll say is this, which is a lot of this. And I'll never underestimate the power of white guilt. And this is something that Shelby Steele has written about a lot, which is that there's this pathological obsession of upper middle class white people that work for Amazon and Starbucks to think that they have to be the white savior of black America. No, seriously. And it's a really sick thing. It is. And it's like, first of all, you're super racist the way that you just categorize society. And secondly, unless you have any materially and actively been racist in someone else's life, why are you trying to overcompensate for yourself? Maybe there is something you're not telling us. And again, racism is not of the Lord. But if all of a sudden, if all you're talking about is race, maybe they're the racists and you're not. God bless you. Thank you for your question. We'll take a couple more. Okay.
- [72:31]
C
How's it going, Charlie? Hi, my name is Riker Roberts and I'm. I live a little bit close to here and I've been watching you on news probably the past three or four years. And I just want to say I'm really refreshed to have somebody that I feel like has a fire, you know, somebody is younger and that's not sitting here and thinking that just because his age, he has nothing to say. So I appreciate that. So my question is, you know, I have a few real quick, but with the Senate runoff, right, we were, they were at, I think Purdue was at 49% and they had a combined like 400 or 500,000 win total between two of them. And they made them go to that because they didn't reach the 50% mark. I think that's something that people need to look into that's just so corrupt and the fact that they won overnight and then the insurrection happened the very next day and we were all told to shut up about it. So that happened. I asked you about the 3am voting count and how they woke up and that today we're told that that's just normal and that cops don't have any jurisdiction. FBI, FBI has no jurisdiction. DOJ has no jurisdiction. Apparently that's okay. We're Told to shut up about that. My other question is Jim Crow 2.0. I think that's kind of positive because finally we actually had some pushback by America on complete and utter ridiculousness. I felt like, yeah, MLB might have made the wrong decision, but I feel like America has said that voting laws need to be changed. And so my question to you is very simple. And it's kind of darker, but I don't want it to be that bad.
- [74:00]
A
Darker than that. Yeah, yeah.
- [74:02]
C
If. If. If God's plan. Because I'm a big believer in God's plan, so I've always been a piece my whole life, no matter what happens to me, If God's plan is for us to not get better, if God's plan is for us not to fix these laws, look at 37 states.
- [74:17]
A
Good, good job.
- [74:18]
C
But if that doesn't work, and we were sitting here and you're in your 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s, talking about the same thing, and so am I.
- [74:25]
A
What are we.
- [74:26]
C
Are we just going to have to say goodbye to our country? Or is there something else that you think that might happen?
- [74:31]
A
Well, that's kind of dark. I got to give you credit on that. Yeah. Geez. Yeah, look. So look, I actually think. I think that your concern is a good one. This is a question I get a lot, and this is not the question you asked. So let me answer that second. But let me first answer one question I get a lot, which is, charlie, do you think we're gonna win? And that's part of the essence of your question. I can't stand this question. It's one of the top three questions I get. Again, I'm not saying it's your question, but there's an essence of it, which is basically what people are asking me to say is, no, I don't think we're going to win. Therefore, you're like, okay, good, now I can give up. That's what some people ask. Let me be very clear. I'm not a Vegas odds maker, okay? I'm not. I'm not going to handicap whether or not we're going. There's. There's so many forces at play here. I will say this. The Lord does not honor what is happening right now. We know that and he doesn't. And the most instructive story is Genesis 11, the creation of the Tower of Babel. Trying to create something up to the heavens bigger and larger than God. They almost can't help themselves. But do that. We know how that ended. And chaos and scattering across the globe. And so this is a good question of what, what comes next. I really don't know. I don't. There's. There's a. Many, many different outcomes that could be coming. And there's about 50 different trends that we talk about on our show that people are afraid to talk about, which is that we're entering the most violent decade in American history. And it's manufactured for the sole purpose to create a national police force that they do not want to abolish the police. They have never wanted to abolish the police. That is not true. They want a national police force. And these local city councils defunding the police are manufacturing a scenario in a situation of suffering that the citizens, like you are going to say, help us. They'll say, okay, well, here's a national FBI police force that's been critically trained in diversity training. You guys see it clearly now, right? See, we're playing into their hands like, oh, who could want to abolish the police? No, no, they don't want to do that. They want storm troopers. Okay? And that's always been. And this is, again, this might one of my complaints against the Republican Party. It's so obvious. That's why they're defunding police, because they know what's going to happen. It gives them an excuse for their own Democrat Gestapo squad. Right. That's a chess move and something most Republicans. I'm trying to get the message out on just that one instance. We're going to experience hyperinflation very, very soon. It's almost guaranteed. It's already here. Why inflation? Again? This is what makes our podcast a little bit different, which is we go a level deeper. We're the why guys. Right? Well, inflation is not just about deteriorating the dollar. How do you solve inflation? Well, there's three ways to solve inflation. You could raise rates. They've decided they don't want to do that. You could raise taxes, which they're going to do no matter what. Or the third way, more human beings. You change the fabric of the political country if you bring in another 12 million people from the third world because more people are trading with dollars. Therefore, all of a sudden, the value of the dollar is spread amongst more people. Therefore, it's a hedge against inflation. So they're forcing the inflationary hand to justify an amnesty bill. Again, most Republicans are playing right into this, saying, oh, they're trying to get inflation because it's only going to help asset holders. Of course that's part of it. But the real part is that they Want a political power grab to go bring in 15 million new people in the next five years. And they're going to create the city, they're going to create the conditions that necessitate that solution. Now, if you think I'm being a little Machiavellian. Oh, I'm all in on the Machiavellian thing. Okay. I'm being very Machiavellian. Okay. I have stopped giving these people the benefit of good intentions a long time ago. Now, your question was, what do we do if things don't change? It's a perseverance of faith. It's a test of faith. So you've mentioned. Thank you for being young in First Timothy. Young Timothy. Paul commends Timothy and says, do not let your age be a barrier to you trying to affect social change or trying to spread the word. I'm paraphrasing, but it's there. It's in First Timothy. So that's a really important point. The second thing is, what does it also say in First Timothy, Timothy? So Paul is in Athens. She might not have been in Athens. He might have been in Corsica a little bit. Anyway, the point was he was scheduled for execution. And before he was scheduled for execution, they gave him. They gave him, actually. Might have been. Yeah, he was in Athens. He ended up getting killed in Rome. Despite the point. The point is that he was. He was in exile and in kind of like controlled imprisonment. And he had, like, nine months to write and study and send all these letters that we now call the New Testament right to Thessalonica, to the people of Corinth. The last letter that we know he wrote was probably the letter to young Timothy, right, Timothy, this upstart kid that really wanted to spread the ministry. And so he says at the end that I have run the good race that I have endured to the end, that I have went forward with perseverance. And that's my answer to you, man, is that I don't know how this thing's going to end out. I think we are going to win because we have truth. And I'm seeing a renewed spirit. But. But we need to have that spirit that Paul had, where Paul knows, hey, any moment those centurions are going to come drag me and I'm going to get reverse crucified for believing in my Lord and Savior. Whoa. Imagine that kind of sort of Damocles. And yet he says, I'm more free than I ever will be. And it says very clearly, I believe in First Corinthians, where the spirit of the Lord is. There is liberty. That's true liberty. It's not. I mean, this is a guy in jail writing the most amazing idea of being free. And he's. He's witnessing to the Roman guards. These Roman guards are giving their lives to Christ that happen to be near him. And so that's my message to you, is we have to say, you know what? I'm 27 years old. I'm in this for the long fight. I want to run the good race. And it's gonna be hard. They're gonna do everything they can against us. Guys, this is a different Democrat party. They're playing for keeps, okay? They're going for the jugular. This is. This is no joke. This is 1940s, 1950s style totalitarianism coming here. You guys know that, right? But what I want to be able to do is I want to finish. Well, whatever that finishing is, I want to be able to write that letter in 20 or 30 or 40 years, whatever, and say, you know what? I stayed faithful, I stayed committed, and we finished the race. And I want you guys all to think about that and pray on that. If you're able to do that like Paul did. That should be the message of all of our lives and everything that we do. God bless you. Thank you for your question. Okay, We'll take a couple more, then I think we got to go to the next church, so.
- [81:07]
B
Hi, Charlie. I just want to tell you that I welcome you, your encouragement and your stance and your commitment. And we, too, are from Marysville Church that stayed open New Revival Ministries. Pastor Aaron Johnson and Steve Reed were partnered with Jeff at Reset. We talk often, and we decided that that's what we need to do. But when you decide to do something like that, then. Then what we're required to do is to be active. And so I'm gonna say a couple things here and then ask the question. I don't know how many of you here are with clw, but that is the conservative ladies of Washington. Hey, sisters, get online and get involved. They are keeping us updated on what's going on in the schools. They are encouraging us to go to our school boards to run for school boards. We have to get involved. And the other thing is, I don't know how many of you know this, but Thursday is the national day of Prayer. It's the first Thursday of May every year. That's when the entire nation is going to pray together. So there's several meetings set up, but we are holding one in Marysville at the Whistle Stop Sweet Shop. You could get a flyer if you want to. If you can't be there to pray, tell your friends and family about it. But this flyer here gives you all the prayers, and we encourage you then to go into Everett. The whole Snohomish county will be there praying. So my question for you, Charlie, is, is this why you're here and what you want us to do?
- [82:37]
A
Yeah, it's partially why I'm here. I mean, look, I. Yeah, that's. That's actually a really good question. Like, why am I here in Seattle? What are you doing here? Look, I. Yeah, exactly. That's right. Look, you kind of know the story, the background of how I actually ended up here, but you know why I'm giving 330 speeches a year and why I'm doing basically. Let me think about this. 550 podcasts a year. And let me think about this. Yeah, that's about right. About. Yeah. A thousand hours of radio a year. And television on top of that. Oh, yeah. And running Turning Point USA and starting chapters on high school and college campuses. The reason I'm doing that. And, you know, I could have a whole. I have a whole speech on this. I deleted all my social media off my phone and all this. I'm thinking more clearly than ever. And I know where this is all headed. I really do. By the way, if you guys want to think clearly, get rid of your social media. It's like a gift from the Lord. It really is. No, it's like a whole veil. Except the Charlie Crooks podcast that's not technically social media, but. So why am I here? Is that. Man, I'm speaking anywhere that people will have me to say some very clear things, that in the Bible, it talks about time in two different ways. So the Greeks had two words for time, Chronos, where we get the word chronological from. And kairos, which is all throughout the Book of Mark. And Kairos is a different type of time. The Greeks were phenomenal with language. Our language is actually a lot more simple than their. They really took words seriously. Kairos is a moment of action, a moment unlike any other, a moment that will determine the future. And that's the type of time that we're in, is a Kairos moment. Because I felt right after Joe Biden got inaugurated the body of Christ believers and conservatives getting into this kind of. This sort of a victim mentality. We lost. They stole it. You know, like. And I get all of that. We just had a good dialogue about that. I get it. But then I said, you know what? I got to do everything I can. Because, look, my family has been here since the 1620s and fought in every single major war from the Revolutionary War to the Civil War to World War II, giving immense sacrifices. And this is a beautiful country and a wonderful country. And by the way, let me just be very clear. I didn't go to Stanford, Princeton, Harvard, Yale. I didn't go to college. I'm like every single one of you, okay? There's nothing unique or special except the fact that I study really hard, I'm able to make arguments in a way that makes sense, and I work really hard. All of you guys could be doing something the way that we're doing it. So why am I here? I'm here to show you that you're not alone, that I'm barnstorming the country, and that you guys possess the tools at your disposal to make a difference. And then I'm especially going to churches because you guys really are the ones that need to get into that. That posture right now. You're the ones that have to get more active than ever before. So thank you. Okay, I think we're gonna to go and do one. One or two more. Is that okay? Got one question to ask. It's from a friend of mine. I need the question. I need the question. I can see the question. Oh.
- [85:34]
C
So she wants to ask how can
- [85:36]
A
we educate others who don't believe or understand what's happening? And how do we approach the topic with children? Yeah, that's. That's a. Yeah. Geez. We need. We need to double our homeschooling population in the next five years. What we have to do. So it's a great question. Look, the art of persuasion is a hard one. So let's go to the person who is the greatest dialoguer of all time. I love the word dialogue, by the way. It comes from two Greek words, which means through logos or through reason, dia as we get diameter, log, logos, reason, speech, which is all throughout John and John 1. So what is the best way to pursue truth? Well, Jesus being truth himself, did it by asking questions. Phenomenal way of getting towards truth. Who do men say that I am? What is love? Should you do this on the Sabbath? He asked the best questions that anyone has ever asked, and he allowed people to think and process it for itself. If you guys are trying to persuade a friend of yours, just ask questions. So why do you believe what you believe? Where do rights come from? What is government? Is Seattle currently going in the right direction? Right. Why is it not going in the Right direction. Do you think we should get rid of all police? What do you think they're going to replace that with? These are very basic questions. We need to do more asking and less telling. The more asking, the more pursuit towards truth. I'm telling you, it will not happen immediately. It's not about the conflict conversions. It's about the conversations. So the number one form of censorship in our country is self censorship, is people shutting themselves up. I do it. That's right. There are family members where I'm like, I can't do it. I am no greater than you. Seriously. And I'm up here doing this every single day. But I'm like, you guys. Where I'm like, I am exhausted. I just want to get through this meal. And you. Right. And I repent for those moments, by the way. I do. I am not getting preachy on you guys. I'm right down there with you. But I think to myself, man, if I really am going to live out the courage I'm trying to instill with you, I got to at least stand for what I believe when it's going to be the most uncomfortable for me. Right? I got to at least stand for truth. The people close, because that's the hardest. You all know that. It's easy to go up to a stranger and be like, you know what? You should be a conservative. You never have to see that person again. This is why Uber drivers have more collective wisdom, because everyone talks to them, Right? Never have to see this person again. I could just tell my whole life story. No, they have the greatest stories ever. Because people just give every. Because it's like an anonymous therapist, right? It's true. And that's it. I'm done. And then never have to. But if that's a family member driving you, Whoa. Because what does that mean? That's accountability. That is consistency. And all of a sudden, you might not say those things and you might not open up that way. What am I getting at? Is that we have to be more bold to have the toughest conversations, which the closest people to us. Now, before we even get into politics, though, every single person here has to be a daily ambassador to bring people to Christ every single day. Because once that happens, that's the most important thing. So. And by the way, there might be some people here that are like, all right, Charlie, I love you. And I kind of plug my ears during the religious thing. I've been burned by the church. I get it. There's a lot of churches out there that don't do it the right way. There's a lot of people that say one thing and they don't do the other. But let me tell you, that doesn't make the gospel any less necessary for you just because you've been burned by a church or some guy on TV that said something and did something else. Let me tell you, here's the gospel in four words. Three words, two words. One word, four words. Jesus took my place. Three words. Him for me. Two words. Substitutionary atonement. One word. Grace. Now, what is grace? Let's talk about justice, mercy and grace. We throw around these words all the time. Very few people can ever define them. Justice is getting what you deserve. Stole something from a local store, go in front of a judge, serving a prison sentence. Mercies. Go in front of the judge and they find out you stole something and they give you a little bit of a less prison sentence. But grace is something that is beyond human comprehension. Where you get, you go right in front of the judge and they're about to sentence you to jail and someone pops up and says, I will serve that prison sentence for him. That's grace. Where all of a sudden you're like, wait, I can go, I'm done. Like, yep, I got this. That debt's been paid. He's good. Now. We're going to keep on messing up every single day we live. Every single day. You need to be renewed with grace. But once you accept Jesus Christ into your life, I could tell you as someone who has done this, something's different. The way you talk, the way you eat, the way after you do something that you don't like, it's all of a sudden you're bringing Jesus with you when you do that. Not to say you live a perfect life, of course not. But you are actually reborn. That's why we call it born again. And so this is a question for everyone to ask, which is what happens when I die? Every person thinks about that at least once a week, if not every single day dominates everything. And we have an answer to that, is that you're able to have life everlasting. It's a gift. It's literally just there on the table for you to take. It's not about checking boxes, not about giving money and all that stuff. You do that because you're saved. You don't do works to get saved. You do works because you are saved. Right. Let me be very clear. And you accept that gift. You have life everlasting. Every other religion is about you getting closer to God. Gotta wear the hat Gotta eat the food. Christianity is totally different. It's God coming to you where it's just. You just gotta open up your heart and let him in. And so then from there, once you're all daily ambassadors and missionaries every single day for Christ, then once people start drinking from the streams of liberty, they're gonna want to find its source. Because liberty is not man's idea, it's God's idea. And that's the way you win people over. God bless you. Okay, we'll do the last question back there. We've been at almost for two hours, guys, so it's great. I love it. It's great.
- [91:49]
B
It's really great to meet you, by the way. I'm really grateful that you have been in the colleges and in the high schools. I am a recent college graduate and a much older adult doing that. And I was at the University of Hawaii. I met. Missed it when you and Candace were there. Oh, that just kills me. But I did meet Tiana Elisara, she headed a chapter there at the University of Hawaii. And that's how I found out about you guys. But I'm very excited too that you are in the high schools. And if you could, because I brought a soon to be high schooler here with me, if you could please speak to the young people who maybe aren't that interested in politics or, you know, maybe rolling their eyes when these kinds of things are mentioned. Could you speak to them about what is happening right now?
- [92:38]
A
Yeah, look, I was a unique high school kid. I always loved politics and I loved it because my parents did a really good job. And this is just some encouragement for some young parents out there of never ever teaching me politics. My parents never did that. They did a really good job though, of making me understand the country, our history, and what made us different. And then from there I realized, well, then why do some people want to mess up this beautiful country that we're in? Right? So that's the most important thing is the patriotic element. And let me tell you, as someone who studies this history for hours a day, we have some amazing history in this country that most young people are never exposed to that could only be described or explained as divine intervention at times. But look, I get it. If you're 12 or 13 or 14, you're like, oh boy, the political thing, I get it. And that's fine. But just understand that there will be a moment when all of a sudden you're going to come across something and say that's not right. For example, there's a Young lady in the room here, and you play sports and you're like, I don't like politics. They drug me along to this church thing. And he's throwing all the. Everyone's clapping, like, okay, let's just get home, whatever. And maybe you're a young soccer player, 14 or 15, but all of a sudden you're gonna be at a soccer match and a bigger person than you've ever encountered is gonna be playing against you, maybe a basketball meet, you know, basketball game. And you're like, that doesn't. They're really athletic and really built. Turns out that's a biological man playing against women. And that person ends up winning All Star mvp. Of which has happened in Connecticut. Of which has happened all throughout the country. And you complain to your parents, you say, I was not able to compete at my highest level because they had more testosterone and more muscle mass, and they were bigger. And like. Well, you remember when that guy came to that really sweaty gym and you were counting down the minutes and you're like, I didn't like that. And he said, you got to get involved and get engaged. That's why it mattered. It mattered because what he was talking about was, amongst other things, that men are men and women are women, and women's sports are deserving of protection. And so there's a. There's a hundred thousand different examples I could give there, but it's coming. It's coming to everyone's livelihood, regardless of your age, regardless of your background. And so that would be my one piece of advice or kind of contribution to that. And I'll say this. Our high school students at Turning Point USA are just amazing. They get. They are so involved and so engaged in starting chapters. We are on pace to have 1000 turning point USA high school chapters by the end of this calendar year. 1000 turning point USA High School chapters. And if anyone here wants to get involved with Turning Point USA, we have a very easy website. It's tpusa.com youm can get engaged, get involved. And we really are pushing every single day on high school and college campuses. Let me close with this. I will reinforce the shameless plug if you guys are able to subscribe. This whole conversation, if you want to hear it again, will be re aired on our podcast feed very soon. I'm getting married this Saturday and I'm taking. Thank you. Very exciting and thank you. And I'm taking a couple days off, so you'll have to. So. Oh, thank you. I know. Lazy. He's giving up. And I'm gonna take a whole week. And so we're gonna post a lot of these speeches. So if you're like, man, I really want to hear that again. Then you guys can subscribe, as I told you, on all of your podcasts, app. And by the way, all of these open air conversations we've been having across America I think are really helpful because a lot of the questions are there. So I encourage you to do that. But I'm going to end with this, which is on Pearl harbor, the day of Pearl harbor, the day that lived in infamy, there was one man smiling. So the greatest man to live in the 20th century, Winston Churchill, who. He was taking it on the chin. He was feeling similar to how some of you feel, which is where you're living through this cultural blitzkrieg, right? Every day you wake up at something else. Aunt Jemima, Dr. Seuss, Coca Cola has been lost. Delta, they're raiding apartments. You know the stuff that you're like, whoa, this is not. This is a cultural blitzkrieg. Shock and awe. Winston Churchill was smiling on Pearl harbor, looking at his fellow war cabinet, and he said, we have won the war. They're like, what are you talking about? We don't even have an inch in France. What do you mean we've won the war? We don't have it. Our navy nearly got obliterated in Dunkirk. The morale of the people of London is going down by the day they bombed the hospital last week, you just walked the rubble. Our Royal Air force were losing 300 people a day. What do you mean we just won the war? And he said, oh, no, I know the American people. I studied their history. He said, once they're awake, the war is over. And I'm telling you right now, we awaken, we are going to win. It's time to take our country back, everybody. God bless you guys. Thank you so much. Thanks so much for listening, everybody. Email us your thoughts. Freedom charliekirk.com and if you want to support us, go to charliekirk.com support or get involved with TurningPoint USA@tpusa.com God bless you guys. Speak to you soon.