Ep 925 | The Robertsons Hold Nothing Back: Trump’s RNC Speech, God & the Republican Convention
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I am unashamed. What about you? So welcome back to Unashamed. You know, you never know where we're going to turn up in different places. I'm back in Gulf Shores. I had to come back down here to get...

Lisa and bring her back. I'm preaching. I'm doing a follow-up, Jace, to my Hebrews 10 sermon from last week. It's rare now with this kind of the way my schedule is that I get to preach two weeks in a row. It's kind of nice because you get into the context of a text and it's kind of nice to be able to get the other half of it. So I'll be doing that. So I got to get back. So I'm in Gulf Shores, Southern Lair. Zach's with us or as we like to call him, J.D. Vance Jr.,

Or you would be senior, I guess, because you're older than him. I'm telling you, they keep coming. It's up to probably 100 techs now. I never even thought about it, to be honest with you, until Matty put the side-by-side for us on the last podcast. And you do kind of favor J.D. Yeah, when I saw him after our conversation about that, I was like, oh, my goodness. Yeah.

Oh, it's wild. I mean, well, last night was the, um, was the, I guess the finality of the GOP convention. And so I got, uh, of course, you know, they had a lot of, a lot of footage of him up there. So I, I mean, my phone was blowing up like, this is you, you're the, you're him. Well, you were in the political arena. People don't realize that. Uh, I mean, you, you made a valiant attempt for what'd you run for?

U.S. Congress. You endorsed me, Jace. Did I? Yeah, you did. So, Zach, what was your take on Trump's speech, on the convention itself? I mean, what was your take on it at all? Oh, let's go there. Well, yeah. You and I have talked some, so I know you and I disagree a little bit about it, but go ahead and tell us what you think.

Well, I'll tell you, I'll tell you the first scripture that comes to mind that gives me peace and gives me hope is when, when, in John 18, when Jesus, when he said, he said before Pilate, he said, my kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. My, but my kingdom is not from the world.

And I think about I think about that when I was watching it, because I'm I'm I'm kind of an old school. The term is, I think, called classical liberalism, which actually means you're a conservative. But there's not a lot of guys like me left. You know, I think we have to be careful with some of the populist rhetoric. I mean, it's you know, I think it has to be anchored. If you have we did a movie about this. If you have any system.

of government that is not anchored in the Imago Dei, that man has made the image of God. And that has to be the core philosophical anchor for it. It really doesn't matter, conservative, liberal. I mean, Francis Schaeffer said it best, conservative humanism is still humanism. So I was disappointed in it. I felt like it was not a lot of

Like, it was just a lot of kind of cliches. It wasn't something I didn't, I didn't want, I didn't watch it and think, man, I'm inspired. I'm new. I mean, you know, if anything, I was like, man, like God help us. I mean, you know, but I know I'll probably get a lot of flack for that. And, but I mean, that's, that's, that's kind of where I stood on it. On the, on, on what? He's just talking about generally on the convention. On the whole convention. I felt like, I mean, you have stuff like, I mean, this is a tricky, tricky subject.

Because, you know, I thought about 1 Peter 2, which, you know, 1 Peter 1 and 2 kind of mirrors a lot of what we've been studying in Ephesians. You know, you go through this great plan that God had for human beings in Jesus. And, you know, even in Ephesians 2 and 3, we start talking about unity, right?

And how through Christ, it's the ultimate place to bring people together. I mean, it's in the context of Jew and Gentiles, but you have all these statements about you're the body of Christ and you're the temple of God. And from Peter's perspective in 1 Peter 2, he makes that statement about

In verse nine, you're a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation. So when I think about that, you realize we're a holy nation, God's nation within a nation. Right. That we love and that, you know, always say you appreciate America when you go somewhere else. You get back and you're like, huh. But even in 1 Peter 3,

The account there, you know, in verse 11, he talks about being aliens and strangers in the world. And so to your point about that conversation that Jesus had with Pilate, he was like, you know, I'm not of this world. And he had just prayed after giving three chapters, John does, about

when Jesus goes to the right hand of God, which he is at now, he would pour out his spirit. Well, then Jesus has this amazing prayer in John 17. And y'all remember it. I mean, but it starts talking about unity. And it also talks about our role in the world. He's predicting that you're going to be my chosen people as a group in this world. And just to give you a thumbnail of it, just to...

which I think this is exciting, but it also, you have to put in a perspective about, well, you know, Zach gave his take on like when you watch a political convention, we're always going to be a little bit less excited because Jesus is too exciting. What we have in Jesus as a group is,

is way more exciting than any kind of political structure within a physical kingdom on Earth now. Now, if they want to elect me president of the United States, I'm going to tell them that when you come in the doors of our schools, first graders, third, second, fourth, fifth graders, junior high,

I would have the gospel being preached. You can take it or leave it. Yeah. We're going to make it available. Maybe you should run, Phil. So when's the next cycle? 2028? That's just what we need. You've already got a vice president guy that looks like J.D. Vance. At least they're mentioned. There was some spiritual...

ramifications of what oh yeah man i think a lot of that he said more about jesus he and he did say that he'll he'll deflect bullets if they're coming at your head well yeah well phil what i was i was trying to just give you some biblical context because while zach was watching you know i watched last night and uh and i loved there there was a black pastor from detroit michigan yep

Now, you need to watch that because I put myself in his situation. If you ask me to go to a political rally, that's not something I'm interested in. But if I was, and I have done a couple things in my life around that. So you're in this weird spot of declaring that Jesus is the ultimate answer and there's a holy nation you can be a part of that God uses while also trying to deal with

the current political earthly climate of being a nation and electing. Well, let me just say this, Phil, though. So when this guy gets up, I thought he did a really good job of declaring Jesus as his Lord. Yep. And then using the current situation that happened,

Through the eyes of being a part of a godly kingdom. So basically, I don't know if you heard him speak, Phil. Yeah, I heard him speak. But Trump, 30 days before, had gone to his church, which according to this preacher, which I need to get his name. Somebody Google Detroit pastor speaks at convention. And let's get the guy's name because I saw that it was on YouTube.

But so he so so what happened on Trump's birthday 30 days ago before the shooting? This pastor had Donald Trump in his church and he said it was basically in the hood. Yeah. The pastor's name is Lorenzo Sewell. And so they had him in their service. Well, the pastor said, well, a lot of the people didn't like it because they kind of lean toward the Democratic Party. And they're like, what in the world?

And so he more than lean, but yeah. Yeah. So he defended that. He's like, because a former president who's running for president asked to come to our church. Of course I said yes. And he said he had one request. He said he didn't want to speak. He didn't want to tell us. He came to listen and he had one request. He's like, will y'all pray for me in our country? He's like, as a man of God.

Absolutely. And so that's what I did. And he said, then after seeing what happened 30 days later, and he called it a miracle by a millimeter. He said, me as a believer, trusting in God that he's all sovereign and that he is providential. He said, I concluded that God was not ready for him to go on. He's got a plan.

And so I thought it was really interesting. I thought it was inspiring. It was focused on Jesus. He had numerous lines talking about Jesus still changes everything today. And he said to the people who don't support President Trump, he said, maybe you should consider that maybe God has a plan and wants to use him because it does seem very unlikely that a man could get that close to

to death and survive. And we're, we're talking millimeters here, you know, that's it. So, and in that moment that this same man has now had a reflection on his mortality and, uh,

He has articulated that he believed God alone saved him. So I think that's a good thing. And look, we all go through that in our life. I've had many near-death experiences. That is a good thing. But one of the things I kept thinking about last night, and really, maybe I was tainted from the first night. I mean, I'm just watching this unfold, and I'm thinking, what in the world is happening to us?

I could go down the list of even just the first night of how much things have changed. But, you know, I was thinking about this quote from Ronald Reagan. You guys have probably heard this before because he was really famous for this quote, which is actually kind of hilarious. He said, the nine most terrifying words in the English language are this. I'm from the government and I'm here to help. I mean, that was kind of the idea. But I feel like now on both sides of the aisle,

What we're being told is that we're going to somehow find some kind of salvation from their version of the government. And it's just not true.

That's not going to happen. I mean, you're not going to be saved by a political movement or figure. Now, does that mean that we advocate our responsibility to be involved politically? No. But when you clearly see things in the platform, like, you know, I'm going to vote my conscience on this and I think everybody should. But that doesn't mean that you have to carry the water for a political party that clearly is not.

synonymous with the kingdom and at least the ethic and the teaching of the kingdom. There's stuff in the platform. What's the downside for loving God and loving your neighbor? Jace, I would say that our family has been kind of firmly in the pro-life battle really for years. And we kind of all go about different ways. I mean, you and Missy kind of have, and Zach are more on the

adoption, fostering. Fostering. I went and visited the little one that we're in his life yesterday. And, you know, I'm always inspired just by...

giving life. I mean, this is what we do. And I love it because the idea is, is obviously we're trying to get these babies, especially from situations where mothers have an unplanned pregnancy and they're not sure what to do. And we understand that. I mean, we've helped a lot of young women in crisis, most of our ministry and most of our lives. And so we want to help them make a good decision and

And it's not just bringing that baby into the world, but it's also looking out for those children and helping them strive as well. And our good friends at Preborn, they're more on the front end of the situation. They have a network of clinics that provides free ultrasounds to women

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That's why I said it's a tough spot. For years, our schools could talk about God, Jesus, the Bible. For years and years, when I was in school, I mean, they pledged allegiance to the flag, fear God, love God, love your neighbor. I don't see the downside of talking to young people.

and giving them that information. We believe that God sent Jesus to save the world. Yeah, well, you're not able to do that in our schools today. That's what I'm talking about. Yeah, but I'm saying you're left with a quandary, Zach. I mean, because we only have two political choices.

And so I think Franklin Graham, who spoke later after Pastor Sewell, I thought he did a good job of balancing the Christian people view. He did a great job. Yeah, because he went back and said, look, now there's a lot of rhetoric and even had a funny thing about him sending Donald Trump a text saying quit using foul language, you know, which you could tell it shook Trump up. He's like, I'm really working on that.

Because, you know, he's from, I mean, he spent a lot of time in New York and all this, and I'm sure he cusses like a sailor. But, you know, kudos to Graham for sending that text. And I know why he did. Because us as Christians, we're like, you know, we're trying to support the candidate that best supports the character and principles of God for our nation. And we only have so many choices, right? Yeah.

So he kind of articulated that because he said, I'll say this, forget about what he says, because we all know Trump. He's a, I'm not sure how to categorize him. He's a shock and awe articulator. So he'll embellish points, kind of giving you a picture instead of the details. You know, I've said that before. He kind of speaks like an apocalyptic language. Everything's an embellishment language.

of the reality. So the other side says, well, he's lying. Well, I'm like, no, he's doing pretty much what my family does. They embellish stories to get to promote a principle of

And once you kind of wrap your head around that, you understand why everything's extreme. Everything's a blanket statement. You know, it's like no one has ever seen this before, to use an example. Well, I'm sure someone has seen this before, but he's trying to give you a visual embellishment of like, this was spectacular. But to Graham's point, when you look at what he did with the appointing Supreme Court justices,

who lean way toward the principles that Christian people support, where you're like, okay, when you look at what he did as far as promoting religious liberty, for getting these kidnapped pastors out of countries, when you just start looking at a trail of things that he did, well, it was more...

supportive to Christian values. And so I'm 100% sure that's why Franklin Graham accepted the invitation and got up there and prayed for him and the country. So that's kind of where I'm at. You're not going to make everything you hear work because we get our standard from God's word.

Yeah, that's where my value. If I want to know something about morality, I'm not going to go ask a politician. I'm going to read my Bible. Yeah. So loving God and loving your neighbor. Well, exactly. It's good advice. I don't care who said. But you can't dig a hole, you know, and say, well, I'm just not going to be part of the process. Because when you look at the alternative, well, look at the track record there.

I mean, I don't yeah, I don't think you can. But I think you can say and I think we should say as members of the citizens of the kingdom, I think we should say.

OK, I'll be involved in the process, but I'm not going to be consumed by the process. And my identity is not going to be in my political leanings and my political ideology, because what happens and I look, I mean, this is coming from someone who came out of politics like I was fully you guys. I was fully going that direction in 2014. I honestly could write a book about this that probably would. But I'd make a lot of people mad, I'm sure. I mean, I've seen a lot.

a lot of stuff that I've never shared publicly. And I've seen behind the curtain, I've seen under the hood on a lot of this stuff. And, and the reason why I, uh, got out of it as a, as a pursuit is because, um,

Really, the Lord convicted me with this verse, that my kingdom is not of this world. It doesn't mean it's not in the world. The kingdom is in the world, but it's not of the world. And I think we need godly people to come in. I want Christians to run for office. I'm not looking for a complete abdicating of responsibility inside of politics, but I think what's happening in culture today

On the left and the right, I mean, I don't know how we can say this isn't happening, is it is becoming an identity. It's called identity politics. And that's not just a phenomenon of the left. It is a phenomenon of the right, too. And I think I speak for a lot of people. Now, there will be some people that will throw accusations at me for saying this, but I just got to believe there's a lot of people who are like, you know what? I'm with you, Zach. Yeah.

I don't want to be identified in that way. I want to be identified as a citizen of the kingdom. And so what happens when you identify in that way, just like what happened here with Jesus is,

I mean, he's that's essentially what he's saying. If my kingdom was of this world, we'd be up in arms fighting right now. But that's not what we're doing. What are we doing? Well, I'm heading to the cross. I'm headed to be crucified. I'm heading to lay my life down. And so I'm much more interested in that, because if we could do that and embody that as a church,

While at the same time, I'm not saying abdicate our political responsibility. But what I am saying is, is like the spirit in which we do it, I believe, has to embody the spirit of Jesus, which seems to be very sacrificial in its nature. Well, and this, Zach, is not a the concept. What you're describing is, I think, is not a new thing. The idea of dual citizenship has been around since the first century.

I mean, when you read the text, you see about Israel, people who were in physical Israel. And yet now Jesus is here and says, I've got a kingdom and your citizenship is in heaven with me in the heavenly realms. Well, that created tension.

I mean, we've been talking about that quite a bit in all of our Bible studies. Same thing with Paul, who was a Roman citizen and, you know, was was very vocal about his rights as a Roman citizen. And yet he was also a member of the kingdom of God. And so he's planting churches on his way back to Rome to face Caesar.

So I think what you're describing is the constant tension. And I agree with everything you said about what we put first. It has to be kingdom first. But I disagree on the convention. Let me give you my take on it. So I thought just as a Republican and a person who was a Reagan guy and was inspired by him, and I've kind of seen what I call the drift of the party that went into the

just this whole establishment thing about money and wars. And, you know, so I've bought into some of the reason why there is a Trump, but when I watched the convention, uh,

I looked at it more from an emotional side, I suppose, which is not always good just to be emotional. But I loved the difference. I love having the black pastor that Jason mentioned and Franklin Graham and Hulk Hogan in the same night. I mean, I laughed. Yeah.

You know, I was like it was entertaining. And I think that's what Trump is. And so I get it that people is just all serious, all policy all the time. It's not that for sure. Trump is an entertainer and tends to go that direction. But but me, I looked at it more like the tent was expanded.

just on the political side. It's not where I'm going to put my faith. Trump, as much as I appreciate what he's done and everything and him surviving, he's not my Messiah. There's only one. There is Jesus. There is a mystery, and that's for sure. But the Apostle Paul in his letter to the Ephesians, Ephesians 3, verse 6 says,

The mystery, he's on about the third mystery, but this and here's another one. The mystery is that through the gospel, that's the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus, the Gentiles are heirs together with Israel.

That's why we look after Israel the best we can. And they're in a dilemma over there right now. Members together of one body and sharers together in the promise that's in Christ Jesus. And he became a servant and so are we. And we're trying to get that out because it does not harm. It helps us.

What Jesus did the story of Jesus? Yeah, it's you're being helped with it Especially when your children coming up first graders third graders Just tell them that Jesus loves them and we love them and move on from there. I don't see the downside. I

So, you know, all of us at some point have had our cell phones, and we go, we need to make a call, and we look, and no cell phone coverage. Has that ever happened to you, Jay? All the time. And the more remote— It does me, too. That was a joke. Dad's always remote because he lives in the remote. For 10 years, Patriot Mobile, one of our sponsors, has been America's only Christian conservative wireless provider.

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Because we laugh and won't allow someone to talk about God and him sending Jesus to save their sorry hide and forgive their sins. Yeah, but Phil, there's always a cycle that happens. And even no matter where we go overall in our view of God, there's something about

really heinous sins, and it's something about everyone contemplating their own mortality that brings a God consciousness, which is why that was the two big things that Jesus accomplished by becoming a human and dying on a cross and being resurrected. Because you even see that, you know, when Trump gave the first part of his speech, which I thought was the best part, because you're really seeing that

him dealing with his own mortal being. I mean, you're like, as long as it's, that's the way humans are. As long as it's happening to somebody else, we literally act like there's no consequences to decisions we made or,

or we continue to make, or our own death. It's always happening to somebody else, but all of a sudden when it happens to you, well, you start thinking, well, is there a God? And what's my plan here? And that's the reason we're on this planet and the way God designed this is because you have this same conclusion come to you one day, and then you got to look at your options. And unfortunately, there's not very many options available

outside there being a creator God and sending Jesus that's going to give you true hope and joy and peace and a purpose on the planet. Yeah, that's the key. And I think when you think of, I'm not saying I got all the answers on how all this comes together. I think that the church has struggled with the conversation on the involvement. And there's a lot of different, like really good debates on this topic of how does the church engage politically. But I will say this.

Historically, when you look at, and I think I've said it before in this podcast, but you should research these two movements, the American Revolution and the French Revolution.

And both of those movements were very similar. I mean, they were so similar in what they were proposing. They were constitutional social contract agreements, a government of the people, for the people, by the people, the pursuit of life itself.

liberty and the pursuit of happiness in the American case. And in the French case, it was the pursuit of life, liberty and fraternity, which kind of means the same thing. Our philosopher, Thomas Jefferson, they had a philosopher named Jean-Jacques Rousseau. And both of those philosophers studied under John Locke. And all this came out of kind of some of his teachings. But what was the difference? Because one of those movements, our movement, ended in war.

the greatest prosperity movement probably in the history of the world that's still going on. We're still living off of the capital of what was started way back then. What happened in the French Revolution? It was a fight against the elite, which they needed to be. The elite, King Louis and Maria Antoinette, they were corrupt, and they were kicked out of office, rightfully so. But the

The difference was is that the French Revolution, where the American Revolution was predicated on that our rights come from God. We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal and endowed by a creator with certain unalienable rights. See, there's a non-arbitrary anchor that God is there, man's made in his image. That was the basis for the American Revolution.

The basis for the French Revolution was not so. Everything was the same except that the argument was anchored in man himself. It was humanism first. It was populism. I mean, the French Revolution, if you want to go back and look at history and say, what happens with an unbiased

brutal bridled populist uprising. Then go look at what happened at the Palace of Versailles when they came in and they stormed the palace. And they were, I mean, it is a brutal scene. And then what happened as a result of that in France, go watch Les Mis. I mean, it was just paranoia. Maximilien Robespierre brought out the guillotine. They're chopping people's heads off. Anybody that was an enemy of the revolution, they would chop their head off, ended in the

utter chaos. They burned down the Cathedral of Notre Dame and turned it into the Temple of the Goddess of Reason. I can't remember the whole story there, but they burned a bunch of priests at the stake. They changed the workday from seven days to 10 days to eradicate any remnant of Christianity. Why? Because man was God now. And if you look at what happened as a result of that, it paved the way for a brutal dictator named Napoleon Bonaparte. So my point here

is that we're latching on to this populist uprising in America. That may not work out like you think it will, because history shows us that it doesn't. History shows us that when we grab on to populism, instead of the Imago Dei that man's made the image of God, then that does not work out well

So that's my only that's what I'm saying. And I'm not trying to be a purist, but I mean, you watch it and you think, man, where is that? I mean, you're right. You would always have to be careful of where you go. But it wouldn't be fair to say, based on what I watched this week, that that this populist conservative movement that's now the current movement is without God. Right.

I mean, God was mentioned all over that convention. Every other speaker was someone like we mentioned today. So it's not like it's going without that. So I do agree the guardrails need to be up. But it's not anchored. I don't hear the argument. I don't hear what this current movement is. I don't believe it is anchored in religion.

the same thing that the American Revolution was anchored in. I don't think so. Probably not, but it wasn't just about the kingdom values, Zach, because a lot of that was over taxation and money and the same principles that are still around today. I'd like to give my take on that. Give it, Jase. Well, I think, though, what Zach just described is something you should consider. I mean, you think about, so Jesus dies, bears resurrected, the church starts. And it's basically starting...

with just groups of people who are not political or powerful in the world's eyes. They're just sharing Jesus, helping people, and they're meeting in homes. So what happens? They get under attack. In Revelation, there's a lot in there about that attack. At the hands of Rome, the temple is destroyed in Jerusalem. You have that aspect of it. And what happens is...

The world has one religion, but its political and religious ties are under one head. There's only one. And that goes on for years and years and years through the centuries. And the problem was that those people in power were corrupt. And it didn't become about sharing Jesus and helping people. It became a...

a force and their leaders became corrupt. So when you think, you know, America's birthplace, because of that human flawed run religious organization, they wanted independence. I mean, they wanted to be able to be free to worship God, you know, in quotations in their own way. But it was just in contrast to,

to people setting up some kind of religious organization and then it functioning outside the character of God. I mean, there were wars being done. They're killing people who take them on. It just became an earthly kingdom under God in name only.

And so that's really what happened. So 16th, 17th, 18th century, what happened? You have what they call, what do they call it? The Reformation movement or, you know, so all these individual churches crop up under the name of religious freedom. America's born. And in my opinion, well, they went too far. The other way as a whole, it became so individualized that now,

You have tens of thousands of different religious groups supposedly following the same Jesus, and they don't like each other. They're not very unified. Yeah, they're not unified. This is just a question. Do y'all think one of the successes of our podcast has been because we are doing this as a family thing?

structure, a family unit, because we've got two brothers, a cousin, and our patriarch. Is that one of the things you think people like about? You don't see that very often. You don't? I mean, I was thinking about that. I just realized we're all family. Yeah. That's right. It's an epiphany for Jason. That was a joke. So, of course, the Robertson family were biblically grounded.

We have a foundation, which is why we do the Unashamed podcast. And we're excited to tell you about another family, Focus on the Family podcast with Jim Daly. Every episode of Focus on the Family is designed to help you guide your loved ones through the unique challenges faced by today's Christian families. Because in essence, we're all one big family, right, in Christ.

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which goes back to the one who wrote the book and how he revealed himself in Jesus. And that's what I want to do because these are difficult questions, and you're trying to explain this to people. I'm going to vote just to say this for people who line up more with godly principles. I mean, that's just going to happen eventually.

Every time, because my true citizenship is with God and we are a holy nation. But I wanted to read what his prayer was after he spends three chapters talking about giving us his Holy Spirit, human beings, and us representing the presence of God on earth. So he prayed for himself first in John 17, and he says, verse three, now this is eternal life that they may know you.

the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you've sent. At the end of the day, nothing on this physical earth is going to produce that kind of life. Nothing.

It's not available. It's only available in Jesus for human beings, eternal life. It's not out there. So just you got to keep that in perspective. So then he prays for his disciples, which is our role in this world. And I wanted to read the back half of this paragraph in verse 13. He said, I am coming to you now, but I say these things while I'm still with you.

in the world so that they may have the full measure of my joy within them. I have given them your word. He's praying to God, his father, and the world has hated them.

For they are not of the world any more than I am of the world. And I think he's setting this foundation for what we're saying on us being new creations by the power of God through Jesus Christ, filled with his Holy Spirit in a world where the creator of the world has made us a new creation and a new world in the world. My prayer is not that you take them out of the world.

So we're not supposed to dig a hole and say, well, you know, forget it. There's a job for us to do, and he explains that in his prayer, but that you protect them from the evil one. They are not of the world, even as I am not of it. Set them apart, sanctify them by the truth. Your word is truth. So we're supposed to be set apart and offer this glorious life

within this life in Jesus. That's what we're supposed to do. That's why I was bragging on the pastor from Detroit, Michigan. That's what he did. If you listen to his eight-minute speech,

He was underlined by association, given his support to Trump because of his track record for what he's done for Christian people, but also that he came and asked for prayer. But make no mistake about it. His speech was about the Lord Jesus and what he can do to human lives by changing. That was overwhelmingly the point of it. And so then he says in verse 18, as you sent me into the world.

I have sent them into the world. That's your purpose. We point people to Jesus. That's why I'm bragging on this guy. And so then when he prays for all the believers, based on what Zach said, what was his prayer? His prayer was in verse 20, my prayer is not for them alone. I also pray for those who will believe in me through their message. Well, who's that? That's eventually going to be us. And what was the prayer? That all of them may be one.

Father, just as you are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. And so that's why I made the point that I get it what happened in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries.

You can't be a part of some corrupt religious group who are doing things contrary to God and are not highlighting Jesus Christ in his life. You can read the four gospels and see that everything Jesus did was good. There was zero corruption. He was reaching down to the poor, all these political issues that we have. He was taking on people in places of power.

and taking them on with truth, compassion, love, and they kept persecuting him. He was dealing with people who had mental challenges, people that were controlled by the evil one. I mean, you just, the more you read, you're like, this is how we're supposed to function in this world. So then we have this revolt against that. But then we became so individualized that we lost our power.

Because it's kind of like a river, all these references. We talk about the Spirit as living water and us as a holy nation, us as a temple, us as a priesthood, us as this picture of being a powerful river with all this life teeming in it. And you say, why is he giving these illustrations? Well, when you think about how a river is created and water being poured out from heaven and going down a hill and all these obstacles that are going in its way,

While that's going on, little streams are getting detached from the river and they become powerless. You know, they become stagnant. And so I think that's what you got to realize as part of us individually coming to Christ. If you try to do this alone, you're not going to make it. That's a good point. The power is that we are the body of Christ. We are the kingdom of God. So he's wanting us to unite in Jesus Christ.

And you say that today and people are like, well, I can't believe you said that. I mean, because Zach said one time, I said, what do you base your unity on? And I was like, if someone will put all their focus and center on Jesus Christ, I'm going to love them and I'm going to support them and I'm going to be unified with them. I'm not worried about the rest of the stuff in the short term because of this prayer.

Because of this prayer. So when you detach yourself on all these things other than Jesus, you turn into temple worshipers, just like they did under the old system. You have thousands of groups that have detached themselves so much that they become powerless. ♪

I think that's what I'm like. Maybe that's what I'm yearning for is the kind of power that I read about here. Like I want to like that seems to be like real power. It's not the power that how you think it would come, but it is a power. And I love that you mentioned that the how the radical individualism has exploded here.

And it really has in Western culture. I mean, there's been a lot of people that have written about this phenomenon of radical individualism, or I've heard it called expressive individualism. But it's the idea that me, me, me, me, me, and even in the church, the way we even talk about salvation, it's all personal. It's like personal.

me and God, and it doesn't involve anybody else. But there is another, and it is me and God, but there's also a collective part of this as well, that through the church, the Ephesians, we've said this over and over again, the manifold wisdom is made known. I think that's that river, the power of that river that you're talking about there. It's that collective unity of a bunch of individual redeemed people together proclaiming his kingdom. And I think that when I'm reading this right here,

about us being witnesses and us going out and showing, being the kingdom, being in the world, being sent out, the apostles here being sent into the world. I mean, they're going into a hostile territory where they were going and meeting with enemies of the cross.

And then those today's enemies became tomorrow's brothers and sisters. And I don't ever want to. That's the thing. I don't think I want to lose that. I don't want to be so captivated by outrage and anger that I can't look around at my adversaries and I don't want to look at them.

as me versus them. I want to have a vision so ingrained in my heart that I look with compassion and hope to think that could be tomorrow's brother or sister. Yeah. And so what you both just described, which I'm 100% in agreement with, and to continue the metaphor, this river of life that you're missing, that's us, that's the kingdom of God. It'll never be a political movement.

in the world. It's not, it's not designed for that. I mean, we talk about what's going to happen in the next life where, you know, all things are made right and glorification, you know, so it's never going to happen on this earth because the evil one is still here and he's working overtime and mostly through, through kingdoms, through earthly kingdoms. But I will say this just as to sort of begin to tie a bow on this idea of talking about the convention, um,

I think what you saw in those people that we respect and obviously are kingdom members and not everybody was for sure. There were some people, you know, you got a little bit of everything this last week, but they were streams. They were going into that political venue and talking about what we're talking about. I mean, that's why Franklin Graham was there. He's trying to make a difference. And, and so when I see those, that that's what we're doing. And to your point, Zach, that's exactly what we'll do. We want to be,

Christ ambassadors in every facet. But I can, I can promise you this. This is a prediction in a couple of weeks, there'll be another convention and you won't see many streams of the godly. Oh, we'll go through there. Well, exactly. It's not going to happen. I still go back to wind it up as a prisoner for the Lord. He's in jail. You'd think he'd be singing the blues. The apostle Paul who wrote this, uh,

As a prisoner of the Lord, they got him locked up behind bars. I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you've received. Be completely humble, gentle, be patient.

Bearing with one another in love, make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. You need an army of people who are doing this. The unity of the Spirit. There's one body. There's one Spirit. Just as you were called to one hope when you were called, there's one Lord. There's one faith, one baptism, and one God and Father. And they won't let us teach our children that.

It's just sickening. Now, Phil, I have a surprise for you today because, look, a little birdie told me that you were going to read Ephesians 4 today. Seriously. Not the fact that you have read it, I would say, a dozen times in the last 12 podcasts, but I did something for you as a gift to you because I thought, why does Phil keep reading the same passage?

So I went and looked this up in the Greek and I found something I'm going to give as a gift because it really excited me. What I found fascinating is in Ephesians 4, what you just read in verse 3, make every effort to keep the unity of the spirit through the bond of peace. Because I was going to make the point when you brought this up.

that I would say the overall arching idea of the Republican convention was unity.

They were trying to unify the party, in quotations, and their messaging was they wanted to unify America. We want this unity. But what we have in Christ is a much greater unity because we're unified in our purpose of declaring Jesus and living forever.

And it's for all people. So that's what we talk about. But look, we have the same problem the Republican Party has, which is why I said what happened in the 16th, 17th, and 18th century went too far about being individualistic. And so we are thus...

Not unified today, and that's the biggest problem. Do you mean in the church? Yeah, we're not unified in Jesus. It is everybody as a whole. I mean, I'm giving you an exaggerated picture of this, but I'm saying there's so many groups. Just drive down the street. There's literally a church building on every corner. And you're like, you know, we could save a lot of land.

for homeless people and we would save a lot of time and we would be much more powerful if just a third of us would say, you know what, let's do this together in the name of Jesus. We're gonna declare Jesus and let him work it out. That's where the true power is.

So we all know that that's true, but we don't like to talk about it because we're frustrated even amongst our own groups with the same thing that brought this individualistic nature, which is all of us have flawed human beings in control at our churches.

And they do things that are wrong. And so what do we do? We leave. We go down the street. And we're like, well, they're wrong. And then what do we find? Another group of flawed individuals running the church, making poor decisions one after another. So that is the nature of being flawed people trying to be unified in the spirit. What I found that I wanted to share with you that's fascinating is that when I read this and I looked in the Greek text,

The first two words of verse four is not in the Greek. They put this here because they tried to make a sentence. So, you know, from Greek to English language, they thought, well, this doesn't seem right. So if you take out those two words, you know what you'll find? You take out, you know, by putting the two words in, I think they excluded the passion of which what he was writing.

Just think about how this statement is different if you take out those words. It almost seems like you would see something at a political rally where after every speaker says something profound, did you notice the crowd would start chanting little phrases and all? Well, look, this has the same spirit about it because watch.

Make every effort to keep the unity of the spirit. Yep. Through the bond of peace. One body, one spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called. One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and father of all who is over all and through all and in all. He literally gave a chant.

likened to a political rally. He didn't make a sentence out of it. He literally started chanting. Look it up in the Greek. There he is. It's not in the text. It just goes into a one, one, one. Well, the things that he's saying is... J.D.'s mom. J.D.'s mom. J.D.'s mom. But he's saying one Lord, one faith. There's one Jesus that destroyed this wall of hostility forever.

among people. It's the same reason that he started in Ephesians 1 about in Christ, in Christ, in Christ, in Christ. Well, after a while, us as human beings should be saying, I'm not going to argue about all the things he's saying in Ephesians 1, but we need to figure out who this one Christ is. Right?

I mean, how many times does he have to say it? 13 times. That's where I'm sitting right there. So I'm like, look at the Lord Jesus himself. Read the four gospels and make your political platform revolving around Jesus Christ. That's why we get frustrated with the world. I'm like, look, I'm voting for Jesus. And then let's talk about everything else. You're getting there, buddy. I've been trying to get that platform out.

For years. And when I noticed that there is, is not in Ephesians 4, I found my political chant. There's one Lord and faith and it's in Jesus Christ. And through him, God can be in and through all on the universe. Not just the America, the earth. I'm talking about the universe.

So when we get to Ephesians 4, and we will at some point, we're going to hammer that out some more. So let me just wrap this up by saying, you know, we are engaged. We all look at things a little different on a political scale, but we're completely unified in unashamed nation that Jesus is number one and we serve the kingdom. So that's our take on the RNC. So it's like fish, spit out the bones and enjoy the rest.

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