Culture & Christianity: The Allen Jackson Podcast - Borders, Boundaries & the Bible

Episode Date: March 9, 2024

While the United States has provided $75 billion to Ukraine to protect their border from Russia, our officials continue to insist our Southern Border is secure. “Why do Ukraine's borders matter so much more than ours?” Pastor Allen Jackson asks. “While our border is open, Americans suffer. Every new wave of immigrants has an impact on you and me.” In this podcast, Pastor Allen discusses borders, boundaries, and the Bible, offering a biblical perspective on the Southern Border crisis, the contested borders in Ukraine and Israel, and the moral boundaries being actively deconstructed by our culture. Borders and boundaries exist for a reason, they matter to God, and we have a responsibility to defend and uphold ours.

Hey, this is Alan Jackson. Today we're going to be talking about borders, boundaries, and the Bible. Why all that stuff matters to those of us who imagine ourselves to be Christian. But first, let me just remind you, you can listen to Culture and Christianity, the Alan Jackson podcast on Apple, Spotify, wherever you consume podcast. Make sure to follow, subscribe, and like this podcast, wherever you're listening. We drop a new episode every Saturday. All right, let's get into this a little bit.

You know, all the podcast up to this point, I have done interviews with either friends of the ministry or people that I had an interest in some things happening in current events. This session is a little different. I want to talk to you about some takes and perspectives on what we see happening in the world around us. It gives me an opportunity to step outside the sanctuary a little bit. We live in a time when there's a lot of turbulence and turmoil and confusion. And when I'm with my friends and we're just talking, you know, it's hard to know who to trust, what to trust, how to sort out what's happening. that's really the point of this podcast to try to give you a perspective

from a biblical worldview, maybe from a pastor's perspective, if that's helpful. But to sort through all the clutter, the messaging that cascades over us every day feels to me so often like somebody's getting their talking points from central command.

And oftentimes my opinion or my feeling about what I'm hearing and seeing doesn't line up with what I'm being told. And so I hope we can add a little bit of clarity to that from a biblical perspective. And so we're going to be kick it off with kind of what's leading in the news right now, especially this week, all the confusion around the borders and the boundaries in our lives that seem to be under assault.

And if there's any biblical perspective on that or not, you know, there's one group of Christians that say we shouldn't say anything about current events or politics. And then there's another group of people that say we have to. And I'm probably much closer to that latter category. I don't think talking about what's happening in our world makes me political. In fact, it makes no sense to me to study our Bibles or to embrace a fact. faith and then have no imagination of how that faith impacts our culture. And I typically find the people who are saying I'm being political simply don't like the perspectives I'm putting forward. And if they use the word political, they think I'll hush. They calculated incorrectly.

I would say we not only have a responsibility to engage what's happening with our world. I think it's a part of our biblical mandate. I don't know how you can be salt and light if we don't have the courage to talk about what we're reading about in the newspaper and what we're seeing happen in our own communities. We desperately need. a biblical perspective on what's going on in our world. So that's the point. And today we're going to pick up this whole notion of borders and boundaries. I'll read you a scripture because typically most of my perspectives are going to emerge from that.

Deuteronomy 2717, it's a chapter that's filled with pronouncements of blessings and curses. The children of Israel pronounce a blessing and a curse and they understand that their choices will bring one or the other. And one of the curses that's pronounced says, cursed is the man who moves his neighbor's boundary stone. And all the people said, amen. It's not some obscure verse. It's a theme really throughout the Hebrew Bible especially that to move a boundary stone is abhorrent before God.

He says he hates it. And I understand there's a difference in a boundary stone and the boundary of a nation. But the principle is consistent. You know, the idea that the borders of your personal property or the borders of a nation are not something that should be easily set aside, and they certainly shouldn't be moved without agreement

and intentionality. God said he hates that. In fact, he said it'll bring a curse upon us. I'm enough of a biblical literate that it captures my attention when I read something like that. So I think what we're watching happening in our nation right now, with our borders having been completely deconstructed and being totally porous to whomever from wherever, has a very significant impact upon people of faith.

And if we don't pay attention, we don't understand it, and we don't take a place spiritually, that I think we forfeit our assignment as salt and light. So we're going to unpack that for a few minutes. And before we get into the heart of this discussion on borders and boundaries, I want to tell you about something we're doing here at the church. At the end of April, we're having a conference. I've invited some of my friends, many of whom I have spoken with across the country in various conferences.

But they're all speaking to culture from different vantage points in different seats. And I think we're gathering everybody in one place because I really think it'll just help us to understand a bit what's happening in our world. I don't think we can afford to leave our thought pattern and our thought development of what we're being fed by mainstream media. And so there's some people who are very clever and astute observers of culture. In fact, we are very creatively calling the conference culture and Christianity. Here, you can meet some of the people who are going to participate. We are watchmen on the walls, and if we see evil and we don't use our voice, it says it's on us. our exercise of our faith in America is at risk

what are you going to do about it we are called to be advocates for Jesus of Nazareth in Nashville this April join us for the culture and Christianity conference Brandon Tatum Eric Metaxus Kirk Cameron Allie B Stucky and more go to lead with faith.church to register If your calendar will permit and your schedule allows I hope to see you in Murfreesboro

for our conference. It'll be a good time to try to understand our assignment in what's coming towards us. You know, plainest possible language, it seems to me

that we are witnessing an intentional dismantling of boundaries and borders. And it is, not only is it happening, it has been well underway. It's not a new thing at all. It has been rather subtly,

and sometimes not subtly at all, wrapped in a great deal of language that suggests compassion. You know, we've been lectured ad nauseum, by people that have somehow achieved elite status, at least in their own minds, that an open border and welcoming whomever wants to come across it is the ultimate expression of compassion. And that if we have a voice anything to the contrary of that,

we're for putting people in cages and separating parents from their children. And we've become evil incarnate. And unfortunately, too many churches have picked up that mantra. I don't think it's a biblical perspective. I don't think what we're watching is primarily about compassion at all. It has made the cartels. some of the most powerful people on this continent. It has made the trafficking of human beings, the selling of children, sex slavery, abhorrent things, the trafficking of drugs.

All of those things have skyrocketed. They've grown exponentially, and they're all wrapped up in this notion of a friendly, open border as a happy, clappy expression of compassion. Baloney. You know that word? It's a Greek word. It means I disagree. It's not a Greek word, but it means I disagree. You know, in reality, I would submit to you what is being done, and I believe it was the intent originally, quite candidly, was to create chaos and confusion.

When it first started and they would show us pictures of people who were making a difficult trek through Mexico that were coming from Central America countries, and they were fleeing great poverty or oppression or some sort of tyrannical, oftentimes authoritarian governments, it was hard not to see those pictures and respond with compassion. But, you know, we're years into this process now, and that's not the primary people flow that are, they're not just flooding into our nation, they're invading our nation. There are people that have come from more than 160 nations. They've come from nations where they're not fleeing political oppression whatsoever. It's impossible to believe that they've all come here simply because they want to pursue the American dream and enjoy our wonderful educational system. We shouldn't ignore the reality that many of them come with nefarious intent. They intend to do us harm. I'm not saying everybody does, but an open border, unregulated, unchecked, unmonitored, with no screening,

everybody coming isn't friendly. Just imagine you open the front door of your house. And you said, listen, if there's anybody in our community that has a need, if you're hungry, if you need a piece of furniture, not if you just want to take one, but if you really have a need, feel free, feel welcome in our home. How long do you think it would take before somebody entered your house that maybe had some interest other than just the driving demand of a personal need in that moment?

Wouldn't take very long. Well, it's beyond naive to think that everybody flooding across our border is simply coming to pursue the American dream. You know, today, today, the White House unveiled a new name for illegal immigrants. This one fascinated me. They call them newcomers. Newcomers. I want to go back to the old label for just a minute.

Illegal immigrants. See, the part about this that bothers me is the illegal part. We are a nation of immigrants. I am pro-immigration. We are a melting plot. Our nation has come from the nations of the world, typically people who fled difficult places and circumstances, crumbling economies, great needs, pressure.

They migrated to our nation, often with great difficulty and great sacrifice in hopes of building a better future. Our nation is a very unique. experiment in human civilization. There's never been anything quite like it. I know that's not fashionable today. It's far more fashionable to denigrate our nation and to mock it and to make fun of it and to say that our founding fathers were greedy, hypocritical. A casual read of history will debunk that. Somebody's manipulating you if you hear that story. People that denigrate, criticize malign, the nature in which our nation emerged without telling the truth. Without telling the

truth about what truly happened, you need to be asking what their motives are. Because it's not to build goodwill and cooperation and unity. They're about something else. And it seems to me that the outcome they celebrate the most is chaos and confusion. So our current administration decides that all those people pouring across our border ignoring the legal immigration process. He doesn't offer a way to fix it. He doesn't bring a resolution.

He doesn't expand immigration policies. More than a million people a year can immigrate. to our nation legally. But millions, tens of millions of people have come across our border. And so now we want to call them newcomers. This little word game suggests to you and me equal standing with those persons who have come to our country legally. Well, that's offensive to me.

I have a lot of friends. I have helped many people immigrate to this country. It's expensive. There's a process. It takes a commitment. It takes a period of time. And to simply look at these millions of people who have come illegally, intentionally breaking our laws and to welcome them as newcomers is not only a manipulation of language, it's a manipulation

of intent. If you begin your stay in our country by behaving in an illegal fashion, why would we be surprised if you continue to behave in an illegal fashion? Your illegal entry is rewarded with status, with standing, with housing, with health care, with education, with social benefits. What's the motivation to begin to behave legally. It's insane. It is simply insane. It's preposterous. Yet I'm not sure why I'm surprised. We've spent years now messaging that criminal behavior isn't really criminal, that it has to be understood in terms of personal circumstance or personal need. You understand that it's very manipulative language, right? There's some very high-profile legal cases right now in our nation.

Some with former presidents of the United States, nobody is suggesting we have to understand their circumstances. We're just prosecuting them. Oftentimes, when there's no victims and there's nobody filing a formal complaint, it's just attorneys filing complaints to gain

political advantage. And yet we have millions of people coming in illegally. And we're told that the most important criteria with which we should look at that filter is to be understanding. It's mind-numbing. Again, today, Trump and President Biden are both visiting the border. Clearly, it's election season.

Biden's ignored the border since, at least with a personal visit. He hadn't ignored the border. He's deconstructed all the boundaries since he was first put in the White House. But it's election seasons. They're both there today. The number's a little confusing. Somewhere between 10 million, 16 million maybe as high. Illegal immigrants have been into our nation under this current administration.

Not fair to blame the current administration. uniquely, this has been a long-term problem. But this administration continues to set new highs in putting out the welcome mat and deconstructing any boundaries or attempts to stem the tide of the invasion from the nations of the world. Meanwhile, Americans suffer. I'm going to say it again, while this is happening, while our border is open, Americans suffer. With every new wave of immigrants, it has an economic impact upon you and me. It's simply It's unavoidable.

It's not mean spirit. It doesn't even mean the people who are coming are wrong. It's simply we're changing the demographic. We're bringing in a group of people. Homelessness is skyrocketing. It's a problem in every major American city. And it's a problem in many cities that aren't major American cities.

Why are we surprised? You bring 16 million people into the country who have minimal resources. They don't have any housing. They don't have any accommodations. It puts pressure on all the available housing markets. It puts pressure on the people who are already on the margins of society, struggling for housing in their own right, and you bring in 10 to 16 million more people,

you don't need to have a degree in human behavior to understand that's going to create a housing crisis, and we see it. So homelessness, all sorts of poverty are on the rise because we're driving these people. Our health care system is overwhelmed. In our little community, the waiting in our emergency rooms often is multiple hours, because it doesn't take long to learn that if you go to the ER, you won't be turned away, you won't be refused. So it doesn't mean everybody in the ER has some life-threatening disease. It just means they want an opportunity for free health care or they need an opportunity for free health care. And after all, we're a compassionate people.

I think that's a good thing. But we can't provide health care for the world. We don't have the health care workers to do that. We don't have the budget to do that. We're $34 trillion in debt. Folks, technically, that's bankrupt. One of the largest obligations on our balance sheet as a nation is the interest on our debt. If that's true in my home or your home, we're teetering on total financial ruin.

And we're there as a nation. It's more than inconvenient and awkward. It's our reality. And our open border is contributing mightily to that process. Our schools are overwhelmed. We don't have the capacity to welcome millions of new people in short order, without any preparation. Oftentimes when there's some significant language deficits,

we can learn new languages. Again, we're a nation of immigrants, but there needs to be a plan for it, a process for it. It's beyond troubling. In the last few days, there was a 22-year-old nursing student in Georgia, Lake and Riley. She was murdered by an illegal immigrant. Someone who had been arrested,

had broken our laws, been arrested, and was released, put back on the street, no punishment, no deportation. why would we imagine that they would curb their behavior? The fact that their poor behavior would escalate into violence in a point that it cost human life isn't particularly startling. It's a pattern and we're encouraging it. I listened to a father to an interview. His son had been killed in a motorcycle accident

because of the illegal behavior of an illegal immigrant. And that was in 2010. Again, this isn't like some brand new problem that has crept up on us in the last 90 days. We've been ignoring this for years. There's enough, both sides of the aisle on this of Mesda. This is not a political discussion. This is about a nation without the will to enforce our borders. We keep moving boundary stones.

We keep ignoring principles that make our homes safe, and we're not bringing those principles to bear in our nation. It started rather innocuously. It's kind of subtle. You know, it wasn't too long ago when sanctuary citizens, cities were the rage. They were chic. You wanted your city to be a sanctuary city. You wanted to be a supporter of sanctuary cities. Those cities advertised for and welcomed illegal immigrants. They refused to enforce federal immigration laws. They said they were heavy-handed. They were unfair. They didn't acknowledge the suffering of the people of the world. But they didn't even hold the illegal

residents in their cities to the same standards, the same legal standards of local citizens. And then those sanctuary cities demanded federal funds. Now, that's irrational. We're not going to enforce federal law, but we still want the federal government with the taxpayers of the citizens to pay our bills. And we complied. And we did it for so long. There was a real political advantage in sanctuary cities. It garnered wonderful press.

There was public goodwill. There was applause if you were a sanctuary city or a leader in a sanctuary city. your political career gained momentum. You were celebrated in the media so often. So now the idea has been expanded to an open border and the advertising of a sanctuary nation. And we see the consequences. Our borders aren't enforced.

Federal laws are ignored. Funding is demanded. Security is ignored. I think the awkward part of this, and we're told not to look at it. If you talk about it in public, you'll be shamed. If you do it in some polite society at a party or dinner party, people often scow at you.

They don't want to really have the conversation. I think it has to be had. It wasn't 2020 and 2021. U.S. citizens were mandated. It was 21 by the time we got the vaccine. U.S. citizens were mandated to receive a vaccine, or we were told many of them would forfeit their jobs, maybe even their businesses.

Some of our finest military personnel were discharged because they refused a COVID vaccine. They risked their lives in defending our nation. and they were discharged from their service, from their duty, because they refused an experimental vaccine. We're told repeatedly by our most powerful officials, from the White House to the cabinet members, that our border is secure.

How many times have we heard that? How many people have we seen look in a camera and go, our border is absolutely secure? I guarantee it. It's just crazy. There's nothing to see here. Don't look. And if we raise an objection, we're denounced and labeled as xenophobic.

Are we lacking in compassion or some other term that's intended to bully and secure it? On this point, I don't think the churches have helped. We just act like we can't see or it's all a discussion of compassion. Folks, the majority of the world is never going to sleep on a sheet. We do not have adequate resources to eliminate global poverty. And to act like we do without transformation of the human heart by the gospel, is hubris and arrogant. There's a God, and it's not us.

We have an assignment to be compassionate, to show mercy to those around us, but to imagine that we as a people could eliminate global poverty is just preposterous. It is such an overstatement, such an expression of hubris. Our refusal to enforce our border

makes our homes and our families less safe than they have ever been. We want to change our environment. immigration policy, let's change it. But let's not act like there's not a problem. We have forfeited our security for the foreseeable future. We have truly sown the wind and we will reap the whirlwind. It's an unmistakable part of our future and it happened on our watch. It matters. You know, globally, we have an obsession with boundaries. We are participating right now in a war in Ukraine, between Ukraine and Ukraine.

Russia, and it's about borders. The Russians crossed a Ukrainian border, and we have provided $75 billion, and we have stood by while more than 500,000 casualties have been stacked up, and all of that's a border crisis. If borders don't really matter, why would we invest that much money in that much precious human life in defending a border? Why is it Ukraine's borders matter so much more than ours. If we didn't provoke that conflict, we were certainly a catalyst in that conflict by pushing the whole NATO issue in the discussion with Ukraine and Russia when we knew that it was a line that had been drawn in the sand. If that border matters so much, why doesn't our border matter so much? Since October the 7th, Israel's border has been a daily

item in the news. Hamas, a terrorist organization, crossed Israel's border. and brutally murdered more than a thousand Israelis in the most humiliating. I've seen the videos. I went to the Israeli embassy in Washington, D.C. To see some of the raw footage from that day, it would be an insult to animals to say that Hamas behaved like animals. It was horrific. But it was a border invasion.

And the Israelis understand that if they don't defend their border, they will lose their national sovereignty. We're no different. So Israel has been in a very determined way doing their best to remove Hamas and their influence over the Gaza Strip. It'll bring a better life for the people of Gaza. They live under the tyrannical, murderous, violent, heinous behavior of Hamas. They need a liberator, and the global community was indifferent.

It's sad. It is truly tragic to hear the global community talk about the people suffering in Gaza, while the global community funded and celebrated the growth and the gaining strength of Hamas. They have demonstrated their murderous personalities and their complete lack of character. Do you think the people of Gaza were flourishing under Hamas' leadership with billions of dollars being spent on tunnels

that they could use for terrorist attack when they weren't providing schools and health care and education for their own people? Again, how long will we not watch? How long will be will we will will will be willfully ignorant about what's happening in our nation or the nations of the world. Borders matter. They matter biblically.

They matter to the security of our children and our grandchildren. They matter to the security of Israel. They matter to the security of Ukraine. We have been willfully naive for too long. We're going to have to decide to make a different response. Or we're going to lose our freedom and liberties. I don't know all that the future holds. I wouldn't pretend to be a prophet.

But I can tell you the willful opening of our borders. eliminates our sense of security for what's ahead of us. I told you this was about borders and boundaries. I think they really go together. The chaos and confusion that the lack of a border makes possible is being brought much closer to home, the boundaries in our own lives. It's not just our borders being ignored.

There is a very aggressive move underway to remove our individual boundaries, to separate us from traditions, from values which have been foundational to our civil liberty and strength. If they can set those aside and they can set aside the institutions that have been the primary underpinnings of those values, then the culture is adrift. And they can be defined, the rules can be defined by whoever happens to have access to a microphone.

At the moment, we're watching public authority just almost totally be swept aside. For years now, we have tolerated the demands to defund the police, We've all heard it. We've heard it from powerful figures, elected officials, celebrities, influential persons. The first responders have been singled out and targeted. We've witnessed the vilification of those persons who run towards trouble on our behalf. They have been singled out. Their failures have been highlighted. Well, the outcome of that, and now it's been several years of that, is we find ourselves with increased crime, with unsafe cities, with brazen, theft, The looting of stores. We've all seen those videos. When some mob breaks through the glass wall of a store in a matter of moments, lutes it of the entire whatever happened to be in that store.

And it's not some remote city on some distant coast. It's happening in places very near to where all of us live. Violent crimes and criminals are repeatedly released. It's just, it's almost unbelievable. Police officers, you know, they can only restrain crimes. with the consent and the support of the governed. We all know the line. We've heard it in Hollywood and movies in various places of that thin blue line.

We're not suggesting that police officers are all thin. What it is is a declaration that it's a relatively small number of people who we call upon to enforce our laws and maintain order. And our sense of civility and safety rests upon the consent of the governed, giving the authority to those people that have been delegated with the responsibility of running towards trouble. Well, we've been watching that be intentionally,

purposefully dismantled. Asperians cast upon the character of those who have raised their hands and said they will protect and serve. And they survey, coast to coast and border to border, all those people serving in those roles, and they look for people who misbehave. And when they find one, and you can find one, then they turn all the lights on,

and they repeat the story on a 24-7 news cycle until there's enough agitation and enough anger and enough resentment that it begins to cause further disruption and destabilization. No profession. No profession could withstand that scrutiny. People who misbehave, people who don't do their jobs should be held accountable for that. But we don't want to close our hospitals and cancel medical practices

because one doctor creates malpractice. We don't want to close our church. because one pastor or priest or ministry leader misbehaves any more than we want to close our schools because one professor or one teacher doesn't do a good job of teaching a class or they mistreat a student. We recognize there is poor behavior and the individuals who behave poorly should suffer the consequences for that. But we don't want to cancel whole professions. And you and I have to be awake enough and alert enough to recognize that the intent of open borders and taking down these boundaries around our lives and our communities

is to promote chaos and confusion. I want to stop being a party to that. I mean, there's no end. It gains momentum. It's like going down a roller coaster and you crest that hill and you start that portion of free fall. And that's about where we are. We're poised at the top of the hill.

If we don't make some course changes, we're going to enter into a season of free fall. And I don't know that we'll regain our balance from that. We see it in so many ways. They're redefining the institutions that have brought stability to our culture. They're redefining marriage. They're redefining family. The building block of society has been marriage and family.

It's the most stabilizing part of the world in which we live. As imperfect as our marriages are, and they have been imperfect. As many problems as our families have, there hasn't anything throughout the course of human civilization that's ever suggested, anything brings greater stability to our lives than the marriage between a man and a woman caring for their biological children. In a broken world, a fallen world,

all of us know we are far from that perfect example. But the building block, that foundational idea, has never been improved upon. And we're witnessing its purposeful, intentional deconstruction, a redefinition of marriage. The nuclear family has been, set aside. Biblical perspectives on human sexuality

and sexual behavior, things like purity. They are viewed as quaint. It's like something old-fashioned, like something we would look at through a window of history and understand we have progressed far beyond that. We're far too enlightened now, far too educated, far too sophisticated. Why would we be held to some ancient boundary that could constrain our

desires and our personal expressions of pleasure in the pursuit of what we want in the moment. Well, the story of the Christian faith is learning to say no to ungodliness. And a lot of things that are being given cultural permission right now are blatantly ungodly. And the church is going to have to find the courage to say no. We have to say no around our kitchen tables and say no with our holiday tables and have to talk to our children and grandchildren and talk to ourselves and say, I will not give myself permission to be ungodly. We're being told these days. that how we choose to identify is more important than our physical reality.

It's preposterous. It's bad science. It is junk science. It's every bit as much of the junk science that we followed through the whole COVID debacle. The virus from China was real, and it was a virus from China, and it seems to unmistakably have started from a laboratory, and they hid that from us for months. Then we were told to follow the science, and I'm really good with that.

My academic background began in the sciences. I'm happy to follow the science, but spoiler alert, the science doesn't change its state boundaries. The science isn't different in Tennessee and California. Science is science. And we didn't find very loud voices in the scientific community standing up to reinforce that principle. And when those did, often they were punished and they suffered or they were canceled or they were censored. We were fed instead propaganda. and now they're feeding us propaganda on telling us that we can choose our own gender.

Folks, my father was a veterinarian. I grew up in a barn. I've seen lots of things be born, calves and foals and kittens and puppies. And the first question almost is always the same when there's a new arrival. What is it? And you know, in all those instances, I've never one time seen somebody look up and say, well, it's hard to tell. Or I'm confused.

It's usually a pretty simple answer. Now there's a lot of things in life that can make life confusing. And I often meet people who struggle with great confusion. I have compassion on them, whatever the point of confusion. But I don't want to institutionalize confusion. I don't want to celebrate it. I don't want to suggest that it's something we should strive for. I certainly don't want to suggest it's more chic than the lack of confusion.

Again, on this point, the church needs to find a voice. we're living in a time when those who have authority and leadership and powerful voices, both in politics, in the media, in the arts, in so many places, so many of our sports figures, I mean, it's across the board,

are making choices that bring confusion and chaos. And we desperately need the church to be a voice of truth and reason to hold forth a biblical perspective, a biblical worldview, that will bring stability to our children and our grandchildren. It's our own homes.

It's not always popular. It's oftentimes not easy. There are people that will try to tell you to be quiet or to push you aside. I would encourage you to be more determined to speak the truth. Everybody didn't cheer when Jesus talked. And everybody certainly didn't cheer

when Jesus' disciples went forth with the message of a risen king. And Jesus said to us, you'll be hated by all nations because of me. So I'm not really surprised that a biblical worldview doesn't always earn friends for us in a broad way. But if we please the Lord, I trust him to secure our future.

We can live in a chaotic world filled with chaos, and we can still live with the peace of God. Before we go, I'm going to give you some things you and I can do to bring that peace to our lives, our homes, our friends, and the world in which we live. We are watchmen on the walls, and if we see evil and we don't use our voice, it says it's on us. Our exercise of our faith in America is at risk.

What are you going to do about it? We are called to be advocates for Jesus of Nazareth. In Nashville this April, join us for the Culture and Christianity Conference. Brandon Tatum, Eric Metaxus, Kirk Cameron, Alley B. Stucky, and more. Go to leadwithfaith.church to register. As we wrap this up, I want to answer the question I'm asked more often than any other. And it's what we, what can we do? You know, when you start talking about current events, people often, I think, feel despair or fear or hopeless or powerless.

I don't feel that at all, and I don't want you to. And, you know, we are, if you're a Christ follower, we're children of the king. Your name is known in heaven. We don't stand in our authority. The outcomes of my life aren't about Alan's gifts and abilities or IQ or education. I'm depending on God's help and his power, and I believe you are too. And collectively, that's the story of Scripture. God doesn't need a majority.

We don't have to have a majority in the next election. I don't elections matter. They have outcomes. But truth has an authority all in itself. So what we can do is be the people of God. You know, the simplest answer to that is seek the Lord. Don't presume upon your faith. Don't tell me when you were born again or saved or converted.

Don't show me your Sunday school attendance pins. The relevant question is, how are you seeking God today? And if you haven't been, no guilt and shame, simply begin to say to the Lord, I'd like to know you better. Get your Bible down. Read it every day. Systematically, front the back. Read it like you're interested. If you say it's boring, stick with it. I told God one time, I thought he'd written an incredibly boring book. But I wanted to know who he was, so I was going to persevere in reading it. And I don't know what day it happened. It's somewhere along the way. It became the most interesting book I ever read, and I like to read books. and then take it to your kitchen table.

Talk to your family about your biblical ideas. Bring them to bear in your home, not in an overbearing way. If you're a fan for a sports team or you have a hobby or you've got a favorite chef on the Food Network, I bet your family knows all about those things. But don't live with them and not talk about your faith. Then take it to your holiday table. When you get together with your extended family and friends,

talk about what you believe. I know the rule. When you get together, you're not supposed to talk about faith or politics. It's a bad rule. You better talk about faith in politics with the people you love. It's important. If you're not going to talk about it there, where will you talk about it? Or are you going to allow the people on the other side of the discussion to dominate it because you're afraid to?

No, we're going to have the courage. And then take it to your sphere of influence. Talk about it with the people where you work. Again, I know we've been told not to do that. But the corporate setting, once we were told should be empty of any moral perspectives, now that corporate boardroom is driving the moral conversation. If you don't believe that, go Google Bud Light and watch what they're doing. Watch what Disney's doing.

Watch what Apple is doing. It's, watch what Starbucks. It's the corporate culture, driving a worldview through the heart of our culture, and God's people are afraid to talk about current events. Well, that was yesterday. Today, we're talking about culture and Christianity. There's a whole broad menu of topics that we've got perspectives on. Everything from our education to how we worship in churches,

to the food we eat, to climate science, there's a lot to talk about. I look forward to unpacking it with you in the next few weeks. New episode drops every Saturday. In the meantime, Jesus and you, that's a majority. You keep standing up for our boss. He's got our backs on this. Hey, thanks for joining me today.

Before you go, please like the podcast and leave a comment so more people can hear about this topic too. If you haven't yet, be sure to subscribe to Alan Jackson Ministries YouTube channel and follow the Culture and Christianity podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. Together, let's learn how to lead with our faith and change our culture. I'll see you next time.