Culture & Christianity: The Allen Jackson Podcast - Living Fearless [Featuring Jason Whitlock]

Episode Date: May 24, 2024

“In 2020, I made a decision to walk away from corporate media to start my own media company, where I could answer to myself and answer to God,” Jason Whitlock told Pastor Allen during this podcast. An accomplished sports journalist and the host of the podcast, “Fearless with Jason Whitlock,” he shares his perspective on what’s happening in our culture and how fear has stopped Christians from speaking truth. They also talk about Whitlock’s career as a sports journalist, the critical roles men and women hold, race and racism, and importance of sacrificing our own thoughts and ideas to follow biblical principles. Whitlock also provides details about his upcoming men’s conference in Nashville, “Fearless Army—Roll Call 2.0.”More Information:Fearless Army Roll Call 2.0 Conference:https://fearlessarmyrollcall.com/Fearless with Jason Whitlockhttps://www.theblaze.com/podcasts/fearless-with-jason-whitlock--It’s up to us to bring God’s truth back into our culture. It may feel like an impossible assignment, but there’s much we can do. Join Pastor Allen Jackson as he discusses today’s issues from a biblical perspective. Find thought-provoking insight from Pastor Allen and his guests, equipping you to lead with your faith in your home, your school, your community, and wherever God takes you.Listen on Spotify:https://open.spotify.com/show/3JsyO6ysUVGOIV70xAjtcm?si=6805fe488cf64a6dListen on Apple Podcasts:https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/culture-christianity-the-allen-jackson-podcast/id1729435597

There's so much racial idolatry in the black church. I'm seeing a church that raised me now destroy people in my view and walk them away from a biblical worldview to a racial worldview. If you wake up and something happens to you during the day and your way to evaluate it is through a racial lens rather than a biblical lens, you're going to be confused. Well, welcome to our podcast on culture and Christianity. My guest today, I feel like we're old friends.

I have read your stuff and listened to you so much. Jason Whitlock, the resident of Nashville, but now you're in the borough. So welcome to Murphersboro, Jason. Thank you. Good to be here. I'm actually friends with another pastor in this area, Anthony Walker. Yes. Highway 299 or is it 231?

231. He comes on my podcast all the time and he's been a big supporter of mine and supporter of what I'm doing in the podcast world. Well, I was excited when I heard you'd moved to Nashville a couple years ago. And so this just feels like the Lord's timing that we get to sit down and catch up a little bit. I got to be honest with you, Alan. I started doing homework and was like, people like, oh my God, yeah, you and Alan Jackson, you guys think just like.

I've heard just people like His politics align with yours and his worldview aligns with yours and then when I was telling some of my partners at the Blaze that I was coming on this podcast and going to your church and it was like, Ali Best Stucky was just there and I was like oh my God, these guys know Ali Best Stucky

and they're fans of hers, we do see I die. We had Ali B, we just finished a culture and Christianity conference and Ali was a part of that and she did not embarrass you. No, I definitely. Definitely. I hope I don't embarrass her. I hope we've got as much courage as she does. Yeah. Well, she walks out there with that kind of blonde hair and cute smile and sticks a knife between your ribs.

So with the truth. Yeah. Yeah. I don't, courage is not something I lack. So I'll hold my own with Allie there. I would say that is the truth. Your podcast is fearless. Fearless with Jason Whitlock. And, you know, we're in an era where we're being controlled by fear.

and people don't want to stand up and speak the truth out of fear. They've designed a culture, a corporate culture, where you're punished if you stick to your biblical values. And so people are going off into workplaces for eight and ten hours a day where they have to be a different person out of fear. And so a lot of the stuff that I talk about is just about conquering your fear and remembering that, you know, God will provide. He will be the ultimate provider.

There's nothing to be afraid of. Amen. I don't know when I first saw you, but you was on television, but somebody was interviewing you. And you put more Jesus in your response the most pastors I know put in their sermons. And so after that, I started asking Rabbi Google, and I kind of stalked you a little bit.

But I'm amazed at your bold faith in an arena where that's not typically normal. It's just, it's authentic is what it is. And authenticity is important to me. And so you probably saw me, there was a point where God humbled me in the world, humble me and life humbled me. You know, I'm riding high and having this incredible journalism career. I'm really popular. I got a national television show.

And, you know, I've been hired by ESPN twice. I've been hired by Fox Sports twice. But in 2013, 14, I got humbled in a major way that I was saying that I was in a weird place where I had all these values installed in me as a child from growing up in the church and my grandmother, Lovie Kennedy, mama Lovie Kennedy planted so many seeds in me that a lot, for many years, those seeds were in me, but I wouldn't let them blossom. I was out in the world. I was wealthy and I was famous and I was stupid. And God had to show me just how stupid I was. And the left really came after me because they could see things I hadn't recognized in myself. And so there were things that I would write, even as a man of the world, when I look back, I was like, well, that's only God telling me to do that.

My values are this way because of the seeds that were planted me in 25th Street Baptist Church when I was a kid and just the way that I grew up. The left recognized that and said, hey, we can't let this guy ascend to any more power because one day he's going to wake up and realize exactly who he is. He's a child of God. He was raised that way. And so I was saying Jesus, not knowing I was offending people, not knowing that this was putting a bull's eye on my back. And so when they came after me and smeared me and tried to destroy me and ran me out of a job that I had at ESPN, that's when I realized like, oh, only if I don't get right with God, I'm not going to survive this. And you probably saw me in the aftermath of that in 2014, 15, 16, 17, anywhere I go, and I thought it was appropriate to say Jesus, I was going to say it. and I didn't care.

But then as things have become more and more secular, I realized that in that corporate media world, it's just frowned upon. They don't want you. You can talk about God, but they really don't want you talking about Jesus. And they really don't want you to go too far with that conversation and pointing out like, hey, the reason why things are this way

is because we've walked away from our biblical principles and values. And so in 2020, I made a decision to walk away from corporate media, start my own media company where I could answer to myself and answer to God. And so I just like, I really do like saying Jesus and talking about Jesus because it's real for me. Me too. But you live in the sports world or have lived in the sports world. And it seems to me that there is an authentic faith in a lot of those athletes, those professional athletes, even though it's not particularly welcome. But it seems to give you a camaraderie with a lot of those people.

It does, but many of the athletes, they got golden handcuffs on as well. And most of them want to be closeted Christians. And you don't find it. I don't know if you've been following a news cycle with this Harrison Bucker, the kicker for the Kansas City Chiefs. He... Who knew Homemaker was such an explosive term? Yeah, but he's just letting it rip. And it's been amazing, you know, I guess I can say this.

But it's the, well, yeah, I can say this because she's been publicly. But the owner, the wife of the owner of the Kansas City Chiefs reached out to me today, just thanking me for supporting Harrison Bucker. And again, I lived and worked in Kansas City for 16 years. So these got Latavia Kant and Clark. Park Hunt, these guys have known me for a long time. But they're rallying around. The chief's ownership, they're supporting this guy.

And, you know, I think those of us as Christians, even if we, maybe we're not Catholics, but anybody that's quoting scripture and anybody that's standing on biblical principles, I'm going to support. And he's doing that. And I'd love to see it. And I hope it inspires some of the other athletes, not just to thank Jesus after. a victory, but go out there and be a tad bit divisive, you know, speak that truth and shake people up the way Harrison Bucker has.

Well, you don't have to be divisive. If you stand up for a biblical worldview in the current culture, they start sticking labels on you, which makes you divisive. But if you've been living under a rock or haven't been paying attention to the news, the kicker for the Kansas City Chief spoke at a Catholic graduation ceremony. and really just highlighted a biblical worldview and then expressed appreciation for his wife and mother of his children as being a good homemaker.

And social media and the press and the NFL has lost their minds, suggesting he'd be fired. I mean, it's more than a little ironic to me that Colin Kaepernick became a hero by protesting our nation, and this Kansas City Chiefs guy, is a pariah because he called his wife a homemaker. most people believe you can have it all.

And that's the biggest fallacy in the world. You can't have it all. Life is a series of choices that all have consequences. And not everything is for everybody. And that's what we've convinced people that everything's for everybody. And that's why a gay man will say, well, marriage is for me. And I'm going, well, how can that be? God created.

He told you what it is. So it's not for you. So don't do it. And I crack jokes. I'm not always this serious, but I'll say to people like, I would love to wear a size 32 jeans. They're not for me, so I don't put them on. Not everything's for me, so I don't do it. And I'm glad that I had enough sense that when I was more worldly and more immoral,

I was smart enough to know, hey, man, you can't take this kind of immorality into a marriage. You can't lie to a woman and promise her you're going to be monogamous and all these other things when you have no intention of doing that. And so I give myself enough correct for saying, I had enough common sense to say, no, that's not for me. In the current mindset I'm in, marriage isn't for me. And so I just, we've created this belief that everything is for everybody and it's just not true. Well, I've listened to you talk a little bit about sacrifice. And I think that is such a valuable message because we've lost, nobody wants to make a sacrifice.

And the truth is all the best things in life are on the other side of sacrifice. There's no question about it. And people, there's all these things, and that's what my men's conference this year is about, is about sacrifice and all the things that stand in the way of sacrifice. like cowardice, your sexual perversion, lack of gratitude. When you don't wake up every day, like, oh my God, look what Jesus did. This is unbelievable.

I get an opportunity today to be a better person. But when you wake up entitled, thinking about what the world owes you, well, man, if I, you know, if my ancestors weren't slaves, my life would be better. you know, if I was, if I'm a woman and if I had been born a man, my life would be, but this sense of entitlement, that all of this stuff. And this is what I had to realize, if I wanted to speak these truths that were planted in me, I had to get righteous because if my sexual immorality was something they could hold over my head, that's why all these, Hollywood celebrities and influencers and people on TV, they're all compromised. They're all living very unrighteously. They've all been, not all, but they've been compromised in a Jeffrey Epstein or Diddy type of way where they have dirt on them. And so they're afraid to speak the truth.

If you're a man and you have a second family, you're married and have a second family somewhere, you're not in position to speak truth because you're so afraid. Someone's going to call you out on your immorality. You sit quietly. So, you know, I call them sacrifices, but they're really not sacrifices. It's just about, hey, you need to get in obedience to God so you can stand on these truths so that you can protect a culture and a way of life that's best for your kids. And so I look at adults, and I mostly talk about men because if we do the right things,

women will follow us. But if men, if we're not willing to make sacrifices for our kids and the next generation, shame on us. And we need to burn in hell. And whatever happens to us, whatever president they send us, we deserve Joe Biden because we've been cowards and we haven't sacrificed. And so the leadership that we get, people get upset. Like, these guys are all immoral. They're all cheating and making money.

And they've sold out to China. That's a reflection of us. We're so immoral. We have immoral leaders. I think the leaders we have a reflection of our hearts. But the opposite of sacrifice is indulgence. And what I hear you describing is we've all chased indulgence. We want freedom to do what we want, when we want, the way we want,

and we won't allow anybody to put boundaries on us. Pleasure. Pleasure. We think life is about pleasure. It's an idol. It doesn't make us happy. Yes. And again, when you think about,

If your whole life is built around pleasure, that's how you get into this mindset of, of, you know, do without wilt. Whatever feels good to you. We've built a world based around feelings. A man will say, I feel like a woman. And then they want us to change all the rules of society to fit what he feels. And that's just, that's not rational. It's unsustainable. It's illogical and, you know, not to offend anybody, but it's a feminine worldview.

Women are a bit more controlled by their feelings and emotions, and that's why God gave leadership to men. And we have to say, hey, we can't build a world based on feelings. It's going to lead to this kind of chaos that we have right now. Our kids are less educated than it, perhaps. anytime, certainly in my lifetime, and probably longer. They're more immoral. They're more sexually active at an earlier age. They're trying all kinds of different sex acts.

And again, at an earlier age, because the whole culture is telling them to listen to our music. And it's so demonic. And we're all celebrating and loving it. And looking up to these people, it's crazy. And so we have to sacrifice and get in alignment and in obedience. You know, you guys, you ministers say it all the time. But everybody wants the Savior. No one wants the Lord.

And, you know, no one wants to be told what to do. Well, he's told us what to do, and it's all great advice. And it's not up to us. And we're going to give an account for it one day, which should put the fear of God in all of us. I want to take a minute and talk about your conference because that's really what got the opportunity for us today. You're hosting a conference in Nashville, June the first, called Roll Call 2.0. Tell us a little bit about it. Roll call, this is the second one. The first one was last April. And it's a annual men summit that I do built around my podcast, The Fearless Army,

and so we have a roll call of men this year. Last year was great, but this year I wanted to take it up a level. And it's me and John Rich, the country singer. We've partnered together. We're not ministers, but for me, I can speak for myself and I can speak for John. John's father was a minister. He still loved. Would you both tell the truth? Yeah, we both tell the truth. But what we want to do is we want to be an asset for ministers. Again, I'm hoping one day someone say, man, Jason was like Barnabas. That's my goal. in life. And so we're John

Rich, white guy, me, black guy, we're trying to bring believers together and put aside this racial differences deal. You and I were talking before this podcast about your journey with Christ and your family's journey with Christ

and how it started in your small home and a group of misfits coming together to talk about God. That's what I'm trying to do on a larger scale to get black and white believers to realize we're not enemies. We're actually allies. And we got to move past the superficial difference of skin color.

That's a trick of the devil. That's a trick of the secular and the leftist. And so John, with music and me with my connections to athletes and speakers, you know, John brought some of his friends, John Cooper from the Christian rock band skillet, Jeffrey Steele, who's a you know songwriter and singer

in Nashville of legendary status. Those guys are going to sing. I got a couple other friends of mine. Tamara Conrad, she's a great singer. I'm not supposed to say his name because he was on the voice, but Tay Lewis, I call him the Michael Jackson of country music.

He's going to sing. And then we brought in, you know, Voddy Bakum. He's not shy. Yeah, he's not shy. He's a heck of a speaker and he's a heck of an evangelist. E.W. Jackson, if you've never heard him, you'll be blown away. This guy's got a story, his own personal history and his walk with Christ and just his walk as a black American. It's an amazing story.

Alan, you have agreed to lend this your voice as well. We're looking forward to that. Anthony Walker, but who I mentioned earlier, but also Mark Robinson, who's going to be, I believe, the governor of North Carolina. He's the lieutenant governor right now. He's running for the governor's office in November. He's been courageous? Yeah, he's been real courageous. I honestly think in 2008, he may be a presidential candidate.

He's coming in. Vince Everett Ellison. I don't know if this guy's a prolific writer and author, and he's writing some really bold stuff. stuff about how did we get to this mindset that our rights come from government and not God? It's the craziest thing, but people believe that. And his argument it is it's the 1964 Civil Rights Act, that it's Martin Luther King, who's an idol, that Martin Luther King manipulated or in cahoots with Marxists, that that 1964 Civil Rights Act, it did some good things, but it left a legacy where it's kind of replaced the U.S. Constitution and it's made people believe

that the government holds our rights. Not that they were given to us by God. And the first time I heard him make this argument, my mouth dropped to him for us and that's exactly it. Why didn't I think of that? This is brilliant. That is the problem. There are people that believe, hey, man, God is in control and he's sovereign. And that's where my rights come from. And then there are people that believe, no, the government. And Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi, they tell me what my rights are. And if they say put a mask on and don't go to church, that's what I'm going to do. Even though God said, no, I gave you an immune system. I designed you perfectly. I told you to go to church and fellowship. But for me, it's a very personal issue because, quite frankly, Alan, there's so much racial idolatry.

in the black church, I'm seeing a church that raised me now destroy people in my view and walk them away from a biblical worldview to a racial worldview. If you wake up and something happens to you during the day and your way to evaluate it is through a racial lens rather than a biblical lens, you're going to be confused. and you're going to think when the TV, when Rachel Maddow gets on MSNBC and says, well, you know, the LGBTQ, it really affects black people. And, you know, black LGBTQ people face the most discrimination in black trans people. If you have a racial worldview, you'll hear that and go, yeah, the LGBTQ, they're my allies. And transgender, they're my allies.

you come out of the biblical world. You're like, the transgender needs some mental health. And I've told you this homosexuality is an abomination. So, but people are being so blinded by race. And they're using that as a ploy to get you to think that America is evil and that its founding principles are evil. You know, too many people are waking up thinking, have I, black people, black people that call themselves Christians.

If the actions frustrate white male evangelicals, it's a good thing. And instead of like, well, hold on, do these actions align with God and my values? We've been tricked. We think we're at war, a racial war, and we're not. We're in a battle of good versus evil. we're in a battle. The patriarchy versus the matriarchy. This stuff is straight from Genesis.

You know, same battle's been going on forever. It's not a new game plan. But it's invaded and permeated our academia because critical theory with its Marxist underpinnings puts us all in terms of oppressed. And then it adds to the race to add to the division. And we hate one another and we stop working together and we kill our productivity and our effectiveness.

I think the racial discussion is more difficult today than at any time in my lifetime. Because there was a point in time where the moral authority for the whole racial discussion came from Scripture. Yes. And we'd made mistakes, and there was wrong, and we had to find a way to ask for forgiveness and start to bring some healing. But we have moved so far away from that. Alan, think about this as well, and this is part, because I talk about this all the time. the racial issue in America, the black American journey in America is what made America so great. You had, if we go back to Richard Allen who founded the AME Church in like the 1700s,

black Americans demanding that our founding fathers and politicians, hey, you got to live up to these things you promised in the Declaration of Independence and in the Constitution. That's what compelled America to be great and to live up to those biblical ideas. And then so when it came to segregation, the argument was like, hey, this isn't consistent with this Bible.

You have to correct this. And so America did. And so I'm trying to argue and tell African Americans, black people are like, we're what made this country great. sticking to this Bible and calling America to live up to these values in the Bible is what made America great. And you don't want credit for that. You want to run around and pretend like, well, I didn't have nothing to do with that or, you know, this country's evil.

You're taking a dump on your ancestors who sacrificed amazing things so that I could be free so that I could drive to Murphy's, bro, and sit down with Alan Jackson. and have a nice conversation in his beautiful church. And I just can't throw all their sacrifice away because some Marxist opportunists have said, you know, there's victory in victimhood. And that's the other thing. A Christian that's a victim? How? On what basis? It's an impossibility.

So you have to ask just to, are you a Christian? Because you can't be a Christian and a victim. That is so good. If we choose the role of the victim, we've said the cross wasn't enough. Because that's the place that were all redeemed. Or it wasn't effective. Well, if you're not familiar with Jason Whitlock, you need to be. His podcast, Fearless, is a blessing to me.

And he is sponsoring a conference in Nashville, June the 1st, at Rockettown. Rocketown. Yeah, I almost forgot to me. Go to Fearless Army Rollcall.com. Fearless Armyroll call.com. Use a promo code with the word fearless, all lowercase. Tickets are $150. If you use the promo code fearless, it's $100.

We'd love begging you to come. It's going to be amazing. The music, the speakers, the food. It's going to be amazing and fun. We'll be done, I think, around 4.35 o'clock starts. And I haven't even rattled. We got athletes and coaches and coaches. coaches that are coming in if you're into sports or not, you'll meet a lot of cool people.

I've been amazed. There's people that are trying to come that if they do, people will be like, oh, my God, this guy came and his connections to mainstream corporate media. But I think a lot of men have had enough. and they want to come out of the closet. Because, again, as Christians, we have to know. We've been stuck into a closet. We've got to come out of the closet.

And I think enough are frustrated and inspired. Everybody else came out of the closet and we went in. Yes. That's true. And so they're looking at Harrison Bucker. They're looking at what we're doing with Fearless and the people that have been coming on my show and people are getting inspired. Let's come out of the closet.

And, you know, if they can be out of the closet, we can too. All right. you're listening to this and you're in Middle Tennessee especially, don't miss this. We just had a conference here on our campus, culture and Christianity, and so many people reached out to me and said, I didn't know, I wish I could have been there. This is better. June the 1st, it's a Saturday in Nashville at Rocket Town. Jason will be there, but there's a whole host of other really talented, bright, courageous people participating. John Rich is coming, but don't hold that against them. If we hang out with John, he's going to get it figured out.

But it truly is an opportunity. Nashville needs a little bit more Jesus. You know, I've been in Nashville longer than you have. And this used to be the center of Christian publishing. It was the Southern Baptist Sunday School Board. Headquarters building was one of the tallest buildings downtown. Now we got wagons filled with inebriated young women screaming at the people on the street and they're being heckled from the bars. It's not the Nashville that I remember.

We need some Jesus in Nashville. So June the 1st, let's be there with Jason Whitlock. and help make this happen. It's important for our city and it's important for our nation. It's funny, Mitch, I live right downtown and it's amazing. I live on the 19th floor of my 19th story building, but you can hear everything for, and I don't know if the windows or whatever aren't as good as they need to be, but you can hear everything. And so I hear the party vans and a lot of them play rap music that's filled with cursing and all this other stuff.

And I'm just like, how did we get here to where you can be driving down the street and people are dancing to music that's MF this and B word this and all this? How did we get here? And that's, I look at, you know, did you see this video of Diddy, the rap mogul? and I used to listen to rap music. I was always a critic of it, though, and always pointing out, but I can't, that's not much of a defense.

I always knew what it was, but I listened to it. And then in the past five, six years, I just started filling myself up with so much gospel music that I've poured so much of that in that there's just no room for rap. I can't, when I hear it now,

I hear it in context and I hear every word of it. I go, holy cow. And so I just don't listen to it anymore. But I'm just asking people to look at what Diddy is about and did and then go listen to the music. We should not be surprised. Anybody that's making pornographic, violent prison culture music, no one should be shocked that he would treat a human being and a woman like a pet, like something he owned and had no real respect for. And that is that culture. And we have to, as believers, if we're pouring the right stuff in us, there's just no room for that. And it's, you know, before I hopped on the highway today, I had a big salad because I didn't want to eat any snacks on my stuff up here. And I didn't want to. And that's, Alan, because my gluttony is the problem. It's

sinful. And I've been correcting it and trying to create. And it's a strong. And it's a strong. struggle. But the key is just you got to pour a bunch of good stuff in you, and then there's no room for the bad stuff. And so if I'm here at church on Saturday, which I'm looking forward to hearing you speak, again, that means I'm not on Netflix or Amazon watching some movie that entertains me. But, you know, because now I'm telling you, I look at the TV shows I used to watch, because I can't watch the new ones because the new ones are just awful. But even when I go back and look at the stuff I enjoyed 20 years ago. I got new eyes on now because I'm talking too much about God every day not to see things in perspective. And so again, I just try to fill

myself up with good stuff. And that's why I'm looking forward to hearing you speak tonight. And then I'll hop in my car, listen to gospel music. I'll be on a high time I get home. I'll be like, well, let me fall asleep. No bad stuff got me today. They went it one day at a time. Every generation has to make a decision for themselves. And that gives me hope because you know, you're downtown, the Ryman Auditorium. Yeah. Which was the home for the Grand Ole Opry for so long, started as the Nashville Gospel Tabernacle.

The largest saloon owner in Nashville got saved. Jason, thank you for what you're doing. And we will see you on June the 1st at Rocket Town for Roll Call. Well, looking forward to hearing from you there. Looking forward to hearing from you tonight. All right. 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.