Shaun Newman Podcast - #799 - Gabriel Rench

Episode Date: February 19, 2025

Gabriel Rench became a symbol of resistance against government overreach after his arrest during a Psalm sing in Moscow, Idaho, amidst COVID-19 restrictions. This incident in September 2020, where he was detained for participating in an outdoor worship event, ignited a significant debate on religious freedom and civil liberties, profoundly shaping his path. As a co-host of the "CrossPolitik" podcast, Rench now works to bridge the gap between faith, culture, and politics in an increasingly secular world.Cornerstone Forum ‘25https://www.showpass.com/cornerstone25/Get your voice heard: Text Shaun 587-217-8500Substack:https://open.substack.com/pub/shaunnewmanpodcastSilver Gold Bull Links:Website: https://silvergoldbull.ca/Email: [e-mail] Grahame: [phone]

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Rumble, make sure to subscribe and leave a review. If you're watching on an X, folks, give it a retweet. Okay, on them with that tale of the tape. He's the co-host of the Cross-Politic podcast and founder of Pango Media. Talking about Gabriel Wrench. So buckle up. Here we go. Welcome to Sean Numa podcast. Today I'm joined by Gabriel Wrench. So, sir, thanks for hopping on. Thanks for having me, Sean. You know, this is a, I don't know if anyone on your side told you the story,

but so I'll tell it. I was going to tell it before we started, but so be it. This past summer, I took a road trip with my wife and three kids, and she's from Minnesota, so we drove from Canada and we did this huge, long loop. And we went through this place called Moscow, Idaho. Yeah. And when I first interviewed Aaron Younggren probably a year ago, maybe longer, I was like, where are you live? And he's like, Moscow.

I'm like, would you talk in Russia? He's like, no, in the States. I'm like, there's a Moscow in the States. Anyways, then I got to go through it this past summer and interview him a second time at Red Balloon. And so like when this came through, it's like, hey, do you want to have Gabriel on? I'm like, where is he from? Like, yeah, I could probably mess with Moscow again. So, sir, thanks for hopping on.

Hey, man, small town that's having a big impact, I guess, at least in your life. I would say, I would argue, going back to COVID days, a pretty big impact on North America, honestly. Yeah, you know, that was, I mean, you're referring to probably my arrest and what happened in COVID in 2020. We just happened to be in a part of, I think, what made our town so impactful on the national state. is because we're in a conservative state, but in a, a, a blue dot of a city. We're, we're a university of Idaho's in our town. We're a college town. And so, uh, our city council, liberal council in a conservative state, they just

trip a lid and COVID. And they were like mandating you couldn't even outside. You couldn't stand six feet apart without, um, you know, wearing a mask or, you know, is just even outside they were controlling us. And it was so weird. And so it became such a. striking, you know, fight that locally for kind of in some spaces what was happening nationally. So we end up, for those who don't know the full story, but my city council during COVID

shut down our town in March, my church protested by going outside and singing psalms and not standing six feet apart as a wild protest. I mean, it's crazy. We'd sing psalms and hymns and not throw any Molotov cocktails. And it was very nerving for our city and our cops and everything. after about six months of protesting, they arrested me. We were at City Hall, parking lot, singing psalms, and there's about 200 of us, and I just happened to be one of the people they arrested, along with another couple friends of mine. And when they arrested me, I mean, you know, my friends had cameras around, of course,

the whole thing, and it just went viral immediately, you know, churchgoers getting arrested by the cops, you know, for singing psalms. It was just not a good look for them. and when and then like i think it's like two three four days later trump got a hold of it and retweeted my arrest and it just it just blew up i mean we had people all over the nation calling our cop lines complaining to the cops about arresting me and uh so it became a real lightning rod for for covid and and god was kind and as you know um james coates and um tim stevens and others my arrest and they both told me

it was like, you know, it encouraged me to kind of do the right thing and stand for the right things and then that kind of I think encourage others to kind of stand up and unfortunately they end up getting arrested too in Canada for standing for what's right, but yeah, it was a lightning rod that encouraged

other protests to go forward. You know, it's wild. Well, I mean, all of the story is wild. But, you know, I don't know if he said the date. September 2020 is when when this is all going down. And here's what's going to blow my mind all over again, probably hopefully yours as well, is it took until February of 2022 before we start getting out of it.

And that was the trucker combo. So like we like it's like like we hadn't even got to. We hadn't even got. Exactly. We hadn't even got to the vaccines and the in the, like we, I was just literally talking about this. We hadn't got to the vacs mandates. We hadn't got to you can't you're not going to be able to fly or or going a train or any of this federal travel if you didn't have a certain pass right we had snitch lines like we weren't allowed to go into restaurants weren't allowed to go into kids hockey games like on and on and on this went so like when i when i read your story you know again i'm like i was september of 2020 man we took a long time up here wow in the cold barren north to get our stuff together well and you know i mean my

story is similar. I mean, I was, I think I was, John MacArthur was the first church to really have their fight. I think I was the second Christian churchish, at least on the national scene to have our fight. But it's the same story. You know, city council comes up with some sort of power trip where they can, where they think they can trump the constitution. They can take away my first amendment rights all of a sudden through some sort of cold or flu or, you know, whatever you want to call it. And, All at the same time, you know, we're going outside, not standing six feet apart and not wearing masks. And we're the problem. You know, we're, we're the ones causing the community spread or we're the, you know, and while my mayor is doing outdoor weddings, hosting them, hosting outdoor weddings, not standing six feet apart, not wearing masks.

You know, the city council are attending parties, not, not standing six feet apart, not wearing masks, you know, that kind of thing. And so the hypocrisy and my little hometown, you guys obviously. felt it with um he's not even your premier anymore trudeau or supposedly well he the prime minister is still he's he's intending to resign so he's still there until like march fourth roughly so he's still there yeah he's in between yeah uh and you know the same thing with you know prime prime minister churdo and you know of course Gavin newsome in california going to wineries and so forth i mean it's all the same thing which which you know help hopefully shows and demonstrate demonstrates that it was a power trip or either some sort of fear tactic or power trip for most people.

Excuse me for that cough. Don't worry about yourself. No, we're going to be just fine on this side. You can't get us through the screen. They might have tried telling us different back in the day. We know that to be true. You've got to tell me a bit more about yourself. You know, like certainly I know the lightning rod moment of where your name gets, I don't know.

if you're thinking protesting in the early days of COVID, it's right in there with a few different ones. But who is Gabriel? Like, where did you come from? What's your background? Yeah, well, you know, I have a connection with Alberta because I'm from Texas. And, you know, Texas is kind of the Alberta is the Texas of Canada.

So I was born and raised in Texas. I grew up in, I was born in Dennis and Texas. And the joke for us Denisonians, is we're on the border of Oklahoma, so we're the first line of defense for those Oki's crossing that border. So that's how important Denison is in the politics of Texas.

I grew up in Texas, lived in Tyler. My dad moved around a little bit in Texas, and we basically landed in a Garland, Texas, where I grew up for about 17 years in Garland, went to school, played basketball in high school.

That was kind of our big family sport and it was pretty successful there. And then my dad, my dad worked in the semiconductor industry and I don't know if you experienced this but my dad was a never graduated college but worked hard and grew into and grew up into the semiconductor world with the fabs from texas instruments until Hyundai semiconductors so over time he became pretty successful in the semiconductor industry and got a job in eugene oregon at Hyundai semiconductors and so that was the year i graduated high school if you know anything about you

Eugene Oregon. It is it is the I-5 corridor from you know Seattle all the way down to Eugene Oregon. It is full of liberals. And when I moved from Texas to Eugene Oregon, it was like going from, you know, Cowboys and Indians to VW buses and hippies is it just I did not fit in. It was so weird. So I was there in Oregon for about one year and I went and played college basketball down in California and outside the Bay Area. And then over time, I worked in college. and eventually came to Moscow, which in 2002, I moved to Moscow to go finish my school, University of Idaho. And of course, that kind of gets you into kind of where I'm at immediately. I live in Moscow. I got a wife and three kids. And we have a little, I don't know, boutique

ranch. We got 10 acres, you know, we call it a boutique ranch, but it's, we affectionately love our property and what we have there, got a couple horses, stuff like that. So, but, and I went, graduated college, married my wife, went into the work. force and then in 2016 this will bring you up to speed I started cross-politic cross-politic is a show where we talk about politics the taboo things you aren't allowed to talk about politics and religion politics and faith politics and Christianity and that was in 2016 and interesting enough that was two months before president Trump was elected so that was in september 2016 Trump got elected in November of 16.

None of us voted for Trump on my host, Pastor Toby and Knox. We did not vote for Trump. I didn't because I just couldn't trust him. You know, he Trump at that time, at that point in time, you know, he's running as a Republican. Well, I just knew 10 years before that he was a Democrat. I knew 15, maybe he was 15 years before that. He'd slowly changed over time because I think the Democrats left him. but he was pro-choice and now he's pro-life.

I just couldn't get a handle on him. So I didn't vote for him that time. And then all of a sudden, when we launched our show in September, Trump gets elected. And the left immediately started calling anybody who voted for Trump a racist. And it was pretty quick. It was within like months of Trump being elected. And so, well, in America, we have this very,

sad disconnection between faith and politics like the pastor doesn't talk about politics the pastor doesn't address politics the pastor doesn't teach and disciple on politics and so our i think our show gained a lot of traction because we were like just because you vote over trump doesn't mean you're racist um you know and so we started applying the bible to everything that had been going on in our current political situation with trump and and so our show grew significantly that year um over uh time and then of course the rush collusion stuff happened. Eventually, the Hunter and Biden laptop stuff starts coming to play. Other things that Trump had been doing,

his nominations of Supreme Court, the whole Kavanaugh, Justice Kavanaugh thing that happened, where all these false accusations were being thrown at him, stuff like that. So we just would walk everybody through. Here's what the Bible says about, you know, what's happening with, let's say, Justice Kavanaugh. You know, for example, there's a biblical justice to charges.

your accusers need to have a name. You can't just be accused anonymously. Your accusers, their stories need to corroborate. This is all just biblical justice, basic biblical justice stuff. And so you could just kind of walk through the biblical justice of what's going on and disprove the charges against Kavanaugh and that kind of stuff. So our show grew significantly kind of through that process with Trump and everything. So now what I do is I host cross-politic.

I've been doing that for eight years. We're on direct TV and, of course, podcasts and all that stuff. I have a number of businesses that I'm working on. I have my own public relations agency, Pango Media. Pango Media, Pango, my son, when he was two years old, he had a little beanie baby. He was a penguin, a little beanie baby penguin. And he called it Pango. And this was 2014.

15, something like that. And one day I said, I'm going to make a company name out of that. So I got a public relations agency named Pango because my son's Beanie Baby. So Pango Media is my public relations agency. And I also have a business network, a Christian business network, business makers.network that we're actually launching and rolling out now and be fully up and running in March. Very excited about that, bringing business leaders across the nation in Canada together and everything. So kind of a

entrepreneur and host of cross politics kind of what I do now and in between them, I'm just getting over having a week long fight with pneumonia and it's been, it's been a very difficult week. It's so good to be with you, Sean,

in a cheerful show to kind of get over this pneumonia. So if I go back to 2016, you start your show, you said none of you voted for Trump. So do I assume then you all voted for Hillary? No. I think I wrote in like Ron Paul, I think. Or I might have wrote in my pastor just for fun. I can't remember. Actually, I really can't remember. So you weren't, okay. Then I'm curious about this because I'm like, okay, so you weren't on the side of like, oh no, the Democrats are going to, you know, Hillary's going to be and the next president. You're like, no, you're critically looking at this. You're already skeptical of the political scene, I would say. Would that be?

fair? Yeah, my thought process was I couldn't trust Trump and I said, and so I couldn't vote for him. And I knew Hillary was going to be bad for us. I mean, that was just a fact. I, you know, Trump was a little unknown in the sense that maybe he could be good for us. Maybe not. I didn't know. But my, my issue was with trust. I want to, it's, you want to be as principled as you can when you vote for politicians. And so one of my principles was I want to vote for someone I trust. And I couldn't meet that bottom barrier for Trump that first time around. Now the second time around, obviously I'd seen what he did for four years. And so I knew where I was going to agree with him on.

I knew where he was going to execute on. I knew where I was probably going to disagree with him on. I could trust him then. So I did vote for him in 2020. What do you think of, you know, in the last, you know, I don't know, what has it been a couple weeks? since his inauguration. I'm curious, you know, like I would say this about Idaho. The first time I'd ever been through it was this past summer.

And when I were driving through it, I'm like, yeah, now this is my type of state, you know, like really, really enjoy it. So I kind of get a feel for maybe, maybe I'm wrong on this on Trump and the thoughts there. But like, you know, here on the Kansas side, we see the tariff thing, right? And so then everybody goes scrambling everywhere. in you know that's its own story from a canadian perspective yeah curious what what do you see like what do you think of uh of trump's you know first few weeks in office um so first off i believe the election was stolen from trump in 2020

um for multiple reasons i think covid laws that affected elections and stuff like that popped up a number of things that had happened um but at the same time i am 20 20 hindsight i'm grateful he lost the election and in 2020 because I think he's more prepared now and then he would have been if he would have won election in 2020. And he has more of the populace behind him. I think he has more people behind him doing what he's doing now than he would have in 2020. And the ambiguity of 2020, if he would have won, there still would have been a lot of ambiguity there. So I think the clarity of what's happening in 2024, I'm very grateful for. And I think Trump is more focused and understands the

plays he needs to run in a way i don't think he understood in 2020 so very grateful in one sense that he lost the election because i think he's doing a way better job than he he would have been in 2020 you think when he got elected in 2016 you know it's his first time in you know political office he didn't know anybody he didn't know who to appoint people would recommend appointments they'd end up appointing someone who was against trump's vision for what he wanted to accomplish it was just and then he had the lies of rush inclusion um that that that's immediately started happening so his whole first presidency was a dog fight. Now he's he's got a lot of clarity and everything. So that's the big idea. Now, I'm, I'm super excited about what he's doing in office right now. Now, I do have some, I think,

and I think he might be doing this. I think he might know there's a judicial fight coming. I am a little nervous about all the executive orders that he's issuing. I would prefer Congress make law. But he's issuing an executive. orders to to the branches that are under him and he has a right to do that but the congress congress has set up this whole bureaucratic system congress votes in the bureaucracies congress votes in the departments and trump now can basically govern by executive order through all these departments um so i'm a little nervous about that even though i agree with a lot of them um i would like things i would not like to have so much power in the president's hands i would like congress and the president and the

judiciary be more balanced than it is right now. But that's an issue they need to figure out. Congress needs to figure out and everything. But Trump has the leeway right now. And so I'm very excited about what he's doing. As regards to tariffs, tariffs are a bad policy. I'm against tariffs as a policy. I'm for tariffs as a tool, as a tactic, as a fight, as a means.

Because all tariffs ultimately are, you're just taxing your own citizens. That's ultimately what a tariff is. It's just a tax. So, but if, you know, we're giving Canada $200 million a year, you know, we're, if Canada's borders are leaking in fentanyl and stuff like this, if Canada is letting in illegal immigrants into our nation and not doing anything about it, then I have no problem, you know, using tariffs with Justin Trudeau to get him to do his own duty as prime minister in Canada. So that'd be my, I guess, short take on the tariffs there for Canada. And I understand the frustration for you guys. but hopefully that also would help you guys make changes with your new Premier Prime Minister, excuse me.

Yeah, well, Trump called him Premier. He's called him Governor. He wasn't called him Governor. That's right, he's called him Governor. Yes, I think you gotta love the date. Well, I mean, I don't know. I love the digs because it's Justin Trudeau in office. Well, it's hilarious to me, like, he was blackface

Trudeau for me forever. Since I found out he did the blackface thing. It's, yeah. Well, he's fancy sucks. He's blackface. He's everything but a good leader. Like, I mean, it's the long list of things that you can go down with him. You know, I'm curious, you know, your background of politics and faith and like melding them together.

I remember when I started this show and, you know, a hockey guy. And so, like, in sports, what are the two things you don't talk about? Politics and faith. You just don't do it. And yet, I don't know about you and certainly would love your thoughts on. it they pretty much make the world go around right like they're two of the most i mean obviously i put faith before politics as being the most important subject to to really talk about you start to understand to wrestle with to realize there's things at work here that uh go beyond me and

you yeah and you know like we're not going to talk about that like does i mean that seems like the greatest trick the devil ever pulled is making us go oh you don't want to talk about that Don't talk about that. I remember in, so I was living in Texas. I must have been like seven, eight years old, something like that. My mom took the kids to go visit Grandma and Grandpa in California. We did this train ride from Texas to California to visit Grandma and Grandpa back in the 80s. And I remember sitting down at my grandpa's table fixing to have dinner and he prays.

And then he starts talking. He said, there's two things you never talk about together. That's faith and politics. And then here's the only one allowed in the room to talk about faith and politics. And so that that play is is there for the for the sheep to be afraid of mixing and matching. They always, the leaders always talk about faith in politics, whether they believe in, you know, the God of the Bible or not. They're always mixing politics and religion all the way down to, you know, Planned Parenthood is a religion, you know. And so it's a play to get the sheep to not push for truth and clarity in politics and in life and in life.

laws and all that stuff. I agree with you. Our relationship with God is the most important thing that needs to be discussed and that needs to be sorted through. It's the foundation of truth. You basically, let me put it this way. Every human being that is born, we all have two, commonalities to us. Everyone has these two things. We all sin and we all die. And how you answer those questions determine how you view life and where you go after you die. How you treat each other's on the, how you treat each other on this earth, you know, and where you go when you die? How, what kind of laws you make? Those, you know, we all sin and we all die affect everything. And so I want, if we all sin and we all die, well, I want a worldview that answers

those questions for me well. Evolution doesn't answer that question for me well at all. In fact, evolution doesn't even have a category for sin. It's just kind of like a survival of the fittest kind of thing. And so going to the scriptures, I think the God of the Bible, the scriptures define and answer those questions overwhelmingly satisfactory to me okay if i'm a sinner i sin how do how do i get my sin dealt with well you get it dealt with in a god who sent his only son to die on the cross for your sins okay that's so that's my my my sins were dealt with in christ when he died and rose again from the debt and he saved me from my sins um well what happens when i die. Well, if you're in Christ, you go be with eternally with God forever. You have your relationship

with your father is fixed forever, is made right forever. And so that's the foundation I want to be, I want to have that figured out pretty well, right? And then as it relates to politics, I mean, the thing with politics is, Sean, I don't know how many kids, how many kids you have? Or do you have any kids? I got three kids also. What happens your husband? in your house makes its way out into the streets. Eventually your kids leave. Eventually your kids get their own jobs. Eventually your kids have their own family. Eventually your kids, you know, you know, so on and so forth.

Well, if you have, you know, if dad leaves the house or if mom and dad have a bad relationship or if, you know, mom and dad can create a great long lasting, healthy family for generations or they could create a family that is detrimental to society. So politics, my point there is politics begins in the family. And so we've got to be talking about these things because what happens in my neighbor's house is going to come out in the streets. You know, we're politics is kind of the, you know, it's it's the outworking of community. And then the structures and, well, you know, around that. And so I want to answer and sort through the religious issue first because that has immense impact on how I talk about politics because everything is related.

You know, God created this world and there's nothing really disconnected. There's this Abraham Kuiper, this old Dutch pastor said, there's not one square inch that's not Christ. Everything on this earth. there's not one square inch that's not not christ and so everything is is connected and so we want to be able to i think and i think that you know part of what you want to accomplish on the show is like i want to be able to discuss everything and not have any my hands tied behind my back and that kind of dialogue is so important for i think um this last you know man we were we've been suspended from youtube multiple times since 2020 i'm sure you probably fought that battle a little bit i've been

scorched earth on there a couple times so it's a fun place to be yeah so there's those who fear those who want to silence those are usually the ones that are running from truth and the truth is either sets you free or condemns you that's that's that's the facts truth either sets you free or condemns you that's in trial and court of law then you know everything and so I think ultimately what we're dealing with is is we're we're we're scared of what the truth means to us right now and where we're at. And that you saw that during COVID, you know, of course, Trump election and all this stuff. I think we're seeing light and darkness in a clear light than we've ever had before.

I want to throw something at you. How long have you been a believer? So my dad and mom were Christians when I was born. Okay. And so I've always known, there's never a time where I didn't not know I didn't love Jesus. So I just kind of, I grew up in the Kool-Aid. Okay, fair enough. I grew up going to church, but one of the interesting things about this podcast, particular,

is I didn't start out to talk about faith. And I certainly wasn't going to church, and I certainly didn't believe in Jesus. I certainly didn't believe in a lot of things. I grew up in going to church and reading the Bible and et cetera, but I ran from them as hard as I could. And one of the things I'm curious to throw you is, you know, like, if you set out to find out how the world works, what is truth? I'm not saying you find it on day one. But if you followed this podcast for long enough, which now in fairness, we're closing in on 800 episodes, folks.

So I mean, it's taken some time. It has not been a race. It has been a very winding adventure, a journey. And yet it found me and slapped me upside the head. And part of that was COVID. You know, like I look at COVID and I, was it a horrific time? Oh, certainly. But the amazing things that have come out of there is,

is insane. And so I guess what the question is, if you have open dialogue where you go back and forth, you ask questions, no topics off limits, I don't know what would happen in a Muslim country or whatever third world country, I have no idea. But if me and you just get to start out blank slate, we're going to talk about everything. Don't you eventually get to this conversation? Like, how does the world work? Where do we go after?

some of the the the yeah i don't know you you you dig a hole and eventually you hit the rock like you just like i can't hmm i can't go past this and then you rest with that and you pull on it like i don't know maybe your thoughts man a couple a couple thoughts there um one is is we're created and um when you're created beings you have an artist that created you you have um you know you know you know you know you you know the picture on the wall, you know the artist that drew that picture because you know the how that artist thinks, you know, how you've seen other paintings from him, that kind of thing. And and so as created beings, you're constantly, you know, we're created with a desire to know truth. And so even if you didn't grow up Christian, everyone wants to know their creator.

And some people fight against that. But that's, I mean, I've, you know, you know, had conversations with people from all over the world. And almost every, you know, if you sit down with someone for 30 minutes to an hour, you're always, almost always going to get to some sort of question around the bigger question, the more in-depth conversations. So I think that's part of evidence that you're created by someone and you're created by who I'm arguing, you created by God. And so the other thing is in Psalm 19,

it says that heavens are declare the glory of God, the earth is permanent, you know, the stars speak about God. So just looking at God's creation, there's a declaration that's happening. Every time you look at the sun set, every time you look at the stars in the sky, It's declaring God.

Just like that painting on the walls declaring that it's artist. And so there's kind of this inescapable reality that we are created by God. And so I think that's why I think that it's like this inerrant desire, this inerrant feeling, this inerrant instinct that happens. Does that make sense? It does. And yet I think of Canada. I can't speak to the United States.

You guys have a different culture than up here, right? We're told we have no identity. We've become secular. You know, we're very welcoming of all cultures and a whole bunch of different things. And somewhere it just slowly eroded out. And slowly we don't talk about it. And if you don't talk about it, it's kind of like wrestling with something that's all around you.

but you didn't realize it. And then one day you just like, we're going to talk about this. Why aren't we talking about this? And for me, the thing is, you know, one of the things I heard on my side was,

well, the day me you crazy. And I started laughing. I'm like, man, they already think I'm crazy for talking about COVID. Let's roll into this.

Let's talk about it. Right? Like, you know, like, so I become one of those guys. I'm like, I was already one of those guys.

If this is what turns you off, then you were already turned off a while back. But as soon as you close off your brain to hear any conversation, I worry that you won't be able to find what I've found. Now, on the flip side, if you're open to any conversation, then you have to wrestle with things. And once you start wrestling with things,

you know, the story of Jesus and the Bible, and on and on and on. It's just like, huh. Now there, there's a wrestling match that's going to, you know, that's got a lot to it. Yeah, two things there. One is, I've come to the conclusion. that we have a pretty significant slave mentality here in the U.S.,

and I'm sure you could probably say that about Canada, too. And rich slaves are the worst slaves. We're very rich nation, but we're so comfortable in our slave mentality that we like our two cars, our TVs, our houses, you know, our Uber eats, you know. So, you know, it's like we're given so much. And yet over time, we've become to think more and more like slaves where the government

tells us to stand six feet apart. Okay. The government tells us to wear a mask. Okay. You know, like the slave mentality is so deep. But we're rich slaves. So it's like, yeah, okay. And that is, that's a, but I think that's what COVID did is that it actually woke up.

a lot of the slaves and said, this ain't right. Like, like the slave mentality cracked in COVID and praise God for it. And so I want, I want, you know, to, you know, I want, of course, I want the gospel of Jesus to overwhelm everybody. I want you to be forgiven of your sins. You know, I want you to have a right relationship with your creator and your wife and your kids and I want your kids to grow up love Jesus you know it's like all that is part of what we're trying to crack like like you got woken up under in 2020 um the slave mentality cracked like

like it did tons of people in which praise god um and and so I think um you know I'm I'm just hoping that you know this the slave mentality that's in Americans here um that it starts to crack even more because I mean now you're looking at Trump just undiq doing all these budgets with USAID and all this money that's been going all over the place. You know, apparently we bought like $50 million in condoms or something. And the leftist, this is where the slave mentality is really thick. The leftists are saying, stay away from our budgets. And we're like, stop spending $50 million on condoms.

Like they won't even address like $2 million to Guatemala for sex surgeries. You know, that all this, all our money from through, at least through USAID is going out to all. all these crazy expenditures, and the Democrats are like, you're being the dictator. You know, Trump, stay away from our money. It's like, why don't you address the budget problem? That's the slave mentality, and it needs to crack and needs to open up for that. But what you're asking for, if you're saying, I want to not be a slave anymore, what you're asking for is a true freedom that really hurts.

This is what makes people, this is what makes. So remember Israel and Egypt, Israel and it was in Egypt for 400 years and then God delivered them out of Egypt and then three days into the wilderness Egypt started complaining again saying God if we're in Egypt we'd have good food and warm fire and water So Israel was free after 400 years and in three days into the wilderness They were complaining to God that they not to mention not to mention God's right there Yeah, exactly that's a part of that story. I'm like doesn't make.

But that's the slave mentality. It's like if you actually get true freedom, you will start complaining because it means you got to go find your food. You got to raise, find your own water. Like you got to find your, you know, another example. A good example, this is public school, public education.

I'm absolutely against public education. It's done far more harm than good in our society. But if we undid the government mechanism of taking money from all of us, and then channeling it to their public schools, and then now there's no public education, and you've got to figure out how to educate your own kids, that's where the complaining starts.

That's what it means to be free. It's like, no, you pay for your own education. You figure out your own education. You start your own school, whatever. That's a good example of what I'm talking about, where all of a sudden you're going to get all these, even Christians are going to be like, no. What, how would I educate my kids?

Oh, man. People, yes. Well, I mean, you think about it. It's the system's been set up so that your kids go away for, you know, they hit a certain age and they go away for, what is it, eight hours a day, roughly. So, you know, like some people relish the day when that happens. So, you know, like, I've interviewed enough homeschoolers on this side where there's, you know, like anyone can do it.

I would argue that you want to have your, your stuffing in line. Right? You gotta, you know, get your stuff in line. But like they talk about there's some days where you want to like, you're like, what am I doing? But I equate it to, I coach you seven hockey here. So little guys. Yeah, yeah. And, uh, oh, it's once a week. I'm like, what am I doing?

This is the toughest job in the world. And all it is is hurting cats and they're just having fun. They're just you seven, five and six year olds, right? Yeah. On skates and not realizing that those skates are sharp and you're just like, stop kicking. Stop doing this. So I can, you know, like we're in a world where, man, you can remind your people when that happens, when you're feeling, oh, man, coaching hockey is so difficult this week or whatever. That's a good reminder that, hey, freedom is hard.

It's good. It's glorious and it's difficult. You know, those days when you're working with your homeschool kids or, you know, I got my kids and we work with a, we got a Christian classical school here in town. say my kids school too um and i also coach i coach um uh junior high girls basketball and varsity girls basketball and um same kind of thing i mean i just got done with them by varsity season i got two weeks left with my junior high season and i'm in the middle of all this and it's you know you got three months of late night late practices and games and but that's another it's another good reminder that freedom is good it's glorious and it's hard

every time you, you know, you start your own business. That's difficult. But guess what? You know, I got friends in the UK. And, you know, I started my own public relations agency. And I started my own business makers network and, you know, started my own podcast, you know, those kind of things. And one of my friends in the UK said, you know, you Americans just can start stuff. Like that's not, that's not the UK, the Great Britain mindset.

Just go, you know, oh, you don't like working for this employer. Go start your own business. And they're like, what? Right? You know, so there's a funny, I mean, each nation obviously has their own kind of slave mentality and stuff. But that's the point is freedom is good, it's glorious, and it's difficult. And that's the road we should always want. I don't want the government taking care of my kids' education.

I don't want the government taking care of my retirement, you know, social care. probably not even be there for me when I die anyways. I don't want the government taking care of my health care. That's doing far more harm than good. I don't want the government taking care of, you know, I mean, just kind of go down the list. So actually this might be interesting for you. In the Bible, God gives us three governments. He gives us the civil government.

He gives us the family government and he gives us the church government. Those are the three defined government. three defined governments and that he gives authority to. And each government, this is a Protestant, this is a Protestant doctrine or Protestant principle. This is where our Constitution principles of a constitution came from. Each government is defined and has limited authority. Limited authority. That's really important.

God defined the civil government. He defined the family government. He defined the church government. Each government, he gave him authority, but he also gave him limited authority. So, for example, we look at like Romans 13, the government's job. is to deal with bad guys and encourage the good guys. That's Romans 13. You know, the government's job is to enact justice, okay, and be judicial and not have unequal weights and measures. Okay. That's to deal with, you know, and that would include like capital crimes and, you know, legal issues and, you know, so that's the government's job. The government's job is largely like a legal job. The family government. you know, think of Ephesians 6. And they're supposed to raise the kids and nurture and admonition of the Lord.

The family's mom and dad's job is to, you know, put it this way. Mom and dad's job is the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare. That sounds like a government job. No, it's the families, right? Health, education, and welfare, that's my job. Not the government's job. And then the church's job is to disciple the nations, preach the gospel

and administer the sacraments and then lastly to enact church discipline, its own form of discipline. So if a husband cheats on his wife and doesn't repent, then their job is to excommunicate that husband out of the church. But each government is defined.

Like the church government, job is not to administer capital punishment. God gave that to the civil government. That's not the church's job. The family's job is not to, you know, play cops and, you know, play cops out in the streets. That's that's the civil sphere. And so if we actually would just go back to basic biblical definitions of our government, and that would reel in a lot of the craziness that we see right now.

And just being able to function off those categories, those three categories that God defines. So it's not like we're making things up here as we go. We can't. but God defines the civil government's authority. God defines the family's authority and God defines the church's authority. And it actually would be just so much of a blessing to all of us if we got back to even that basic understanding. You ever see that happening?

You know, I believe that Jesus is king and I believe that he wins over the course of history. So if you think of it this way. I don't know if you're familiar with terms of like post-mil theological. or primal theology, stuff like that. But let me illustrate it this way. When Jesus died and rose again, it said there was about 500 witnesses to see him ascend into heaven in Acts chapter 1.

And 1st Corinthians chapter 15. And by the time Paul died, it was probably around 6380, maybe 6480. And Paul, of course, wrote a lot of the... New Testament. And so let's say by the time Paul died, maybe there was what 30,000, 100,000 Christians and only kind of in the, you know, Israel, Turkey, you know, Middle East area or whatever. And probably Christian and he had probably gone farther than that by that by the time Paul died. But if Paul would somehow miraculously come back to Earth right now. There's about 2 billion confessing Christians on this earth now.

So when Paul dies, you know, maybe there's 50,000 Christians by the time he dies, and now there's 2 billion. And then there's a church on, you know, church in every city, at least one faithful church in every city, likely. Paul would have been like, oh, my goodness, look at what the gospel's done. And I think, you know, Jesus talks about how the church or how the gospel is going to go out like a mustard seed. and the kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed in it and it starts off really small

and then it gets bigger and bigger. And I think that's what's happening over the course of history that the truth of the gospel is going to draw people to him and at the end of time, whenever that is, 10,000 years down the road,

there'll be more Christians on this earth than non-Christians. In fact, probably non-Christians that are left or having to fake it. But that's because, but that's that's because the gospel is true and the gospel frees people from their sins and the gospel reminds people of their purpose and life and and and the power of the gospel is in the fact and the reality and the historical reality that jesus died on the cross and rose again for the sins of this

world and so that reality is so powerful it's changing all of history um in and sometimes we get discourage because we you know history if you look at history you know it's kind of a series of like ups and downs like okay you know all right things look real good and then down real good down you know COVID was definitely a downer point for sure for a lot of us um but over the long haul from when jesus died and rose again till now where we're at the gospel has had more impact on this world than ever before and it's only going to grow um does that make sense It does. You know, when I look back at COVID, you say it was a down, but actually, the longer I think about it, it's like, what a time to have been alive or to be alive, I guess.

I shouldn't say it been a lot. To be alive. Certainly, you know, without COVID, I'm not sitting here talking to you. Like, I just, you know, like, so it's like, it's wonderful. I heard this, I heard this old preacher talk about the worst day in humankind was the day. that Jesus was nailed to the cross. And the best day in humankind was the day that Jesus was nailed to the cross, roughly, you know, because of everything we've been talking about.

That's right. Right. It's this whole thing of, you know, that was a beautiful way to put it. I always hear the Chinese farmer proverb, maybe, right? Maybe. And I'm like, yeah, you look at COVID, you look at anything that's to come, no matter how dark it gets. You actually don't know what it's preparing you for in the days ahead.

that's you know because we serve a god who works all things to our good for those who love him um job said um shall i take not the only the good from god and not the bad um god um because he's the ultimate storyteller um takes the things where we think it's the worst thing that could possibly happen in this moment in time and turns it into something far more glorious in our lives than we could ever would have imagined before. And that's because, so here's, here's the problem with unbelievers. Is bad stuff happens to everybody. But do you serve a God who takes that bad and turns it into good for you?

Or just bad things just happen to you and life sucks. You know, there's just bad things, you know, shit happens. You know, being a Christian, finding out, you know, COVID, yeah, COVID was horrible for us. I mean, they shut down our town. We lost something like 3,000 jobs and like three months in our small little county. Small county. We got a county of like 50,000 people. 3,000 jobs.

That's a lot. It was horrible. My buddy owned a restaurant in downtown had to fight like hell to keep that thing alive. You know, it was horrible. But we all, I know all my Christian friends have seen God's goodness through all that tragedy. And now, you know, to my point about President. in Trump, I think we're seeing God's goodness politically because of what happened in 2020. And so God gives purpose even in the tragedy.

So if you don't believe in God, there is no purpose in the tragedy. It's just sucks. We're a rock hurling through the galaxy and there is nothing to it. That's right. That's right. Appreciate it you hopping on today. You know, I'd probably go on and on with you. I've been enjoying the chat. Another guy from Moscow.

What a small world. You know, any final thoughts? Where can people, you mentioned you have a couple new projects on the go or just social media, your show. Where can people find you, Gabriel? Yeah, thank you, Sean. My show is CrossPolitic. You can go to CrossPolitic.com to kind of follow all the ways to watch it, YouTube, Rumble, DirecTV, all that stuff. Pango Media is my PR.

agency pango media.com. My business network is businessmakers.network. And then I got a bunch of little projects. I got some tech projects going on too. But you can basically follow me on Twitter. It's probably the best. I usually touch on something here and there over time on that. And that's X.

Don't dead name. Don't name Twitter or X. at at GM wrench g Gabriel Michael wrench R-E-N-C-H-G-M-R-N-C-H-G-M-R-E-N-C-H-G-M-R-E-M-R-Nch on Twitter and everything so thanks so much, Sean, for getting me out of the week that I was in. Well, hey, we try on this side. Gabriel, thanks for doing this, and, well, hopefully it isn't the last time. Who knows the next time I'm going through Moscow, Idaho.

I certainly joined the first time. The next time, maybe I'll get you and Aaron on at the same time. That'd be a lot of fun. Either way, thanks for doing this. Thank you so much. on.