The Bryce Crawford Podcast - JD Vance Felt "Darkness" From These World Leaders (EP 221)

Episode Date: August 31, 2026

JD Vance Felt "Darkness" From These World Leaders

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One of the companies, when they get rid of one model and announce a new model, they actually hold a burial ceremony for the old model and like the employees apparently will cry. Whoa. I got to talk to you about this. So obviously during the Red Cross Day, President Trump tweeted that AI photo. I don't know if you know what I'm talking about. I'm a Christian. I saw the photo.

It made me upset. I'm not going to lie. It made me upset. I don't know how he thought he was a doctor in the photo. I did first. And I thought it was me as a doctor. Only the fake news could come up with that one. White robe with a red sash on it.

You know, and that makes me upset as a Christian. When I see something like that, It rubs me the wrong way. I mean, what do you think about that? I mean, I'm biased because I see this from the inside. So it's like, did Donald Trump meant to post a meme of himself as God? No.

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and upper room worship. This night is going to be a night that I'm not going to forget, and you're not going to forget either. Tickets are on sale right now at bricecrawford.org slash tour or click the link in the description below to grab your seats. And please, the only way to buy us through this official site, I recommend not trusting any random resellers. I genuinely believe that this is going to be a night. People care with them for a long time, and I'd love to see you there. All right, let's get into this episode. What's going on, guys. Welcome back to another episode of the Bryce Crawford podcast. I'm Bryce, and today I'm with Vice President Vance. Thanks so much. Of course, man. Good to see you.

Thank you so much. Yeah, I love being in an environment like this. It's nice to be out of the studio. And thanks for inviting us over. Of course. Of course. So you have access to more information and things than the average bear. I mean, you have top secret access. Has anything that you've learned from this job convinced you that the spiritual world is real since getting that access. So, you know, like, I haven't seen anything that says, okay, there's a clear spiritual dimension to this particular problem. You know, like, I don't have the file that says, oh, this wasn't a UFO, it was actually a demon, which is always, it's always something like, I actually, like, I have this strong

view. I actually kind of got into an argument with Joe Rogan about this. So I like a lot, by the way. But Joe thinks they're extraterrestrials. And I'm sure a lot of people think it's all fake. And my attitude is if they are real, isn't it as likely they're angels or demons as they are extraterrestrials? But like I don't have like a top secret file that sort of proves that one way or the other. What I will say is that there are, you know, the way that I've always felt God kind of speaks to me is through little coincidences, like little things that are just very, very hard to explain away.

And I see those little coincidences all the time. in my daily job. And just, you know, like little things that will happen. You know, we, like, we went to the Pope's inaugural Mass, and it was right after, you know, it was in the summer, maybe the late spring last year. And there was something like, you know, we brought the Dominican friar who actually baptized me.

And he sort of was talking to me about a Bible verse. that was like just so on point, something that like was really meaningful to me. I think it was Psalm 53 actually, something that is kind of constantly come up to me in a number of ways. So there are just all these little coincidences that happen in the day-to-day job, but there's not like a top secret piece of information that I have that says definitively proof this thing is definitely real or not real or it means this thing or it doesn't mean this thing. I just, I've seen a lot of things that convince me there is a thing. spiritual dimension to things. I'm a big believer that, you know, human beings, like we, I think we tend to try to,

especially in the 21st century, we try to rationalize everything, right? We see something that doesn't totally make sense. And our response is, well, there must be some boring, physical, scientific explanation. And I think sometimes, you know, you should allow yourself to think, or you should allow yourself to feel what I think is pretty natural, which is that there are things. out there that don't make a ton of sense. Yeah. And they don't make a ton of sense, at least if you're trying to explain them scientifically.

But I think they do make sense if you're trying to understand them spiritually as part of what I think is inherently a battle of good versus evil. Have you ever been in a room, though, like in Washington that feels spiritually dark? Because I've been in a room that's like, okay, you feel like Satan is presently here or there's blatant evil. Have you ever felt that? just being in a room around power or influence, stuff like that? Yeah, so definitely, though less like a room itself

and more sometimes like people that are around you sometimes give you a very, very bad feeling. You know, I've definitely, you know, I've been in meetings with world leaders where various issues are being discussed and somebody will say something or somebody will make an observation and I will like feel a certain darkness about it.

And I kind of like, it sort of sets off every spiritual alarm bell in my body. Like whatever that person just said, I need to be very careful because that's not a great thing. So I would say I feel it more around people necessarily than places. Though I will say, you know, what place, have you been to Gettysburg?

I have not actually. So you're actually not that far. It's like an hour and a half drive, I think, from D.C. So something worth doing next time you're in town. But I've been to Gettysburg, I believe, once in my life and actually stood at the battlefield. And it's very clear, you know, this is where Pickett's Charge was and the guys were going up the hill. And you sort of, that's the one place where I feel like a very dark spiritual energy is Gettysburg. And I think it's just because so many people died there.

But it kind of like, I remember being there and it made the hairs on the back on my next stand-up. And so, you know, I guess I do think that certain places have spiritual. energy because I felt that at Gettysburg. But most of the time, I would say when I feel something either positive or negative, it's usually centered around people rather than places. Well, I feel like if you're in a position like yourself, I mean, you're the vice president of the United States, you have to have some sort of spiritual discernment or, I mean, you wouldn't be good at your job. You know what I mean? So I think it's, I think it's, it just fascinates me because I hear all these stories in L.A., oh, Hollywood, Illumani, whatever. And I think, okay, sure, people can have

their conspiracies about that, the spiritual stuff or whatever. But let's talk about like the real like decision makers, like people in power that actually legitimately can make a decision and it impacts the world. And I've always just been fascinated by that. And you know, you know, it even makes me think to how evil works if you, so back in Butler, Pennsylvania, right? President Trump was almost assassinated. He barely moved half an inch. Correct. I mean, you literally would not be sitting here talking to me.

Correct. So how, when you, when you think of that scenario, do you see, how does, do you see God in that scenario bringing you here? Yeah. So, and this is why, you know, I say like, if you really want to try, you can find just a hyper-scientific, irrational explanation for this. Okay. So President Trump is standing on stage, standing on stage, I guess. And he points to a chart. And he points to a chart just so happens to be at the exact moment that the guy took a shot. Now, again, there was a physical explanation for that. He noticed the chart. He pointed at the chart. He turned his head.

The guy fired the bullet. Crazy coincidence, right? These things happen. But I think that that's a very spiritually impoverished way to look at things. Like, whatever the reason is, whatever God was trying to accomplish, like, it is just so obvious to me that coincidences like that don't happen without the hand of providence. Yeah. And so when I think some people are desperate to see.

too physical and explanation there, two scientific explanation there, I think it actually is good for your soul to sort of say, well, you know, whatever it means, clearly there was some higher purpose at work because this guy was milliseconds and millimeters simultaneously from dying.

Now I have a very personal connection to this too, obviously because I like the president, I serve under the president, I think he's a great president, great man, but there's a much more like personal dimension to this too, I've talked about a little bit, but, you know, I was, there was some talk about announcing the vice presidential candidate at that rally. Okay, that was right before the convention.

So the morning, that was a Saturday morning. I'll never forget it. I flew down there and I met with the president. And I had always been asked, have you ever talked to the president about being vice president? And the answer was honestly, always no. Well, the first time I ever had a conversation with him about being his vice president was that Saturday morning. of that rally where he almost lost his life. So I'm, you know, talking with the president.

He doesn't offer me the job on the spot, but he kind of hints that it's going to be me. He basically says, look, you're going to be very happy. And then he turns to his chief of staff, who's now the White House chief of staff, very good friend. And he says, why don't we just bring JD up and announce this thing in Pennsylvania? And then he goes, no, no, no, no, I actually, no,

we don't want to do it in Pennsylvania. Let's do it somewhere else. And I kind of like, of course, in that moment, I think to myself, what if he had called me on stage at that moment, right? What if both of us had lost our lives? Because again, there's sort of a butterfly effect that if I'm on stage with him, maybe both of us do something where we both lose our lives. Or maybe both of us survive.

There's just a different, there's so many different elements to this and so many different variables that you kind of just have to hope and pray that you're doing the right thing. you have to use the spiritual discernment that you can to try to make the right decisions. And you have to accept that ultimately it's in the hands of God. And if God wanted Donald Trump to lose his life that day, he wouldn't. But God didn't want that. And that to me is a very profound truth of what happened in Butler. And there's, again, a very personal dimension to it as well.

What do you think America would look like if the shooter was successfully? I do think that we would have had real civil strife in a way. way that I don't know that the country ever could have come back from because you, okay, so let's just, you play this out and Donald Trump loses his life, okay? Then some other person becomes the Republican nominee for president. Now, that person, we have to remember, there is a very deep and emotional connection between President Trump and a lot of the voters who make up what you would call the Republican base or the MAGA base, right? And I don't think that those voters, frankly, rightfully, I sort of put myself very much in this category.

Like, I would have always wondered, is Donald Trump's assassination part of some broader conspiracy, some broader plan to deny people, the American people, their will to choose their next president? Donald Trump got right to the doorstep of getting a second term in office, and they literally killed him. I would have had that thought in the back of my mind. And it would have to me, I'm just speaking for me,

But I think that what I'm saying would have been true for millions of Americans, it would have delegitimized the entire political process. Even if a Republican had won, I would have assumed that that Republican was kind of illegitimate. I would have assumed that very dark forces had taken out Donald Trump right as he was about to come back in to the White House. So I think if I would have thought that, as close as I am to the political process, I think millions, probably tens of millions of millions of Americans would have felt the exact same way. And there would have just been an illegitimacy to our entire political system. And man, like the American project runs on legitimacy, the consent of the governed. And if you think that it's all BS and you think that even when a good guy is about to become president, the powers that be you're going to take him out, that is a terrible way to have a functioning democracy.

And again, I think the country in some ways would have been okay. in other ways, I think it would have never come back and it would have been permanently, permanently destroyed. Do you guys ever talk about that day still? Not really. You know, it's, so the president and I are very much, there are so many ways in which we're very different. We're very alike in some ways.

And this is one way in which he and I are just kind of very alike, which is when something bad happens, you can dwell on it, you can focus on it, or you can try to just process it and move on. And he's definitely a process and move on guy. So he'll make like joking references. Like sometimes, you know, if somebody brushes up against him, he'll be like, oh, I've got that throbbing sensation of my ear. And just as kind of a joke.

But he never really talks about it in that moment. And like the one way I've heard him ever discuss it is, so that chart, it was actually a chart about the number of illegal immigrants who had come into the United States under the first Trump administration and then how it skyrocketed under the Biden administration. That chart was made by Ron Johnson, who's a senator from Wisconsin, a really good dude, by the way, like a very good friend of mine. He's a great guy. And Ron once told me, Ron Johnson once told me that, like, he told the president that was my chart. Like my chart, you know, he was trying to claim credit. He said, my chart actually saved your life. And the president was basically like, oh, thanks.

And then moved on. So there's not a desire for the president to dwell on bad things. And I think it would be impossible for him to do his job, if so. If you were always, like I had a speech yesterday. And if I'm thinking about who in the crowd could have a weapon, you just can't do your job. So you just have to like kind of process things and move on. And again, for me at least, I don't know if this is true for the president.

I wouldn't speak from. But for me at least, like being a Christian gives me a certain sense of contentment about these things. For sure. It's fundamentally, like as my grandmother said, you know, if God wants me to be here, I'll be here. If God wants me to not be here, I won't be here. and that gives me a certain just comfort with whatever risks come along.

It's all in God's hands. I'm going to go do my job as long as he gives me the ability to do it. The throbbing pain in the ear, I thought that was funny. Speaking of your coincidence is, do you think that maybe every now and then he gets a throbbing pain? Like that could be God's funny way of reminding him like, hey, I spared your life. Yeah, I think so. I think so. And I mean, you know, having never been shot before, I don't know.

but my sense is that while it was by the grace of God, not a serious injury, it is the sort of thing that's always going to leave like little traces. And yeah, I do think there are ways in which that throbbing sensation probably speaks to him. It's interesting. The president is a person of faith. He doesn't wear it on his sleeve. He doesn't talk about it a lot. But he definitely has an inner spiritual dialogue and you can tell.

And so I don't know. I've never asked him, but it wouldn't surprise me at all if that, that pain is a constant reminder of how close he came to meeting his maker. I want to ask you something real quick. If you're already paying a phone bill every single month, wouldn't you rather that money go towards something you actually believe in? Because most people just pay the phone bill, stay with the same major carrier,

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So you wrote this book Communion, which is about your journey of faith, kind of losing faith and coming back. What made you tell the story now? You know, it's a little bit. So my grandmother had this phrase, and I'll try not to cuss. She was a very devout Christian, but she had a foul mouth. But, you know, Esther get off the pot. Pooper get off the pot. And I had been working on this book really since my first book came out, which is in 2016. So I've been writing this thing since the summer of 2016. And I've been writing this thing since the summer of 2016. and I got elected to the Senate and that kind of delayed things. And I got elected vice president and that kind of delayed things.

And I got to this point or I was like, all right, if I'm ever going to actually publish this book, if I'm ever going to finish this book, it's got to be now, right? You know, there were a couple of things that motivated me and wanted to get the story out. I mean, number one is I am obsessed with this question of why are people who are raised Christian? Why do they fall away from the faith? Like what is it about the faith that just doesn't stack up when people go to college or people graduate from high school? And I've just known so many friends who were raised by very good Christian people. And some of them came back to the faith and some of them didn't.

But I'm sure you've seen this. I'm sure a lot of your listeners have seen this. It is a common story that people lose their faith when they kind of hit that late teenage, early 20s part of their life. So I'm sort of fascinated by that. I kind of wanted to write that story down for my own sake, but also in the whole. hopes that it was instructive to others because you'll you'll probably like I would be surprised you guys can probably dub it out but there are right now three kids upstairs I just heard one yell because they're upstairs playing the fourth is at school because this is his first day of school

but like you know we take our kids to church every week sometimes more than once a week we pray every day we talk a lot about God every day and I I am again really fascinated by but really troubled by this question of why is it the people who are raised Christian, why it doesn't take. And I think for me, at least, and this is just one guy's story, but for me at least, part of it is that when I got into my teenage years, my early 20s, the faith just didn't seem that relevant to me anymore. Like when I was 14 years old, the gospel of Jesus Christ really spoke to me. Now I'm 42 years old, and it really does. And I talk a lot about, like, why didn't it speak to me when I was 21 years old. And again, and I think part of this is as much as a lot of

Christian groups and a lot of Christian pastors and a lot of people are working on this problem, I just think that there's something unique about going from, you know, a kid who lives with your parents, now all of a sudden you're out on your own. You're trying to find your way in the world. And there's something about the world that is better at speaking to young people than the gospel is right now. And that's not the fault of the gospel. I think it's the fault of us. Well, yeah, I mean, I couldn't agree more. We do a lot of stuff on college campuses, like open dialogue and stuff like that. And we got some stuff coming up in the fall. And it's so interesting how those four years formulate the next 60 of a lot of people's lives,

which kind of blows my mind. So I did Liberty University online. And at first, you're kind of like, am I going to go to Christian college? Like, what does that look like? But I'm so grateful I did that. Because that in comparison of, you know, not knocking a big university, I love SEC schools, whatever. But it's just, you know, God, I love college football. Are you Georgia fan? Of course. I don't bark, though. I'm not a barker.

You know what I mean? Yeah, I'm not like that crazy. But, you know, I like college football. You know, it's like different because the teachers actually cared about my soul. Yes. Like, they didn't just care about me, like passing a class or, you know, whatever ideology that they wanted me to listen to. It was so they genuinely cared about my soul.

So when I graduated in the spring, and when I'm walking across, like, these professors, I've never even met face-to-face hugging me, shaking my hand. Like, that was just, that has set me up and encouraged me in another level of going, wow, you care about my faith. You care about what I mean. So, yeah, I think it is fascinating. I agree with you. I think we need to do a better job of kind of teaching my generation to be bold for their faith

and stuff like that. I think that's a very important challenge, I think, for the next generation of young people. of young Americans. And this is something obviously Charlie Kirk was very passionate about. If you look at a lot of the TPA USA rallies that Charlie Kirk did, you know, a lot of them were politics focused. People asking about politics, but a lot of them were about God. People were asking about Jesus. Why do you believe? You know, here's this question. Why does God tolerate pain? Why does God tolerate suffering? And Charlie was in his own unique way, a bit of an evangelist. But, you know, in some ways, it's very simple, right? Like when I was a 19-year-old guy, like I wanted two things out of life. I wanted to get, you know, good job, good credentials. And I was, I talk about this in the book, but I was too worried about where I went to school, how much money I made. I was too worried about prestige. And that was my own flaw. But I also wanted to meet girls. Like those are the two things that I wanted to do when I was 19 years old. And I think that, you know, what eventually, for me, at least, brought me back to Christ, brought me back to faith, is this recognition that I had set myself up

for a lot of pursuits that were leading me nowhere. And, you know, I was very successful. I'd gotten into a good law school. I was about to make a lot of money. But I started asking myself, am I actually a good person? And the answer, unfortunately, was no. I was becoming a bad person. I was becoming a person who was too focused on things that didn't actually matter. Now, that realization sort of forced me to reckon with the relevance of the Christian gospel as an antidote to what was going on in my own life. But I do think that we've, we've, as a a Christian community have got to figure out why is it that so many of our 19, 20, 20, 21 year old kids, they go off to college or, you know, some of them go into the workforce,

they go to the military like I did, and they lose their faith. And that is, to your point, it's such a critical moment. Like if you make it to 22, 23, and you are a person who's spiritually formed, who's got a good faith community, there's a good chance. That's the rest of your life. And if you make it to 23 and you've discarded your faith, there's a very good chance. That's the rest of your life too. So I'm not saying I got all the answers, certainly not in the book, not in my own life. But that to me is a very important part for us to focus on, is how to keep people from a 16-year-old Christian to a 23-year-old non-Christian. How can we do better at keeping more people? Well, I mean, I grew up, I grew up in church. I went to a private Christian school,

and I didn't even become a Christian until 17. And I had actually had, this, if I'm being honest, hatred, bitterness towards God because of hypocrisy. I'd seen literally people in our community telling us to do one thing and then they would do the total opposite. There was a pastor in our kind of community that cheated on his wife and stole money from the church that he was serving at. Ran. You're just kind of like, what the heck?

Yeah, absolutely. And I understand that's not every, you know, not every apple is bad. But, you know, you see that stuff. And then you blame God for suffering. Of course. And then you hear, you have a dedicated Bible class every year. and it's just kind of like, well, Jesus is just some, you know, hippie guy on my quizzes every now and then, you know. And so, so to go from that to, you know, like, I had an encounter with Jesus and Waffle House. That's how I gave my life to Jesus. I know, yeah. And the Promise Land. That's awesome. You like Waffle House? I was in Waffle House on Saturday morning. I mean, it's the best. Isn't it crazy? All-Star special. Of course. Got to go with the All-Star, but it's crazy. I think that's Ash Browns. Double Hash-Browns. That's literally my order. And then scrambled eggs with cheese?

I actually do fried eggs. Okay. I'm another medium guy. Yeah. I mean, it's just, I feel like that's the one food chain that we can allow them not to pass the health code because it makes the food better, you know? Well, okay. So by the way, Waffle House, it's going to be an infomercial for Waffle House. Like, people understate how healthy Waffle House is compared to what else is out there.

Now, people are like, oh, it's greasy diner food. Okay, think about this. So when I first got, like, fell in love with Waffle House, I was like the second or third grade. Yeah. And, you know, my family, we'd drive a lot from Ohio to Kentucky because we had a lot of family in Kentucky. And Waffle House was always like the place that we stopped.

It was cheap. It was quick. It was reasonably healthy, you know, so long as you made the right choices. I think of bacon and eggs, that stuff, that's good for you. But when I really like sort of realized how good Waffle House was, is so I started dating my wife. We were in law school together. She's a vegetarian, which, like, I didn't even know what that meant.

I was like, wait a second. So you only eat bacon on Sundays? She's like, no, no, I don't eat bacon at all. Like, whoa, how do you survive? But she and I would, we'd love to take road trips together. Like we took a road trip to Colorado and back. And we took a road trip to California and back. And I realized, like, for a vegetarian, when you're on the road,

there are basically two good restaurants on the highway restop, Taco Bell and Waffle House. And she actually had a preference for Waffle House because you could actually sit down. It was made to order. And it's like the irony of ironies that Waffle House, which we think of this like southern, greasy restaurant, is actually like my Indian American vegetarian girlfriend taught me to fall in love with Waffle House because it was actually a solid nutritious meal on the road. That's how you knew she was your wife. Yeah. And that's that moment. Yeah.

That is that exact moment, you know. I fell in love with Waffle House and I fell in love with her. And I promise I'm not getting paid by Waffle House. And I don't think you are either. Me either. This is just genuine love. Pure love. Yeah.

And that's what makes it better. You know, the glass of the door is missing. There's plywood on the door. There's a motorcycle on fire. It's 11 o'clock at night. Something crazy is going down. But you feel at home. There's so much chaos going on.

You feel at home. And shout out a Waffle House, man. You know, that's one of the ways that people measure how bad in natural disasters. Have you ever heard this? No. Okay. So if there's flooding, if there's a power out of fire.

Like, if a Waffle House closes, that's how we know this is. Doomsday's having you better get in the bunker. It's going down. The zombies are coming or nuclear war or something. Literally, we had, I remember we had the worst snowstorm in like fourth grade or fifth grade and the Waffle House didn't close. They stayed open. No employees. You could go in there cook food, leave money on the counter and leave. They wouldn't close to the restaurant. Like that is awesome. That is awesome. It brings families together. Absolutely. Absolutely. Incredible. Absolutely. But you said you were from Ohio.

I know I had a Christian background. Were you raised with a Christian background at all? Yeah. So I was raised in Christian family. But not a like, we didn't go to church a lot. And so the way that I encountered God growing up was one primarily through my grandmother. I called her Mamaw. She raised me because my mom struggled with addiction for a big part of my early life.

And Mamal was a very devout Christian. Would read the Bible multiple times per day, talk about Jesus, pray multiple times per day. But we didn't go to church very often. And so if we did go to church, you know, it was once a month. It was once every other month. But we would watch a lot of TBN, Paul and Jan Crouch, 700 Club. We'd watch Billy Graham, you know, revival meetings. And that was how I mostly encountered God growing up.

And I do realize that, like, one of the downsides of that is that because I, my faith was so attached to her. when she died, I kind of lost my faith. And again, I talk about I'm a 19, 20, 21. My grandmother dies when I'm 20 years old. And I went from being a devout Christian to an atheist in like a year. Wow. And that, in hindsight, not having my own relationship, not having my own spiritual formation,

having it so attached to one person, I think is one of the reasons why things didn't work out. And it's certainly like hypocrisy, I feel like I was lucky where a lot of the Christian leaders I encountered were very good people. They actually, you know, nobody's perfect, but everybody kept the teaching pretty well. But you definitely saw some hypocrisy. And that, obviously, that is something that can alienate you from God. One of the things that sort of brought me back to my faith that I found, like, very profound about the Christian faith is, okay, so, you know, Jesus comes into your heart.

And I think, you know, I believe that you can be formed by grace. Sometimes for some people, that's very quick. But for most people, that's a process. It takes a long time. Grace is constantly working on people. One of my foundational Christian beliefs. And one thing that I think is very compelling about the Bible is if you think about it, so many of the great church fathers are people who are quite literally awful hypocrites.

King David was a murderer and adulterer. He, like, you know, lusted after. I believe it was like his buddy's wife. So he had his buddy killed. Yeah, crazy. And this is like one of the, and, you know, okay, so Paul was quite literally persecuting, killing Christians, encounters God on the road to Damascus. And one of the things the Christian faith says is we are going to take these incredibly

broken, screwed up, sinful people. And this is how God, this is the medium by which God chooses to reveal himself to the rest of humanity. And I think some people look at that and say, well, why doesn't God choose to reveal himself through perfect people? But I think what I find very profound about this is because there are no perfect people and we are profoundly broken. And Christianity makes a very unique claim for itself. It makes a claim that God is going to work through broken people. Yeah. And he's going to perfect those broken people over a process of grace, which of course takes time. And I think that that acceptance, that recognition that, yeah, a lot of people are hypocrites,

and that is how God is going to work through people, sometimes some very hypocritical and sinful people. I actually think that's a very profound understanding of human nature, and it would be very easy for the Bible. And frankly, you know, in some ways, in some ways, it would be more compelling if the Bible was all about perfect people who were instantly transformed by God and did everything that God told them to do.

But that's not how people really are. And I think it's interesting that, that the Bible makes an argument about human nature that is actually true, which is if you're going to reveal yourself to humanity through other humans, you're going to have to work with one obvious exception through some very imperfect people. Two and five Canadians will hear the words, you have cancer. That's why every step and dollar raised matters. On September 19th, join thousands in Toronto for the Princess Margaret Cancer Foundation walk.

Challenge yourself, friends, and family to walk. 21 kilometers in support of life-saving research. Together, we can carry the fire and help create a world free from the fear of cancer. Register today at pmcfwalk.ca.ca. Don't you wish you could just hit skip on the worst parts of your life? You know, the same way you can skip an ad? I get it. I'm Siaya and I live in Ice Cove.

I've made some questionable decisions that didn't end up the way I planned. And today I'm still figuring it out. somehow things usually get worse before they get better. Apparently, that's how I roll. So bundle up and come along for the bumpy ride. Don't miss the new season of North of North starting September 8th on CBC Gem. Have you ever read Confessions by San Augustine?

I have. I mean, that book is awesome because he's just like, it feels like you're reading every 20-year-old's personal journal. Absolutely. You know? But it is true. When I was baptized, I chose as my baptismal name, San Augustine. because that book was so profoundly.

Well, it's just encouraging and refreshing. Like one of the things that I've noticed immediately just from the quick interactions and getting to sit down is your humility, but your sincerity. You know, it's easy to talk to someone that's just being honest. You know what I mean?

It's like this. You know, I think that is true why we connect so much to a King David, which he is such an interesting case because you would think you wouldn't forget the guy that slept with his buddy's wife and then killed him, but he's known as a man after God's own heart.

heart, which is insane to think about. And that gives me hope, too, for my story, knowing, I mean, I was just telling one of the guys earlier, you know, I know mistakes I've made that no one knows that I've made. And that makes me feel like the most broken human being on the planet. So when Jesus came into my life, I'm like, he sure as heck can do it for anyone else, because I know the crap I've done. Nobody else knows. Well, a buddy of mine made this observation. I'm still working on him. He's not a Christian yet, but he'll get there eventually. But, you know, he said, well, look, when you read the Bible, you have all these people who have these amazing encounters with Christ. And he's like, so Peter literally sees the guy walk on water.

He goes out to meet him. He starts drowning and Jesus rescues him. He sees the guy get nailed to the cross. And a few days later, he's walking around, walk in, talking, hanging out with his buddies. And he's like, I feel like if I could have that sort of experience with Jesus, that person to person face-to-face experience with Christ, then I would be a Christian. it'd be easy. And I'm like, but dude, that's not human nature. And in fact, the story of Peter, if you think about it, is he sees Jesus walk on water and then he denies him three times. Yeah. Right. Like it's a very fascinating. The Bible is implicitly a super fascinating, but I also think a very true argument about human nature. Peter literally saw God himself manifested in the flesh,

walk on water, and he's still denied him three times. Like there's something about human nature the Bible was getting at that I think is very, very true. And that's what I tell to anybody who's like, well, I just haven't encountered God in the right way. I say, number one, you know, I'm a strong believer that God always encounters people in the way that they need to be encountered. So you just got to keep your eyes open. You had, as I understand it, a prayer and Waffle House, you were going to commit suicide.

Yep, right? Yep. And, you know, that's how you encountered God. For me, it was, there was like a yearning. There was a recognition that I was flawed and that I had some real problems. And there was a yearning to do better and a recognition that God was lighting the pathway to be a better human being. And then that led me to all of the other Christian truths that, of course, we believe in. I just, I'm a big believer that everybody finds God in their own way and encounters God, on their own way, but you've got to keep an open mind. Like, don't be the guy who when God is speaking to you, you've got your hands over yours. Yeah, it's interesting that like, there's, there's like time

and time again. I think Jesus feeds the 5,000 and then like a couple chapters later, they come back. Like, yo, give us another meal. Are you guys insane? Like, all you guys just want food. You don't want me. And it's, but then it's like, I do that all the time. You know, subconsciously, you do it all the time. 100%. That battle. Yeah, you feel like so grateful. You have a moment where a prayer is answered or, you know, you feel the presence of God, and you feel so grateful. And literally two days later, you're like, pissed off about something else. It's like, oh, God, help me out about this thing.

That's human nature. Yeah, yeah. There's like a story. So when Moses sets like the Israelites free, God, like, lets them basically pillage Egypt and they get all this gold. Yep. And then they get out. And Moses like, all right, I'm going to go on top of this mountain and meet God. I'll be right back.

And they go up. And the gold that God literally gave them, they're like, he's taken too long. Aaron, build us a golden calf. After they've worshipped 500 golden calves and been in slavery multiple times, you would think after the third golden calf, they'd be sick and tired of it. Well, and that's another good example of just the craziness of human nature is, oh, you guys were brought out of slavery. You literally saw Moses part the Red Sea.

And what, like three weeks later, you guys are worshipping the golden calf. It's pretty wild if you think about it. If you think about it, it's pretty wild, but it's true to how human beings actually are. We're never quite satisfied. We're always a little needy. And, you know, there is no, like what I always try to remind myself, both for my own sake, but also for my kids. There's no, like, light switch where the light switch goes on and that's it. Okay.

For everybody else, you have to keep on flipping the light switch back on because, you know, gravity. nature, the troubles of the world are constantly trying to flip it off. Hey, quick pause. Most people never go deeper in their Bible because they don't know where to start. It feels like you need seminary just to get past the surface so you don't even try. That's actually what our sponsor, Logos, fixes. And if you've never heard of it, it's not just another Bible app. It's a full study library. Commentaries, original languages, the voices of the church, all in one place and actually easy to use.

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Start your exclusive 60-day free trial and grab the bundle at logos.com slash Bryce. That's logos.com slash Bryce. Links in the description. All right, back to the episode. So I want to know about this because you've talked before in the past about like struggling with your temper and stuff like that, which is so wild to think about because you're such a gentle human and and really kind. So like what was that like navigating? I'm the same way. I get frustrated, you know, especially driving in L.A. Like it's, it's genuinely like, we'll test your character. Seriously. We'll test your character. What was that journey like navigating that struggle? Like, did you go to therapy or was it just community, church? Like, what helped you?

Yeah, I mean, so I did go to therapy once or twice. I did, I just found talking to a stranger about my feelings. One, the feeling of wallowing in it. I didn't like that. And two, it just was an uncomfortable experience for me. So it was definitely something I just had to work on, you know, with myself, my friends, you know, spiritual leaders, my wife. I mean, and I'd say like it's not, it's a constant battle, right? I mean, I would say the, the way in which, like, you know, I have four kids. And every parent will tell you, sometimes kids just do things. It's like, what is going on. I mean, literally last night, we had a dinner here with some foreign heads of state.

We're talking about very important international problems. And my six-year-old, who's just started his first day at school, he comes downstairs. I made, I've run a request. I was like, buddy, I have all these people here for dinner. Just be good tonight. No screaming. So he comes down, stands right there. And then your audience can't see it.

But on the other side is the dining room where I'm with like four foreign dignitaries. and just start screaming at his mom up the stairs and says, I'm not going to go to bed and I'm not, and I'm just, you know, in my heart, I'm like, oh my God, this is so frustrating, right? So it's a constant struggle. But last night, you know, I said a little bit like, Lord, help me handle this with patience.

I put my napkin down. I said, guys, give me 30 seconds, duty calls. I walked over and had a rational conversation with him. But, I mean, people are imperfect, right? Yeah. Sometimes I'll walk over. to be like, get your butt upstairs. And, you know, like, that's the nature of being a parent is sometimes you're perfect or not

perfect. Sometimes you do the right thing. Sometimes you don't do the right thing. Sure. And for me, I would say where I felt like my temper was the worst is when I started dating Usha, and I grew up, like, in a pretty rough household, a little bit of abuse, but just a lot of chaos. And so, like, she grew up, very middle class, immigrant family, you know, racking. professional discussions over disagreements. That's not how we did it in my family. We would fight and yell and holler and that's how we did things. And so just the natural inclination whenever we had a disagreement, either to just kind of give her the stiff arm and walk out and be like, I'm not dealing with this right now or to like want to fight and yell. Those, that, that sort of instinct is something that I had to deal with. And again, it's not for me, it wasn't the light went on. It was a constant process of understanding for me,

why is it that my instinct is fight or flight? Like how did the way that I grow up actually influence me in a bad way? And then most importantly, just saying little prayers and saying like, all right, God, what do you want me to do in this moment? And that process, again, I think through grace and through some will and willpower,

you just, for me at least, you just slowly gets better and better. But it's, again, like I said yesterday, it was a struggle. I did good yesterday. I'm sure I'll do bad tomorrow. Yeah. I mean, I don't have kids yet. I got,

I got dogs and cat and, you know, all this stuff. So I feel like, you know, I'm yelling at my Doberman, not to eat my other dog's food and, you know, all the other stuff. So maybe, maybe one day I'll, I want the kids. Dogs are good training for kids, man. I feel like we're getting prepared, you know,

I want to build a dynasty. Yeah. Do you ever just get that? I mean, you have four kids. Absolutely. I mean, you're just like, man, I want to build a dynasty. And, you know, go, I think that's,

there's like that, that man in me that's like, yeah, I'm trying to know. You know, you want to know that the future, like you've got a stake in the future and that long after I'm gone, there's going to be little vances running around, making their mark on the world. That fills me with like a deep sense of satisfaction. So absolutely. So you, I want to know what the specific moment was for you that kind of gave you that return to faith. Because I mean, you, I mean, your mom struggled with addiction, which is 11 years sober, right? 11 years sober. Which is a, I've had friends that have lost her lives to, you know, overdose and stuff like that.

So I think that's incredible. Sure. What was the moment just experiencing your life, the ups and downs that was like, I'm coming back to. Yeah. You know, it's hard to say, it's hard to pinpoint a particular moment because for me, again, it really was a process. It was, you know, I want to be a better man. I think Christianity is a pathway to being a better man.

But how do I want to engage in my faith? I'd gotten out of practice with prayer. found that even when I started to think about or at least be curious about the Christian faith, I would sort of sit down and pray and I'd kind of forgotten how to. Like I just lost that vocabulary for talking about God in that way or talking to God in that way. But one thing, I mean, again, I think we all have our unique virtues and vices. And I think one of the vices that I have is that I can tend to be a little negative about certain things or tend to be pessimistic. Right.

I can be a glass half empty kind of guy. So we were actually on a vacation with my nine-year-old, who I think you just heard scream upstairs. He's playing with his sister. He was maybe one years old. And we were at one of these old ancient churches we were in France. And my wife had gone to the bathroom. So like, Ushah's gone.

It's just me and the baby. He's asleep. So I just feel completely alone in this massive church. And then two things happen. So one, I looked up at the stained glass window and it's like there was sort of, it was a little dusty. And you could see the light shining directly from the stained glass window to the altar in a way that just it felt again like God was speaking to me. And I just, I felt the presence of God. I felt like he was speaking to me.

And that was very, very profound to me. But I still had this kind of like pessimism. I was like, look at this beautiful church and nobody's here. It's empty. You know, this is the sort of place that would be full all the time, at least with people praying. I have this feeling that, like, Christianity might be true, but it's on the decline, and nobody really takes this seriously anymore.

And I'm the only person who's even in this church. And, you know, I kind of have this, like, glass half-empty moment. Yeah. And then I sort of heard somebody in the corner of the church, and I saw there was a woman who was just kneeling quietly and praying. and I kind of have this moment where it hit me in the face like, well, you're not alone, and maybe you should stop being so negative. And the fact that there's even one person here is enough of a foundation for God to build on.

And that feeling of like, you know, it's like when somebody proves you wrong, it can sometimes it takes a little bit more than if you were right from the beginning. And so that pessimism, nobody's here combined with, oh, that person's right there. I just didn't see her. That had a very transformational effect on me. And I actually left that church. And I was like, all right, I'm getting baptized. We're going to take this more seriously.

And I got home and that's what I did. That's amazing. Every guess that we have on, I love to ask this question. On a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being absolutely certain, one being not certain at all. How confident are you that you'd go to heaven? Oh, man. That is a tough question. it's high, but it's not 10, right?

I mean, it's, it's a seven or it's an eight. Like, I'm always one of these people who is always going to have little doubts. And, like, if you'd asked me that question a year ago, probably was like a five or a six. Wow. Wait, why the change, like five or six and now seven or eight? Because I'd say the difference is, and again, all respect to God. but, you know, I still occasionally have doubts like, is this actually real? Yeah.

Right? And, you know, maybe that's sort of where I come. So it's not, like, if it's real, I feel confident that I've done the things necessary or more importantly, that I have followed what God has told me to do, believe in Jesus Christ. I believe he's my savior. I try to do the things that are, you know, sort of. of necessary to walk the path of faith. And I think that eventually leads to heaven. But I'm not 100% certain. And I'm always going to be one of those people who has little

doubts about it. That's interesting that you mark yourself as an eight because of a doubt. Because all your people typically, you know, they land on the spectrum of seven or six or whatever. And they say, well, well, because like I try to do enough. I mean, I've done some wrong stuff. So I'm like a seven, right? But you're just like, well, I'm an eight, but I have doubts. Whereas I'm like, well, I feel like doubts are normal. I talk about Jesus every day. And I'm like, I struggle to read my Bible sometimes. I doubt.

I have a hard time praying. I'm learning to be, you know, a good husband still and a good friend and a good leader. But I like asking that question because there's a pastor friend of mine who asked that. I was at a time he was at a pastor friend. But now he's a friend of mine. I was at a conference he was preaching at. He asked the crowd. And I was like sitting there and I was like, I think I'm a six.

It's a really good question. And what's your answer? Now I would say 10. But not out of it, not out of an ego, but because of what he said, it clicked for me. Because I said a six because I'm like, I haven't, you know, I've done some bad stuff. And he looked at the crowd and said, if you're like a, you know, anything but a 10, do you think Jesus only died for 60% of your junk? And I was like sitting there and I was like, well, it's a good point. Like, no, I believe that.

That's a powerful comment. Yeah. Then he gave this like analogy that if like if I gave you two tickets courtside to the Lakers game and you scan the tickets in, and you went in and you get down, the security's going to stop you and be like, well, maybe not you. They might bring you in there with the Secret Service. But, you know, the security stops you and they say,

why am I going to let you in? You're going to say, well, I have a ticket. And the guy would be like, well, where did you get those tickets? And you'd be like, well, Bryce gave them to me. They were a gift. And I just, I really loved that phrasing because even now, and I asked myself that question so much, just kind of like trying to re-center my heart of going,

like, God, I don't even want to have the slightest idea, even if it's a like a false humility on my end where I'm like, but God, like I haven't done enough for you where he's like, well, you know, I like I like I'm your ticket and then that stuff kind of follows. I think that's a right attitude. That's, you know, it's a fun question. Two and five Canadians will hear the words you have cancer. That's why every step and dollar raised matters.

On September 19th, join thousands in Toronto for the Princess Margaret Canaan, Cancer Foundation Walk. Challenge yourself, friends, and family to walk 21 kilometers in support of life-saving research. Together, we can carry the fire and help create a world free from the fear of cancer. Register today at pmcf walk.ca.ca. Going on vacation? We're here for it. With kids who turned the backseat into a courtroom drama over whose tablet is louder,

whose charger is faster, and while watching the same cartoon form. For the hundredth time is a human right. Yep, we totally have vehicles to handle that. Because whether it's a road trip or a business trip, where your flight's delayed, your phone's at 2% and your dinner is whatever is open. Yeah, here for that too. Enterprise.

We're here for it. Yeah, like, obviously, it's not about what we've done to deserve it. I think that's very important. Like, Jesus Christ was the, is God's sacrifice? he is the person who forgives sins. That's very important. I just, you know, there's, you're right, there's a certain humility in the face of doubt where,

you're like, I feel quite confident that no other religions are true. I've thought about a lot of other face, a lot of other religions. But, you know, there's always that question where it's like, do you go to, you know, do you take your last breath and nothing is on the other side? And that's my question. and again, I feel more confident today that God exists than I have probably at any other point in my life. But I just try to have some humility about what I don't know.

And I think that's why I say an 8 out of 10. But you're right. It's not about us. It's ultimately about him. Yeah, I've always just loved that question. It's such a fun one. It's a fascinating question. And it's fun to ask like the non-believers that we talk to.

Yeah. You know, because they don't understand that aspect of the gospel. Whereas like you and I can see here and go, well, yeah, like he paid the the prize. They're like, yeah, but Jesus, like, why don't I need Jesus? You know, I'm like a four and you know what I mean? They might say that. It's like, well, you know, it's, it's always fun to gauge. So I got to ask this, you met Pope Francis on Easter. Yep. And then the very next day he passed away. That's right. I mean, what was that experience like? That was wild man. So, um, like, there's a little bit of background there because he was sick at the time. Yeah.

But, you know, I was in town. We actually mainly were in town because we were taking an official visit to go to India. And you can't fly directly to India. And we were going over Easter weekend. And so I was like, well, you know, like what's a good halfway place to stop where we can sort of do some other official business just to break up the flight? And we sort of settled on Rome. We have a, you know, a good friend there, the Italian prime minister and some things to work. on. We were sort of very focused on a couple of international issues there that the Italians

were helping us with. So we decided to stop there. And then, oh, great, you're in Rome over Easter Sunday. What a cool place to be. So I was actually at the Vatican getting a tour of the Vatican, I believe, on Saturday. And I sort of assumed that I wouldn't see the Pope. But there was, there was a weird diplomatic ritual going on where it's almost like they didn't want me to feel insulted because the Pope wouldn't see me. And I'm like, well, guys, the Pope is very sick. I don't, like, I'm, anybody knows me. I'm just not very formal about this stuff. Like, my attitude is, oh, if the Pope has a stomachache, fine, I'll see him the next time. Like, I'm not, I just, I don't get weird about these diplomatic niceties. But a bishop pulled me aside on Saturday

and basically said, hey, like, the Pope really wants to say hello. We don't know exactly when it's going to be. But if you would, just like keep your phone on. you and we'll find a time. And so anyway, the next day is Easter Sunday. And I'm getting ready with the kids. I think we're having breakfast. And I get a text message from that bishop basically says, hey, the Pope would like to see you. And then my staff has to figure out all the stuff about moving me in Secret Service. So anyway, I go and see them. And one, it was very interesting because one of my staff members is very devout Catholic. And I'm very devout Catholic, but a lifelong Catholic. and meets the Pope and starts crying.

Wow. And I didn't have that same, you know, I just, the emotional connection to the Pope was different, I think partially because I'm relatively new to the faith. But, you know, he was a very sweet man. He was very kind. You know, there were some conservative Christians and some conservative Catholics,

and I'm obviously a conservative Christian who didn't like certain things that Pope Francis did or said. I always just thought he was an interesting guy. and even when I disagreed with him, I kind of, the things that I disagreed with him on, I thought were fascinating. And anyway, we met, we talked for a little bit. He told me that he prayed for me and the children. He gave the kids these like really, really sweet Easter presents.

We still have, you know, we still have them upstairs in this house. And then I said, I said goodbye. I told him I prayed for him every day, which I did. And, yeah, we landed in India and did sort of a rival ceremony. and then my staff told me that he had passed away. Wow. Yeah. Wild.

Do you feel like that was one of those, I don't know, another God coincidence that you got to meet him right before? I do. I don't know what it means. Yeah. Me, I would know what it means. Yeah. I don't have like a lot about this.

You know, I'm one of the last people to meet the Pope. And then the new Pope comes, obviously, an American, an American pope. I thought a lot about like how to interpret it or what the meaning. is. But sometimes you don't have to have all the right answers. God is just encouraging you to ask the right questions. And I've thought a lot about that. And what's interesting is my kids were very affected by it. Now, they had met the Pope. They obviously knew that he gave them Easter presents, some chocolate eggs. They were very excited about. But they were very affected by it. And it's interesting. I think it's the first time in particular, one of my kids, the first time I had ever

seen him actually genuinely sad about hearing somebody that had died was Pope Francis. Wow. Why do you think that was? I think it's a combination of one, he felt personally affected by it because he was there while it was happening. And two, it's just an age thing. Like when you tell, I mean, I think every kid develops differently, but when you tell a three or four year old that somebody has passed away, their kind of reaction is they'd only even fully understand it. Yeah. And It's, in my experience, it's when there's six or seven when it really hits. And for this, for this kid, it was just the right developmental stage. I want to know what you think about the end times.

Yeah. And, you know, just because you get a perspective, I mean, you're the vice president of the United States. You know, you know a lot that's going on more than people do. What do you think about the end times? Do you think that we're here? Do you think it's common? I have for my entire life been fascinated by in times prophecy and theology. So the first Bible that I ever got was actually the John Hagee prophecy study Bible.

I got this when I was probably 10 or 11 years old. And this is like the late 90s, early 2000s. There was a lot of focus in sort of the church on in times. I would say there's less now, I feel like. Do you really feel that way? Oh, man. I felt like when I was when I was like 14, 15, 15, it was almost the only thing.

Like the left behind stuff? Left behind stuff was huge. Well, now it's happening again. There was a young guy last year that was like September this date, Christ is going to return. We're all going to get raptured. So he literally vlogged

like him selling his car and all those belongings. And then that day came and then the next day came. And then he apologized and repented. And I was like, wow, great. Two weeks later, he started again. I was like, you've got to be kidding me right now. How do you have you messed? I have a fall of this guy.

But I had a buddy of mine. So I went to the military out of high school. I graduated high school in 2003. And I had a really good buddy who was convinced that the rapture was happening in the fall of 2007. And I don't know why that was his time. He's like the rapture going to have in fall in 2007. So we both graduate high school in 2003. He goes to Ohio State.

I go to the Marine Corps. And this dude has so much credit card debt. I get out of the Marine Corps in 2007. And I'm about to start at Ohio State. and he's just about to graduate and he's got so much credit card debt. He's like, dude, the rapture's coming. I hope he's been on that Dave Ramsey

beans and rice because he might... Since then he's been on the Dave Ramsey beans and rice diet. So, anyway, it felt like a much... Maybe it's just I'm older, but it felt like a bigger thing. I mean, my view on it is... So one, do I think that we're in the end times? I don't know. and I think that it's probably bad for me spiritually to focus too much on it

because there are like things you got to do. I got to be good to my wife. I got to be good to my kids. I have to be, you know, as good of a leader as I can for the United States of America. And so I think that focusing, well, I'm fascinated by it. I think focusing on it is too much can be very bad. I think that there are like things about the world that make me feel like, not shocked if the Antichrist was walking among us.

But again, I try not to focus too much on it. I think that, you know, I made life as living as an investor in Silicon Valley sort of right before the AI boom really started. I sort of got into politics. And, you know, there are things that some of the AI companies you see happening where you feel like there is some really, really weird spiritual dark energy. So like, have you heard this? like one of the companies, you know, that develops these models, when they get rid of one model

and announce a new model, they actually hold a burial ceremony for the old model. And like the employees apparently will cry. What the heck? Yeah. Yeah, that's odd. That makes me feel very, that's really weird. That makes me feel very uncomfortable. And there's some, some dark spiritual things going on there.

I mean, people have like AI romantic partners now. People are they. It's like watching my strange addiction. again, you know, we're like someone's in a relationship with their car. Yeah. You know, but it's like, it's modified into, you know, an AI robot. A buddy told me that his, his wife was using, like, chat GPT, or maybe it was one of the other ones, but was using that as like a marital counselor.

And then sort of had this moment of realization that, like, this is the worst marital counselor ever because it just tells me that I'm right all the time. Yeah. Right? There's no real human feedback. It sort of short circuits that social part of our brain. where we respond to other people's wants and needs and just completely. Like, I think that's kind of satanic.

Yeah. When you, like, completely divorce the human from the social element that God made us for. For sure. I think that's very, I think it's very bad. So, I, you know, so anyway, I'm fascinated by it, but I try not to spend too much time on it. And I'm, you know, there are, there are also, obviously, there, this is one of the areas where different, you know, like Southern Baptists might look at it a little differently than Pentecostals who might look at it differently from Methodists who might look at it differently from Catholics. And one of the things that I think

that Catholics are very focused on that I think is very good for me is this idea that we are, we don't know when God is coming, but we are commanded to try to as much as possible try to make the world the kind of world that God wants it to be. Right. So, and And what I mean is where people are encouraged and able to live more virtuous lives, where husbands are able to take care of wives and vice versa and families are thriving. And, you know, people are sort of building a life not talking to a chat bot, but they're building a life talking to their friends and their family. So I tend to think like the, while I wouldn't be shocked if we are living in the end times, what I'm trying to focus on is doing as much of God's

work as possible right now. And if that leads to the end times, okay. And if that leads to, you know, us building a better world that thrives and survives for a very long time after I'm gone, that's great too. I just think you've got to kind of try to have an attitude of the end times may be coming. In fact, they are coming. It's just a question of whether they're coming thousands of years down the road or a few months down the road. And we've got a lot of work to do right now. I got to try to do the work I can right now. I got to talk to you about this because when I saw this online,

I sat on it because I saw a ton of videos about it. So obviously during the Red Cross Day, President Trump tweeted that AI photo of him. I don't know if you know what I'm talking about. Yeah, yeah, of course. And I'm a Christian. Yep. I saw the photo.

It made me upset. I'm not going to lie. It made me upset. My personal opinion, I don't know how you think you're a doctor. I don't know how he thought he was doctor in the phone. I mean, he was white robe with a red sash on it, you know.

And that makes me upset as a Christian. Like as someone, and let me say this. Like, I have so much respect for all of our leaders. Sure. I do. Hands down. I understand it's difficult. I appreciate our military, everything in between.

But like when I see something like that, it rubs me the wrong way as a Christian. I mean, what do you think about that? So I hear you. And I know that the president didn't mean any offense. Obviously, he loves Christian. and politically, like, as built, I think it's done a lot of good for religious liberty and certainly didn't mean anything by it.

I mean, I'm biased because I see this from the inside. So it's like, did Donald Trump meant to post a meme of himself as God? No. I just, because I saw it happen in real time. Here's what happens. Like, I'll just give you the sort of the background is the president has a good sense of humor. He posts a lot of stuff.

and the way that he gets this, like he doesn't sit on social media himself. He's way too busy. What happens is people will bring him stuff and say, hey, hey, look, isn't this funny? And then sometimes he'll, like, chuckle at it. And sometimes if he really thinks it's funny,

he'll have somebody post it. And that's exactly what happened here. If somebody brought him something, he saw it, he said, oh, that's funny. He put it on his truth. He did not meant to, like, mock or mimic God. That's just not who he is.

And then, like, he saw people responded negatively to it. He took it down. I just, like, I understand what you're saying, but I really don't think the president meant anything by it. And I think that him taking it down was him sort of saying, you know what, this didn't come across the right way. So let's go in the direction. Well, I did appreciate that. I did appreciate that. And I think it definitely takes, I was just talking to some friends about this in general the other day. Like, it takes a lot. Because we were talking about how, this is actually last night, we were talking about how just in general, right? If we're sitting down with a non-believer in general,

And we're having like a podcast conversation. But to me, it's like one on one because I'm like, oh, I care about their soul. They have this front up where they, if they're not a believer and they feel like that they're in the wrong, they may have this wall up where they just like can't be wrong if that makes sense. That's right. Yeah. I know exactly. So when he took it down, I like, I appreciated it. But yeah, I was just curious. I wanted to know what your thoughts were on that. Yeah. Yeah. Now I'm like, I don't even have Instagram on my phone. So I'm kind of like in that. I tried to take a break from social media a little bit. I actually started during Lent last year.

I took a break from social media. But I just found that it was like actually made me much happier. And so I haven't really gone back to it fully. I need to, frankly, because just so much of our work and our life is done on social media. But no. And the president, like, genuinely, it's interesting. He is so fascinated by technology and so fascinated by AI. And so like when people bring him these memes of, oh, look at what this building could

look like, oh, you know, here's, here's you hanging out with like Abraham Lincoln and, you know, Mousay Tong. He'll be like, oh, that's like a, look, it actually looks like a photo of me. So it's, it's, I do think that people sort of, there's an, there's an interesting dynamic where the media tends to exacerbate the division by treating things that the president does as humorous and saying this is him being serious or this is him pretending. to be Jesus or whatever the case may be. And I think in reality, the president is just he's, he's one of these guys who, he's a backslapper, he's a bit of a ballbuster for those of us who work with him.

And he just likes to have a good time. And I think that if people appreciated his humor, they would recognize he's not trying to offend people. He's trying to keep things light. Yeah, I, uh, two and five Canadians will hear the words, you have cancer. That's why every step and dollar raised matters. On September 19th, join thousands in Toronto for the Princess Margaret Cancer Foundation Walk. Challenge yourself, friends, and family to walk 21 kilometers in support of life-saving research.

Together, we can carry the fire and help create a world free from the fear of cancer. Register today at pmcfwalk.ca.com.com. Do you think because he's so disconnected from AI, he'd be the type of guy where if you brought him an AI photo, he'd think it was real? Like, wonder where it was taken? No, you know. So he actually goes, and it's interesting because I thought he goes in the exact opposite direction or he just assumes everything is fake. Okay.

Like it has to be like double or triple verified. It is actually genuinely, I saw a video of a panther coming through a living room window and I thought it was a real and it was an AI video. It was really a panther like crashing through that window right there, boom and like coming and attack in this guy in the room. I mean, there was a video that was circulating on X a couple of years ago where it's like this woman jumps off a diving board, and it's a very large person, person who clearly has some weight problems to put it diplomatically,

and goes into the pool, and then, like, the whole, like, building collapses. And, like, my initial reaction was like, oh, my God, that must have been a very poorly constructed building. And then I realize, oh, I'm an idiot. This is clearly fake. You felt for the AI? Even I fall in. Even if just for a few seconds.

So I'm kind of where the president is now, which is like, if somebody's, brings me something. My automatic assumption is that it's BS. Like, oh, what was it recently where somebody brought it to me? Oh, it was a photo. So Carolyn Levitt, who's the White House of Breast Secretary, she's leaving

the White House soon, and Ushah, and then Stephen Miller, who's our, like, Homeland Security, Deputy Chief of Staff, very good guy, his wife, they all had babies in like the past couple of months. Yeah. Okay. So somebody posts a photo of Carolyn

Usha and Katie with the three babies. And I'm like, oh, that's a really cute photo. And then I'm like, wait a second. Has Usha even seen Carolyn and Katie since like she's had baby Alec? And the answer is no, it was totally fake AI photo. So you just, man, like what's going to happen and it's going to take us a little while to get there? Is people just have to assume that everything is fake until they verify it. I mean, my, this is hysterical.

So like six months ago, a year ago, I love my mom. Mom, I love you. But she sends me some like TikTok video with same AI stuff in it. And it's about how like J.D. and Usha are having marital problems. Okay. And so she sends me this video and she's like, hey, honey, I just saw this on TikTok. Like, you know, what's going on? I thought everything was great.

Like you and Usha seemed really happy the last time I saw you. And I was like, mom, this is fake. This is like somebody put something. on the internet. And you can't just assume that everything on the internet is true. I mean, my mom, like, again, God love her, but she has made many Nigerian princes many thousands of dollars. I mean, she's one of these people who is the Facebook Sam. There is an entire Nigerian Camelot dynasty that's being funded by my mom's Social Security. Eight accounts, eight accounts, same profile picture, different names. Yeah, yeah. I, uh, so we just got to anybody out there,

you just got to be careful about the AI stuff. My, my, my, my grandma. mom will sometimes send me videos. Look, this person made a video about you. And it's like a hate video. And I'm like, did you even watch the video? Like in the thumbnail, I've got like devil horns in the thumbnail. Exactly. And like, you know, but you know, she's like trying to be like all sweet.

But I totally understand. That's hilarious. We appreciate you. Thank you for your time. I'd love to pray for you. Please. Thank you. Yeah, absolutely.

Jesus, thank you so much for today. God, thank you for Vice President Vance and just our conversation. God, thank you for his humility and his sincerity. Lord, Jesus, we just ask for continued. wisdom and guidance and leadership. We just thank you for the ways that he's serving our country, Lord. God, that we just ask that you continue to guide his steps. Would your word become a lamp to his feet consistently more and more as the days go on?

Lord, we love you. We're so grateful for you. In Jesus' name. Two and five Canadians will hear the words, you have cancer. That's why every step and dollar raised matters. On September 19th, join thousands in Toronto for the Princess Margaret Cancer Foundation Walk. Challenge yourself, friends, and family to walk 21 kilometers in support of life-saving research. Together, we can carry the fire and help create a world free from the fear of cancer.

Register today at pmcfwalk.ca.ca. Amen.