The Eric Metaxas Show - Ask Me Anything (continued)

Episode Date: February 5, 2021

As you know, my new book is out. It's called Fish Out of Water. Go to Ericmetaxis.com. And now here we go with what we had the other night. It's called Ask Me Anything. We are in the middle of our Ask Me Anything with our star Eric Pataxus. And we're starting to run a little bit over time, Eric. So just keep in mind. Okay, two false questions from here on in. Go ahead. There we go. Let's go to Randall Hayes. He lives in San Antonio, Texas. Texas, big fan of yours, Eric. So I'm going to ask the question. How can the Republican Party resolve its divisiveness? I fear forming a new party would divide us further. I don't think

forming a new party is the answer, but I do think that many Republicans have revealed themselves to be, I said skunks earlier. I don't mean to be unkind, but that's the correct word. And they need to be sent out of office because we are, we're in a cold war with China. They want to eat our lunch. They want to destroy us. They are evil. They don't believe in good or evil. They believe in power.

They are aggressively, militaristically, atheists. And they are crushing Christians in that nation. And we need to take this seriously. If you're just kind of going on a joyride as a congressman or a senator and you don't really care about that, you need to resign. And we need to elect people who would go along with, you know, the kind of MAGA philosophy, who are robust patriots, who are enemies of cultural Marxism, of cancel culture, of political correctness. We need those kind of leaders. And if you're not that kind of a leader, I think you better get out of the way. because people have had enough.

I honestly think that what we saw, folks like Kelly Loeffler and a lot of these folks, you just think like, why in the world would we elect that person to represent us? It's an incredible honor to represent the American people. And why would we elect people like this? Why are we being given these people? So I think a lot of people are going to run

who are the real thing, who saw Trump as a great leader and who want to model themselves on him, except for the tweeting. Great. Let's move on and go to Jane Mello. She is in Union, New Jersey. I'm sure she got some snow.

Jane, you are on with Eric Metaxus. Yeah, I got some snow. Eric, when I paid cash for this, and by the way, thank you so much for Aaron that time. It's all worth it because I gave all the money that I had. I had to beg for food. I did not. That money, didn't you?

I can tell. I did not sign up to ask any questions, because I knew it was going to be short. My time would be short. So I just wanted to use this opportunity to thank you from the bottom of my heart for all you do. For the books you've written, I am not, I was not born in America,

but I'm American in my heart. I'm an American citizen. And I love this country. And the more I read your books, the more I love it, the more I love God. And, you know, people talking about Bonhoffer. Bonhofer did change my life a year ago. And I listened to your books on Audible. And I would listen over and over again to Bonhoff and really, really challenged me to, you know,

to be more committed to my faith in Jesus Christ and not ashamed of the gospel. And you're ready for everything. So thank you. realize what it means to me when they say things like what you just said. It means everything to me. I am so grateful to you. I really have no words. I'm just so grateful. Thank you for saying that. And it's just an honor that I get to write these books and do what I do. The fact that folks like you are appreciating it, trust me when I just tell you, I'm really moved. Thank you very much. Appreciate it. Thank you, Jane. Let's go on to Rob Blaine of Houston, Texas. Rob, you are on with Eric

metaxis. I will ask the question. With the recent fraudulent presidential election, how do we go forward and win back the presidency, House and Senate, knowing now the left will go to any links, including massive fraud and denial of same? I'm sure I don't know the answer to that, except to say that a lot of people have been really praying. I've been part of a twice-weekly prayer thing. There are all kinds of people across this country, and my wife has been amazing in this, really praying, knowing that God hears our prayers, knowing that God is the one that brought this nation into existence for his purposes so that we could thrive and be a blessing to the other nations. And I really think that at the end of the day, I think maybe we've seen that without

God doing something miraculous, it's not going to happen. So I think that at this point, the main thing we can do is pray. It doesn't mean that, you know, every one of us has a role to play and things to do. But there are so many of those kinds of things. I just think that most people, and it gets back to my book, if you can keep it, there's a price for liberty. Keeping the republic means we've got to step up. And I think a lot of of us have not stepped up until recently things are falling apart and we're thinking I've got to do something we've got to do something we ought to have been doing things all along and we kind of got caught in a deficit so to speak and we are now aware I think we're waking up people are waking up

the church is waking up and I would say ultimately pray with real faith and ask God to shake this nation that we would not continue to go down this path I mean I think that the folks that have done some of the things that we have seen, you know, with regard to the election and trying to cancel people they disagree with demonizing people for daring to support Trump. I mean, those people, you know, in a civilized society, those people would be banished from the kingdom forever because that's simply unacceptable in the United States of America. When you have leaders doing that, when you have people like Nancy Pelosi and leaders who you can't imagine they could be so ignorant as to think that this is acceptable behavior.

It's magnificent. It's just like beyond its breathtaking level of ignorance or chutzpah or whatever it is. But I mean, I think the people, we the people need to speak up, speak loudly. And as I said before, really pray, pray, ask God to do something. I believe God will do something. And I think if he does not do something, I don't know that we get out of this. but I believe God does things. I've seen him do things,

and I believe he will do something. William Fuse, you are next in the queue from Florida, South Carolina. William. Bill? Didn't I just bump into you on the street in New York City when I was Christmas shopping, and here you are on a Zoom call. Yeah, and last time was in Orlando at the Kingdom Advisors before everything got shut down.

Well, it's good to see you again. And as you know, I was a patron of Socrates in the city back when we could do such outrageous things as gather in person and came to a number of the dinners afterwards with NT Wright and in D.C. with Dr. Meyer and Dinesh DeSouza. So I'm going to give you a snowball question. And it's not what you are your favorite flavor vice. cream. I'll allow CNN to ask that of the president. You're having a dinner party and you have six people that you can invite. All right. Living dead. Fictional. So six people, who are the six people? And who sits at your right hand and who sits at your left and why? Carnet there. And then who's going to give a darn who the heck else is there? I'm going to be like, oh, excuse me, Jesus. It's

David Niven's turn to talk. I mean, are you kidding? What are you talking about? So we have to take Jesus out of the equation. Otherwise, the whole thing just ceases. It's over. So if you take Jesus out of the equation, I don't know, there are so many people that I would just, Lincoln, for sure, George Washington, probably, he's, he's, I think he was more of a tacit turned fellow and I think he would be, he would make me uncomfortable. comfortable. But, oh my goodness, you know, how could I not want Bonhoeffer and Wilberforce there? If Luther were there, it would get kind of rowdy, because he was just that way. But I, that's a question. You know what? I should, like, go pray and ask God to tell me who, because that is like, there's no way for me to answer that question. So I'm just, you know, I'm just filling the air with words. Folks, welcome back. This is the Eric Mattaxas show, but we're playing what I did just the other night. It was live. It's asked me anything. People came on and they asked me questions and it's just me answering their questions. Here it is. Let's move on to our next questioner. This is Joel Cornwell of Chicago, Illinois. Joel, you're on with Eric Mataxis. I am overcome by it with despair sometimes at the wokenness. of the American church. And I come from a Lutheran and Episcopal tradition. And those churches really, in a lot of ways, have just been ruined by the woke culture.

Something had to come in to fill the void, I guess. So my question is simply, since I have trouble finding a place to go to church that I can stand for an hour that I can tolerate. Where do you go to church in New York? Well, because of COVID and because I travel so much, it's a little hard to answer that question. A lot of Sundays I am either with my parents up in Connecticut,

you know, they're getting on in years and I want to spend every second I can with them. It's a joy for me to do that. So a lot of weekends I'm with them. or Suzanne and I visit her family. And then a lot of weekends I'm traveling and I'm speaking in churches. So it's kind of weird. But we go to an evangelical Presbyterian church here in New York called Central Presbyterian.

I have gone to Times Square Church quite a bit. You know, it's funny because my tastes in everything are eclectic and in church is the same thing. I mean, I think that, you know, there are churches where they move in the gifts of the spirit and they blow the shofar and get crazy. I love that. I really love that. And I think that moving in the gifts of the spirit, and for those people who don't know what that means, you're not a Christian. No, it means healing and prophecy and stuff. But the problem is finding places where they know how to do that.

So it's not kooky and it's not sloppy because that is all. There's nothing worse than that. But I really think that in some ways because of the kind of COVID thing, we're able to kind of check places out. You know, look, first of all, Christians, we're not supposed to just like go to church and then that's it. I mean, it should be part of our lives. And I think that there are all kinds of people that you can listen to online. And then you can go to a local church. And then your local church doesn't have to be everything.

Then your local church can be a place where, well, they don't do this and they don't do this, but it's okay because I get those needs met elsewhere. I really think it's important for us to understand that, you know, being a Christian is more of a full-time thing. It's not just a little thing I tick off on Sunday. And I need to be feeding myself, whether it's with books or radio programs or podcasts, whatever. but but there are amazing sermons from all these different kinds of places i've been listening to some of these prophetic folks uh and i take that very seriously and because i take it seriously uh if they're wrong you know i want to shoot them uh so i have not done that yet just to be clear uh because i know the FBI is listening but the point is that i think all of that stuff is of

god but you have to have wisdom on where to get it uh and so i've appreciated appreciated Dutch Sheets's ministry. And some people know Ken Fish, who's on my program, and we'll be on again soon. And so my tastes are really wildly eclectic, and I don't have an answer. Times Square Church is a great place to go here in Manhattan and to check out online. But, you know, that's another non-answer. So thank you. You are listening to Ask Me Anything with Eric Metaxis. Let's move on to Marianne Wilkes. She is in Colbert, Washington. Marianne, your question is a little bit long.

I'm going to ask you to shorten it a little bit, but you are on with Eric Metaxus. Eric, I'm a mom of five. I spent 14 years homeschooling and then worked as a church children's director. And now my dream is to help develop a series of holiday children's books that will direct families. parents and kids back to the roots of our freedom, namely faith and virtue. But I'd like him to have some humor, too. I've thought of like, take back St. Patrick's Day from the Green Beer Leprocon Society. Anyway, your own book, Squanto, and a miracle of Thanksgiving, is one of our family favorites. We read it every Thanksgiving. But my question is, what five holidays would you

recommend to be at the top of my list and which heroes and their virtues should be the focus of each holiday. Let me just be blunt. You didn't pay enough money for me to answer that question. That's a hard question. That's a $500 question right there. I think it's kind of funny that you asked that question because I have literally thought of that myself, what you just said. I've I've wanted to do that myself. And so you may be stepping on some toes here, sister. No, but seriously, I'm not doing it right now. So feel free.

We need more of this stuff. I think, I mean, I say this a lot. And it sounds like what you were just saying. Like, you know, I wrote a children's book on St. Patrick. It was never published or it hasn't yet been published, I should say. But St. Patrick was an unbelievable saint of God. And the fact that most people don't know that, and they think it's about like Jamrocks, Leprecons, and Green Beer. He was a born-again, holy saint of God. And when you read his

story, you're reading about an amazing missionary, just this incredible figure. The fact that we blow that off on St. Patrick's Day, what a crime, you know. So that's one, obviously. I think that George Washington's birthday and Lincoln's birthdays, I hate the fact that they were kind of mushed together into President's Day. But these are extremely amazing men who we were privileged. We wouldn't be here, frankly, if they had not led this nation. And we need to know their lives and revere them. I write about them, obviously in my book, if you can keep it, they are amazing. In my book Seven Men, I write about Washington. I was in awe when I really understood who Washington was. So anybody, any woke idiot who says like Washington's bad, he owned slaves, like there were

no slave. There were no landowners in Virginia who didn't own slaves. Like that, it just gets crazy when people start getting into that kind of stuff. Nobody thinks slavery is a good thing, but you've got to understand the time and look at what he did. And what he did, we should all, we are all in his debt. So, you know, his birthday and Lincoln's birthday, I like Flag Day. It has a big place in my heart. And of course, it's very close to July 4th. I think on July 4th as well, What do we celebrate on July 4th? We don't celebrate firecrackers, hot dogs. Like, that's not, we sell, we eat hot dogs and blow off firecrackers to celebrate liberty for which people died.

This holy thing called liberty that people around the world would do anything to have this beautiful, beautiful thing that's a gift of God. We need to celebrate that. And we need to tell our children, you don't deserve liberty. Most people around the world don't have liberty. you need to appreciate it. You need to do something to pay it back. You need to help others learn about liberty. You need to understand there are people around the world who have no liberty.

This is just something that we have an outrageous gift. We need to know what it is. We need to celebrate it. And I mean, when I wrote, if you can keep it, it really got to me. I thought, how is it possible? Most of us in America don't know this. And I hadn't really known it until as I was writing that book, it all came to me. So I obviously have a passion.

I'm trying to raise the money to do a, I mean, I haven't tried earnestly, but we want to shoot a mini-series based on the book if you can keep it, because I want to get this information out to a larger public. But I think that those holidays, you know, keep you going for a while. We can blow off Halloween. I think Thanksgiving takes care of itself. My Squanto book kind of explains that a little bit. And, you know, Christmas and Easter should speak for themselves as well. So I'll, I'll just stop. But thank you. That's a great idea and a great question. Let's move on to caller number 18 out of 20. It is Lorenda. Lorenda, tell us your city and your question for Eric Pataxus. Hi, I live in Dalhart, Texas, and I'm a high school English teacher, and I came across your book. Probably five years ago, and last year I assigned it to my high school boys. And so several of them read it, and I think it made a difference. I'd like to get more of my high school boys interested in it.

So this is my question for you to answer for them. And girls too, of course. But just think about talking to my young men right now. If you could speak to the heart of the young men in our nation, young men who are proud to be American, but may not be sure what that means, what would your most important message be for them? You know, and I joke, but when I wrote the book,

I tried to put all those ideas of what I would say. to a young person in the book in a way that it's not hard to read. It's not big like Bonhofer. It's the sort of thing that you can assign to high school kids because I feel like it's a little complicated. Like there are a number of pieces to liberty. You know, the central idea is the golden triangle of freedom. But I think, you know, if, yeah, if I had one thing to say, it's to say that virtue and faith are inextricably intertwined with freedom. There's no such thing as freedom without virtue and usually without faith. And you need to cherish virtue and cherish faith in the culture in which you live. Folks, you're listening to Ask Me Anything.

This is the Archimtaxas show, but we're playing what I did the other night. It was a live thing on YouTube and Facebook. Ask me anything. People ask me questions. Here it is. Well, let's go to caller number 19 and 20. to be the same person, Rachel Cleveland of Adams, Tennessee. Rachel, I told you never to call me here, Rachel. How dare you? You paid for two spots, Rachel. So you get two questions.

Rachel's trouble. If I would have seen her name on here, uh, Rachel, you should, first of all, you should be behind bars. You have no business being on this call. I just got out. Are you serious? Rachel, you look. different. I let the grays grow out. Great. I wouldn't have recognized you, but it looks very,

it's very attractive, and I don't blow smoke. Thank you. Thank you. I did buy two questions, but I'll let my sweetheart ask one. Want to let you know, we look forward to seeing you in Murphy's Borough this weekend. I forgot. I'm flying to Tennessee. That's exactly right. You're going to be you guys. You're going to be there. Well, yes, I'm doing a lot of speaking, you know, around the book. And basically, when I preach a sermon, it's my testimony because that's kind of what the book is about. But, yeah, I'm going to be in Murfreesboro, and then I'm going to be in Charleston, South Carolina. And then I'm going to be, like, in San Diego.

I'm getting around. If you know of a big church that is interested in my coming, let us know. Come to my website and let us know. So, Rachel, do you have, do you and your, is that, is that? your husband there? This is Martin. Yes, that's my husband. Hi, Martin.

Yeah, go ahead. I wanted to ask you, you kind of alluded to that you consider New York, your mission, and I was kind of hoping that by now you and your lovely bride would be tired of it, you'd be ready to leave to Tennessee. It has its downside.

Let me tell you that. Nobody likes mugging. I guess we're not there yet. De Blasio's working hard to bring us back to 1975 crime levels, but we're not quite there yet. He's got to work harder. Well, I think because my parents are in Connecticut and Suzanne's family is in Jersey, I really believe God has planted us here because family is very important to us and we want to see our folks every opportunity we get. So at this point in life, I could never be one of those kids, you know, who just goes to some other part of the world.

You don't see your folks that often. I love my folks. I treasure time with them. And so this is just where we are for this season. It would be a lot cheaper to be in Tennessee. And let me tell you, I wouldn't mind that. But this is just where we are. But I do get to travel and see these wonderful parts of the country.

And trust me, when I tell you, I appreciate these different parts of the country. So it's fun to get to connect. I think it's very, it's refreshing for me to come to places like Murfreesboro, where I'm going to be this weekend, and to connect with people. And just to see how much faith there is and how much patriotism there is, it ministers to me, actually. So, again, I don't know if I answered your question, but that's all we have time for. Okay, Martin's going to ask my second question.

Do you have any upcoming tours to Europe, guided tours like you've done before? No, do you have anything in mind? Yeah, no, I don't have any plans to go to Europe. Obviously, we've been filming a documentary on the discovery of the Tomb of Odysseus. Crazy, amazing story. So I was there some months ago in Greece, where my family's from. But I don't have any plans. I think that once the COVID thing dies down,

You know, I love Europe and many of my books have been translated into languages and I get to go there to Germany. And but I don't have, I don't have anything planned at this point. No, I don't. But boy, and anytime I have an excuse, it's just a, I just love it. And as I say, I have family in Germany and family in Greece since my mom and dad are from those countries. And going there is wonderful. I also love England. Suzanne and I, we had our honeymoon in London and, you know, we're anglofiles in a way. And so, yeah, we would, I'd love to get over there. I just need it. I need an excuse or somebody to invite me to speak or something like that, but nothing on the, on the schedule right now. Thank you, Rachel. And Eric, I know this is a

sad moment, but we're coming down to the last question. And this would be. I can't get away. I can't wait to get away from these people, Phil. You know me. I don't want to be your name than you do. Priscilla Boynahan from Vancouver, Washington. If you are here, you can ask anything of Eric Mataxis. Where are you finding your courage to withstand the onslaught of criticism from others, especially fellow believers, and then finding the strength to forgive? We're so proud of your bravery and your willingness to be a voice for those of us

who doubt the honesty of the election. Forgive. What are you nuts? I'll tell you, that's a really sweet question. You know, it's funny because when I was writing about Bonhoeffer, people would ask about his courage, and I would say, I don't see him necessarily having courage. I think if you have faith and you know God is real,

it just automatically gives you courage, because you know he's real. You know he has your. back. You know he's the only one whose opinion matters. And it makes a fiery ring bound by wild desire. Folks, as you know, my new book is out. It's called Fish Out of Water. Go to Eric Mataxis.com. And now here we go with what we had the other night. It's called Ask Me Anything. I think that God has proved himself to me, uh,

so much over the years that I couldn't live with myself if I didn't speak up when I have an opportunity. And I think that this has been a season that I've, I didn't ask for this. I mean, the last thing I wanted was the election to go this way or whatever. And I, but I thought, it was just a funny thing. I thought people need to speak up. And I noticed, once Fox kind of went south, I thought, whoa, this is not good. There are people in America who need encouragement, they need information.

And I find myself suddenly in the role of being able to help with some of that through my radio show and, you know, the YouTube version of my radio show. And I have to say that because I had that, I felt like I must do something. I must speak up. I must, you know, and in some ways I didn't want to, but I had no choice. I just said there's no way I can keep silent. This is so grievous, so sick that we would live in a country where people aren't sure if their votes were counted. That is really sick and evil. And it's the death of America. And people need to speak up. And I have a platform. It's not a huge platform. But by God's grace, it's something. And I'm going to use it. And the people that came against me, I mean, it's a mixed bag. I mean, I have had friends. sends me these insane emails and you just think, you know, I guess they believe the press. You know, they read that I punched some guy out or something like that. Like, yeah, I'm a violent guy.

I'll just go up to people and punch them out. I mean, you know, he was trying to run me over with his bicycle. It was like it was an insane scene. But people read these things and they don't realize that that's not true, that the media has become dramatically biased. I mean, it's one thing for them to get stuff wrong. It's another thing for them to have an animus against you or your point of view and then to try to write a hit piece.

And then you read these hit pieces, half of them written by Christians. I had a Christian friend, quote unquote, say that I had blood on my hands at the Capitol riot because I've incited people. And I just thought, this is lunacy. People believe this. And they seem to be, you know, it's like the end. of the world and they just have no filters. They're just going to go crazy. And I kind of think like, you know, I can say very earnestly that I have particularly thanked God for my wife, Suzanne,

because to have her through this season has made it much more possible for me to get through it because there are times that it's been very tough. But at the same time, I just know God, alive he sees us and i i don't you know when when you have people like bonhoffer to look to as models you think i haven't had to give my life and even if i did so what nathan hale gave his life people get we're all going to die like does anybody think you're going to escape that you're not so the point is where are you going when you die and how are you living before you die i mean to me that's just logical and true and we only get to pass this way one time and to be cowardly or to be, you know, in any way living my life because of, you know, what people are saying.

And so I don't, I simply don't know what else I would do. I could never live with myself at a time like this because there are so few voices. It's shocking to me how many people have just slipped away and they don't really want to get involved. And I think, you know, I mean, I sort of get that, but I also think that it's, if we all keep quiet, we make it harder for those who do speak. And that's why I get so angry about the way Mike Lindel's been attacked. I just think you can't let people like that take the bullet and then, you know, you go on your way while they've been canceled. That is not right. You've been part of canceling them if you do that. So I'll say it again, all those stores that have thrown his products out,

Coles, Bed Bath and Beyond, Wayfair, and H.E.B. Stores, the corporate leaders there should be ashamed of themselves, and they should know that for the rest of my life, I will tell people never, ever darken a door of one of those anti-American stores until they change their policy and understand what they did was simply wrong. You've disrespected most of the people who shop in your store. I don't, I simply don't know what else. that I would do. I mean, if our nation is in a crisis, which it is, then the whole world is in the great, the bellwether. We're the shining city on a hill. There's no America waiting in the wings to take our place. There's China waiting in the wings. So if you don't understand this is the battle that this is the fight, then, you know, it's already over and even so come Lord Jesus. So I

don't know. I think, yeah, I'll leave you. Thank you. Eric, we have one last. bonus question. You may remember we called on Jonathan Stapley of San Antonio, Texas, and his microphone wasn't working. So I have been asked to ask his question. You're going to like it. Tell us how you met Suzanne and how you fell in love, the Eric and Suzanne story. You're just asking me this because you know I'm going to have to face her in five minutes, aren't you? No, in all seriousness, we were both going to Times Square Church in Manhattan. David Wilkerson was the lead pastor. He founded the church.

His brother Don Wilkerson was pastor as well. And we met at a like a birthday party. Well, I mentioned it's Suzanne's birthday. It was her birthday party 25 or 26 years ago. And a friend of mine invited me to that. So we met. And we were friends for the better part of a year. before I realized that she was loaded and I wanted a piece of that money.

No, that's not true. I think it was, it was just kind of funny thing. We were real friends and we were in ministry and stuff together. But as the time passed, I realized, wait a minute, holy cow, I've got feelings for this chick. And by chick, obviously, I mean broad. But I think that it was just one of the. those things that we, we just, we met in this perfect kind of situation. And, uh, I'm not going to say marriage has been easy because Suzanne is a heavy drinker. Um, but, uh, no, that's not true.

But, uh, honestly, that was, that was how we met in our whole, you know, the courtship or whatever. I mean, that's a longer story. But, uh, I, you know, obviously I believe God ordained. it. Folks, welcome back. This is the Eric McIntaxit show, but we're playing what I did just the other night. It was live. It's asked me anything. People came on and they asked me questions and it's just me answering their questions.

Here it is. You know, I say to people, marriage is important, but you want to marry somebody who's on the same page as you are with respect to Jesus. Because when things get tough, you can pray together and you have that in constant. common with each other. And that's vital. I think that is the glue that it makes all the difference. And it has made all the difference unto this very day in our lives. So I also just remembered, I didn't answer part of the previous question about forgiving people. I think, you know, forgiving is complicated because I think a lot of times people don't understand it. They think it's

like saying, well, what they do is no big deal. It is a big deal. Jesus forgave the people who crucified him. Crucifying him was kind of a big deal. It's not like he said, hey, don't worry about it. It happens to everybody. No, no, when people do something wrong, it's wrong. But we're obliged to pray for them so that they might see the truth. They might repent. They might, whatever. And also, I don't, I mean, I have so many real friends that are on this, on different side, than I am with regard to the election or that kind of stuff. And I just want them all to know, I love you in spite of that. And if you'll be my friend in spite of that, I'll be your friend in spite of that.

But yes, when Christians attack me publicly or something like that, it's just, it's sad. But listen, if I claim to be a Christian, of course I'm going to pray for them because Jesus forgave me and stuff. So I do take that very seriously. so I don't want to make light of that. Eric, the name of the book is Fish Out of Water. Is there a book? Oh, yes. It is a Regnery book.

It is available on Amazon, and everywhere books are sold, with the exception of Bed, Bath, and Beyond and Coles. HB and Wayfair. Actually, yes, I do hope the first week of the book is very important. So I'm just begging everybody shamelessly. You made my wife cry. I have to be here. I can't be heard with it. The least you could do is buy a half a dozen of these suckers and hand them out. And it is a book that would make a gift, as I said, for people that are not on the same page as you are, theologically or politically. It is utterly apolitical. A lot of it is very funny, insane stories that you really won't believe, but every syllable is true. And I'm grateful that the day that I launch it today, I got to do all this. But I want to say, if you're inclined to purchase any copies doing it this week makes a big difference to the publisher and to the whole the way these

things go. The first week is really crucial. So I'll say that. I'll say that just because it's true. So we can watch you on YouTube. We can watch you on. Don't forget your TBN show. YouTube channel, TBN's dead to me. Forget about them. We're talking about Salem right now. I'm on YouTube. If you go to my YouTube channel, we post everything. except now anything really controversial about the election. YouTube has made it very clear. They don't believe in free speech. It's sad.

So we're not posting that kind of stuff. That's stuff we're posting on Rumble. But everything else, we got an interview with Tim Tebow, with Daryl Straub. I got all kinds of stuff. That's all on YouTube. And I ask everybody, please share my social media stuff because I know I've been shadow banned. And so I just ask you, please, you know, spread the good news as you're able to. but I'm really, I'm so grateful for this.

Every one of you that participate in everybody who didn't pay a dime, I love you too. It does mean a lot to me. I don't take this for granted. And Phil, thank you for setting this up. I would love to do this anytime. Thank you, Eric. This was fun. Thank you, Dan Nelson and Jasper Lukos and our national events team.

And thank you, Salem. We'll see you guys. Thank you for listening. All right. Bless you all. Seriously, thank you so much. Oh, man, say, Jesus is just not.