The Eric Metaxas Show - Ed Morgan

Episode Date: May 3, 2023

Ed Morgan of Inspirational Leadership has a new book with seven key questions that help people navigate through tough medical decisions: "The Patient's Survival Guide."

Folks, welcome to the Eric Mataxis show, sponsored by Legacy Precious Metaxas show. There's never been a better time to invest in precious metals. Visit legacy p.m.investments.com. That's legacy p.m. Investments.com. Welcome to the Eric Mataxis show. They say it's a thin line between love and hate, but we're working every day to thicken that line, or at least to make it a double or triple line. Now here's your line jumping host, Eric Mattaxas. Hey there, folks. We've got something very special today.

First of all, we have my friend Ed Morgan in the studio as my guest. Ed, it's just wonderful to see you. We've been friends for a long time. And I knew you only, really, in your incarnation as the head of the famous Bowery mission here in New York City. How long were you the head of the Bowery? Indeed. 22 years. it was a wonderful run. Incredible. Just doing God's work in New York City. I mean, we've known each other in many other contexts. What I didn't know was that you had the book that I'm holding in your hand, that you had this in you. It's amazing. This is called the Patience Survival Guide. Totally different subject. We're not talking about the Bowery Mission. We're not talking about ministering to the homeless. This is the patient's,

survival guide, seven key questions for navigating, navigating the medical maze. Ed Morgan, my friend, how did you come to write a book called the Patience Survival Guide, seven key questions for navigating the medical maze? Well, you know, if we think of our lives, Eric, like a tapestry, we have all these threads running through our life. And one of the threads running through my life, which had nothing to do with the homeless and the poor, has been the medical thread ever since I spent a year in bed when I was seven. Did your parents find out about that? No, seriously, a year in bed when you were seven years old?

That's a lot of truancy, right? How did that, what happened? Well, I took one of the early sulfur drugs, early antibiotics, and the early ones had a tendency to crystallize in your kidneys. And so you come up with nephritis. So not all drugs are safe? Who knew? Because I'm getting boosted and vaccinated. Just kidding, folks. I've got to be honest with you, Ed. As the years pass, I become more and more astonished at the problems with the medical system and how many of us look at doctors as gods and think whatever they say and more and more evidence comes out.

You're telling me that seven decades ago, you're prescribed an antibiotic that... Well, it's well known. puts you in bed for one year. That's not what they're supposed to do, folks. So that's amazing. I never heard this about you. But, you know, God used it for good. Because, you know, I was reading at grade level when I first took to my couch.

And when I finished the year later, I was reading a 10th grade level. Oh, you're kidding. Yeah, but you're a genius. That's cheating. No, no. So, okay. So help me all my life. But in all seriousness, you're prescribed a drug and antibiotic.

And basically the side effect sounds like practically kills you, puts you in bed for one year. Yeah. Well, antibiotics, you know, one of the classes of drugs that have genuinely helped mankind. No doubt. No question. It's their overuse. I mean, there's many classes of drugs today that are not helping mankind.

And, you know, sulfa drug, fine. You know, that's been for 30, 40 years. Okay. So also, you know, another reason the medical thread has run through. my life. I got into it with my wife, Judy, who came up with first breast cancer, stage one, breast cancer, and boy, did I get into it. And really, I found that poor science is part of our cancer treatment industry today. Poor, poor science, bad science, I think you want to be clear. Sloppy science.

science, which actually is not science. So what you, because you're a bright guy and you rolled up your sleeves and got into it, you, you began to see what was wrong. And this book is your answer to that to try to help people navigate what you call the medical maze. Yeah, it's worse than a medical maze today. I kind of went off center for the title of the book. But, you know, So Don Berwick, the head of public policy, medical public policy at Harvard says today, basically the pursuit of wealth now dominates health care. Okay, let's think about this, because I've noticed this thread. And it's implications, yes. This has happened.

This is, look, this is evil, ladies and gentlemen. Journalism, the medical world, these used to be professions where it was sacred. Getting the truth in journalism was sacred. It wasn't about profit in the medical industry. It was about the Hippocratic Oath. It was a sacred calling to heal the sick. The profit motive crept in, and of course because you and I are both Christians, we understand that apart from virtue, everything goes to hell.

And when you suddenly have a medical industry that has been leaning more and more toward the profit motive, that is scary stuff. Totally. The wonderful guy who wrote my forward in the book, Dr. Norton Hadler, Yale, by the way, Harvard Medical School, distinguished faculty member at UNC, Chapel Hill. His quote is just beautiful. In the U.S. today, health care is a commodity,

disease is a product line, and physicians are a sales force in the employ of a predatory enterprise. How's that for a quote? Well, that's, but I mean, that is really, really dark stuff. That is really scary stuff. When you think that most people, where else do you go? You know, and we're not talking about socialized medicine, folks. That's got its own problems.

We're talking about, we're talking about medicine in general. Runaway capitalism. I want to read, this is Norton Hadler who wrote the forward. I want to read his endorsement for your book. He says, it's common sense to assume that improvements in population health are a direct consequence of the advances of diagnosis and treatment for which the health care system is quick to take credit. But a great many of the putative advances have withstood scientific scrutiny poorly, if at all. There's been a choir singing that truth for some time. Ed Morgan is contributing his voice to that choir. He brings a keen perspective

tempered by a life course devoted to caring about those in need. The patient's survival guide, that's this book, is a clarion call. Perhaps this is the voice that will fill the pews. Almost everyone listening to the sound of my voice right now is dealing with this in one way or the other. So you have seen this, Ed, and you're a methodical, thoughtful person. And so as you've gone through this with your wife, Judy, and with your dad,

and I mean, through your life, you've seen this, and this book is the result. I've watched so many friends die. Actually, I'm. unnecessarily or ahead of their time. You read the church bulletins. Please pray for Sally. She's having her carotid artery operated on tomorrow.

Oh, wow. You know, so much new industries in the pursuit of wealth. You want to hear a couple examples? Yeah, yeah. Like what wasn't a big industry 20 years ago? AFib, you know, atrial fibrillation. Talk about that. Yeah.

Well, in the last 10 years, through new drugs that have come out and a wonderful statistic, you know if you have atrial fibrillation, you're five times as likely to have a stroke. Of course, that is true in. In one sense, but if you look at the actual absolutes, the absolute risk, it's very low. 60% of people over 60 have AFib, have episodes of atrial fibrillation. Okay, so what is the medical industrial complex says there's money to be made? What do they do? What do they do?

Well, ablation, the interventional cardiologists go make a lot. lot of money off of it. And so you're saying this is often unnecessary surgery. Yes, and unnecessary drugs. Now we're talking about the new class of blood thinners. Once you start taking those, you're not a well person anymore. And what is this class called? Well, it's blood thinners.

Andy, it's eloquist, Zarelato, Proxy. these are billion-dollar drugs. And you're saying, generally speaking, they do less harm than good. We're going to go to a break. We'll be right back. Folks, I hope we've peaked your interest. Don't go away. The book is The Patient's Survival Guide, seven key questions for navigating the medical maze by my friend Ed Morgan. Hey, folks, you like meat, so do I.

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I just get angry instantly when I hear about this stuff, but you're a calm, rational person. And you're saying that the medical industry is more motivated by the profit motive than it used to be, which is a scary thing, and that they are doing operations and prescribing drugs that ultimately are not to people's benefit. Exactly. 50% of Americans over 50 take more than three drugs and are diagnosed with a chronic condition. This was not true 50 years ago, right? This is not true in Europe.

In Europe, there's not $5 billion worth of advertising per year for prescription drugs, as we have here called DTC, right? We're the only civilized country other than New Zealand that actually has, that allows advertising for prescription drugs. And the runaway American big pharma system is just gone crazy in terms of profitability. So do these people have no souls, no consciences? I mean, it's an extraordinary thing when you're entrusted with people's health to turn a blind eye. to some of the things you're saying. It's chilling to me. And again, we speak as men of faith. It's a chilling thing to me when people genuinely lose sight of the real bottom line,

which is to say what is right and what is wrong. So what does a former executive like me do about something like that? I have three books on my shelf from Norton Hadler, my friend, and others that say, we're going to reform this. We're going to make this work. My goal here is just to save a few, you know, is to have people exercise wisdom when they confront the medical system. You know, Proverbs talks about three kinds of people, all in the book of Proverbs, in the Bible, you know, all three kinds of people, the wise, the fool, and the simple, you know, the fool's made up his mind, he's going to go the wrong way. The wise is able to confront

life, and the simple, many of us are wise in spiritual things, but we're not wise in medical things. We're simple. We are the major market for all these drugs and procedures that constitute over-treatment, over-diagnosis, overtreatment, and galloping medical mistakes. You know, because hospital treatment today is so complex, one of my heroes down at Johns Hopkins, Marty McCarray, estimates that 250,000 people die unnecessarily in high. hospitals every year through medical mistakes. I mean, that's astonishing. Marty McCarrie, he's a friend, he's been on this program.

He is a brilliant MD. So when he says something like that, that's chilling. Yeah, right. It's hard to fathom, right? So that's a lot. And, you know, other people estimate up to 400,000, you know, the population of Cleveland every year die out of the hospital, and in the hospital unnecessarily because of the big three,

which is over-diagnosis, overtreatment, and medical mistakes. Let's talk about over-diagnosis. I mean, mistakes are mistakes. Sure. But I'm not excusing them. But I'm saying over-diagnosis, overtreatment. There are people like my mom and dad on a vast array of drugs. I can't keep track.

I'm sure aliquist, which you mentioned, is one of them. You know, yeah. What's the story? What do you do? Yeah. Well, you were asking, what is an example of overdiagnosis, for instance? Yeah. Yeah.

Well, okay. How's your thyroid feeling today, right? Thyroid dectomies have doubled in the last 10 years in this country because most people have nodules on their thyroid. And in 0.7% of cases, they might turn cancerous. Well, no. You know what happens, of course, is that... That's kind of like you could have brain cancer. We better cut that head off, you know, proactively. Let's be proactive and prophylactically cut off your head because you could get brain cancer. So you're saying that there's money to be made and that there are people incentivized to say, let's get rid of the thyroid and what's the patient going to say?

Oh, I guess I better do it because what do I know? Yes. And thyroid is much more complex than they'll tell you, you know. And there's Internet support groups for the tens of thousands of people that have lost their thyroid unnecessarily that would never have had any trouble from it. You know, the definition of overdiagnosis is basically being done. diagnosed with something that will never cause any trouble in your life, you know. Okay, so you mentioned all these drugs that people are taking. You mentioned aliquis is one

that I've just heard my parents mentioned, but blood thinners, all this kind of stuff. Generally speaking, what would you say about that? Well, there's a whole class of drugs. I'd say blood thinners are one that are just moved up the scale hugely, or, you know, growing at 20. 25% compounded every year. Another class of drugs is the immunosuppressants. You'll see them on TV every night, but they never called them immunosuppressants. What do they call them?

Well, Humera is one of them. They call them they'll help your skin disorders. They'll help any autoimmune disease. At what cost? Well, by suppressing your immune. system. Okay, that's a little scary. Yeah. Suppressing pieces of your immune system. So later on, you know, drugs are tested short term, and then they're licensed by the FDA. So long-term testing is very short in this country. I mean, very scarce. So if you really try to look into how

you're not really told what the long-term consequences will be, if you're prescribed Humera, for instance, or could be, you know. So I actually followed the train through down to specialized types of lymphoma that are hard to treat and all other kinds. Well, you want to talk about statins, right? Yeah. There's another class. 43 a million Americans on statins, or is it 47?

And what is that for, statins? What is that? Stateness lower your cholesterol. Right. They're thought to be harmless. Yeah. So, but long term, well, you know, the common muscle weakness is one thing that they don't mind saying. But type 2 diabetes, did you know, for instance, 50% of your brain by volume is cholesterol?

No, okay. So what you're doing when you take statins, 43 million of us do, is you're lowering the production of bad cholesterol in your body. But you're also lowering your ability, your brain's ability to replace cholesterol. So in other words, a doctor's not incentivized to say, eat better. He's incentivized to say, keep doing what you're doing, and here take these. Well, that's very good point. That's pretty scandalous. Yeah, he's not making money if you cut out fatty foods and bad food. He's not making money off of that. So he is making money if he says statins. Here you go.

Yeah. And I would say the great majority of PCPs, primary care providers today, are very compassionate, caring people. But they're no longer free to be clinically. wise. They're not they're employees. That's what's scary.

Yes. Well, that's right. They're employees that there is, what is it? Some hospital is mandating that they push X, Y, and Z. Standard of care, right. They have production goals. Yeah.

And standards of care. So if, I mean, the statistics are astounding. The big medical hospitals and Insurance companies are snapping up doctors and making them employees to an amazing degree. 22 percent of American doctors, only 22 percent are left practicing alone or in a small group. So do we have anybody going to war against this, Ed?

I mean, your book is a different subject, but I'm saying, is there anybody out there trying to change this? institutionally because this sounds like a nightmare. I have 30 books on my shelf that have been tilting at this windmill for 20 years. Yeah. No traction. It's hard. Well, it's like a mill of the industrial complex. Okay, so in the book, actually we're out of time

in the segment. We'll be right back. Folks, the book is The Patients' Survival Guide. Seven key questions for navigating the medical maze. Ed is a trusted friend, and I'm very glad he's written this book. We'll be right back. Americans have had it. They're done supporting companies that rake in hundreds of millions, sometimes billions of dollars, while crashing the country that made their success possible. Until recently, we had to take it, but companies like Patriot Mobile are building a whole new

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slash Eric. We need to stand together and support companies that share our values. Get free activation today with the offer code Eric. Tell me why Relief Factor is so successful at lowering or eliminating pain. I'm often asked that question just the other night. I was asked that question. Well, the owners of Relief Factor tell me they believe our bodies were designed to heal. That's right, designed to heal. And I agree with them. And the doctors who formulated Relief Factor for them selected the four best ingredients, yes, 100% drug-free ingredients. And each one of them helps your body deal with inflammation. Each of the four ingredients deals with inflammation from a different metabolic pathway. That's the point. So approaching from four different angles may be why so many people

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seven key questions for navigating the medical maze. So people just get sucked into this. And most of us have been taught to kind of trust our doctors. Yes. So what about that? Yes. Well, as we were saying before, there's three kinds of people in the book of Proverbs, and the simple are those who, in Proverbs 22, for instance, who just go on their way.

The wise turn away from danger and the prudent, but the simple go on and get clobbered. It says in the message, you know, version. And a lot of us are wise about a lot of things. But we don't, we're like cats in the library. We actually don't know what's happening. We just go to our doctor and we think we're so smart because we understand so many things. And we've read up and we've talked, we've been on the Internet

before we go to the doctor, right? And we think we know, but all of the information really has this overlay on it, which is the profit motive. Okay. And it's hard for us to sniff that out, but you're saying that the doctors themselves are part of a system that they have very little power over. Yes. So what do we do about this? Yes.

Well, with your PCP, with your primary care provider, you can try to, you can, in fact, make an agreement, an arrangement with them. I should read it how I actually put it in the book. But sit down and say, you know, I've read a lot of things about my condition or et cetera. Would you be willing to try conservative treatment here for me? I would like, I don't want all the latest tests. I don't want the latest drugs. I would just like to have your best clinical judgment, not necessarily your practice's standard of care. care. And so that's, those are two different things today.

Not necessarily your practices standard of care. In other words, you, the doctor, are under this pressure to go with a, quote, unquote, standard of care. And you're saying that patients need to say, which is, can we go outside that system? Can you give me your, would you feel free just to give me your breast clinical advice, not what you would do for your mother, but what you would do for yourself. And do we really need to go to a CAT scan on this yet, right? Or, et cetera. Now, what would be, playing devil's advocate, what would be the problem with going to a CAT scan? In other words, first of all, there's just, there's money that's expensive, but, you know, yeah, the insurance covers it. of this grand corrupt system.

But for the patient, what harm is done to the patient in getting that CAT scan? I'm not clear on that. Yes. Well, besides the money and the exposure, you know, cumulative, it's estimated, you know, two to four percent of cancers, you know, are the result of all the exposure we have, x-ray exposure today. But that's not as big a problem. As another whole thing that's another whole episode in medicine called incidentaloma,

us. A cat scan will pick up, for instance, I had a friend who had a new heart valve. They cat scan him to see how things were going. A heart valve is just fine, thank you, but it reached down to his kidney. You mean the cat scan? The cat scan did. Not the heart valve, just to be clear. So the catscan reached down to his kidney, and they saw what? They saw what 15% of us, imagine how many millions that is, saw it was a shadow. And now the question is, what do you do about that? You know, what is the clinical, what, you're sitting in front of your doctor, and he said, your heart valve is fine, but you have the shadow on your kidney because we reach down there.

What do you think we should, you ask them, what do you think we should do about it? Okay, so here comes standard of care versus clinical judgment. Right. If you're not wise or if you're simple about this, you're going to believe, everything that he says when actually 0.7% of these incidentalomas, particularly on your kidney, turn out to be aggressive or in any way dangerous to your health. So the question is, should you go for a biopsy, which is very, very difficult? So you said 0.7. So in other words, less than 1 in 100. So we're talking about like 1 in 130 cases. Is this going to be a problem?

So pretty much not a problem. But they say, well, we want to be careful. Let's have a biopsy, which is a major thing when the odds are near zero, that this is a problem. Yes, right. Oh, this is a problem all over in mammographies and the whole thing. And there's money to be made on the biopsy. And on everything, down the line. There's a whole system.

So this friend ended up, you know, once the cancer word was mentioned, and having his kidney out. Having his kidney out. Right. It was not cancerous. Well, as it turns out, the pathologist said, well, there's a collection of abnormal cells here. Which could eventually become cancer.

Which could eventually become. You have to be sorry for a pathologist, however, because they have the hardest job in the world, right? they're not going to want to call something benign if it's right. So the saying let's play it safe and we'll all make a lot of money. Hey, what a deal. It's not coached in those terms. Well, but isn't this the bottom line?

First of all, let's play it safe. It's not costing me a penny. I don't have to get my liver out. I don't have to get my kidney. So let's just go with it. That's where we are. We'll be right back. We're talking to Ed Morgan.

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who's written a book called The Patients Survival Guide, seven key questions for navigating the medical maze. So give us some more examples of, you know, people, my dad is like taking his blood pressure like three times a day. He's obsessed with this. People seem to get kind of sucked into this idea that they've got to keep an eye on that. Sometimes for good reason, but often it sounds like not something they should worry about so much. Not so much. One of the methodologies of over-treatment today is to define down disease, you know.

So systolic blood pressure definition of too high used to be 160. Then it became 140. Now we have a new definition called anything over 120 over 80 is elevated blood pressure. Okay, which is. And now eligible for one of the new blood pressure. Okay, because 120 over 80 is like perfect. Perfect blood pressure. So anything beyond perfect, they say, hey, let's...

The American Hearts Association now says, well, you know, let's evaluate that. Let's call it elevated blood pressure, and perhaps drugs would be useful here. We can all get rich, kids. I've got to tell you, this is sickening, Ed. You're so kind and gentle as a person that you're... But, I mean, it is really... I'm so glad you wrote this book because it is sickening, and we need to be aware of what's going on.

Another example might be, if you'd like another one, yeah, stents. Stents. Heart stints. Life-saving, if you're having a heart attack, run and jump on the gurney and ask for a stent because it'll open up the artery that's starving your heart of blood. Right. Right. But a stent in routine purposes placed, half a million placed every year, including members of Congress

and a former president who has stent. have been shown to extend life zero. There is no extension of life. So why did they get a stent? Well, to open up an artery. Right. Well, often it reocludes. But yes, they do that if it's more than 50 or 70% occluded.

Okay, but why shouldn't they, Ed? I don't get it. Why shouldn't they? Because it's a risky procedure that carries its risks, and will not extend your life by one minute. Why should you have a risky procedure? So first of all, it's a risky procedure. That's number one, and so we need to factor that in which they tend not to.

But then, in other words, why would they prescribe a stent to somebody? Why do they say that? Your heart's going to operate better if your arteries are open. You're asymptomatic. You have no trouble with angina. or anything like that. But we need to open this artery. It's more than 50% occluded.

Okay. And you're saying in many cases, even though it's more than 50% included, that's okay, and it's safer to let it ride than to get a stent. Yes. But you're saying that the standard of care has changed? Totally changed.

Where they are incentivized to put in that stent because they're not the one having that operation. They're not the one taking the risk. There's only upside for them. Yes. And because it will help prevent a heart attack in the future. They say. They say.

However, well, this is to come back to our whole cholesterol question that we were talking about earlier, right? Yeah. 50% of people who have heart attacks have normal cholesterol. And you don't get a heart attack from having your arteries gradually occlude and stable angina, as they say. You get it from inflammation in your arteries that break loose and travel. to your heart and cause a thrombosis there, you know, cause an infarction. Okay. So you don't, so heart attacks are not predictable.

And you, the only way you can reduce the ability to, I mean, reduce the incidence is really to reduce inflammation in your body, not cholesterol. Okay, and how do we reduce inflammation, eating a lot less sugar, for example? Yeah, that's right. and making, you know, eating mostly real food, I like to say, shopping the outside of the grocery store, and not eating mostly processed food. Right.

And not eating sugar as much as we do. Right. And all these things that are just so, so simple. And American medicine, you know, and when we talk about trust in American medicine, 38% of people trust the American medical system. now. In 1975, it was 80%. Right. So something's wrong. And we need to really be wise in the application of how we treat our medicals, our own medical treatment. Don't get into cascade

events that often start with a simple test. Some sort. You have framed this as you say it's the patient survival guide, seven key questions for navigating the medical maze. So the book is kind of for everyone. I know you're a great communicator. For 20 years, you worked for General Electric as a speechwriter. You know how to communicate, and that's important because I think a lot of times people with books that get intimidated, it's difficult. You're trying to write this for everybody, trying to be clear. Yes, exactly. And, you know, when you get into Statistics and figures. It's hard to recite them.

But, boy, do we need ever to be wise and not simple today in confronting the medical system? So many other tidbits. So just a minute left. Reiterate if you would what you think, other than buying the book, which I recommend the patient's survival guide, what people ought to do? people ought to forge a new pact with their doctor and say can we talk for real. And some doctors won't do that, though. Isn't that the case? Wouldn't you think? So how do you find a doctor that will be real with you?

Yes. You have to find one of the 22% left, or you have one of the concierge doctors, or one of the 22% left, mostly in rural areas, of doctors that actually want to talk to you with their own clinical judgment and are not scared. of their employers. And it's really... That are not scared of their employers. So not part of some big system would be ideal. Yes. That would be ideal.

I think in the future, we need to establish a coterie of doctors that actually... That are willing to... Give it to me straight, Doc. Really straight. Yeah. The book is The Patient Survival Guide, seven key questions for navigating the medical maze. by Ed Morgan. Ed Morgan, thank you for writing this book, and thank you for your time.

Really appreciate it. Hey there, folks. I hope you have heard that on this program we are doing an appeal to you, my listeners, the audience for the show, to raise funds for Christian Solidarity International, to free slaves. That is exactly what I said. Literally, to free slaves. Christian Solidarity International since the 1990s has been doing this. They have freed 100,000 slaves, but there are many more who are enslaved now, real people just like you and your family. And I'm talking to Todd Chavin. He's a spokesperson for CSI. Todd, you said that this is like an operation that happens a few times a year. So there's kind of an urgency to this. So how is that?

How does that work? Yeah. Yeah. So you've got North Sudan, South Sudan. We're basing out of South Sudan and going up into North Sudan and negotiating the freedom of these slaves that have been held captive, many of them for decades now, most of their lives. And so but then what we do, the second that we negotiate their freedom, we get them out of that slave master's home off of his property.

But then we gather them together. And three times a year, typically, we, it's a pretty great distance to get back down to the, you know, kind of the home base where these, we need to get these slaves taken to. So we get them in a group together and we call it a slave liberation and we transport them together down into South Sudan and begin to hopefully reunite them with their families and get them started on our new life. And so it's a really exciting time for us, as you can imagine, because it's like the culmination of all this prayer and work and your donations. We've had one of those already this year. We've got another one coming up here in the next month or so, and then another one in the fall. So I guess the point of this is there's a real urgency to what we're asking you to do today in giving your gift, whether it's $250 or maybe you could give $1,000. Because the more money that you give to us now, that will allow us to know what our capacity is to negotiate the freedom and set even more slaves up and get them started on their new lives yet this year.

And every year we try to save and free more slaves than we did the year before. Sometimes we can do it. Sometimes we can't. But, you know, we can't release a single human being except for people like you. And I have to tell you, Eric, your listeners over the years have been so incredibly generous, not just in the size of the gifts, but the fact that many of these people that have come in and partnered with CSI because of your program, they continue to give year after year after year. And so thank you for being so invested in this important life-saving work that suicide. You know, I say it all the time, we've got to live out our faith. If your faith is just some intellectual construct, I got bad news for you.

It's nothing. It's dead. You don't have faith. If you don't live your faith out, the scripture says faith without works is dead. So you're not saved by your works. But if you believe you will live out your faith in works, in doing. doing good things. And it's vital that we understand. That's a privilege, folks. That is a privilege that we get to do things according to God's will for his purposes. You want to bless God.

You do these kinds of things. So there's other things you can do, but I just want to tell you, I can't think of anything that is clearer than the idea that I give a certain amount of money and it will free people from slavery. I tremble. I tremble when I think of God and his heart and are indifferent sometimes. And so this is an opportunity for each of us to take seriously what we claim, we believe, to do something, to do whatever you can do. The website is metaxis talk.com. That's the radio website, metaxis talk.com at the top. You'll see a banner for Christian solidarity. please folks go there if you prefer to call 888 2533522 again 888 253 3522 this is an amazing opportunity please take advantage of this 888 253 3522 Todd Chapman thank you