The Eric Metaxas Show - Fun Fact Friday Christmas Edition (Encore)

Episode Date: December 31, 2024

Eric and Albin bring you a Fun Facts Friday Christmas special 

Ladies and gentlemen, buckle your seatbelts and keep your arms and legs inside the car at all times. Here comes Mr. Thrill Ride himself, Eric Mat, Texas. What do you say? Is that really you, Eric? Listen, this is... How is it not a TV program suddenly? I don't know. First of all...

I didn't know you look like that, but it's kind of cool. That's really funny you say that because I didn't used to look like that. Why didn't you? I was much younger. Okay, so this is like freaking me out. That's a camera. Yes. We are now on, the radio program is on camera.

So today's Fun Facts Friday. It's a special Christmas edition. But do not forget that we're going to air this all through the Christmas season. Yes. And this is like the beta version of the Eric Metaxus show, Super. So if you sign up for Metaxus Super, you get. You get slide whistles, you get visuals and stuff, and you can watch it. You know, I want to be clear, folks, this is going to be the program from here on in.

That's the way it is. We're doing the program. We've got to dress up a little bit. We've got to dress up a little bit. Put some pants on there, sir. And we've got a drink out of our Eric Mataxis show mug. Got them right here. You know, that kind of stuff. We've got to turn off the sounds on our computer.

That's right. Turn everything off, okay? Make sure the hair has come if I have some. I'm going to take my hat off at this point. I know we're pushing these hats a little bit because of... We're... I guess... Okay, so today's Fun Facts Friday.

Now we've got to do the show. We're going to do the show now, so please. Okay, get ready. In three. We're going to... Oh, you know what I haven't done yet? No. Oh, relief factor.

Okay, first time visual. Eric, really... I see in the past, I've actually watched it. I've watched you do this, and now you're going to do it. I take two packs. Two packs. You want to have some Christmas fun? There you go.

How about get rid of the aches and pains and pains? for Christmas. And don't drop the pills on the floor. I'll drop the pills on the floor. Okay. Okay. Okay. Down the hatch, they say.

Three, two, one. There you go. It's all gone. Okay, let's look. Okay, look under your tongue. Okay, kids. Okay. Very good.

Oh, my gosh. You know, I had a hump on my back and I can feel it disappearing. Wow. I'm just sitting up straight. That takes care of it. Okay. Albin, this is Fun Facts Friday. Now, before we get into the fun, we got some serious stuff to do for Christmas,

we're trying to raise me. money for CSI. Right. CSI is Christian Solidarity International. So I want people to go to the website. Now, by the way, what website? It's MetaxistalkisTalk.com, and it's right? There it is.

There's a visual. It's right there behind me. Right there. That's what it looks like. So if you're listening to this program and you're not seeing the visuals, you can't see the websites literally behind me. So people are just going to be aching to get this $2.99 a month video TV program. Yes.

for their friends. I hope so. I hope so. So the key is to check the website for everything. And the website is metaxis talk.com. That's right. That's the website right behind me if you're watching this on video. And if you're not watching this on video,

you can watch it on video by going to the website, metaxis talk.com, and clicking on, there's going to be a button. There will be a button. By the time this airs, there should be a button. By the time you watch this or listen to this, If you go to Metaxistock.com, there should be a button that says sign up for Metaxus Super.

And while we're able to do it, it's going to be $2.99 a month for the year. Soon it will go up to $5.99 a month. That's the normal price. But we want as many people to sign up as possible. We want you to sign your friends up or give it as a Christmas gift or New Year's gift, whatever it is for the year. At this point, maybe a Groundhog's Day gift. No, we can't wait that long. We want this to be as soon as possible.

Let's do it. Let's do it. So a few things. Number one, go to Metaxistock.com to give to CSI. The banner is at the top of the page. That's right. Number two, go to Metaxestalk.com to sign up for this program on video. In fact, if you go to Metaxestock.com, you can see this program on video.

You may be watching this now at Metaxistock.com. See, we don't know that. Which would be so meta. It would be really meta. It would be. And by the way, too, when you give to CSI, you do get, if you give the, you give the, $156. Oh my gosh.

You get an official Eric Mataxis show hat. Either in black, very stylish, or in khaki. K-H-A-K-I. Yeah, khaki. Yeah. So those are the gifts.

So for $156 you get Eric Mattaxas show hat. That's official. For 500, you get two hats. For a thousand, you get two hats. A signed book from you, sir. Oh, you get one of these? Yes.

or if you can keep it, your paperback edition of if you can keep it. So you get one of those, okay? That's some heavy stuff. For $1,000. And then you get to come in here and sit in the studio and be on one of these cameras. Now, suddenly it's TV. Now, by the way, how much money do you have to give to get the Eric Mataxis show machete? That is going to be over $10,000.

If you give her $2,000, we'll make a machete for you with their own hands. Cardboard. Okay. Now, Albin. We're going to keep telling people about CSI through the program. Yes. I want to give out the phone number. If you prefer to call, it's 1-800-222-2-2-9.

1-800-2-2-5909. If you don't want to call, the number is still 1-800-22-259. Yes. Where you can go to Metaxus. Okay, we've got to get to the fun. It's Christmas Fun Facts Friday. It's Friday. And the first thing we have to do, the very first thing is saying the, you know,

The official Fun Facts Friday song, right? I don't have the lyrics, but I think I remember them. Okay, you'll pick them up, right? Because there's a lot of people they'll be singing along. Okay, here we go. Come on and have some fun just for the fun of it. Tune into Eric's show and you'll be in the know. You may learn something new and something untrue to.

Fun Facts Friday's here. Oh, yeah. That is some fine singing. It's some fine, fine. Eric Hanson is just aghast of what he's witnessed in here. Eric Hansen, you might even be able to see him on TV. You can see him reflected in my glasses. That's beautiful.

That's beautiful. You got those mirro glasses like in Coohan Luke. Oh, my gosh. All right. Now, Alvin, people are saying this is a Fun Facts Friday Christmas edition. Get to the fun and to the facts. They haven't heard one fact or one fun thing. All right.

I just, I want to run down some of the things we're going to cover on today's show. Okay. So, just so you know, I've actually brought in some Christmas toys. Oh, my gosh. So I'm going to get to those. Okay. The toys, you know, like you open up the toys on Christmas Day, but we're going to get to the toys in a moment. Okay.

I'm going to talk about something. One of the fun facts I discovered in this book, The Forgotten Man of Christmas. Now, we had Howard Eddington on the show. Right. Right. We had him on. In fact, if you want to go back to the, to the, to the. podcast, you'll be able to see him on Wednesday, December 13th.

We had him in one of the hours there. Right. Great, great. Recently. That's very recent. That's very recent. I want to go over some stats. An older gentleman, let's just put it this way, he wanted to remain anonymous, sent some

stats about why men are happier than women. You know, it's one of these, it's kind of fun. You mean a listener to the show wrote us. And he said, when you do Fun Facts Friday, I'd like to share something. Okay. Yeah, yeah. Now, you know, he filed it on the internet, but it's a lot of fun. I want to go over something that boils my potato.

Now, this is something that involves the subway. And you and I go... You know, I'm literally sitting here across from you, and I'm already confused. Is this intentional? No, no, it's not intentional. I'm just running down what we're going to go over today. Oh, so this is what we're going to go over. Yeah, this is all what we're going to.

You know what it is? But why don't we just go over it? We could, but I want to get people... You know how I just want to get people enticed. Like they'll be saying, like, oh, I can't wait to see that what boils his. potato to day, that kind of thing. You know, okay. So, and then we're going to go, like I said, we've got some toys

and we've got some fun facts that are not so true about Christmas and we get some real facts about Christmas. So if we have some time before we go to a commercial, do we have some time? Yeah, we do. Okay. I want to read something. This is an actual fact. I did not know this until I... We don't have a lot of time. Go ahead. Go ahead. The forgotten

man of Christmas, okay? By Howard Eddington. It's all about Joseph. Go ahead. He talks about why we celebrate on December 25th. It's because of the Romans, they used to celebrate their God who was the God of the Son. They used to call them, it was the Feast of the Invincible Son, S-U-N, and they celebrated it on December 25th, because they thought that was the winter solstice, which is winter solstice, as we know, is actually the 21st. So they got that wrong. But the Christians picked up on that and said, we're going to celebrate the feast of God's invincible son, S-O-N.

And that's why. You know what? That doesn't make any sense. usurped it. It doesn't make any sense because that's in the English language. The pun only works in English. And English was not invented until about, you know, 1,200 AD. Now, you have to take this up. We're going to be right back. Holy cow. It's Fun Facts Friday, Christmas edition. Okay, every new year, we all spend a few days seriously thinking about what we can do to improve our lives. And usually it revolves around better health, right? Well, I want to strongly encourage you to do what I do, take responsibility for your health by taking balance of Nature's Whole Food Ingredient Supplement. Seriously, they're packed with 31 varieties of fruit

and vegetable ingredients from tomatoes to sweet potatoes, just about everything in between. It's a resolution you can truly keep all year long like I do. This is your last time to put it off, because today you can become a preferred customer at Balance of Nature. Use my discount code Eric to get 35% off plus free shipping plus a free fiber and spice supplement. It's an unbelievable limited New Year's promotion, but you can use my discount code Eric. Call them at 800. 2468-751. Use discount code Eric or order online at balance of nature.com. Discount code Eric to get 35% off their food and veggie supplements plus a free fiber and spice supplement. Okay, ready? Balance and Nature.com. Use code Eric. Go. Hey there, folks. My Pillow is excited to announce that their Christmas extravaganza is finally here. Get this season's flannel sheets for as low as 59.98. They won't last long. So get them while you can. They're famous My Slippers. Those haven't been on sale for a long time, regularly priced at 11998 for a limited time now, 5998.

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free. Mypillow.com. Use code Eric. Hey, that's Shirley Jones, stepmother of David Cassidy. Incredible. Folks, it's Fun Facts, Friday. You're listening to the Eric Mataxis show. The Eric Mataxis show in in case you're watching us on video. You already know because we've got, we've got, we've got, we've got a lot of logos everywhere you look, Eric Metaxus show. And I brought some toys in. And if you're listening on the radio, then you really need to go to the website, which is Metaxus talk.com. So you can watch this on video.

Because if you could say the way we're dressed up, we look absolutely preposterous. I'm wearing vampire, plastic vampire fangs, and Albin has a carrot for a nose. It just doesn't make any sense. I'm like a snowman. It's kind of warm here. So metaxis talk.com is the website. And if you were watching this, you could see that right behind me is the website. But if you're not watching this, it's just an abstraction.

What good is that? What good is it indeed? Now, we went to a break and you kind of pointed out something that your friend, Howard Eddington, wrote in his book about the use of the word son, S-U-N, and the use of the son S-O-N. And that was done in English. This was, by the way, when the Christians took that over, it was a couple hundred years after words that they took it from the Romans. So I don't know if the English was a round,

noter. But Albin, speaking as an English major. Well, there you go. And a writer, I can tell you that the pun, S-U-N and S-O-N, did not exist until the English language was invented, which was a long time. I mean, Chaucer is 1,300, okay?

So the pun might have existed around Chaucer's time. It certainly didn't exist at 500.8. Well, they didn't have cups and chaucers back then. Okay, now here, now we know that the song that we sing in the beginning says, you know, you're going to learn something new and something untrue to. So I'm going to throw that into. You mean the Fun Facts Friday?

Theme song. Yeah. So that would be something that, you know, if you look it up, you say like, look, I'm an English major, like our friend over here. Yeah. And I found out that sun and sun, you know, that's a little bit off. Okay. But here is something that is true on a, on a, uh, a, uh, a, uh, a, uh, a, uh, a, uh, a, uh,

religious or a belief sort of thing. This is what I really like. Okay, now, Howard Edicton did some research for the book, and he said that Joseph was not so much an artisan of his day. You know, when he was a carpenter, we think of people that are carpenters today. They have beautiful chairs and table sets and all that. They work with wood. They do, but they work, you know, we usually see them as artists, right?

Well, he was a day laborer, a frightfully ordinary man for the extraordinary responsibility God was assigning to them to be the... I mean, I'll go a step farther. From what I have read in recent years, it seems that in fact, Joseph and Jesus were not carpenters. They were builders. Okay, right.

Well, he did in his time. He worked with stone and wood. So it seems that Jesus... I mean, this is actually kind of big news, right? That Jesus was not a carpenter, but was a builder. And if anything, he worked with stone. stone and not with wood.

Now, Howard. Now, I've read that in a few places. I can't say that's for sure, but that's what I've heard. And Howard points out some of that. But of course, I'm just reading little snippets here. But this is the key point. This is what I love Obama, because he was like an ordinary man. He was an ordinary laborer, as it were, right?

But here's the thing that, you know, Joseph was spoken to in dreams throughout the Bible. There are four dreams that Howard brings out here. And Joseph never actually speaks. in the gospels. You never hear a word from Joseph, but he takes the orders from the dreams, and he moves on, and he does all the things with the angel. Well, just the fact that there are four dreams, this is one of the things in this book that I was astounded by. I thought, how did I miss that? Not two, but like four. Yes. I know. I missed that too. And the title of the book, to be clear, again, it's the forgotten man of Christmas by our friend Howard Eddington. Okay, go ahead.

Right. Now, and he talked about how, of course, Mary was an ordinary woman. She was probably about 14, 15, 15, years old, and Joseph was only about like maybe 1920. He was a young guy, right? We mostly see him as a bald guy with a long beard. That's mostly how you see him picture. But this is the point of all that, the two of them being ordinary. This is a great fun fact for the Christmas season, okay, the reason for the season. The most important thing in the world can happen to the least important people in the world, that the king of kings and lord of lords can take up residence in the most ordinary of lives and that the greatest somebody who ever lived can come to nobodies like Joseph, like Mary, like you, and like me.

Amen. I love that. I have to say that, you know, the one thing that Luther, Martin Luther, talked about over and over and over again was this issue, was the idea that we would think that Jesus would come on a golden cloud, that he'd be, you know, wearing. a tiara, a crown, and holding a scepter and an orb, and it would be jewel-encrusted. And the reality is no. The God of the Bible is a God who came into the world in a dirty place.

He came to the lowest of the low to show us his nature, his real nature, is to love us and to reach us wherever we are. As high and mighty as he is, he reached down, down, down. as far as necessary to reach any one of us wherever we are. I mean, it's kind of an amazing theological point. And by the way, Luther's right here in the studio. There he goes. You see? Now, by the way, if you're listening to this as radio or as a podcast,

you cannot see that Luther is with me in the studio. Now, if you go to the website, metaxis talk.com, you can see that Luther is right here. He's here. Why would I make it up? Why would I make it up? Here he is. I'm pointing to him.

If you're looking on camera, you can see him. and even our engineer, Eric Hansen. Eric, am I lying, is Luther right here? He's here. You know, that's the other thing. You know, radio is so yesterday, right? So you want to get to what they call television, okay? It's like two words of vision and seeing, like, you know.

No, tell is far. Okay. That's like we get telescope. Well, you're the English major. You get telescope. You get telisavallus. It's a lot of Greek words. Right.

So telsovalis looks better far away, so to speak. That's right. That's right. Now, before we go out to commercial, whenever that happens, okay? No, we've got four minutes in this segment. Oh, great. Because I talked about a little bit about something that boiled my potato. And I know we talked a little bit.

On Fun Fact Friday, we like to share things that really, man, it just boils my potato. So, Albin, tell us what boils your potato? Okay. Now, people are going to say, well, why is this in a Christmas edition, right? Well, because it's winter. And some people, you know, going to celebrate the winter solstice. Well, here's the problem in New York City on the subway. It's usually crowded anyway, okay?

So I'm coming down to work, and I'm always jammed in there. Now, of course, it's winter, and everybody's got those big puffy coats like, you know. Michelin Man. Yeah, that kind of thing. They look like the Michelin Man. But here's the worst part of all of this, and I know you've contended with this as well. So this is what boils your potato. Because I want to be clear, in this segment, we're covering what boils Albans specific potato.

My potato, right, is when. people wear backpacks. A lot of New Yorkers... Oh, man. That gets my goat. Right. Wow, that just chaps my... Hide. Hide. Now, they'll put on the back... They'll put on the backpack, and they won't know it's there. And it's really... Some of these guys have these really huge backpacks.

I don't know. Some of the backpacks are so big. One backpack I saw was so big, it was the size of a small tugboat. Well... That's hard to believe. But if you've seen a very, very small tugboat, which is the size of a backpack, you'd know them right. But it's more like... This is the visual I get. It's like one New Yorker is given a piggyback ride to another New Yorker, right?

And then when the door's closed, they're standing there facing you, right? And the door's going, Bing, Bing, Bing, Bing. It's catching the backpack. And the guy's standing there like, oh, somebody's holding up the train. Somebody's holding up these thousands of people are being held up by this dude's gigantic backpack. And you want to grab them like this. See this on the visual? You want to grab them like this by the straps of the knapsack and pull them in like that, right?

You want to pull them to safety. But you know it's Christmas and you don't want to do that. Well, I got to tell you, I'm sure a lot of people listening to this all over the world can relate to these subway problems. Well, okay, so it's Fun Facts Friday. We've got to share some other Christmas fun facts. Okay. I want to share another one that's from why Santa Claus gives coal to children. You know how it's been when a kid is bad, they actually get cold?

But that's in the old days when kids were considered bad. Today, we all realize that if you call a kid bad, you could cripple him for. forever. And so you just tell kids you're the most wonderful thing ever. Don't ever correct a child because if you do that, it will cripple his soul. Well, and the other thing, all the stockings are hung out by the mantle with care. They're all filled with the exact same thing because you don't want to, Santa doesn't want to give everybody something different because that means like you're a different kid and you're a different kid and you. But in the old days, when we cared about, when we really cared about children, if they were bad, we'd put coal in their

stockings. Okay, so where does that come from? That's right. Where does it come from? First of all, how do you get your hands on coal? But, you know, in New York City, it's very hard to come by. But go ahead. This goes back to like around the early 1800s. Now, this is something that B.S. Bentley discovered, okay? Oh, B.S. Bentley. Yes. So. Go ahead.

Oh, okay. Well, what he did was that back in the 1800s, they used to fuel houses with coal, right? So if you got coal in your stocking as a kid, that meant you actually good because Santa was giving you like free fuel fuel for the Christmas season. Yes. Oh, you are kidding me because it's from B.S. Bentley.

Yes, but there's a codicil to that and there's another like, yeah, we're going to get to that. A codicil? Yeah, I don't know what that means. An actual codicil? You're the English major. I think I'm probably misusing that word for. There's an actual codicil. I can't wait to see this codicil. We're going to be right back. It's Fun Facts Friday. Starring Albans Sater. It's the Erkman, Texas show. We'll be right back. with a song of a literary fairy.

Hey folks, listeners to my show know I'm passionate about the work of Christian Solidarity International because they protect and free those who are being persecuted and enslaved for their faith. Thanks to you to date, CSI has freed more than 100,000 people from slavery in Sudan, but the work is not done yet. It's estimated that there are still tens of thousands more still in bondage, and CSI is preparing right now for their final slave liberation of this year. I'm hoping you'll join me and help them. liberate another 300 women and children. Your gift of just $250 will free a woman in Sudan who has

been enslaved for years and provide her with food and other supplies necessary to start her new life. Call 888-253-3522. 888-253-3522. Christian Solidarity International, freeing and healing captives in Jesus' name. Go to metaxistalk.com. Metaxistalk.com. Click on the Christian Solidarity banner. at Metaxistalk.com or 888-2533522. God bless you. Cassidy. Ladies and gentlemen, it's the Eric Mataxis show. Metaxistock.com is our website.

If you were watching this on video at metaxistock.com, you would see that right behind me is a screen with our website, MetaxistalksTalk.com. That is correct. And you would explode because it would be so meta. It's right behind me. Look, right there. There it is. Okay, so this is a fun fact Friday special edition.

Albin Sater. Yes. Lay it on me, man. Now, we were in the middle. We were talking about the coal. Oh, the coal. Okay. Coal, very important.

People, if you're bad, they put coal in your stocking. Right. That's what today we think it's bad. Now, I'll show you why there's a turnaround here because like in the May 1800s or so, if you got coal in your stocking, that helped fuel your house. So that may, hey, I'm a good kid. Look at all this coal free fuel. Right.

And by the way, for those of you who are just tuning in, that is an untrue fact. courtesy of B.S. Bentley, just so you don't think that that's real. Go ahead. Let's keep going. Let's keep going. Shall we? Then, then when houses changed to electricity, okay, if a kid got coal in his stocking, the problem here was now, hey, listen, kid, you're living in the past, man. Get with it. Right. You're a bad kid.

I got you. Right? I got you, man. Now, there were also houses that were fueled with gas. We know that, right? And so if you found a dead canary in your stalking, that meant there was a leak somewhere and you should just get out of the house. I think the idea is for me to be confused, in which case, Bob's your uncle. I'm as confused as can be.

Lay it on me. Okay. So, Albin, so now those are untrue facts. Do we have any true facts to lay on the listeners at home? Because are people saying, you know what, man, I tune into the show to learn some fun real facts, some true facts. Do we have any true facts to lay on the groovy? listeners at home. Okay. I'm going to get to that right now. Because these cats are hungry for knowledge. Yeah. Okay. Here we go. This is no full-in. There are probably three, three authors. You're an author.

You're going to appreciate this. You're an author. There you go. I'm an author. It's not like they say. It's not like they say. I'm an author. I write. I write books. There you go. Right there. But three authors that were really instrumental in making the images of Christmas that we have now. Oh, I know who they are. Can I guess? Yeah. Why don't you go? Okay, Washington Irving. You got it. Charles Dickens. You got that one. Third one's a little...

Thomas Nast? No. Oh, wait a minute. Don't tell me now. Don't tell me. Thomas Pynchon. No. John Updike?

No, I'm going to go with Clement Clark Moore. Oh, of course. He wrote... Now, you know, it's interesting. Two of these guys are New Yorkers. Well, that's the other interesting thing. Two-thirds of Christmas was invented in New York City, where we are right now. That's true.

True. But what's funny about the first guy on the list, because by age, around 1819, he went to England. Wait a minute. Who? This is Washington Irving. Went over to England, and he experienced what he called an old-fashioned English Christmas. And when he came back here, he started writing about it, like his experiences is England. Yeah. Okay. So one of the things he talked about, but he added to it, the gift giving and things like that, was, although it was actually gift giving to individuals was something that people did for Christmas, but it was a Christmas Carol that actually made gift giving, like we have the CSI campaign going on now

because it's Christmas, right? But the reason that we give to charities at Christmas was because of Charles Dickens says a Christmas carol, the Scrooge story. Exactly. Now, hold on. So you mean to tell me that give you. gift-giving individuals already existed. Yeah.

But somehow Charles Dickens' Christmas Carol, which was published in 1843, that began the idea that we think of Christmas as a charitable thing. Right. Expanding out to our fellow man. That was that whole idea. See, this kind of stuff, that's amazing to me. I never thought of that. And you remember this. This is something you'll remember, too.

A Christmas Carol was published for the first time on December 19th, like less than a lesson a week to go before Christmas, December 19th, 1843. Right. Okay. And it had the original drawings and things like that. And, of course, the first edition sold out immediately. But it affected the public so much. And, of course, it's a tale that's told every, every year.

Right. You know, it's always in print. It's always being published. But it affected people so much that a job, that the idea of workers getting a day off on Christmas, that that became like, like, like all the, all the places, they decided we're going to make this standard across the board and giving a gift to an employee like a turkey or something. Because remember, in the story. You know, I got to say, that's, that's, I'm amazed.

I didn't know this. Yeah. And to think that a book could have that power in a culture. I mean, that Dickens was so popular and that that book was so popular that it changed the culture. Yeah. So that employers suddenly thought, oh, yeah, I should give my employee Christmas Day off. First of all, the idea that. that that wasn't the case before that,

that you kind of would think, like, really, that you wouldn't get Christmas Day off? Right. Not everybody did that. In fact, the Puritans thought that you actually should work more on Christmas Day. This was another, yeah, this is something that Washington Irving found because it was kind of like, you know, working and, you know, honoring God by doing, you know, by working, by being the person, you know, building, that sort of thing.

That was a Puritan thing. And it was like Washington Irving kind of wrote against that, like saying, like, you know, We're flipping that around. Just to clear my mental palate, we're going to go to a little music. Yeah, a little bit. From David Cassidy and the Partridge family. Folks, stick around. It's the Eric Mottackettackett Show Fun Facts Friday with Albin Sater.

Telling me why Santa Claus is coming to town. He's coming, coming, he's coming, coming, he's making a list, checking it twice. He's going to find Santa Claus is coming to town. He's coming. He's coming, coming. And now it's so funny because Santa Claus, his theology's messed up because he's got a works righteousness mentality. Like if you're bad, he punishes you, if you're good. There's no grace.

There's no grace, man. It's messed up. In my new book, in my new book. Yeah, I have a new book out called Martin Luther, the man who rediscovered God and changed the world. In that book, I talk about the issue of grace and how when you have a workspace-based, view of the world like Santa, you're kind of getting it wrong. Thank you. You're welcome.

One thing I want to mention about Christmas calendar. And by the way, some of these traditions, you know, getting a day off and all that, they were around, but it was like now everybody's doing it because it's almost like, if you don't, you are Scrooge. You see how that all played in? You know, but it shows you, we did a breakpoint on this. Now, people, maybe people listening to this program don't know that I do a radio commentary called Breakpoint.

And you can go to breakpoint. And at breakpoint.org, you can listen to these. But I did one a couple of weeks ago, or maybe it was a couple of days ago. I can't remember when we aired it. But it's about the very issue of how art can transform culture. And the idea that this novella, it's not a novel, it's a novella, a short story. I mean, it's not a short story, but it's not quite a novel. It's longer than a short story.

It's a novella called A Christmas Carol in 1843. So dramatically affected the world, especially the world of England. but of course it jumps over the Atlantic and affects us. I find that fascinating, and it ought to move people, particularly people of faith, to produce more art. Yeah, yeah, to do something, that one thing. If that was the only book he wrote, he would be famous at infinitum, right? And unfortunately, he wrote so many more books, and that's why he's not famous. Yeah, unfortunately.

Whoever heard of Charles Dickens? Yeah, who's that? It's so sad. Reading, and it's fun to read the original from which all these movies are taken from. Right. Because there's Magoo's Christmas Carol in back in 62, which is one of my favorite. Wait a minute. Wait, wait a believable.

McGoo, you realize there are people listening. They don't even know who Mr. Magoo is. But Mr. Magoo is a cartoon figure from our youth. Yes. And unfortunately, he passed away just a couple of years ago. He sure did. Well, yeah, Jim Back is, sure, the voice. But there's a scene in there.

Now, remember, Mr. the young Scroo was dating and engaged to Bell. Okay. And in all the movies that I've seen anyway, I haven't seen, there's a scene in the book in the real Christmas Carol where you find out what happened to Bell, his sweetheart. The girl that he was dating, right? In the movies, they never follow up with Bell. Right. Or if they show her, she's like in a poor house and she's helping the poor. Really?

I've never seen that. My favorite, okay, but I was going to say my favorite Christmas Carol Scrooge movie is the 1970 Scrooge starring Albert Fing. Thank you. Alec Guinness plays Jacob Marley. Oh, really? Okay. Alec Guinness plays Jacob Marley. It's brilliant.

Okay. It's brilliant. But if you haven't seen the Scrooge musical, the 1970s Scrooge musical, I rave about it every Christmas and I have to rave about it now. I didn't mean to interrupt you. No, that's okay. But I just wanted to get in. I rave about Alistair Sim, but there's a scene in the actual and the original Christmas carer where you see what happened to Bell. And what's interesting is Bell is actually married, has several kids.

She's happy with her husband. And her husband says, this is all in this little scene. He says, like, you know who I saw today? I was walking past his counting house today. And I saw him in there on Christmas Eve, counting his money, he looked like a sad, lonely old man. And she was like, oh, you know, the way they laugh back. That was beautiful.

Yeah. Beautiful impression of Bell laughing in her old age. It's kind of fun because it's almost like, you know, and he is seeing this, of course, Scrooge is with the ghost. And he's seeing this thinking like, that was the woman. Those could have been my kids. Oh, you mean, oh, you mean Scrooge as the Ghost of Christmas present.

When he's with the Ghost of Christmas present, he actually goes to see Bell at home. Right. He's standing off in the corner and he sees how her life turned out. Like he's a miserable old Scrooge and she's a happy bell, you know. Right. So I thought that was kind of interesting. Scroo. And speaking of Great Marley.

That's the, that's the when I watch the Scrooge musical, the Albert Finney Scrooge musical, I have the whole thing memorized. There's so many beautiful moments in it. But Albert Finney, you know, his voice, he says, Scrooge. It's incredible. And then when Scrooge is opening his door, so the knocker, you know, he hears Scrooge. And then he goes into the house and then a ghostly coach pulled by white horses comes past him. And the ghostly coachman says, Merry Christmas, Governor.

Merry Christmas. Wow. It's really spooky. And by the way, you also find this out. Mary used to main an old England that you had a little bit too much to drink and were a little inebriated. So people didn't say Mary back then, but he kind of popularized that war. Okay, that's another thing. I did not know that Charles Dickens popularized the phrase Merry Christmas.

We used to say Happy Christmas or whatever. It seems like over in England they still say Happy Christmas and we say Merry Christmas here. Right. But I wanted to get to some of the toys because I, teased them at the top of the show. But this was something I bought, you know, the Charlie Brown Christmas, which came out in 1965. Can I hold him?

You can. Oh, please. See? Oh, my God. Where do you get this? I got that about 20 years ago. 20 years ago. Yeah, but that's what I like about the Charlie Brown Christmas. It actually talks about the real meaning of Christmas, the Savior coming. And the voice of lines. Did you know, I don't know if you knew it, but

Charlie Brown Christmas, I mean, obviously Charles Schultz, he refused to back down. The network wanted him to take out the religious part. This is in 1965. Exactly. They wanted him to take it out. Yeah.

And he refused. And they kept it in. And forever and ever, this is again to show you the power of culture. That's right. That's right. Forever and ever people have been watching this beloved Christmas classic and it includes the gospel. That's right. Christmas story from the gospel of Luke.

How amazing. I know. They can't get rid of it. They can't because everybody wants to see the Peanuts Christmas special. And there it is. Does he say the same thing over and over? Yeah. Can we say it one more time? Yeah, go ahead.

Okay, we got to hear this. What's Christmas all? What's Christmas all about, Linus? Oh, my gosh. Here's something else Christmas is all about. My mother-in-law gave me this. I'm, I'm speechless. I'm speechless. See, she was so happy that I married her daughter. You know, we're going to a break. We're going to play a little Charlie Brown Christmas. Oh, my gosh.

Hey there, folks. As promised, I want to get my friend Kevin McCullough back on here. to talk about CSI. This is an insane opportunity. I beg you, take advantage of the opportunity to free a slave. There's nothing more significant. Anyone could do. No better Christmas present. You could give to someone to say that you've done this in their name. You've freed a slave. You go to metaxis talk.com. Metaxistocococcom. The banner's right there. So my first question for you, Kevin McCullough, you were recently on here talking about the work CSI does. I thought I'd have you back. so you could detail further the impact that is made. So what do you say?

Well, the great thing about what CSI is doing, and I love the fact that our shows do this together. We're both in the process of asking people to join the effort. And what's great about doing it at this time of year is that we are just around the corner from another major liberation with Christian Solidarity International. And what that means is that people are going to be freed, and they're going to be allowed to go home.

And as you think about the holidays and kind of what this is normally, you know, all about, going home is a big thing for a lot of us at this time of year. But imagine being someone who was kidnapped from your home when you were maybe six, seven, eight years of age. You're a girl. Your parents may have been killed in front of you. Your mom may have been raped in front of you. There may have been things that you've seen repeatedly in how much. people treated you over and over again for dozens of years. And now as an adult, you have the first opportunity this Christmas to be with people that love you, to be with people that have missed

you, to be with people that have wondered if you were even still alive. That's the beauty of CSI at Christmas time. We have a liberation that is just around the corner and we can give them that new life, that return home, that blessing that we all enjoy when we go home for Christmas, we can give that to these hurting hearts that have not felt it in years and in some instances ever. Kevin, where does the $250 go that it frees the slave? I mean, there's more. How are those resources specifically utilized? The CSI program is pretty straightforward. There are what we refer to as retrievers that are Sudan Arabs that want to have good relationships with South Sudan Christians. And they have been recruited over time, over the number of years the CSI has been doing

this, to go into Sudan and look for slaves that are thought to still be alive, thought to still be there. At one point, there were 185,000 women and children that had been taken as slaves. We believe the number is somewhere around 35,000 now, after years and years and years of CSI, basically being the lone voice in the wilderness saying, we got to do something about this. But these retrievers locate them. They alert CSI. They engage in negotiation and they secure the release of the slave. Now, what the slave master will usually release the slave for in exchange is a very hard-to-get cattle vaccine that helps their cattle withstand the extreme temperatures of what they are going through.

Many of these slave masters are ranchers. Cattle is their only means of material wealth or income. And so, you know, you can't be having cattle die on you and be successful. So the life of the cow or the bull is more valuable to the slave master than the life of the slave. And CSI is able to effectively say, if you'll release this slave, we will see to it that we get a vaccine for your, for your cattle.

I know that everybody's in a different place, but everybody can do something. Whatever you can do, please, folks, join us in this beautiful, beautiful thing. Go to metaxis talk.com. You'll see the banner there. You click on it. It'll walk you through everything.

And right now, we're going to hour two. I guess I just want to leave the phone number with you. 888-253-3522, 888-253-3522, or the website metaxis talk.com. Metaxistalk.com. You'll see the banner. This is the right thing to do. Jump in. God bless you.