The Eric Metaxas Show - Ricky Skaggs

Episode Date: December 16, 2022

Ricky Skaggs is in the TBN Studios to talk about his long and legendary music career.

Folks, welcome to the Eric Mattaxas show, sponsored by Legacy Precious Metals. 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. Eric Metaxis show with your host, Eric Mettaxas. Sometimes you have the privilege of having a guest on the program who really is what we call a legend. and I never would say this if he were here because I wouldn't want to embarrass him, but the person that I'm going to interview in a couple of seconds,

some of you know all about him. If you don't, you will very soon. His name is Ricky Skaggs. He is a legend in the music industry. He has 15 Grammy Awards in 1982, who he's the youngest member ever at that time to be inducted into the grand old opera. when he was six years old, the father of bluegrass, Bill Monroe, picked this six-year-old out and said, would you play for us? He went on to become a seven-year-old playing with Lester Flat and Earl

Scruggs. There's videotape of it. In 1971, when he was still extremely young, teenager, went off to play with Ralph Stanley in his band. By about 1980, country legend Chet Atkins credited him, my guest, Ricky's Gags, with saving country music. Have you heard enough? He has played, performed, produced with Barry Gibb, Emmy Lou Harris in the 70s, produced Dolly Parton, work with Bruce Hornsby, and the Amana Radar Range. In 2021, the President of the United States gave him the National Medal of Arts.

Again, I wouldn't say this if he was here in the studio, but he is a legend, and I'm very embarrassed to say, I think he's right here in the studio. I never would have said this, Ricky, if I knew you were sitting here. Ricky, my new friend, welcome. It's great to be here, Eric. I was sitting there listening to you, make all these nice things, and we could be talking about all kinds of other things. So anyway, I appreciate it, and you're a man of honor.

I made a lot of this stuff up. I just want my audience to know. This couldn't be true. So I'll have to live up to the things that you said. When you were six years old, now, you're in your late 60s now. So when you were six years old, which would put us back about 1960, you played with Bill Monroe. That is very hard to comprehend that. I know.

My dad bought me a mandolin when I was five, and so I learned. Now, why did he do that? I had been singing in church with him and mom since I was like three years old. And this is in old Kentucky. Mm-hmm, in Kentucky. And we would sing songs together at home, and then when we'd go to church, we'd get up and they would set me literally set me on the pulpit, and I would sing harmony with mom and dad. They would set you on the pulpit.

Yeah. So you appear we'd say put you up on the pulpit, but down there they would set you on the pulpit. That sounds better. That sounds more American. But you, the reason I'm saying this is you obviously at that time already had a gift for harmonizing. You could hear and sing. And so they knew that they needed to encourage it. So your dad at age five gets you a mandolin.

And already at age six, Bill Monroe is taking notice of you. Well, we, mom and dad and I would play at church, like I said. Then dad and I would go to this little local grocery store there in Blaine, Kentucky, and they would set me up on the pop case, you know, that had. So it wasn't a pulpit, it was the pop case. The pop case, that's the marketplace version. Right. Yeah, so I was getting my teeth ready for the marketplace back then.

but I would set and play and sing and people would want to get a Coke so I'd have to scoot over and they you know it was a double door and look you were so cute I saw the video of you I saw with flat and Scruggs which people can look up on YouTube but I mean you were so darn cute at age seven and when he says what's your name you say Ricky Skaggs it's so cute it's unbelievably cute but even cuter is the song you sing yeah because for a seven-year-old to sing a song about a broken heart and a woman who left me is funny. Yeah. I didn't understand those things back then.

I just liked the song. And the song was, Ruby, are you mad at your man? Ruby, oh, Ruby. I mean, to hear that little bit at your man. And the 70-year-old singing it while he's playing. And that's what I sung with the Bill Monroe thing, you know. It was a hit. Are You mad at your man?

You know, the neighbors in the hood at this little high school where Bill Monroe was playing, you know, they started shouting out after half hour Mr. Monroe's set. They started shouting out, let little Ricky Skaggs get up and sing, you know. And my dad didn't plant these people, I promise you, you know. And anyway, I didn't even take a mandolin with me. So the irony of the whole thing is that I had to play this size, mandolin. I had to play his mandolin. You played Bill Monroe's mandolin when you were six years old?

And I, you know, he took the strap around and, you know, wrapped it around the curl here so that it would fit me. Right. Set it on me. And I said, you know, they said, what do you want to do? And I said, Ruby. And so it was a popular song by the Osborne brothers, Bob and Sonny Osborne. And so away we went, you know. And, you know, no mistake. No, you know, I didn't flip out, didn't faint or anything, fall on the floor, didn't drop his mandolin. Well, you were too young to be self-conscious, probably. Yeah, I didn't know what that was. Yeah, if you were 11, you would have just freaked out. I probably would have.

But he sent me back offstage and then did his big famous Mule Skinner Blues just to rat me, show me up. No, I don't know that for sure, but I just, you know, the crazy thing about that is when I became a member of the Country Music Hall of Fame, Fame. Yeah. They wanted me to take out of the, they got some, some instruments in a place in the Country Music Hall of Fame Museum called the precious jewels. They have Earl Scruggs's banjo. They have Maybel Carter's famous archtop guitar.

They still have that? Yeah. They have Bill Monroe's F5 Mandolin in the case. So they took it out for me. Do they have Mother Maybell's Tortish Shell Combs? Uh, maybe. I'm just kidding. But I mean, who knew that?

Unless you're sitting here, I wouldn't know that they would have these objects. These are like sacred relics. But they let me play that same mandolin that I played when I was six years old. That was, he kept that mandolin all his life. He got it in 1945, found it in a barber shop in Miami, Florida. Of all places, you know, to be in Miami, Florida, walking the streets, just out walking around. happened to look in a barbershop with thousands of barbershops in Miami, Florida. So Bill Monroe found it in 1945.

And went in and bought it for $200. And used it for the 15 years until he met you. Then he lets you play it. He keeps playing it. And today it still exists. Yeah, it does. And was busted up and still, you know, somebody Gibson put it back together meticulously.

But it's amazing. And it just brought back so many memories. And it almost closed a door or closed a season of my life, you know, to play that mandolin at six years old and then get to play it again going into the most famous. When did they induct you into the country music Hall of Fame? 2018. So they waited way too long. Shame on you. No, it's almost funny to me because it is, you know, you, listen, if in 1980, Chad Ackins, the legend, you know, credits you with saving country music from the commercialization that it was

undergoing because of the urban cowboy fad and John Travolta hiss. But it's just kind of funny to me because you've been in this world, you know, forever. The idea that you were playing with Ralph Stanley when you were just a kid, what was it, 1971, so you're like 17. Were you still in high school? I mean, you're still in high school. Yeah. Did you graduate?

No, I wanted to go to the. Stanley School of Music, so I wanted to stay. We started Keith Whitley and I started when we were 16 and played the summer with Ralph and then we had to go back to school and, you know, Ralph wanted us to go get her education and I thought, man, this is the education I want right here, you know. I think a lot of people understand. Folks, I'm talking in case you're just tuning in, this is Ricky Skagg sitting here. We will continue the conversation on all kinds of subjects. Don't go away. In case you haven't been paying attention, the Biden,

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That's Patriotmobile.com slash Eric or call 972 Patriot. Welcome back. I am talking to my new. friend, Ricky Skaggs. He's a man of profound faith and insane level talent. And we're just talking. Yeah. We're not a picking and a grinning. But maybe later on, you'll be a picking and I'll be a grinning because I see that you have a mandolin sitting here with us. I do. So we can, we'll just, we'll just tease that. So people stay tuned in here. All right. So listen, you've won 15 Grammy awards. You've gotten every other kind of award. You've worked with practically everyone. And you're a man

of deep faith. I want to talk about that because that's kind of how we met. But I want to keep going on your career here. So you're a young man, very young man, 16 years old, 17 years old, playing with another huge legend, Ralph Stanley. A famous Stanley brothers. How did that, yes. How did that go? How many of you? How many years were you playing with Ralph Stanley? Well my mom and dad we had gone to see the Stanley brothers right the next year after I had played with Bill Monroe

and so we kind of had met Ralph and Carter and Carter they let me get up and sang with them you know or do a song with them and so anyway we kind of knew each other and so Keith Whitley and I met Keith was a great ended up being a really great short-lived, unfortunately, country music artist himself and just has recently this past year gotten inducted into the country music Hall of Fame. But he and I were friends.

We, like 17 days apart in our age, we met, me and my dad was playing this little place, and we met Keith and his brother. They were playing as well. And so I invited Keith over to my house the next weekend. And from that weekend on, you know, we just knew each other, just played music with each other almost every weekend. You know, we'd be out of school and playing together. And so we heard that Ralph Stanley had just hired a new lead singer

that sounded just like his brother Carter that had passed away a few years before that. So we wanted to go same. So, well, it was a little beer joint in West Virginia right across the river. from Louisa, Kentucky, where I went to high school. So dad took us over there, and we, dad, you know, dad was one of those that, don't leave home without it. He should have got, you know, money from, you know,

was it, what's the card that don't leave home without it? Oh, the card. Yeah, the credit card. I don't know nothing about those cards, but I know what you mean. American Express. So anyway, he always had us prepared. you know, just in case somebody asks us to get up and sing, well, Ralph had made a phone call that his bus had a flat tire. They were going to be late about 35, 40 minutes.

So this club owner, beer joint owner. In the musician world, that's on time. Oh, yeah. And he was such a good man that he said, well, we don't want 35 minutes of dead air. Right. Yeah, the natives were getting a little rest and we sent that little beer joint. And so they come up to the table and I don't know how they knew that we played, you know, because I'd never been in there before. we'd never played there.

But they asked us if we could get up and sing a few songs, you know. And so here again, Dad, you know, we go to the car and get the instruments, get up on stage, and we start playing and sing it, and Ralph comes walking in. You know, in the band, I see him going to the dressing room with their, you know, with their instruments and everything. Well, Ralph doesn't go in the dressing room. He sits down on a bar stool and just eats up what he's seeing. You know, he's seeing these young kids, you know, 16 years old.

singing Stanley Brothers songs, because that's really the only songs we knew. We were singing his songs, you know. And I could see him in my right eye over there, and I was like, I don't, and I was singing his part, you know, and it was so embarrassing, you know. But anyway, we met, we met that night, you know, and from then on, you know, we tried to play with Ralph whenever we were out of school with. If they were close enough, we'd drive and go. And then finally, when we got out of high school, he hired us full time.

That was a great place for me to grow. You know, Ralph's music is very mountain, very old time. And at a time when a lot of musicians would be wanting to play the newest, greatest, you know, most cutting edge bluegrass, I really wanted to insert myself in the dirt, in the ground, in the hills and the haulers. I really wanted to know more. Even though I was raised in that, there was something about the way he sang,

and the Stanley Brothers sang that always just touched me right in my spirit. I just knew that they were singing truth. They were singing songs about heartache. They were singing songs about breakup. They were singing about real life. Well, this is always the tension. And this is the tension really almost in any art,

in any genre, the tension between the roots and then where it's going. and how you commercialize it, and in the Ken Burns' series on country music, in which you're prominently featured, it's interesting because he's constantly talking about that, how you've got the, you know, once it starts making money, people all over it,

and they got this new kind of sound, what are they called it, the Nashville sound, or am I confusing it with the Bakersfield sound? But it's kind of, you get producers producing, and, of course, the tendency is to produce away from those roots. And so there's always that tension and then it becomes a dialectic,

let's call it, fancy word, right? So when Chad Atkins says that, you know, you, you, save country music, I guess what he's talking about is that, you know, when a movie like Urban Cowboy comes out, there's this big surge in a certain kind of music,

but it is pulling it away from those roots. And you always, for whatever reason, you love those American, those old roots, which are older than America, of course. Well, you know, that scripture of honoring your fathers, you know, so that your days and mothers, so that your days go well with you and you'll prosper in the land, you know, that always rang true to me in my heart. I just knew that if I honored, and I don't think it means your particular father, or mother. I think it's fathers or mothers in the faith. I think it's fathers and mothers that pour into you musically. It's just honoring people that's above you and has lived longer than you

have, you know, and there's something that you can get from them that will be beneficial in your life. That's the way I was raised. And so I just, I wanted to keep the roots of that music alive, yet I added drums, I added steel guitar, I added piano, because I'd been with Amy Lou Harris for the last couple of years, and I saw that that was working. And that's in the 70s. So how did you connect with Emmy Lou Harris? Well, I met her in Washington, D.C. when I was working in a band called The Country Gentleman. I was living in Manassas, working for VEPCO, Virginia Electric and Power Company. And I worked there just to make a rent and and a car payment for about six months.

I got a raise, and then I got a job, and I said, see y'all later. I got a real job. So you're like, what, 21 years old at this point? Yeah. You're an old man of 21 by now. Yeah. So, so Emily Lou Harris realizes she could use an instrumentalist such as yourself

and her band. Yeah, and someone that knew the old stuff. I met her one night. There was a guy in D.C. He was a doctor. His name was John Starling. And he worked at the Army Hospital there. And he loved old-time music, worked with the Seldom Scene group there.

And so he would invite people like whoever was playing the cellar door or whatever big club there in Georgetown. He would invite people to come to his house and have a pick and or a son. singing, you know. And so he invited me to come over and said Linda Ronstat was going to be there, you know, and that was in the 70s. She was about as hot as any performer could be at that time. I mean, Linda Ronstadt was huge. And also kind of connecting the pop and the roots. Right. And Emmy Lou knew Linda very well, but I'd never met Emmy Lou. She came in and just kind of squatted down on her knees in the floor, pulled out an old, you know, Gibson guitar and started singing, and it was like, oh, my God, this angel just walked in, you know, with this voice.

And so me and her and Linda was singing, you know, singing harmony and stuff together on these songs. I knew so many old songs, and they wanted me to teach it to them, you know. And here I was carrying the Stanley brothers. I was carrying Bill Monroe. I was carrying that old Lovin Brothers, even sound. and in my heart, and they wanted to know it. Well, it's just beautiful, and I'm glad.

I want to talk to you about just your whole story. When we come back, I want to get into your faith story because you're a profound man of Christian faith or a man of profound Christian faith, we're both. And later on, maybe you'll pick up that instrument and see, you know, if you still have it, you know, that thing that you've had over the year. years that talent. We'll be right back. I think you'll stick around because look, look I'm talking to it. We'll be right

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believers freedom. Call 888-253-3522. 888-253-3522. Christian Solidarity, providing life-saving resources for persecuted Christians for almost 40 years. 888-253-3522 or Metaxus talk.com and click on the Christian Solidarity banner. Give someone the gift of their freedom for Christmas. Thank you. Folks, welcome back. I'm talking to Ricky Skaggs, the legend. Not another Ricky Skaggs, but The Ricky Skaggs, the legend. Ricky, the reason you're here in New York, and I thank the Lord for this opportunity, is tonight you're going to be at Carnegie Hall, playing with my friends, Keith and Kristen Getty. They do an annual Carnegie Hall Christmas concert, and you were with them a few years ago. I remember you up there, but I think you were playing your fiddle, were you?

No, I was playing mandolin. You're playing mandolin? So that's a trick of my memory. I misremembered it. but you um uh you live in the Nashville area these days

I assume I've lived in uh Hendersonville it's a little suburb north of Nashville yeah I've lived there uh since 1980 yeah I moved there in 1980 and so I've been living there a long time

and your wife I've neglected to say is Sharon White Sharon White of the whites another uh grandel-Ockery members and uh well we'll talk about them in a in a few minutes and about her but I So just to go back, so in the 70s, you in a way were a bridge of this traditionalist world with, you know, Flatten Scruggs and Earl Stanley and Bill Monroe into what was happening in the 70s. And it's interesting because the 70s you do see, you know, whether it's the Eagles or Linda Ronstat, you're seeing a mixture happening. And some of that music being brought into the mainstream, into the world, you know, to the pop charts.

I don't remember I'm trying to think of others who were in that but it's interesting to see whether it's Leonard Skinner or Alabama I mean they're just different things happening in a way and so you were in the middle of all that but you were still playing the traditional stuff yourself

yeah I wanted to make sure that the mandolin and the banjo and the fiddle weren't mixed so far in the background that you couldn't tell what they were. You know, I wanted, and I got to, you know, that was one of the bargaining points. I really didn't have anything to bargain with, except, you know, some demos that I had played for the head of CBS

in Nashville at that time. But I just said, because they asked me who produced this stuff, and I said, well, I did, you know. And I said, if you like what you hear, I want you to let me continue to produce. Well, I'll have to get, you know, Larry Gatlin, the only artist we have. And I said, well, so there's a precedent set.

Okay, so, you know, I really wanted to do it. And if we don't sell records and we don't get, you know, chart action happening, then I'd be willing to take a co-producer. But I was just, I was not going to let, you know, just for the sake of having a record deal, I was not going to let my hands come off the console and the mixing. That is interesting. Yeah.

I mean, that's interesting. Now, you had that, that you felt that responsibility. Yeah. to those roots and to that kind of music. When I watched the Ken Burns country music series, which was just delightful, delightful education, one thing that actually shocked me, I kept waiting and waiting and waiting

for at some point, for there to be some mention made of Glenn Campbell. no mention as if he didn't exist or he was just was he too much of a pop star or was there somebody who just said you know I won't be in it if he's in it

or I mean it really was so bizarre to me because I thought of course he was extremely popular and you know but sometimes purists sneer at what's popular and stuff I mean I just don't know if you knew how he was regarded in that world I know I know all of my friends in country music absolutely loved Glenn

and Glenn absolutely loved bluegrass and loved, you know, Stanley Brothers, Bill Monroe, flat shows. He loved that stuff, you know. Hired one of my friends, Carl Jackson, a great band show player, hired Carl to play in his band for, you know, for years. So they would do, you know, gone, gone by, you know, by Jim and Jesse, you know. they do those bluegrass songs on stage, you know. Actually recorded it and had a single out on it, you know.

So I'm surprised, too, you know, that there was, you know, there was others that, you know, that loved this music and that could have been, you know, very, we would think very important to country music. To me, you know, if you're going to mention Charlie Pride and Freddie Fender, I'm thinking you're going to get to, you know, like they really made a great effort to include all these folks. and I just thought it just was bizarre. Sometimes he just kind of scratch your head and you say, where can I get an answer to why he's not mentioned in there?

But again, when we're talking, you know, country, country and Western, it gets very broad. You know, when you're talking about somebody like Buck Owens, the Bakersfield Sound, how do you, you know, it's difficult to kind of pull it all together and say this is it and this isn't it or this is outside the line and this is, you know. Yeah.

Well, Buck had a sound. He didn't want to record in Nashville. He knew what Nashville sounded like. And Buck liked that top end, lots of mid-range, not a whole lot of low-end bass and that kind of stuff. There was just something about the way that he recorded his records. even at Capitol Studios in Los Angeles, you know, he just had a sound and when he went into record,

he wanted to make sure it sounded the way he wanted it to. And I'll tell you who was like the biggest fans was the Beatles, because they were on EMI, you know, in England, and as soon as they had sent a message to Los Angeles, the Capitol there, as soon as Buck Owens records anything, we want copies over here, we want to listen to it, you know, Ringo especially. But I mean, the whole band loved, well, I love the cross-pollination. I mean, it's obvious that Elton John, whom I love, he, you know, connects to all that kind of country music and Bernie Taupin.

We're going to be right back. I'm talking to, I believe it's Ricky Skads. With the overturn of Roe v. Wade, lots of companies are coming out saying they'll pay for employee abortion travel and expenses. Most of you've heard about some of these companies. You've decided to stop shopping or doing business there, but did you know that you most likely own stock in those companies through your 401Ks, IRAs, and other investment accounts? Folks, this is a huge problem, and we need to do something about this to send a message to Wall Street through our investments. You need to go to inspireadvisors.com and get a free Inspire Impact Report. This biblical investment analysis will educate you on what's really in your investment accounts, like companies paying for abortion travel.

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So order now with promo code Eric at mypillow.com. Mypillow.com. Promocode Eric. Well, I'm talking to Ricky's gags. Ricky, you're in the studio with me, and I see that you have a. it looks to me like a perfectly good condition mandolin. And I don't know if it would be possible for you to peck out happy birthday to you or something like that. But I didn't mean you to take that literally.

But of course. Here's a tune I wrote not long ago. Ancient tones. That shows my craziness for the old sounds. Have you ever thought of going professional? Thought about it? I think it's time for you to make the leap. Stop living in the shadows and just step out in faith, brother.

You've got to step out in faith. No, I tell you. I've lived in faith for a long time. I watch you, you know, playing that instrument, and I think to myself, you seem more comfortable with it than without it practically. Like it's been a part of you for your whole life and then some practically. We were just talking about all these different characters. and the history of country music.

You mentioned that the Beatles loved Buck Owens. Now, what's interesting to me is there's certain things that it's the Americanness of certain folks like Buck Owens. When you talk, it's obviously you grew up in Kentucky. You know, you don't say took, you say tuck, you don't say sit, you say set. you know, there's something attractive about anybody's roots, really. And so there's something about American roots. And when you hear Buck Owen's voice, he's got, I mean, he has such a great singing voice. You want to hear his voice.

And there are many, many vocalists like that. You just think, I just want to hear his voice because I love his voice. It sounds like America. Yeah. And I think he was born in Oklahoma, and they was like migrant families that moved to California for work. But he carried that Oklahoma. stank with him when he went to California. He just had something.

The famous Oklahoma stank. But, I mean, look, George Jones is the ultimate example of this. His voice, you just think, why do I want to hear his voice? I don't know why, but I just do. Yeah. The two biggest musician fans in the whole wide world that loved George Jones more than anybody was Keith Richards and Elvis Costello. Who to think it? Yeah.

Unbelievable. Well, that's what I'm saying. Like, you know, you get this cross-pollination with, you know, the stones and the early Beatles, you know, they're playing American blues, you know, and you think it's just so interesting how that cross-pollination, as we keep saying, it keeps happening over and over and over. Well, think about it. There's the Monroe brothers, Bill Monroe and his brother Charlie.

They had this brother's duet. Yeah. They inspired the Stanley Brothers. Stanley Brothers inspired the Lovin Brothers. The Lovin brothers inspired the Everly Brothers. And so the Everly brothers are big inspirations to the Beatles, the Stones, all these English groups, you know. So I just still feel like it had a point of,

birth somewhere with with bill monroe and uh you know that they call him the father of bluegrass music but but obviously he got inspired you know with with people around him you know but um you know it's amazing to see how this old music continues to have life you know well it's it's extraordinary and um you know i was talking about the voices of some people when when i think of um loretta lynn I think there's certain voices that are so American. Yes. And without a doubt, you know, June Carter Cash, there's something, you can't put your finger on it, but it's just beautiful. And it's so in any event, you've worked with so many of these people.

You didn't ever work with Johnny Cash, I don't think. I think I would have looked that up. Well, we knew each other, and we lived there in Hendersonville together, and we, we, went to their house quite a few times, you know, for dinners and just fun things. And he'd call me up. Sometimes he'd say, uh, uh, Ricky, I'm in jail. And, um, you know, and what it was, he would go to the jail in, in Hendersonville and get locked up so that he could make phone calls from there and have people donate to the police department. Are you kidding? Make donations. They'll let me out of here, you know, if you make a donation.

I said, okay, John, we'll do it. Holy cow. What a blackmail artist Johnny Cash was. You're going to get the rest of this story. Oh, that's unbelievable. Well, I mean, I would have known that you would have known him. And, of course, he married into the first family of country, the Carter family. Yeah, June was amazing.

She was, I mean, her story is, most people don't really know her story. I mean, she was a comedian. She was an actress. She was really an extraordinary figure. Yeah, she was a star. I mean, just born a star. Yeah. You could see it on those old Al Ganoi

Grand Ole Opry shows that were shot in Technicolor. Have you seen those things? They're unbelievable. Oh, my gosh. They're incredible. And June would come on as June Carter, as a comedian. Yeah. But then she had sang with the Carter family

when they would come out as well, you know. Yeah. But you could tell, you could just look at her and say, she's got star all over her. She just commands something when she walks out. All eyes and all ears are on her. Well, there's no doubt about it. We're running at a time again. We're going to lock the doors and keep you for a second hour, Ricky. Did they tell you that? Yeah. Yeah, you're in jail. You and Brother Johnny, we're all in jail together.

And that's the beauty of it. When we come back, I want to talk to you about your faith. journey because a lot of people say they're Christians and a lot of people, especially in the country world or Christians of some kind. But you're what I call a hardcore Christian, a fanatic like myself. And I want to talk to you about that. I want to talk to you about a lot of stuff. So when we come back, I get to continue talking to Ricky Skaggs. Ricky, we're grateful for you and for your time. Thanks for being here. And folks, we'll be right back. Folks, welcome back.

Albin, because it's Christmas, I keep wanting to throw out Christmas gift ideas. Now, listen, maybe people think it would be self-serving for me to recommend my own books as Christmas gifts. But believe me, folks, I didn't write the books to make money. I wrote the books because God created me to be a writer and to tell all these stories. I'm very proud of them. You can get most of my books. Well, you can get them anywhere, but you can get them at my story.

store.com, which is Mike Lindell's website. There's all kinds of wacky products there. But my store.com, you can get my books. You can get a Bonhofer poster, which by the way, it's glorious. It's beautiful. It really is amazing. So I just want to recommend my books because I, listen, if I could give them away for free and sometimes I do, I want to get the word out to people about the heroes I've written about, you know, the substance of our faith being, how rational it is to believe in the God of the Bible. And so I wrote his atheism. So anyway, those are my books.

But if you do go to my store.com and you decide, well, maybe I don't want to get Eric's book today. There are a zillion other crazy products. Alvin, you and I are like laughing ourselves sick looking at these. They have the Tick Patrol tick remover. Yeah. Who doesn't want a tick remover? Who wants ticks? Let's be honest.

Very few people actually desire ticks. Well, the Tick Patrol tick remover, you can get it at my store.com. Use the code Eric. And I'm not going to tell you about it because it's just too, it's too real. It's too real. But it's, is it tweezers maybe to get rid of the ticks? No, it's, it works. Stop ticks in their tracks.

with the tick patrol tick remover. Freedom four pack removes ticks head and all. A lot of these tick removers, you know, they just give you the semblance of tick removal. This removes the actual entire tick head and all. So, you know, if you're a camper or you're on tick patrol, you know, this is important stuff. But there's all kinds of other stuff. They've got so many products.

They have the breathtaking tongue clean. cleaner. Oh. They also have an amazing temporary tooth replacement. Did you know that? No. Yeah. If you're missing a tooth, it's this is, you have to go to my store.com, browse around. Just don't forget to use the code Eric when you buy these things. But it's, it says with amazing temporary tooth, that's the title. With amazing temporary tooth, it's easy to fill that missing tooth with a realistic looking tooth that is comfortable and will give you the confidence to smile again.

This is not made up. They're 15 to 20 temporary teeth in every product. I think you have to look into this. All right. Now, we need to get serious for a minute. We keep saying this because we believe in it. If you really want to give a gift that is not goofy or not practical, but that's just beautiful, you can participate in freeing a slave.

we are partnering with CSI Christian Solidarity International. If you go to the link on our website, Metaxistalkis talk.com, whatever you give helps free slaves. This is real. We've talked about it on this program. I keep saying I want to encourage everyone, please, to participate. Whatever you give, your name goes into a hat and we're going to send eight. We're going to draw eight grand prize winners.

So if you just are a kid or you just want to, you know, they want to get 10. $10. We want to put all your names in a hat. Anybody who gives $10,000, I want to have dinner with you or spend the evening with you. I keep throwing that out there. Anybody gives $1,000, which will free force slaves. We want to reward you and thank you in person. When you come to the radio studio, we'd be delighted to have you there. But you have to go to metaxis talk.com. This is just the greatest Christmas gift, folks. Anything, any amount you give, metaxis talk.com. You'll see the banner right at the top of the page. be generous this is an amazing amazing amazing thing god bless you