The Compartmentalization of Christianity

(Taken from Paul Blair’s message at America at the Crossroads 2020 Pastors’ Training)

Well, my name is Paul Blair. I have … I’ll tell you what, I’ll tell you a little bit more about that in just a minute. Just a little bit of background. I am an ex-football player. I actually played at Oklahoma State University back in the early 1980s. Actually, for a period of time we were ranked as high as number two in the country. And, in fact, my head coach initially, when I was recruited out of high school was a guy you all may recognize. A very young Jimmy Johnson began his head coaching career as the head coach of the Oakland State University Cowboys. And although I think he’s a schmuck, I do appreciate him giving me a scholarship and giving me the opportunity to do what we’ve done. I went on to finish at Oklahoma State, was drafted by Mike Ditka and the Chicago Bears. I played five seasons in the National Football League before my body finally wore out.

At the age of 37, and I wasn’t looking for a job … As an ex-football player, and had a private business, and was comfortable and enjoying life, but I was called into ministry as a 37-year-old, and my father was a bi-vocational pastor. I grew up in a pastor’s home. I never wanted to be a pastor. I love pastors, have great respect for them. I know what the job entails gentlemen, and that’s one of the reasons I never wanted to be any part of it, but it was really obvious that God was calling. And as my wife and I visited and prayed about what we must do, obviously, the safest place to be is right in the middle of his will. And for the last 20 years, I have been in full-time ministry, pastoring a wonderful church, and having the opportunity to speak around the country.

As I mentioned a few minutes ago, I was diagnosed with cancer about two years ago. And it was interesting, we had the opportunity to expand and do Worldview Training. Folks, we’ll talk a little bit more about this. God willing over the next four years, we will have an opportunity to help shore up an area that we aren’t taught in our seminaries. Jesus is not just the Lord of Sunday mornings. As Christians, he’s supposed to be the Lord of all of our lives, but we haven’t done a good job of teaching a comprehensive biblical worldview, which we’ll share later.

We had started doing these conferences and were preparing to do these conferences, and we were starting in the state of Florida, and I brought on our staff to work with me as co-pastor of Fairview Baptist Church a long time dear friend, Dan Fisher. Dan and I had been involved in a lot of activities over the last 15 years. And it was really interesting because the weekend that he was scheduled to start officially on staff with us at Fairview Baptist Church was the very … Well, actually, that Sunday he was preaching, I was diagnosed with cancer on Friday and our church didn’t miss a beat. Matter of fact, it may have gotten better. But isn’t it amazing how God worked that out and was prepared? For God, there are no surprises.

2016, we were leading an effort in the state of Oklahoma to end abortion by using the 10th amendment. You say, “But Paul, that’s an interesting concept, what are you talking about?” Well, when the 13 states created a limited general government in 1787, the only authority that was granted to that limited general government were powers delegated to it by the states. The ninth and 10th amendments of our Bill of Rights secure that anything that the states didn’t specifically hand over to the limited general government was retained by the states.

Well, one of those powers is doctors medical licensing. We don’t get a license to practice medicine for the United States, you get a license to practice medicine in Texas, you get a license to practice medicine in Oklahoma. Well, knowing that the Hippocratic Oath states that a doctor swears they will intentionally do no harm to a patient. And recognizing that with an abortion, a doctor is willingly killing one of the two patients that have been entrusted to his charge, we came up with the idea of passing a bill where the state of Oklahoma would be able to jerk the license from abortionist doctors and thus in the practice of abortion in the state of Oklahoma.

Well, we had done our homework, we had met with our governor who was a Republican, who was a professing Christian, and had pledged her support to our effort. And we had met with our attorney general and we’d crossed our T’s and dotting our I’s, and we passed a bill through the Senate, passed a bill through the House, got it to the governor’s desk And lo and behold two days before the end of that legislative session our governor betrayed us and vetoed that bill. Isn’t it amazing how politics works?

There are a lot of observations, a lot of lessons that we learned from that experience, but one of which I am going to share and start my remarks this evening. One of the men that we had hired to work with us and handle our media was a member of one of the large, what I call country club churches in Oklahoma City. A country club church is one of those churches that promises to have you in and out in an hour and assures you that you will have no conviction. Well, he was at a men’s prayer breakfast one week and he was talking with one of the wealthy men in his church because we literally made this whole thing happen on a shoestring budget. And he was visiting with this man about our effort, what we call to protect life and marriage effort because quite frankly if the state stood up and said, “You can’t force us to murder our children,” we would also recognize that the Supreme Court can’t force us to redefine marriage.

Well, the conversation with this very successful businessman went like this. He said, “No, I can’t help you,” And asked or pressed for an explanation, this was the reason that was given. He said … Dismissive and said, “I am a Christian and I am a businessman, but I am not a Christian businessman.” Now think about that for a moment. Folks, that is impossible. Jesus is either the Lord of all of you or he is the Lord of none of you. But his explanation was telling. Here’s another man that goes to church on Sundays, but doesn’t allow the Bible to influence his life the rest of the week. Now, as nonsensical as that explanation from that businessman sounds, that is not the exception and explains why we’re in the condition that we are in as a country.

The American Church, and then pastors listen to me, have adopted a form of platonic Greek Gnosticism into how we practice Christianity. That is how an Oklahoma governor can lead in the National Day of Prayer one week and then veto a bill ending abortion the next week. Jesus is the Lord of Sunday morning, but Jesus wasn’t the Lord of her politics. That’s how Baptists can campaign as conservative Christian champions, then once they’re in the legislature do nothing but champion the expansion of gambling and liquor. Jesus is the Lord of their Sundays, but Jesus isn’t the Lord of their politics. Now let me ask you, how did that happen?

Well, as you all know, context is critical to properly understand the Bible. You have to know who is writing, to whom he is writing, and the subject to which he is addressing. Now, there is no question that early on the Church of Pentecost was 100% Jewish. They had a Jewish worldview with a great knowledge of the Tanakh or what we would call the Old Testament. By the way, the only Bible that the New Testament Church had for about two decades was the Old Testament, but the early church wasn’t concerned about such things as baptism or the work of the Holy Spirit. As a matter of fact, the debatable subject of that first church was the subject of circumcision.

Christianity was treated as a sect or a denomination of Judaism by the Romans. And at that time there were some 24 different sects, S-E-C-T-S, of Judaism. You’re familiar with many of them. The Pharisees, the Sadducees, the Essenes, the Herodians, and now you have this new group called the Nazarenes, all gathering at the temple. Christianity was Jewish to its very core. The question was not whether a Jew, you’re going to become a believer in part of this new spirit-born community, the question was whether a Gentile could? Well, as you know, from your study of the Bible, over time there grew greater separation between official Judaism and the ecclesia, the church.

Open persecution began with the martyrdom of Stephen and the hatred of Saul of Tarsus, and then finally the division or the separation was finalized in 70 AD when the believing Jews left Jerusalem as Jesus had admonished them to do in Luke chapter 21. The Orthodox Jews viewed them as traders to Israel, and that only increased and made permanent the divine. But over time, the church grew exponentially as a result of Paul’s mission work into Asia and Europe, even reaching as far as Rome. What a great time of evangelism as the God of Israel, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob was being proclaimed to the pagan Gentile world. But with that expansion and those converts, the Greek line of thought invaded the thinking of the church. In fact, much of the New Testament addresses the error of Gnosticism as John, and Paul, and Peter all warned against this heresy and their many epistles.

Now I know you pastors know, but just in case there’s someone in the audience that doesn’t know what Gnosticism is, let me just say that the Greeks divided the spiritual realm from the material world. They believed that the flesh was irredeemably wicked and the spiritual was good. Only the soul could be redeemed. The body was sinful and earthly. Well, this led to the logical conclusion, but heresy of the early church or some of the early church, that Christ didn’t actually come in the flesh. After all, how could God become incarnate, become part of the material world?

There were several theories. One was that the spirit of the Christ, the Messiah came upon this man Jesus of Nazareth at~ his baptism, and then departed from him on the cross. One theory was that Jesus was not actually a person, he was a Phantom, and is seen as walking across the seashore he wouldn’t leave footprints in the sand. Well, obviously, both of these are heretical, because either way they denied that God became flesh and they denied that our creator actually gave his life for his creation. But this mentality of separating the spiritual from the physical also led to the conclusion that you can separate your spiritual you from your physical you.

In fact, they even said you can sin all you want to in your body because that’s just part of the material world, as long as your heart is pure. And that’s what John addressed in his First Epistle. He said, “If we say that we have fellowship with Him and walk in darkness then we lie and we don’t know the truth, but if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another and the blood of Jesus Christ his son cleanses us from all sin.”

The apostle Paul wrote to that great thinking church in Corinth, he said, “Don’t you know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God. Don’t be deceived neither fornicators, or idolaters, or adulterers, nor the feminine, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor convents, nor drunkards, nor liars, nor extortioners shall inherit the kingdom of God.” In fact, Paul again said to that same church, “Whatever you do, you should do to the glory of God.” But in modern-day America, we have adopted the same separation as we have compartmentalized our Christianity much like a picnic plate. We have our Christianity in one little section of our life, but we don’t dare let it spill over into our workplace or into our career thinking or into our business ethics or into our politics or into our home. Christianity has become something that we do on Sunday morning, but we don’t let our church thing interfere with the rest of our lives.

We have this box that we consider our spiritual life, where we put all our sacred things, where we talk about prayer meetings, and Bible study fellowship, and mission trips. And then we have this large box where we have our career, and my family, and my business, and my politics, and my hobbies, vacations, habits, wants, my sex life, my education, my entertainment, my goals in life, my desires. Folks, if Jesus is your Lord, let me ask you this. What part of your life or what parts of your life is he not the Lord over? Now it’s those specific subjects that you shouldn’t talk about in church. “But whatever you do,” Paul said, “You do to the glory of God.” Folks, when Thomas fell on his knees before the resurrected Christ and he cried out “My Lord and my God,” he was not asking Jesus to be the Lord of a Sunday morning. He was surrendering his entire life, whatever he is, whatever he did, Jesus was Lord of all.

And ladies and gentlemen, Christianity is not something that we do. And the church is not something that we attend on Sunday mornings. True Christianity means that a person has come face to face with a resurrected savior. As a matter of fact, understand this ladies and gentlemen, Christianity is not based on emotion, Christianity is not based upon a feeling, and Christianity does not necessarily make your life better. You become a Christian in some Muslim country and see how much better your life gets. In fact, if we continue much longer down our path you see how much better our lives will be here in the United States of America. The fact is either the tomb was empty or it wasn’t. And if it’s empty then that means he is the Lord. Now it’s up to us, each individual is what they do with that bit of information.

But true Christianity means that a person has come face to face with a resurrected Christ recognizing that Jesus came because we are sinners. What if we die without him? We’ll be separated forever in the lake of fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels. And that God the Son stepped into his creation as a man we called his name Jesus and he gave his perfect life as a substitutionary sacrifice to pay the penalty that we owe for our sins and that he rose again to prove that the price for sin was paid in full as the wages of sin is death but the chains of death could not hold him. And because he lives we too will live forever in four or five bodies just like his in a new creation, as we are all new creations in Christ Jesus. We like Thomas must fall before him and cry out “My Lord and my God.” Apostle Paul said, “That if now shall confess with thy mouth, the Lord Jesus, believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead thou shalt be saved.”

Folks, salvation, and subsequent Lordship was understood in the Hebrew mentality. You can’t separate them. Think back to your studies of Hebrew, the word Shema, significant to a Jew. Deuteronomy 6:4. “Shema Yisrael, Adonai Eloheinu, Adonai Echad.” ” Hear, O Israel, the Lord, your God. The Lord is one.” That was the John 3:16 of Judaism. It was the fundamental foundation of their entire belief and practice. Will understand this than in the ancient Hebrew, they only had about 7,000 words. We have about 100,000. To understand what they’re talking about you have to look at the context of what’s being said, but understand this. The word Shema means literally to hear, to listen, but the very same word also means to obey and to do. So, men, there was no controversy between James and Paul from a Jewish perspective. What Paul was saying and what James was saying was the exact same thing. The natural result of one falling to his knees to call upon the resurrected Christ as his personal savior is also to recognize that he is your Lord.

What did the Hebrew scholar and apostle to the Gentiles, Paul tell the Greek Corinthian Church in correcting their inherent Greek view and reminding them of their Hebraic biblical truth? He said this. “Don’t you know that,” you are what? “Body is the temple of the holy ghost, which is in you, which you have of God and you are not your own for you were bought with a price.” Therefore, one of the next two. What’s the next sentence? “Therefore, glorify God in your body and in your spirit which is his.” There is no such thing as compartmentalization. What did Paul tell the Roman Church correcting their inherent Greek view and reminding them of the Hebraic biblical truth? He said this. “I beg you, brothers, by the mercies of God, present your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.” Don’t be conformed to this world, be transformed. How Paul? By the renewing of your mind that you may prove or know or discern what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God.

Now listen closely, I don’t want you to misunderstand me. We’re not saved because of a transformed life, but a transformed life as the natural result of being saved. So let me ask you again. What part of your life is off-limits to preach about in church? And what part of your life is Jesus not the Lord over? One of the men that have worked with us, his expertise is in apologetics, the factuality of our faith. Alex McFarland was in a debate with a Muslim cleric named Coleed Griggs. Alex asked him this question. He said this. “Does one have to truly believe the Shahada,” which was the Muslim confession of faith? There is no God but Allah and Muhammad is his prophet. Does one have to truly believe the Shahada to become a Muslim or just say it? You know what his answer was? He just has to say it.

Ladies and gentlemen, saving faith is not simply mental assent. It is not praying an empty prayer. It is not simply a get out of hell free card. The prayer of faith is a heart’s confession that’s based upon the revelation that Jesus is Lord, which naturally results in a transformation. Now those of you Bible students stick with me here. This is not the lukewarm rational pistis of the Greek philosophers. It’s not just mental assent. Saving faith is of the Hebraic Emunah. As a matter of fact, this quote doesn’t come from a Christian website, it comes from a Jewish website and it says this. “Emunah is more than belief.” That certain statements about God are true. It is a belief in God, and trust, and reliance upon God, all of which call forth behavior consistent with that stance of trust and reliance. So as James said, “You may talk about your faith, let me demonstrate to you my faith through my practice.”

Gentlemen, the great commission tells us to go into all the world and to make disciples. It doesn’t say to go into the world and make church members. It doesn’t say to go into the world and make professors of faith. It doesn’t say to go into all the world and make people repeat the sinner’s prayer. It says that we are to make disciples. What is a disciple? Well, we’re to teach them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you. In Acts, chapter 11 tells us that those disciples were first called Christians in Antioch, which means a disciple or a follower of Christ.

Now, pay very close attention because this is where the rubber meets the road so to speak. The last time I was leading a tour group in Israel, we were walking through the old city. Actually, it was on the last day of our tour in the old city of Jerusalem near the Wailing Wall there in The Jewish Quarter. One of the members of our tour group asked our guide, Isaac, he said, “Why do the Jews dress so differently?” Now if you’ve never been there let me explain. First of all, being in Israel is like being in the 51st state. The average Orthodox Jew is just like we are. I mean, this guy right here is amazing. Colonel Guy Bhutan. So they … Outfit called the Givati. Brother Tom Vineyard, you know Guy. His nickname is the animal. He is a Colonel in the Jewish Special Forces that does not send his men into battle he leads his men into battle. He’s an incredible warrior, got an incredibly gentle heart, shared Christ with them in their living room, wept. This bold man was nicknamed the animal. Hey, they dress just like we are.

The question was about this unique group called the Hasidics. The ultra-Orthodox Jews are dressed characteristically in black and white. I mean, if you see, they wear different types of hats, they wear different lengths of jackets, they wear different lengths of pants. Some wear knickers. Some wear full-length all the way down to their shoes. And the question was asked, “Why do they dress differently?” I just assumed it was style change choices, honestly. As many times as I’ve been to Israel, I didn’t know the answer to this. They wear different types and I just assumed that’s what it was. But our guide Isaac said this and listen. He said, “They wear their hats the way their particular rabbi does. They wear their socks the way their particular rabbi does. Their goal was to become like their rabbi in thought, and mannerisms, and behavior.”

Now continue to work along with me in this line of thought. A Jewish rabbi, which means my teacher, didn’t just hand his pupils a syllabus, they were commanded to follow him or literally to walk with him. Do those words ring a bell? In fact, one Jewish Christian author likened the maturity of a disciple to be measured by the amount of dust that he had accumulated on his clothing from following his rabbi so closely as you watched, and imitated, and listened, and learned, and applied his teachings to your life. As a matter of fact, the Hebrew word for walk is Hâlakh, and it doesn’t mean to simply take a stroll. Your walk-in life refers to your overall lifestyle including how you conduct yourself morally. In fact, a rabbi’s interpretation of the Torah was called the Halakha meaning how to walk by God’s word. As a matter of fact, the path that one walks, a comprehensive way of life that affects … Now, remember, Jesus was a Jew. What was the thinking of a first-century Jew in teaching this message that affects every aspect of life?

In America, we have redefined what it means to live by faith. We believe that living by faith means that we live our lives the way we want to live our lives, justifying our behavior in light of the world’s wisdom, and then when we absolutely make a mess out of everything we get on our knees and ask God to fix it. That is not living by faith that is testing God. And Galatians two tells us that the just shall live by faith. Romans 10:17 tells us that faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. So living by faith means that we listen to what the Lord is telling us in his word and obey it and apply it to our lives.

So living by faith means husbands love their wife as Christ loved the church and gave himself for it. That’s living by faith. Living by faith means wives let your inner beauty exceed your outer beauty and let your husband see your love of Christ in your home. Living by faith means parents raise their children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. Living by faith means children obey your parents in the Lord for this is right. Living by faith means avoiding the very appearance of evil. It means don’t commit adultery. It means flee fornication. It means don’t lie, don’t gossip, don’t steal, don’t cheat, don’t covet, don’t murder. It means to be honest in business. It means to me just in your judgment. It means paying your bills on time. That is living by faith.

It means to be generous. It means to don’t get into excessive debt. It means you’re to let your work be an offering and a testimony unto the Lord. It means don’t be lazy. It means work just like the ant and save for lean times. That is what it means to live by faith. So a disciple of Jesus and when it walks with Jesus day by day studies his teaching of the truth and applying his instruction to your life since he is the Lord of all.

The guy in the middle is named George Barna. He is one of the most well-known statisticians among Christianity and Christian topics in America. As a matter of fact, you see Sam Rohr, and Richard Land, and George, and David Barton, and then me. This was me in my pre-cancer days when I was about 290. I could’ve eaten Barton for a snack. As a matter of fact, they say that Eskimos would kill a sled dog and crawl inside his carcass to survive on a particularly cold night. Let me tell you, all four of these guys could’ve crawled inside me and survive one night. But Barna did research. Actually, it’s been over 20 years ago. He’s added more to it since then, but it was very interesting in that he didn’t just survey people, he took a group of individuals that self-identified as being born-again Bible-believing Christians, but then he tested them. And according to the answers that they gave to these questions in a written test, he concluded that only 9% of born-again Bible-believing Christians actually possess a biblical worldview.

You want to know why the … America looks like it does today? The vast majority of Christians are actually post-modernists. We have a lot of born-again socialists in our churches. Why is that? Because there are so many topics that we don’t teach about in church. They’re left to public education, and public university and the secular press to form their worldview. Quite frankly, as Solomon said in Ecclesiastes, “There’s nothing new under the sun.” Everything that we are dealing with in our day and age has been dealt with in scripture. A very simple outline to clarify your thinking is simply this. Understand every topic and put it in the proper category of responsibility. When we think of government we have a tendency of thinking of the United States Capitol. That’s not government especially now.

The Bible talks about self-government. Family government, church government, and civil government. Give me some examples. Self-government. In fact, I’ll stand over here so I stay in the spotlight for the video. It’s not Mayor de Blasio’s responsibility to tell you what size soft drink you can buy at QuikTrip. That’s your responsibility. You’re also the only one responsible for the consequences of your decision. If you wind up drinking 128 ounces of Dr. Pepper every day and you wind up becoming a diabetic, well, too bad for you. Not my fault. Now, as a Christian, I may love you and I may choose to give charity and help you, but that also is my self-government.

Let me give you another example of self-government. I don’t have a problem at all with masks. As I was at MD Anderson, about 5% of the patients wore masks three or four months ago. Those that were … Felt that they were most vulnerable wore a mask to protect them not others. But again, that’s your choice. I don’t need the mayor to tell me to wear a coat in the wintertime. I don’t want to get sick. I’m smart enough to make that decision for myself. I don’t need the City Council to mandate that I take vitamins to keep my immune system up. That’s part of my responsibility. So too, as we’ve told our congregation, those of you that wish to wear masks, knock yourself out. Those of you that don’t, don’t. We’ve got along splendidly. We have had no issues in our church.

In fact, our church is busting at the seams or bursting. I don’t know I was terrible in English. We’ve got people joining every week. They are so thrilled to have a place that allows you to make that decision for yourself that is addressing the issues of the day without fear. But you know what? It’s politically incorrect to call a sin, sin anymore. In fact, we’re all victims of our circumstances and we can’t grow a church if we offend anybody, so we’ve taken self-government out of the equation.

We’ve got family government. Let me ask you a question. According to the scripture, whose responsibility is it to oversee the education of your children? Moms and dads. So why is it when we take our kids down to the public schools when they’re in pre-kindergarten and drop them off, and then pick them up after they graduate college, and we’re surprised when after 18, between 80 and 90% of our kids abandon their faith? That’s part of our job. We’re supposed to oversee the education. But since the 1960s, the family has been under attack. Now we see after Obergefell, they actually … I think in Massachusetts, they now have legalized or are about to legalize polygamy and polyamory. So marriage, family means nothing. By the way, you’ll learn about this tomorrow. That’s one of the goals of Marxism. So we can take family government out of the equation.

Got church government. That doesn’t mean much anymore. Folks, we’re not supposed to be competing with each other. We’re supposed to be all God-called shepherds engaging the culture with the truth of Jesus Christ. Instead, we’re busy trying to steal a few dead members from one another. Trying to relax the rules so we can attract more people to join our congregation. So we can strike church government.

And all that’s left is an ever-growing civil government to tell you what size soft drink you should drink, whether you should wear a mask. And by the way, mandate the mask today, mandate the vaccine tomorrow, mandate the mark to buy and sell and do business after that. We have done several of these. In fact, we’ve got Marilyn and Abraham Rivera right down over … Where are you guys? I saw … There. They put together … Helped us put together … In fact, they were the reason we had an incredible conference with Latino pastors in Miami. We met in Orlando and all over the state. And these are what we call Liberty Pastor’s Training Camps. It’s not denominational. It’s introducing pastors to a comprehensive biblical worldview. Quite frankly, that is our goal. God willing, we’ll have freedom over the next four years and we’ll be able to take this across all 50 states to try to get Christians to start thinking like Christians so perhaps we’ll start behaving like Christians. Let me share this brief video, which is a testimony of our conferences and the work.

George Barna found that only 9% of professing Christians actually had a biblical worldview. So we go to church, but nothing else in our lives reflects the Lordship of Jesus. Pastors we aren’t obeying the great commission. We aren’t making disciples because we aren’t teaching our people to observe all things from a scriptural perspective. We call ourselves Christians, but we live our lives like, raise our families like, work like, and vote just like unbelievers.

So sometimes I wonder how is it that in this world in which rational thinking should take place, why do we seem to be losing ground rather than gaining it? And over the next two days, I think you’ll find out that the reason is not in New York, Washington, or Hollywood. The reason is in the church pews all across the country where people have practiced exactly what Paul Blair said, in that they compartmentalize their faith into that’s what I do on Sunday but that doesn’t affect how I live on Monday. And I believe this. If what we speak in the pulpit on Sunday does not fundamentally change what we do on Monday then what we said on Sunday probably wasn’t worth saying. This is so critical.

Liberty Pastor’s is a voluntary cooperative network of pastors, a band of brothers who work together to engage the culture by preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ, teaching their congregations a comprehensive biblical worldview, and living lives that reflect it.

The seminar is life-changing. I came out of this as a man who is willing to fight the good fight of faith. And I go on to be counted in this fight for what is truth and what is right.

Now, have been an activist for 56 years and I’d just like to say, I have never been to a more impactful reading than I … Than this meeting.

Just leaving the Liberty Pastor’s boot camp and it was a wow. Touched my life. I’m looking excitedly forward to the next steps. May we make a difference and influence our culture for the King of Kings.

I’ve been in ministry for 34 years. I will tell you that this event that we are … Training, not an event, but the training that we were here yesterday, today, this is … I haven’t been excited over anything this much in 25 years.

I believe there are three types of Pastors. There’s the hireling where pastoring is just a job. He’s not going to engage because he’s more concerned about being popular than standing for the truth. Then there’s the fearful. He’s not going to engage because he’s afraid of upsetting his elders, or his deacon board, or his congregation. But then there’s a third group who I believe are God-called ministers who want to engage the culture and transform it, but have never been taught how. We want you. Join us.

What … Thank you. What you are going to experience over these next three days is different from what these conferences are. And let me just say this. 40 days ago … When God can do a lot in 40 days can he not. 40 days ago, we didn’t even have this on the calendar. We got a call to ask us, knowing what we’ve done with his Worldview Training and recognizing the deafening silence because quite frankly, our pastors don’t know all that’s going on. They’ve never been trained in what’s going on. Asked if we can put something together that’s singular and specific. We’re going to be dealing with topics that you may have never heard of before. Critical race theory, Marxism, Marxist strategy. And let me tell you this. You’re going to get it all over the next three days. What is going on around us, including the COVID-19 is not by accident, it’s not by chance.

You’re going to learn about the Black Lives Matter movement. And folks, let me say this real briefly. If we are all created in the image of God … And by the way, if the Bible is true and I keep saying that because I’m confident that it is, all of us can trace our lineage back to the same two parents. We all learned the sentence of Adam and Eve. Now, if the Bible is true and I know that it is, then we all are created in God’s image and thus, we have inalienable God-given rights. There’s no such thing as civil rights. A Marxist strategy is to create groups to fight against each other. We have inalienable God-given rights, and as such, Jesus came to give his life because every life matters.

The only color the Father sees is the blood of Christ. So we’re going to be dealing with these issues from experts. Fortunately, we have got great friends that were able to make their time available. Two or three weren’t able to be here so they’ve shared with video as Lieutenant Governor Patrick did. But you are in for a world of information that we must spread to our people because let me tell you, our people are hungry for the truth. They’re hungry to be led.

And we’re the only Christians in Christian history going back to Acts two, that haven’t been persecuted for our faith. There’s a reason that is. And I don’t want to be the generation that loses it. I am out of time. I’m going to share one video and then I’m going to introduce my cohort and you are in for a treat. You have never seen or heard about the history of the pastors that led up to our war for independence you are about to have your fire lit. But let me share this video. Listen closely. And it starts with silence, but listen closely. Then I’ll … We’ll transition about two minutes introducing to our next speaker.

It may surprise you to learn that I was host to Mr. Khrushchev for a half-day when he visited the United States as a state visitor. But according to President Eisenhower, Khrushchev had expressed a desire to learn something of American agriculture. And after seeing Russian agriculture I can understand why. As we talked face to face, he indicated that my grandchildren would live under communism. After assuring him that I expected to do all in my power to assure that his and all other grandchildren will live under freedom, he arrogantly declared in substance, “You Americans are so gullible. No, you won’t accept communism outright, but we’ll keep feeding you small doses of socialism until you will finally wake up and find you already have communism. We won’t have to fight you. We’ll so weaken your economy until you fall like overripe fruit into our hands.”

I think that the criticism is helpful. I also think that it might … I think of a lot of things. The first thing I think is that we actually do have an ideological frame. Myself and Alicia, in particular, are trained organizers. We are trained Marxists.

Daddy, what was it like when America was free?

You couldn’t tell what that said because of the size of the auditorium, but it was a little girl whispering to her daddy saying, “Daddy, what was it like when America was free?” Now, ladies and gentlemen, I understand the Bible talks about the sons of Issachar. And Dan, if you are ready to head in this direction. We are getting ready to transition over to the final portion of our evening and then you are going to be released for a great night and, of course, a full day tomorrow beginning with breakfast at 7;30. But sons of Issachar and the scripture tells us number 200. Of course, they were members of the tribe of Issachar. But understanding what was going on. It had been some seven years since Saul had died. David had ruled Judah and Benjamin, but the descendants of Saul had ruled the other 10 tribes. Well, now there was a death and there was a question. Should all 12 tribes follow David and the tribe of Judah, or should we continue to follow Saul’s lineage?

An election, a political question. Scripture said that the sons of Issachar only numbering about 200. Imagine that. As vast as the number was of the 12 tribes of Israel, only about 200 of these men had such understanding of the times that they were able to give counsel to lead the 12 tribes, to make the appropriate decision. In fact, to make the decision that God had intended them to make.

You look around this room, in 40 days we’ve gone from not even having a reservation or a dollar in the bank to having a room in the midst of this COVID pandemic. We’ve got 350 people here. That’s more than the 200 last time I did the math. So if God can do what he did then, building upon what Lieutenant Governor Patrick said a while ago, I think he is fully capable of doing his part now, if we are willing to do our part. Folks, it has been a pleasure to be with you. Stand up for just a moment, not to give me applause just to stretch your legs, and then I’m going to introduce you to my co-pastor and longtime dear friend here in just a moment once he gets his musket or whatever it is he’s going back to get. My dear friend and co-pastor at Fairview Baptist Church in Edmond, Dan Fisher.