Alright.
How's everybody doing?
Awesome. So far so good?
Let's take a
few minutes
before
we get going. I haven't done this,
lately.
To,
anything
on your mind, your heart? Any questions? Any
theological things? Any,
we'll even talk
world stuff. I have a question for you.
Anybody but Aiden? This is just good.
When do you think you're going to make
a Wednesday night service of going through,
the the the
with propositions.
About initiatives. Yeah. What have you. So I
mentioned I mentioned this just a little bit
Sunday. I think,
if you have one specifically you'd like to
ask about, I can talk about it. But
I've got them on my website and, the
way that I,
the way that I would, politically lean on
them. And so you you can go there
and see. I don't really give a lot
of explanation. There's, like, 2 of them that
I explain a little bit.
But,
but if you have one that is that
is concerning to you or you want more
information or maybe you've been to the website
and you say, why did you vote this
way?
I can
I can do that for you?
Well,
the thing is sometimes a lot of those
opposition, they're so Bowden issues? They're well, they're
they're they're worded in such a way they're
all attractive. And you think, wait a minute,
there's a hidden agenda behind each of them.
Yeah. Most of them are bad. Therefore,
I I was hoping to that you would
be able to go through them ever so
quickly and let us know how you're going
to vote
even if, explanation is just,
ever so brief. I I don't know, but
it would be great if you could do
that so we could take notes.
I can give you
I'll give you some of the, I think,
the bigger ones.
Let me, let me start with the obvious
one.
Number 79, that is
to,
codify
abortion into the constitution
to our state constitution.
Right now, abortion is a statute in Colorado.
And and
and oh, by the way, even though,
Kamala Harris said in the debate with Trump
that
that there are no states that abortion is
legal up to the day of birth or
even after, she said that doesn't exist, blah
blah blah, and all these people have been
saying that.
She lied. She knows this because she helped
pass this,
in California.
And, in Colorado,
our abortion laws go up
to the day of the day,
of birth,
but then it is,
intentionally
innocuous after that
That and there's other states that have very
similar language.
That if a baby is born,
the,
the
doctors
slash mother
I mean, the mother has to be involved
in the decision, but,
well, she is the decision. But they can
say whether or not they think that this
baby is
viable, and the viable is not the medical
term of viable.
It it, it's that's also ambiguous, and they
can leave the baby there
on the table and let it, die.
That is the way that Colorado law can
be. It's not specifically stated that way, but
it is written in such a way that
that can happen.
And then people are saying, yeah, but nobody
does that.
That is already happening. There are there are
documented cases that you can go and find
where people are allowing these babies to die.
It's obviously not a lot, that are documented
because they're keeping this quiet,
but, there's already documents. So if there's documented
some,
there's a lot more out there that that's
happening. And
there are a handful of states, and Colorado
is the leading
one, that,
up until the day of birth, you can
you can kill the baby
and then,
even potentially afterwards.
So no one's 79? No one's 79. Because
what happens is so I've run 2 pro
life bills
the last 2 years.
2 each year.
And,
if this if 79 passes, what happens is
for me to run a pro life bill,
now I will be trying to I have
to word it in such a way that
I am changing the constitution
because it will be codified in the constitution.
This is not just a statute anymore.
And, and the it's,
I so
as a legislature
as a legislator,
our legislature
cannot change the constitution.
Okay?
So the only thing that I could do
would be able to bring something forward to
the legislature
that
that, presents this as a ballot initiative
to go. And then it then it has
to be,
ballot initiative change the constitution. So so the
threshold just becomes much, much more difficult.
It it almost nullifies I mean, I'll still
do it, but it almost nullifies
any kind of pro life anything after that
because your constitution
says you can't change it. So even if
even if somehow
I could
supernaturally,
miraculously, by the hand of God, get it
all the way through in onto the floor,
We cannot vote something in
as a statute that goes against the constitution.
I mean, the Democrats can. They do it
all the time. We are not allowed to
because we're Republicans
and because
some of us actually go by the law.
So
so 79 is real bad.
The,
the ranked choice voting, does any anybody
does everybody know what ranked choice voting means?
That's you.
Ranked.
As in 1, 2, 3, 4, you rank
them.
So this is a very bad idea. We
need to not we need to vote against
that. What ranked choice voting does is it
takes,
whoever is running for whatever office. And and
it's actually only the this is the silly
stupid little part that nobody's paying attention to.
It's only for the high higher state offices,
so it doesn't affect all the other stuff.
So you're gonna have all kinds of different
you're gonna have some ballots, some parts of
the ballot that are gonna be voting that
are the the way that it used to
be. And then as you go higher up
the ballot, it's gonna be ranked choice voting.
You talk about confusion. That's already a problem.
It will not be able to be done
properly.
Any states
all the states that have tried ranked choice
voting before have all come back and said
it was the stupidest thing we've ever done,
and they've done away with it. K? But
Colorado,
we're smarter than everybody else, and so we're
gonna do this. And what it does is
it takes,
it takes let's say that
that
that,
the the 4 of us. So Daniel, Cara,
and,
me and, Didi, we're gonna run for whatever
office. Okay?
And we're we're
let's say the 3 of them are Democrats,
and I'm a Republican. Because
so
let's call it like I see it. So
so those 3 are the Democrats. I'm the
Republican.
Alright. In in fact, let's throw Allen as
an independent.
Okay?
So 3 Democrats and independent Republican.
And they've and you vote
it depends on how it's set up.
I think it would be the top 5
in our state, but let's let's for numbers,
let's say it's the top 3. Okay?
So you vote, and you have to number.
On your ballot,
you have to number 1, 2, 3.
K. Well, let's use 5 because that's the
way it's gonna be. 1, 2, 3, 4,
5.
You're you're ranking
all of the people.
Doesn't matter what party. Doesn't matter what party
you are. Doesn't matter what party they are.
You're just saying,
1, 2, 3, 4, 5.
Then they take all of these ballots that
are 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and they
see who has the most at the different
numbers
going down the line. And then they take
all of that,
and they rank
all of the ballots. Now if on your
ballot, you only put,
1, 2, 3, 4 because you just don't
like Al. K. 1, 2, 3, 4.
Your ballot gets kicked out.
It does not get counted.
In almost every place that ranked choice voting
was tried,
more than 2 thirds of all ballots
were every single time were discarded
because they didn't
understand or go by the rules, which, by
the way, is the intention of the people
that wanna do ranked choice voting.
Because the more confusion,
the more the the kind of the insider
mentality works. Right? Now, let's say 1 and
2
are Daniel and Kara.
1, 2, 3, Daniel, Kara and Dede. Okay?
They're the Democrats.
That means
the people that get to the actual
election
are all Democrats,
no Republicans
because of the ranking.
And so what happens is you can completely
throw out
any,
any grassroots person, any person that is that
is
a strong conservative or whatever, or what'll happen
is is they'll all get to the the
Democrats do this well. The Republicans are horrible
at working together.
K?
So the Democrats all say, well, we'll just
flood the the ballots with all the Democrat
names. 123. 123. 1, 2, 3. That means
no matter how many votes
the Republican or the Independent get, they cannot
get into that top of the ranking. It's
not gonna be possible.
And so this is this is the that's
a simplistic understanding, but that's the concept. And
and the big deal is most of the
ballots will be discarded.
Because if you don't fill all 5 spaces
out with a name, then you don't then
your ballot doesn't count.
Doesn't matter.
If you like one person and you just
wanna vote for the 1, your ballot's not
gonna count. Doesn't matter. Yeah. It's also
really even more complicated than that. There's multiple
rounds of it. Yes. And so and it's
almost impossible to audit.
It's it's like you you can't come back
later and audit these.
Now,
as I understand it, there's It'll actually be
against the rules to come back and audit
it later. It'll be written in there that
you cannot come back later. Ours is doing
that. Okay. I didn't get that one. I
was under also understanding that that some of
the states that have done this, and I
don't know about ours, I'm asking.
Some of the states that have done this,
they're also changing how to get on the
ballot,
require,
adding requirements like signatures, the things that require
money Yeah. That
that that that mean only candidates that have
big money backing will actually make it ever
to the ballots anyway. Is ours do that?
Because some of them did that. Another another
step in the process is this is an
attack against,
our basic caucus system and our assembly and
caucus. Okay?
So so, basically, if we go to ranked
choice voting and and then you have,
it's it's it's pay to play in my
opinion. You have to have a certain amount
of signatures to get onto your petitioning onto
the ballot.
Guys like me, grassroots guys will never be
on the ballot again.
It'll it'll be impossible for guys like me
to get on the ballot. Because to get
enough signatures, you're you one person can't do
that. You get 5, 10 volunteers. You cannot
get enough signatures to get onto a ballot.
So what these people do is they pay
companies
to get the signatures for them.
Right now, for El Paso County, this is
happening regularly. Almost all of your Republicans on
the ballots all across actually,
almost all Republicans
at
legislator senate
all across the state of Colorado, almost all
of them have petitioned on.
It cost about $25,000
to petition on. I don't have $25,000.
I will never you know you know how
much money
I had in the bank when I actually
won,
the caucus, which means I was gonna be
the only Republican on the primary 2 years
ago? That's how much money I had in
the bank.
$2. 0. Because I didn't have a bank
account yet. So
$1,
brother.
So here's the thing. I could I would
never have been able to get on the
ballot.
I never will be able to get on
the ballot. They go to this, I I
can't run again.
I can't afford to get on the ballot.
It this is designed
for wealthy insiders
that have,
backing,
and conservative
grassroots conservatives don't have backing.
Advance Colorado is never gonna give me a
penny. They're supposedly,
conservatives.
They're supposedly Republicans.
The problem is is I believe,
that abortion is a sin.
Abortion is morally wrong and should never happen.
So Advance Colorado, a Republican organization run by
the Koch brothers, will never give me a
penny.
They are also now they say they're pro
life, but they're not. They also say they're
strongly for the second amendment. They are not
for the second amendment. They will never give
me a penny.
They they gave
3 different Republicans,
2 years ago,
$250,000
a piece
from for races that that are running somewhere
around 10 to $15,000
budgets.
That's what it a that's what a a
legislate,
legislator
campaign should cost. Let's say up to 20,000
if you're one of the big spenders.
They gave,
a representative in Castle Rock $250,000.
That's called dark money
because you can't you know how you know
the most somebody can give me?
$450.
Unless I can get it through a pack,
which hides all the givers,
and it's called dark money, and that's
should be illegal,
but they the Democrats changed the rules on
this last year, voted in a law that
says, instead of 4.50 per cycle, so in
other words, $900
a person, I can only get $450
a person totally,
during a campaign year. Because they wanted to
make sure it was grassroots. The people that
were running the bill were getting 2, 3,
$400,000
by dark money to run the bill, so
that I can only get $450
a person.
And I mentioned this. Not as nice as
I'm saying it here.
Because why? It's corrupt. They're liars. The whole
thing. So, guys, ranked choice voting is an
attack. In fact, ranked choice voting, if somehow
this went across the United States,
it would tear down our republic. We would
not have a republic anymore.
It it can't exist under a ranked choice
voting mentality.
You don't have representatives anymore. You can call
me a representative a representative, but we are
not representing
when under ranked choice voting mentality.
You're not voting in representatives.
You're voting in, wealthy people that are insiders
that are getting paid to do the job,
which a lot of them are anyway.
But then there are some people like me
that are not corrupt. They're not taking PAC
money. If Advance Colorado came to me tomorrow
and said, we wanna give you $200,000.
I would say, no.
I'm not taking in fact, I have done
this,
many different times where people try to send
me money and or endorse me, and I
say, nope. You don't endorse me.
I'm not gonna take your endorsement. Well, we
wanna give you you're not giving me money.
You're not gonna endorse me because why?
I am not that.
This is how the system is rigged, and
ranked choice voting,
it it it makes it even more corrupt
than it already is.
Another big one is 80.
80 is the one that is it is
this one is the one that is the
strongest bipartisan. It is being,
promoted by, well, Advanced Colorado, being promoted by
almost all of the Republicans.
You know, interestingly, another representative sent me a
a, email yesterday or text yesterday. It was
Ken de Graf, and he said, hey. The,
Colorado Chamber of Commerce just came out with
their,
endorsement list. They had endorsed all the Republicans
except 4 of us.
Guess which 4?
The conservative 4. Stephanie, Brandy, Ken, myself.
Which if they would have endorsed me, I'd
have been like, did I answer something wrong?
What where what happened?
But,
but,
all the Republicans,
except the 4 of us, are backing,
out of initiative 80, amendment 80.
And, basically, it is saying that we're gonna
make sure that
that children have school choice.
K?
That's not the right way to say it,
is it, Carolyn? That's
Well, no. And you're not backing.
No. No. I'm not backing, but I'm saying
that's what the amendment says.
Basically, it's children will have school choice. A
right to school choice. A right to school
choice. There's a A right to equality education.
That's what that's what Yeah.
Yeah. Which which is a smokescreen because they're
they're not planning on them going to charter
schools and things like that. That's not the
goal of this. It supposedly is, but it's
not. But here's the thing.
When did we start letting kids decide
their own education and direction?
They get to start with their own gender.
That okay. Valid. Valid.
Touche.
So
but but here's the thing is you you
don't you don't you don't let a 9
year old,
have the right
to a quality education? You say, well, of
course, we do. We love kids. No. That
takes away parental rights to decide
that the,
help best education for their children. Mark?
Thanks. Well, it is same thing is happening
with statutes that you guys are passing. They're
giving
children rights like the foster care
system. The children have rights. Anytime you see
rights being give given explicitly to children, it's
in opposition to parental rights. Yep. And it's
a way to erode it. And, you know,
if what happens is that you pass the
these things go into the state constitution
or
or in the in the statute and then
it's up to the court to decide
what these things mean. Like,
it explicitly says in the statute well, say
say in the statute that a child has
a right to a quality education. Well, what
does that mean? Who decides that? And who
decides that?
It's not defined. So the courts are gonna
define it. What's a quality education?
And then you have a a system of
oppositional rights where the the parent
the parents have the right to direct
the education of the child, but child has
the choice to an edge to a quality
education.
So what's gonna happen, and these people should
see this a 100 miles away, there's already
LGBT
charter schools in other states.
I can't imagine it won't be long before
they're here in the state.
So when a 12 year old girl and
her cohort
wants to go to this charter school
and the parents say, no. You're not.
Well, then what will happen is the courts
will say,
wait a
second. You know, this right to direct the
the education of the child
is contingent on the on the parent
operating in the best interest of the child.
And they're gonna say this this is not
in the best interest of the child. They're
exhibiting
animus towards LGBT,
and they've lost their right to direct it.
The education of the child. Because they're actually
coming against
the state except the definition of quality.
If the state says
that this school teaching this whatever
ideology
is quality,
then the school that teaches against it, like
a charter school or something that is a
Christian charter school, they're not providing quality education
because they're not giving what the state defines
as what quality is. And what'll happen long
term, that's the short term, is the way
Marx describing this. The long term is all
children will go to to these
state controlled
environments, which were already there at some level,
but the state controlled environments
that says that is quality. And if and
if your and if you as the parent
don't send your child there, you're abusing your
child.
This is child abuse and then social services
has another layer to be able to step
in on these kind of things. Barry? What's
the percentage of, Colorado
in homeschools?
Carolyn?
Well, that's part of the goal. The goal
is to tear down,
homeschool. And the governor really made a big
deal about how he's for charter schools, charter
schools. First, he's a liar.
Hopefully, reporters are listening. I said the governor
is a liar.
And and then the next thing is is
he wants eventually to have charter schools, but
he wants to design what the charter schools
look like, which is what Mark is talking
about that other states are doing. So he's
in favor of charter schools when he gets
to define them from the socialist agenda.
What's that? He started to charter schools.
He he's he's got his hands in this
already. He does not like Christian charter schools,
and he's made that very clear. He wants
his kind.
And he wants to shut down all the
others. And the teachers' unions are
are already on paper signed and confessed that
they are a Marxist organization.
There's a lot of research you can do
on that very quickly,
that they have signed stuff that says that
they do not believe in capitalism, that that
is a an agreed an egregious attack against
children, all this kind of stuff.
And, and so the the next step of
this is the public schools are gonna
just become a worse version of what they
are. The good thing right now is
the,
parents are pulling their kids out of public
schools at an astonishing
rate,
which is good.
We need to continue that trend.
These kind of bills, though, will make it,
very difficult to do that.
You have to go to the
quality education
schools.
I think those are the big ones.
I was asked about the, police funding one.
I'm actually in favor of the police funding
one. The question that I always get with
that is, isn't that pretty corrupt, and won't
most of the dollars,
go to corrupt police organizations?
Yes. They will.
I know that.
But there will be funding that will go
to some good police
departments.
There will be funding that will go to
some legitimate
situations. Some of this really is gonna be
heavily pushed into,
police academy, building police academy, so those kind
of things.
But
here's the thing is I I'm not defund
the police. I I know that our police
departments are becoming more corrupt all the time.
I get that. But not all of them.
This is Denver and and Boulder and stuff
like that. We we know that there's some
of that going on in Colorado Springs. But
guys, we we're one of the areas where
we have a a good police department.
Overall, there's there's problems.
But overall,
the way that you fix that is you
vote in the right mayor.
And they begin to,
they begin to reform that and fix that.
It takes time, but they begin to do
that. When we vote in a mayor like
we have presently, you're gonna have corrupt everything.
Okay?
Daniel?
The amendment g, does that one
just defend,
expand the definition of who a disabled veteran
is with the property tax?
No. So there so this already exist,
at some level.
You as a veteran get a property tax
break.
It it it doesn't
broad broad is not a bad term. What
it does we saw 2 bills come up
in in,
in a session this last year. 1 1
the year before, but 2 big ones that
came up this last time where the what
they're trying to do. So so the bigger
issues that you have let me let me
broaden out past property tax. The bigger issues
you have within the veterans,
the whole veterans culture
is when you get out into rural places,
you don't have the veterans do not have
the,
access to to,
all the same things that you have in
one of the veteran meccas of the United
States, Colorado Springs. Okay?
You can literally get down,
to past Pueblo,
and veterans have to drive 2 or 3
hours sometimes. And we've we've sat and listened
to stories of them having to drive 5,
6 hours just to get some veteran assistant.
Well, that means they're not really being served,
which is part of the deal.
What they tried to do is they tried
to broaden the definition
out
to include
special this was specifically a bill this last
year.
Special
veterans,
priority toward,
LGBT
veterans.
Specifically
transgender veterans.
Extra,
assistance. So if you like, you know, you
got a $100 and everybody there's a 100
people and they're all getting a dollar. What
happens now is all of the veterans that
are not transgender
are gonna get a nickel, a nickel, a
nickel, and then these these transgender people are
gonna get $20 each.
That's the concept. It's not the numbers, but
that's the concept.
So they've been trying to work on this
whole veterans thing for a while trying to
do that. And then also, they tried to,
had a bill that was put up this
last
session. And the lady that put it up
voted against it because
so
it was her bill, but she felt like
that we weren't including transgenders enough. Because what
she was doing is saying that first priority
should be to women.
Women veterans.
Here's the thing with me.
So
that's that came up. That came up in
the conversation, because we had already discussed the
bill of transgender
veterans.
Right? They get a they get the first
cut of the pie.
So so the the the problem with this
is,
there's there's
I think women veterans
have the same
priority
as male veterans.
Right?
When you start classifying,
they're they're no longer veterans. They're veterans of
this class, veterans of this class, veterans of
this class kind of thing. It's the whole
concept.
This is this is a probably a weird
way to answer, but this is my thing
this is my heart on this. This is
my thinking.
When you look across America, you you should
say Americans.
When you put something in front of that,
you're changing
the whole concept of America. So in other
words, African American.
That that's not a that's not a real
thing for almost all of the black community.
They they didn't move here from Africa.
They're Americans.
In fact, my father-in-law used to say this
all the time. He lived in Africa longer
than he lived in America. He said, does
that make me an African American?
Well,
we we got these weird definitions. Okay? So
anytime you say,
that this type of veteran should get
more access
or should have extra benefits just because of
some classification, you've already messed the whole system
up. It's not it's not
nothing is designed to work that way. K?
The idea of affirmative action in veteran thing
is stupid. Affirmative action is stupid to begin
with,
when we start in doing this. And now
now when it comes to this specific bill,
it's not that broad, but I believe what
they're doing is they're trying to lay the
foundation.
Because we already saw that 2 years in
a row where they're they're trying to change
all the rules for veterans. They say we're
trying to get more access, but you can
give more access without trying to classify who
gets first shot at it kind of thinking.
And so Is it tax breaks? So are
you saying you vote for it or not
vote?
I I believe in tax breaks.
And I believe that veterans I have do
what?
See, there's the other part of the problem.
I believe in tax breaks. When you say,
okay. This group gets a specific
tax break over another group, I struggle with
that. Now
I I don't struggle as much with veterans
because I understand the the concept
of what pay is and how that looks.
But here's the thing. Why can't we just
give everybody a tax break?
Why do we have to to to do
this? Now if I say this about veterans,
well, then I don't like veterans. That's not
what it is. I think that everybody should
get a tax break.
What what we do, this is this is
how people this is how government buys votes.
You raise the taxes to this, and then
you say, what is a big demographic that
we could get votes that we don't have
votes for now? The democrats say, well we
don't usually get the military vote. Let's give
them an extra tax break, and they'll vote
for democrats.
That's that's literally what this is.
Okay?
With that said,
I don't mind veterans getting a tax break.
And
and along that same lines, whatever happened to
Taber in this whole
property taxing that you guys got called back
in the special session for? Is it already
gone?
So
so we got called back in a special
session. It it came out to somewhere around
$85,
for the average,
Colorado
and,
$85
property tax break
a year.
That's awesome.
A year.
K?
But here's here's what here so Democrats hate
Tabor. They say this all the time. They
said this to us many times, and now
I'd say that we're gonna tear down Tabor.
Tabor is the only thing that has kept
Colorado from literally just sinking, just sinking ship.
Tabor is the only thing. Doug Bruce was
a genius when he put this together.
Still is a genius. But
so
here's one of the ways that they've been
going they go around it with 4 or
5 different things, and I've argued all of
these in on the floor. But one of
the ways is they make special districts.
So in other words, a special district is
not,
is not,
they're exempt from Tabor.
So the so the concept of Tabor, taxpayer
bill of rights, Tabor. The concept of Tabor
is before anybody,
me, Democrats, Republicans, before we can raise taxes,
it has to come to the vote of
the people.
We cannot raise taxes by ourselves.
California, they can raise taxes whenever they want.
The legislature can.
We can't do that in Colorado
because Doug Bruce saw this coming 22 years
ago.
So we have to bring it to the
vote of the people. So here's the way
you get around it. You have
tolls on roads.
It's not a tax. It's a toll.
You
so
so you have tolls on roads. You have
extra fees. I don't know if you've gotten
your driver's license lately.
You have extra fees. Those are fees. Those
are not taxes.
They're fees.
Yeah. Because what now are they? They're taxes.
Toll is a tax. Fees are taxes. But
this is how we verbally get around Taber.
Then you have special districts like,
school districts, fire districts, water districts, all these
other things. They're not susceptible to taxes because
Taber,
taxes, yes. But Tabor, because we call it
something else. They're they're a special district. They're
a special municipality.
So we got all these groups that are
exempt from this. So then they lower property
tax, quote unquote for the people, But then
they backfill all of these districts because if
if you're gonna pay less taxes, that means
your school district gets less money. Your fire
district gets less money. Your, water district gets
less money. Now,
on on paper, they get less money. But
you understand how government
budgets work?
K.
Everybody
gets more money than they did last year.
Fire department gets this much money. If they
lower taxes, they get this this is what
they got last year. This is what they
get in this year. But when you lower
taxes, this is what they get now.
They still get a 60% increase or something.
That's a big number. But an increase
but it because it wasn't 62%,
they say that they're getting a tax cut.
That is a lie.
That and everybody does. They do it the
federal level, they do it state level. Every
one of these groups get more money each
year than they got the year before, but
they don't just they just don't get as,
as much as they were gonna get. So
they call it a So then we come
along as the state, and we say, well
then let's backfill that. Let's give them that
extra money that they weren't gonna give.
Be given.
They're already getting all of this extra money.
And you say this to the there was,
the fireman came up and and
talked to us in special session.
And I went at them. And there was
even some Democrats that went at them and
said, why should you have extra money when
everybody else doesn't? I'm like
because democrat even said it.
The guys, they get they get 100 and
100 of 1000 more money all the time
constantly. Schools schools never get less money.
They get more money. They just may not
get as much more money if you get
a property tax decrease.
They still and here's the thing. They're still
not when they get the more money, they
don't give it to the teachers.
The teachers don't get all these raises. They
add extra administrators at 3 times what the
teachers make. Did you realize in the last
10 years, 72%
of all,
increases in public education went to adding
administrators?
Not to teachers.
The the the the balance has become there's
a movie that's called,
Whose Kids Are They? You should watch that
movie. Whose Kids Are They? It was put
it was
made by
Deborah Flora. She she,
ran for
senate 2 years ago, and I think she
was running for something this last time too.
But
her and her husband made the movie, documentary.
Very solid. You when you finish that, you'll
just you're you'll be floored
at how corrupt all of the school stuff
is.
How completely corrupt it is. Well, they get
extra money.
They're not gonna give it to teachers.
Why don't we go back to having like
30 teachers and one principal instead of having
15 teachers
and 38 administrators.
Why don't we go back to that and
give teachers the money? Because they don't care
about education. That's not the point. It's never
been the point.
So
that's,
my rant on that. Would you like me
to rant about anything else?
Yes, ma'am.
So
when you're talking about going Hold the microphone
up to you. I I don't like We
have to because they have to hear you
online. Okay.
So going on about
dropping down to 1 principal and 30 teachers,
doesn't that shorten the building as is? Because
given that if you're gonna drop down to
1 main principal
I came from a school that had 3
principals.
We had 3 different principals given on how
many students were coming into that town, coming
in through different high schools, what is that
going to do for those buildings? If they
drop down to 1 being able to control
almost 400 students,
what power will they have there
to keep anything in order?
Adding you could have 50 principals. They have
no power. They're they have no discipline they
cannot discipline.
They have no,
any kind of,
disciplinary power power over the children, and they
don't actually have the power over the teachers
either. That's a teacher union lie. K?
Back in the day when I was in
school, my dad was a principal.
He didn't even have an assistant principal. This
was a decent sized school. Didn't even have
an assistant principal. He was it. And he
ran a school of 100 and 100 of
students by himself. Because why? The teachers
were paid,
decently back in those days, comparatively, I'm saying.
And they could discipline.
When you don't discipline, it doesn't matter how
many principals, how many teachers, how many have
anything. You are never gonna be in control
of that school. That thing is out of
control.
The more teachers you have that are that
are paid decent to do their job, the
more they're going to invest. Right now, we
see you can see videos online constantly. When
a fight erupts in a classroom, a teacher
will walk out Because they can't do anything,
and they're in danger. And the ones that
don't walk out get beat up by the
students.
That that we're not paying these teachers enough.
You don't need a bunch of extra administrators.
What does the extra administrator do? Walk around
the halls? They're not actually doing they can't
discipline the kids. They're not allowed to do
that. So what are they doing? Administrative
paperwork, all that kind of stuff. Things that
teachers used to do back in the day.
If I may ask, what do you mean
by disciplining?
Spanking kids, making them actually stay after school,
failing them when they don't know how to
read at 10th grade, things like that.
Our schools are are completely broken with this.
We we'll never go back to spanking students.
I I understand that.
But we don't have any other way of
discipline. We graduate you realize that most of
the kids that graduate cannot read above a
3rd grade level
now in public in fact, here's a big
one. Do you guys remember when the Department
of Education or the,
Education Administration was started in the United States?
What president started that?
Carter.
We were ranked what in the world educationally?
We were number 1 in the world.
America provided the best education in the world.
We started this national
Marxist
controlled
thought process
education
union.
And now where are we ranked?
In the in the high forties. 47, 48
right now across the world.
Well, I'm glad we did that.
At the same time Yeah. If I was
president, I would do away with that day
1. That is a Marxist organization.
Well, here's the thing that we that we
did with that. Is when that started, the
union started doing all this and that's where
you started seeing major major philosophical
changes in what education was.
K? Now it's easy to look from that
time until now, and see how vast and
drastic these changes became to the point where
we're not actually educating kids anymore. We're not
we're not,
there is no such thing as, as,
critical thinking. And and even all of the
common more common core math and all the
stupidity that we've added into schools, this is
all part of this this Marxist mentality.
But you couldn't see it systematically.
It seemed it seemed ambiguous.
But when you look now,
we we are failing children.
Now, what what they've actually started doing is
now there's a lot of universities
that will not use the SAT or the
ACT anymore
for, entrance,
requirements.
Why?
It's too hard. They can't pass it.
But we still need all of the diversity
within the universities.
And so we are This is what Harvard
was doing when they were when they were
stopping,
Asians
from coming into Harvard.
There were too many Asians in Harvard.
What?
Maybe
they had the best scores. Maybe they had
the best test. Maybe they were
more driven
than all of the other groups. But Harvard
started discriminating against Asians because it didn't look
good in pictures.
Now we don't even do entrance examinations
the same way.
Because why? Guys, these are things This is
when I get up and say stuff about
how the average 40 year old and above
has no idea
how much the country has changed. That this
is the thing. We just assume all the
stuff is still the same. When you when
you hear like Harvard and Stanford and all
this, you assume
that that is the way that that those
Ivy League schools are always what they used
to be.
They're not.
These are indoctrination
camps like you would not believe.
They don't educate them. They don't do this
stuff anymore.
This is where we have so much change.
And it starts it starts in the public
schools in, you know,
kindergarten to 12
with this.
I can't hear I didn't hear what you
said.
That's the point. You you bring them in
and tell them, you deserve
to be there. But, oh, by the way,
you'll never pass this test. You would not
have the qualifications
to be here. So what we're gonna do
is we're gonna run this down. Then the
answer to why you're so unsatisfied and give
you a Harvard education, no one will hire
you. No one will hire you just because
they're discriminating against you. Yep. And so but
it's easy to just radicalize people. And this
is what the this is what the Muslims
have been doing from day 1. Yeah. So
really it's it's okay
to go into this place and break these
people and shoot them and cut their heads
off because you've been radicalized.
The whole world's against you. Yeah. This is
one of the things. Thomas Sowell, has a
whole book about this. If you if you
guys do not know who Thomas Sowell is,
you need to figure out who this guy
is.
He's in his nineties now, and you need
to start reading his books.
The man is one of the the the
best thinkers that has ever lived in America.
And he talks about this. He says
that we're doing a disservice to people
when we let people
into
these,
elite schools. Now he said this back when
the schools were still educating.
K.
Now they're disindoctrinating.
But he says we do a disservice when
we lower the standard so that somebody can
get into the school because of skin color
or because of something else.
He said because the problem is is they
cannot achieve
at that level.
Doesn't matter
who they are, what color they are, whatever.
If they can't achieve at the level, don't
let them in. It does a disservice to
them, and it does a disservice to the
school. And then what happens is the businesses,
the corporations,
begin to not trust that school anymore.
Alright? Is there
Yeah. Yeah. Any in California will hire none
of those IT companies will hire from Stanford.
That's that has become so, I just read
JD Vance's book.
I I don't necessarily recommend it, but,
it it was I'd either way. But,
but he talks about this. That used to
be if you were a lawyer coming out
of Stanford, you could pick your job.
Doesn't exist anymore. Why? Because the school's not
what it used to be.
It's not the same that it used to
be.
The it is better for this student let's
say that the student is a low a
average student.
You let them into a school that is
a high a average student, and they will
always be behind. They can't perform. They can't
do the stuff.
So
they're they're killing themselves trying to get there.
They can't get there. It would be better
if they went to a an Ohio state
or a Michigan or something like that that
I'm not saying there were schools,
but their their overall understanding
is more of the low a or the
high b.
You you won't.
Where you can be in the top half,
your whole rest of your career will be
better.
Yes.
You'll learn you'll learn more instead of just
trying to make sure you make the next
grade you're actually learning.
All these different things. And and Thomas Dole
Thomas Dole has done study after study after
study on this. But when he says something
like that, he's called a racist.
Oh, by the way, he's black.
But he's called a racist for this.
One of the people I read his biography
too is, Clarence Thomas. He says the same
thing. He said, we've got to make sure
that we that we help people succeed,
not just get into a school so that
the picture
of the graduating class has a lot of
different color in it. A lot of different,
mentalities behind it. It doesn't matter. If they're
all Asians, Harvard, okay.
They got in.
It's stupid what we're doing with this kind
of stuff.
Yes. This is by the way, this is
how when Carter started the,
the NEA, this is this is the concept
of how it started. It was started with
the communist, but I would say more Marxist,
principles that guide this.
And and it's written this I I would
I'm being reminded of this documentary a lot.
Go watch the documentary whose children are they?
It'll it'll floor you.
Right. Democratic world Right. Have control.
Yeah.
That that's the concept is it's the the
and that's what the, World Economic Forum is
doing, guys. They're trying to take over the
whole world. They're not trying to hurt America.
Trying to take over the whole world. America
is just their biggest obstacle.
Somebody else? Yes.
Okay.
Alright.
Let's let's talk about the Lord.
Yeah.
That's they let's bring Jesus back to the
school. We don't have to worry about any
of this. But you can't have this this
communism, Marxism cannot have a god
because,
the system is the god.
You cannot have
you know, this is something that gets lost
on people sometimes.
Jesus says that he did not come to
bring peace.
Right? You guys know that he Jesus said
that. Right?
We think
that Jesus came to bring peace on earth.
Goodwill to all men.
Right?
He came to bring peace in our spirit.
He came to bring freedom in our spirit.
That's why I don't think that that the
sermon that I preached about this a few
months ago, I don't think Jesus is as
concerned about freedom of religion as we are.
The reason Jesus gets concerned about freedom of
religion is so that we can,
witness.
So that we can propagate it. But that
happens in very controlled countries too. In fact,
Chinese Christians and North Korean Christians and and,
Iranian Christians
witness a lot better than American Christians do.
They just do.
Fastest growing church in the world right now
is where?
Iran. Iran.
Yep. Alright.
So
Jesus came to bring
peace in our spirit.
Freedom in our spirit. Well, you can't have
that in communism.
When you're free in your spirit, it's amazing
how your conversations change.
It's amazing how your world view changes.
Everything changes. And all of a sudden, the
government's not your god. And
communism can't have that. Marxism cannot have that.
Socialism can't even have that.
Right? You understand socialism will always end up
a communism.
Always.
Okay. Alright. Psalms 51.
Somebody give me a little bit of background.
Where why did David write Psalms 51?
He was a murderer. Yeah. Not just a
murderer. What else was he? An adulterer.
An adulterer?
And not only did he murder this has
always been the thing for me.
And I think some of this is I
don't know if this is because I'm a
guy. I don't know if girls see this
the same.
Maybe because I was in the military. I
don't know.
But not only did David murder
Bathsheba's husband, but Bathsheba's husband
was one of his 30,
one of his elite
military men.
It would be the equivalent
of,
of a navy seal unit and the commander
killing one of his
elite
seal soldiers
because he slept with the guy's wife.
Come on, David.
How
how horrible do you have to be?
How horrible do you have to be?
Well, he's the king. King can do anything
he wants.
I know and I love it when he's
confronted by Nathan later.
And and I and before he wrote this,
he's confronted by Nathan, I believe.
And,
and he tells the story and and they
and then Nathan says, it was you, David.
You did this.
And he said, you could have anything you
wanted,
and you had to go take,
the sheep from the, the guy that only
had 1 sheep.
You get up all the sheep in the
world, but you had to take the sheep
from the guy. That's my I'm paraphrasing.
You had to take the sheep from that
guy.
Man,
the good thing about David,
when God says,
you're a man after my own heart.
That this is
this is why.
David was a scoundrel. He was. I love
David. I think he's one of the most
amazing guys in scripture, but he is also
one of the worst guys in scripture.
Probably
I would love to see David in battle
because that's when he was David.
I would love to see David in the
30 in battle.
I would like to see,
David's,
warrior that fought
the fought the,
lion on a snowy slope,
in a snowy pit.
Man,
would you like to have seen that? Yeah.
David was an amazing guy, but man, he
was a scoundrel. But here's the thing.
Is he
he was a very tender hearted toward God
and he repented.
He repented of stuff. If there's anything,
I think the number one thing that should
always stand out to us in the story
of David is no matter what you've done,
no matter what you've done,
the Lord will forgive you if you just
repent.
And I've had so many conversations with people
over the years. Well, you don't know how
bad I've been or you don't know the
things I'm done I've done.
And I don't wanna know.
But god
knows, and he will forgive you.
Why would god send his son to die
on the cross
if he's not going to forgive us?
Wouldn't it be better to send Fred
to die on the cross?
You say, who's Fred? It's irrelevant.
The reason Jesus dies on the cross
is because he wants to forgive us. David
says, have mercy on me, oh god,
because of your unfailing love. Not because David
deserves mercy,
but because of your unfailing love.
The reason the lord forgives you is because
he loves you, not because you've done something
to earn it.
The reason he forgives you is because you've
done something that needs it,
Not because you've earned something or done something.
Because of your great compassion, god, blot out
the stain of my sins.
Wash me clean from my guilt.
Purify me from my sin.
I I I think you hear me say
this regularly.
That I think that one of the things
as a Christian that has to be one
of our main
guiding
things in our life constantly
is repentance.
A repentant heart.
And I and I've said that in different
settings. First time this happened to me, I
wasn't expecting. I said this something similar to
that. I was going to Denver Seminary at
the time and
and, and there's
there's a lot of,
one saved always saved Calvinist there. And,
the fact that I would say that you
need to repent regularly or you should have
a heart of repentance,
oh, they they took umbrage with that. Deep
umbrage.
We don't need to be repenting.
What do I need to repent of? Sin?
I think that's what you need to repent
of. Sin? The Lord's already forgiven me of
my sin.
That that you haven't repented of? Scripture doesn't
say that.
Scripture says that he forgives you when you
repent.
He didn't just forgive you because he wants
to forgive you. If he's gonna do that,
we should believe in universalism.
Everybody's forgiven. Doesn't matter.
You repent.
This is why it says confess your faults
one to another.
Why would he say that if you're already
forgiven? It doesn't matter.
Right?
For I recognize my rebellion, it haunts me
day and night. One of the things that
I think isn't that comes along with the
repentant
spirit and attitude
is that you recognize who you are.
You recognize your frailty. You recognize the the
potential you have for this one. Paul says,
I'm the chiefest of sinners. I've literally sat
and listened to people say, well, he didn't
mean that. He wasn't really a sinner.
Well, then that means you just made him
also a liar,
which is worse.
Right?
Carrie, did you just wanna hold the microphone
or were you gonna say Yeah. I did
just wanna hold it so no one else
can talk.
As you're as we're, you know, reading this
and everything,
I can't help but think about the story
you shared this morning
on the Joshua Nation stuff about the guy
that was doing the 3 day thing and
talked to the teenage girl.
But that and what you said hit me
really hard, and it was right before I
walked into work.
But you said
he the guy said something like or can
you just share that story first? I don't
want I'm gonna completely chop it up. Yeah.
So I was at a breakfast with,
3 guys,
2 really old guys,
and,
one younger guy.
So Moments of a story. Well, one of
them is in the room. So,
but but he he was talking about this
story. He was at a conference. I'll try
to make it quick, get the main details.
But he's at this conference. He was speaking
at this conference. He comes across this young
girl that had grown up in an atheist
household,
but her parents let her come to this
conference.
And, and he he had presented
Christ in his
message.
And,
he didn't know this girl, but he had
interacted with her. We're just walking down the
hall.
And so she'd been raised in an atheist
mentality for I think I think she's 14,
15 years old.
And,
so she'd been indoctrinated with atheism for that
long.
In the 3 days of the con by
the time they left the conference, he had
a time to talk to her for a
little bit, talk to her about Jesus,
prayed with her, but didn't know exactly how
it turned out.
He got word later from one of the
his people that
that the girl had gone to an another
lady afterwards
and and said that she had given her
heart to Jesus.
That's a great story. Right? Amazing story. But
what what got me is when he said,
you know, it took how many years? 15
years
of indoctrinating
her day after day after day for this
atheist mentality.
He said, but it took the Holy Spirit
3 days to break that down and she
got saved.
As we gotta keep that in our minds,
we gotta that's basically am I right about
the stupidity? Yeah. That's that's the story. Well,
I was asking the other old guy that
was behind you.
Oh. But just as Todd, I was looking
at Todd.
Just as we're reading this, like, it's making
me think of that that we, I believe,
need to be in that constant
mentality,
you know, of allowing Christ to
renew us. You know? Because like you were
talking about this morning,
that
American Christians are just so comfortable
with where we're at, you know, and,
but now I really like that story. And
then with what you said about the 3
days, like that hit me,
pretty hard. And as we're reading this, it
just reminded me of of that. You know,
we kinda have this thinking, and I've even
kind of given,
allude alluded to this a different time. But,
you know, that we gotta just keep working
on somebody, keep working on somebody, keep working
on somebody, and someday they get saved.
I've also seen it happen instantaneously
with somebody that has
no has no history.
Because you have to remember the Holy Spirit
is the guy in charge of everything. He's
the power of the universe.
K. If you wanna put some kind of
equating to it, God is the judge. Jesus
is the word
and also the lamb.
And the Holy Spirit is the power.
When Jesus, the logos,
speaks creation into existence,
the holy spirit is the one who makes
it happen. He's the power
of the universe.
Right? When Elijah calls fire down from heaven,
the holy spirit is the one who brings
the fire down. He's the power of the
universe.
If if the power of the universe can
keep the planets going around the sun and
all you say, oh, no. That's the laws
of physics. Okay. Who made those?
Right?
If the holy spirit can keep the whole
solar system running, don't you think he can
dig into your neighbor's spirit and soul if
you'll just say something?
If you just if you just step out
there,
do this, say this,
pray for him.
Holy spirit, man, he he'll get on that
horse and ride that thing.
All you gotta do is just what you
can.
And the holy spirit can change somebody instantly
overnight.
Overnight.
I I I know I've told this
story here, but I think it's been a
while. But,
when I was a youth pastor,
I needed my lawnmower fixed.
And, so a guy in the church said,
go down to this guy. This is in
East Texas. And when he said go down
to this guy,
he didn't give me an ad. That that's
that's East Texas talk for there's gonna be
a little shed, and there's gonna be a
guy sitting out in front of that shed,
and he will fix your lawnmower. That's what
that meant. K? But I knew that. I
grew up there. So so I go down
to this little shed and and this I
walk in, got my lawnmower, and I'm walking
in. And and there he's sitting there, and
there's, like, 5 or 6 other guys. And
this was the hangout for all these guys.
That's it's like, that happens. Okay? When you
see that on movies, that really happens. And
so
I walk in, and as I'm walking in,
this guy
just starts cussing at me.
I don't know him. I've never met him.
I don't know anything about him. But he's
screaming at me and yelling and cussing at
things I didn't even know. Things about my
family I didn't know. All kinds of stuff
that he's saying.
And and I'm just standing there like,
did I do something?
And one of the old,
guys, homeless people I don't know who he
was. Just sitting there chewing tobacco, drinking, you
know.
And, he said, don't worry. That's just who
he is.
I don't know even know what that means.
That's just did I do something? I still
don't know. So he said, well, come on.
Bring that thing in here. You're just gonna
stand there and blah blah blah blah blah.
You know? I'm like, you know, I'm I'm
almost in tears. I don't know what to
do.
K? And this guy is
91,
92, I think it was.
And,
well no. He would have been, like, 89
at this point.
And so I I go in there and
he's asking about this, and I said, well,
so and so told me to come down
or you'd fix my lawnmower.
And then he just starts cussing so and
so. That was at our he's a guy
in our church.
And
but the whole time he's, like, looking at
my lawnmower doing all this kind of stuff.
And and he said, where'd you meet that?
So and so and so. And I said,
well, he goes to my church. I'm the
youth pastor of the church. Oh, man. I
shouldn't have said that.
It got really bad then.
So I I leave.
Come back a couple days later, he's got
my lawnmower fixed. I walk up soon as
I walk up, he starts cussing me
and cussing the church.
Because he knows he remembers that.
This guy is vile.
So
this gets in me.
Challenge accepted.
Right?
Alright.
Bring it, old man. We're doing this.
So I just start every time he says
something, I just start talking to him about
Jesus and preaching at him.
He's being as rude as any person has
ever been to me in my life.
And so I just take it back to
him. And he'd say something. I said, you
know, you need to shut your mouth. God
doesn't like that.
Looks at me and then he starts off
again. And I said, no.
First, don't talk don't use my god's name
when you're making those kind of statements. My
god is holy and he's just and you're
not any of these things. And I'm just
going at him. I'm tearing him up just
as much. And all these old dudes sitting
over there are loving this.
They're hollering,
you know, that kind of thing. And I
just go at this guy.
And,
take my lawnmower, leave,
and I'm thinking,
what else do I need fixed?
I didn't have anything else to get fixed,
so I just went back to his shop.
I just showed
up. He starts screaming and cussing me again.
He says, what do you need fixed this
time? I said, I don't need anything fixed.
You need fixed. And I just go at
him again.
Guys,
I never thought
this would happen.
A month later,
4 or 5 weeks, something like that later,
he shows up at church.
Came in, sat at the back, just sat
there.
You know, the whole time.
When our pastor gave the altar call for
salvation,
he got saved.
He died 6 months later.
But in that 6 months, he completely transformed.
I
I I wasn't expecting that.
And I'm not saying I'm I get the
credit for that. I I I somehow somehow
obviously, I'm involved,
but it could have been that other guy
that he was cussing that recommended him. I
mean, I I don't know. I'm not trying
to figure that out. Here's what I know.
The holy spirit can change anybody in an
instant.
This dude had 90 years of being that.
In the last 6 months of his life,
he was a good Christian.
And people said they never heard him cuss
again.
Never. The old man got bored with him.
Yeah. It was why be here if he's
not gonna go out? Alright.
I recognize my rebellion.
It haunts me day and night.
Guys, recognize recognize. I'm gonna I'm gonna talk
a little bit about this Sunday.
But recognize who you are. Own up to
who you are. One of the biggest problems
we're ever gonna have in our life is
us.
You're you're you're you are your biggest enemy.
Satan just uses you,
but you're your biggest problem.
Because nobody else can make you do something,
you're doing it because you're choosing at some
level.
Recognize that. When you when you know you
have an issue with something, get before god
and ask him to work on it.
Repent and ask him to work on it.
I I've given you different examples over the
years, but the biggest one for me
back in the day was my anger.
I I had such a major problem with
anger.
Such a problem. And I and I and
every now and then it rears its head.
Right?
But for the most part, I had that
thing whooped.
I spent hours and hours and hours and
hours praying and pleading with God and asking,
going through scripture. How do you deal with
anger? How do you deal with this kind
of stuff?
Talk to people. I've had mentors and counselors,
and I've had my wife.
She's really helped me a lot over the
years with that.
She has a vested interest. And so
the all all these different things. And every
now and then, I tell you I tell
you when it hit me again,
it's standing in the well in the capital.
But in my defense a little bit,
a lot of it is actually righteous indignation.
And so I I kinda let it I
kinda let it take its
course sometimes
in ways that I wouldn't do in the
church.
I figured they don't come to church.
They're getting both barrels.
Look at this. This is important. This is
important.
Against you, who's who's David talking about?
God.
Against you
and you alone have I sinned.
I struggled with that for years years years.
Because I
thought, if if I do something against Daniel,
I've sinned against Daniel. David sinned against Uriah,
didn't he?
How can you how can you just negate
that?
But what
what David is saying is a spiritual truth
that transcends our understanding sometimes.
When you sin,
you can't sin against a person
because they're not god. They are not a
holy
god.
When we sin,
we're sinning against the person that made the
rules.
If I do something wrong to to Daniel,
I've I've wronged Daniel. But I can't sin
against him because he didn't make the rules.
He's not the holy judge. I'm not gonna
stand before him someday.
I sinned against God. But you say, well
that's kinda
getting out of it. It's the opposite.
If I sin against Daniel, it's only between
Daniel and I.
I can take care You know when that
stops? When Daniel dies or I die?
But if I sin against God, it doesn't
matter when I die.
I'm gonna stand before him for that.
Daniel will never be my judge,
but God is always my judge.
And that's what David understood. And and here's
the amazing thing about it. David understood this
before the concept of the cross.
That's that's big. That's powerful in my opinion.
He says, against you and you alone have
I sinned. I have done what is evil
in your sight.
You will be pro proved right in what
you say. And your judgment against me is
just.
And basically, he's just saying, God, I want
you to forgive me. But you're the judge.
You're the judge.
Now be careful with that after the cross.
Because if you assume that maybe Jesus won't
forgive you, now you're going against the word.
K? That's important.
That's an important,
differentiation
after cross before cross.
Right?
Don't ever don't ever let Satan tell you
that Jesus will not forgive you.
That's a lie that goes against scripture.
K?
For I was born a sinner. Yes, from
the very moment my mother conceived me. You
desire honesty from the womb. I, the the
best I can tell, I don't think womb
is the right,
translation here. I think it means from in
the inside of you, not from the inside
of your mother.
K? It doesn't seem to fit the rest,
and that's not really how the Hebrew says.
I don't think it's bad that it says
womb, but I think we miss the bigger
point. And I don't think that's what the
Hebrew was the Hebrew says. But you desire
honesty from my inner parts, teaching me wisdom
even there in in here,
not in the womb.
Okay? That's just that. Alright. We're gonna start
with verse 7
next week.
And we're gonna go down through it.
Alright?
So here's the obvious question of the evening,
but it seems to be a little stronger
for us tonight.
How how are we gonna pray about this?
Let me let me not use the word
we. Because that kinda gives us a little
bit of a
a transference potential.
Right?
How are you gonna pray about this? Wisdom.
I think wisdom is very appropriate because everything
you said Start over, Aidan, so they can
hear you at home. I think wisdom.
Because everything you said earlier about the political
thing affects us in the here and now.
And,
I could understand the right to say indignation
when you have to go to the capital.
I get that. And I think a lot
of whiz mess to go into that. And
looking at what you just shared on the
second half of the set of the service
was very, very spiritual.
What you said about the womb and it
means interbeing
and about finding out about I don't sin
against this person. I sin against god, the
ultimate judge. When we have responsibility
to our brothers and sisters, but it's against
God. And David understood that. I never realized
that before.
That's important. So I think the discernment and
wisdom Yeah. In this message.
I like you attaching discernment to that. Because
to me, wisdom and discernment need to go
hand in hand.
How else are you gonna pray?
Somebody else?
Did I see somebody over here? Raise your
hand.
Oh.
Here here is what always comes to my
mind
Is,
Lord, let me let me be honest with
me.
In your spirit,
convict me
and let me be honest.
I I don't wanna ever get to the
point where
I brush my sins under the rug, and
then I preach to you guys.
I don't I don't wanna do that.
And by the way, that's a lot easier
than you think.
I I want the lord to I wanna
I wanna
truly be open with the Lord. I wanna
know where my
rebellion is. I wanna know where my attitude,
pride, selfishness,
lust. I wanna know where all those things
are in my existence, so that I can
get them before God.
Sometimes I fight with god about things.
Because I try to justify, but
I I wanna be honest and open.
I'm I'm talking about that
some Sunday.
I think that's why I switched to to
Psalms 51 here tonight because it's
it leads us very well into this weekend.
But I I just
I don't wanna be I don't wanna be
an intentional hypocrite. I think we're all hypocrites
at some level, but I don't wanna be
intentional.
Joy? I was just gonna say that too
is that, you know, help me to just
really see my sin because it's really easy
to read about David and think, well, I've
never done a lot of things he's done.
So, I must not be such a bad
guy. And so
it's like
we really
I I wanna see,
you know, how I'm sinning against God in
a in a really way that I can
change.
We we always rationalize. Human nature rationalizes our
sin by assessing it,
toward who we think is worse.
Right? We never pick somebody better.
We don't ever do that. Right? We don't
ever say,
you know, I wish I was more like
mother Teresa.
Right? We always say, I'm just glad I'm
I'm not as bad as these 3 Democrats
sitting here on the front row.
Alright. Let's pray. God, we thank you for
your grace.
Lord, that you truly are
you are grace.
Your your
you fill us with your presence and your
spirit
to soften our hearts so that we can
first respond to your grace and then then
also give it.
Lord, help me to realize that
that when I sin, I sin against you.
Lord, I don't wanna sin against you.
I don't wanna wrong anybody else either.
Or there's no one on this planet
that I wanna see hurt,
harmed.
Lord, I I
I wanna see people judged.
Lord, I don't want anybody go to hell.
So I want your grace for me and
I want your grace for others.
I don't want you to create a clean
heart in me and then give me the
ability to help somebody else see that.
Lord, help every one of us here
to realize and recognize
our rebellion.
And then get it right with you.
Lord, I don't wanna be convicted just to
be condemned. Wanna be convicted so that I
can change it and I can serve you
better.
Lord, I pray that for our church.
Pray that for every one of us.
Help us to let your holy spirit
get inside our minds, and our spirit, and
our heart, and just
just wreak havoc in there
and change us.
We pray all of this ultimately for your
glory, lord god.
And in the name of your son, Jesus.
Amen.
Amen. Alright. Don't forget men's breakfast, Saturday.
Looking forward to,
There Better Be Bacon. I don't know who's
planning this, but
alright. We'll see you guys. Have a great
rest of your night.