Cognitive Surrender

00:00 Father, what a privilege it is to be together today to share, to catch up, to talk about what's been going on, not just in this world, but in our own hearts as well. We pray for our listeners today, our friends, people that are part of the get-to nation. We pray for them, Lord, and we pray for their hearts as well. Lord, the world is assaulting their hearts and trying to grab their attention for everything like a dumpster fire. So, Lord, we pray for the peace that passes all understanding to guard and garrison our hearts and our minds in Christ Jesus. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. It's Wednesday, August 12th, 2026.

00:41 We get to do this. This is episode number 45. This is the life we've been blessed with. This is against French. We get to do this. This is a chance we dare not miss. This is the life we get to do this. Oh, yeah, we do. Hello, brother. Welcome back. Thank you. Do you notice now when we see each other and we're getting set ready for the show that we're kind of not really talking? Absolutely. Just like, we've got stuff to say. It's like, I don't want anything to roll out before the show. Don't say anything. Yeah, I know. And I want to say hello to everyone coming in from No Agenda, those who are believers, those who are coming back to their faith, the Christ Curious.

01:31 Yeah, this hit me this morning. Holy Spirit gave me Christ Curious. Ooh, got that down. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, man. What a week it's been. You've had a week. Yeah. I mean, you've been on an adventure, and it's heavy lifting. It has been. Although it was, you know, so we went to San Francisco. This was for John C. Dvorak's Memorial. We got in Friday, and the memorial's on Saturday. So really, like for 24 hours, I'm just, you know, because I was going to speak. I was asked to say something. So I'm kind of all keyed up about that. You know, then seeing the family, people came in from the Netherlands, from Tokyo, from all over the country just to be there.

02:17 From Tennessee. Sir Patrick Cobel from Tennessee, from Los Angeles, just from everywhere. And there were people there who I'd only heard of because I know their names from like from the old Osborne computer days, from the old DOS PC telecommunications days. Because John had written, I don't know, like 36 books or something. So he had a lot of that going on. But really, the things that were great is that everybody, well, two things. Everybody had a story about how he had helped them in their career, one way or another.

03:02 Everybody agreed completely on his gruffness and his lack of seeming human candor. But the thing that really struck me, and one guy who had worked with John on the book side had mentioned it, and I knew this inherently, is that his criticism, which you could see as like, just like, man, you're such a, you're mean. Why are you saying this to me? You know, his criticism of technology, like, you know, there's no evidence anybody wants to use a mouse. The Apple Watch is no good. He really, and of course, at the time when he said these things, they were true.

03:42 He's, you know, excoriated me for things that I've done or said. He really only was doing that to make things better, to make people do better, to have tech companies do better. And I knew that, but have someone actually say it, I'm like, wow, that is true. Because he could have been extremely wealthy consulting, working for companies, but instead he just drove people to do better because he thought that it was not good enough. Wow. And that was really nice. Yeah, his line. That's no good. I mean, that's classic, John Dvorak. So a lot of weight dropped off of me, I would say. And just being with the family,

04:24 we had to go to the bank and sit there for three hours probate. It's not people, get your affairs in order. It really sucks for people after the fact to go and fix stuff. That's heavy lifting. That's emotional. It was heavy lifting because, too, you're feeling the weight of all the folks that are coming. I mean, anytime we come to a celebration of life, you know, memorial service or a funeral, it's heavy lifting because there's just weight in the room. You know, people are grieving. People are going through that. But there's also the celebration of life side where you get to tell the funny things. things and the good things. Yes, it's life-giving too. So it's all that's hitting you at the same time.

05:05 So it is heavy lifting. And there were comedians there, myself kind of included. I'll just add myself a little bit. Of course. But, you know, he had a lot of comedian friends. His wife, Mimi, she came from the comedy world. I didn't know that. Yeah. Oh, yeah. She worked early on with Robin Williams. A lot of the greats. And so there were some funny people. You see, you know, some 78-year-old guy getting up there and all of a sudden he's doing shtick. It's like, oh, wow. Okay. A pro. Old pros. That's cool. Yeah. So it was, it was the thing that was kind of interesting is, you know, so all these people were speaking in this beautiful chapel, this 100-year-old chapel in

05:47 Oakland. Just beautiful stained glass wooden pews, not really big. And, you know, as I was talking just in general about how I got at the end of my speech, how I got saved and how John just thought that would be great for the show. And I'm like, I just want to pray over everybody here. And because no one mentioned God, no one was doing any of that. And what came out of my mouth was kind of interesting because I said, let's bow our heads. This is interesting. When you say that, almost everyone's head went down. Yeah, they do. Self-respect. But it was like Pavlovian almost. It's like it's built into their system.

06:30 I was like, oh, wow. Okay. And then, you know, I just prayed for everyone to be lifted up. Beautiful. And so, and that kind of ended the era. And now we move on to the new season, which, of course, a big part of that is we get to do this, brother. And we do get to do this. I am so excited. I'm so excited. I say it 50 times a day. Not because it's a podcast title. It's just innate. It's in me. I can't. I'm so grateful. When you live a grateful life, things like living up in a down world, I'm living up in a down world. I get to do this. These things become natural for you. Yeah. But also, neurologically, they drive something into you.

07:09 Oh, yeah. And they build upon. And over time, it becomes your whole perception and perspective to where now you're saying it to people who are going, oh, I've never thought of that before. Because we've never heard it before. We're ready to do this. Our whole staff says it. I mean, it's hilarious for me to hear it coming back. Oh, I'm because I know it's getting in the culture. I get recordings and clips from people of someone else just saying, you know, well, you know, we really get to do this. And like, oh, I caught it. I caught it. So it's kind of out there. Now, when last week, you had not yet gone to the first of your two Meet M-E-A-T ups for healing humanity.

07:49 So I want to hear how they went. It was Dallas and Austin, right? Dallas and Austin. We drove to Austin, flew to Dallas. Man, favor all along the way. You know, you and I, when we travel, we always pray for each other for travel favor and grace. You know, just open doors. And we always pray for each other for an awareness of what's happening on the journey as opposed to just the destination. Yes. Because to me, traveling is about who you're helping at the airport. Who you're bumping into. Striking a conversation with. Absolutely. Somebody sitting on a plane or whose luggage are you helping stuff in a bin? And there's so many opportunities to light candles and just do good.

08:28 I mean, be good, do good. You know, the scripture says this: that, you know, you don't, don't be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. Yes. And so while the world waxes darker and worse, we can be good. And we do it from the perspective of the gift of the Holy Spirit. Actually, a fruit of the Spirit is goodness. So we just do it and we honor God in it. So I love the journey. I'm like, man, my eyes are wide open the whole time. It's like, I want more layovers so I can have more fun on the journey. I have no problem with layovers, man, because it's like just opportunities to talk to people and engage. And I mean, that's what we do. And so great trip. Ended up in Dallas. Man, Dallas is just Dallas, right?

09:09 I mean, you know, traffic and all that, but really it wasn't that bad. I mean, we struck up conversations with everybody we met, but we didn't do it on purpose. We live with purpose. So those things happen, I guess, on purpose, but not because you're just trying to. Like, oh, I got to make a conversation here. It's just, no, man, just talk about life and stuff and laugh. And we had so much fun on the journey with everybody. Even the rental car guy was cool. I mean, he was like, man, can I get you something? Man, hey, let me go get that car for you. Let me make sure you get the right car. I mean, he was just because when you start living this life, it starts to ooze out of your pores.

09:51 You don't even know it. The aroma of Christ is getting. is getting there before you do. Because, I mean, like, you have a very smell you coming. Well, you have a very distinctive cologne that you wear, which, in a weird twist of fate, my wife got it for me. Yeah, no, I said, honey. Conversations need to be had here. This is weird. I smelled me when I came in. No, no, no. I got the other one. Oh, the one with Johnny Depp on it. You know, the high-end one, man. And I went for the shot for the moon, man. Excuse me. I'm just a toilet water over here. The new one. The new scent. I can't even pronounce it. But anyway, so when I put it on, I said, I smell like Adam Curry. She goes, I love Adam Curry's smell. But it's weirding me out because I feel like he's here.

10:36 He's in my space right now. No, wait. He's halfway across the United States. So anyway, all that to say, sorry, man, I got to go. That's right. I'm just laughing all the way to the bank here. So we get to get to Dallas. And again, just crazy open-door fun stuff happens. Like meeting Toby. Did I talk about Toby last week? I talked about him in the message, but I don't know if I didn't. Toby. I met Toby. He's the guy who. The checkout guy? Yeah. I wanted to know if I was a financier. Yeah, we talked about Toby last night. So, that's right, because that was before the meetups after we were there. I was remote last week. By the way, the production sounded really good. I'm telling you, man, this stuff works.

11:16 That mini pod thing is amazing. Pod mobile. Pod mobile. Exactly. So, so we went to the VIP dinner, which is great because it was at a Brazilian steakhouse. Boy, how appropriate is that? These guys are coming around with swords and pieces of meat. I have been to one of these restaurants. Man, it was awesome. But we got to meet people. Oh, go ahead. Is that the one where you, if you want more meat, you put a little red sticker down? You got a red thing over. Okay, yeah. Red and green, red and green, man. I just left mine on green. It's easy to overeat in these places. Man, it was awesome. But we were the people that attended that, you know, they paid extra to come to that and they to meet the people who were in the movie. So we were there. So we got to meet people. It was a meetup. It was like the Connect Center here at the church.

12:00 Right. We're hanging around, just having fun with people, hearing their stories, not really telling ours because they're going to get to see it in the movie, but we get to hear their stories and just hearing people just what they've been free from and what they've gotten food addictions that were like deadly. I mean, like killing them kind of things, you know, three, four, 500 pounds and somebody losing 270 pounds. Now, this is all done on carnivore? Carnivore diet. Carnivore diets. Carnivore and ketivore. So the carnivore space seems to have taken in the keto space as well because there's a realization that not everybody can do that. What is the difference between the two? Because not everybody. Carnivore is basically beef, butter, bacon, and eggs and drinking electrolytes and water.

12:44 So, I mean, it's pretty like a lion diet thing. So it's pretty basic. You know, no carbs, all protein and fat. Okay. So you begin to burn fat for fuel, which is amazing because that's when you become superhuman and you feel like you are. So ketivore is your strongly protein meat, meat, poultry, fish, strongly, like 80%. But then you also like salad or you enjoy healthy, clean other kinds of food. Avocados, can you have a potato? Potatoes. No, no potatoes. Potato is no good. No potatoes. In the words of John DeVore, it's no good. It's no good.

13:21 So no, potatoes are bad. They're starch. So it's pure sugar when it hits your system. But anyway, so all these people doing this together is really cool. There was like 225 people. They sold out that theater. Wow. Small theater in downtown, old downtown grapevine, which is a real cool little drag. It's beautiful there. It's neat. And sold it out. So, man, it was a great spirit in the house. We watched the movie. Man, I cried again just over because I know some of these people that have gone through some hard stuff and are doing well and one not so well. But after at the end of it, they brought us up on the platform because it was an old movie theater with a stage. So they brought us up there. And so Annette and I and Ashley Rogers, who's one of the Carnivore brothers, and Carrie Mann, who has Homestead How.

14:05 That's his channel. He's the founder. He's the one who had the vision. A YouTuber, he says, man, I'm just a YouTuber who barely graduated from high school and I felt like I was supposed to make a movie. He said, I had no idea what I was getting into. So they produced this movie. They've got over 400 hours of footage beyond the movie. That's a lot. So they're going to do a YouTube series and roll these stories out just so people can see their stories. Good. So we got up there and we did QA. They'd given everybody cards. They were writing down their questions during the movie. And man, they're firing them right and left at us when we get up there. And it was so fun. And I got to talk about the Lord over and over. This is what I.

14:49 I appreciate about Carrie Mann. They introduced me in Annette as Pastor Jimmy and Annette. That's all they ever call us. And what that's done, it's we're sort of the unofficial chaplains, pastors of the carnivore space. And it's not like we tried to do it. We just showed up and we were just who we were. So how do you connect the carnivore, ketovore audience with faith? What is the, I mean, I can think of a lot of them. Just how did you do that? The way I do it, I talk about mind, body, and spirit that we're three parts as a person. And everybody's cool about, you know,

15:27 stewarding their mental health. And then a lot of people are good about stewarding their spiritual health, but we're not good about stewarding our physical health. Right. And so I describe it as a three-legged stool. If you have three legs, one is spirit, one mind, one body, and then you cut off any one of those three inches, you have a dysfunctional stool. Many of us have a dysfunctional life because we are not balanced in those things. We're not stewarding them well. So that's my step into that. That's my spiel, if you will, into that. And it makes sense with people. Yeah, I could see that. So we just talk about it matter of factly. And the fact that they introduce us as pastors, that's kind of green light go.

16:08 People are going to expect it. So I met Froda from Finland, and he said, man, he said, I'm noticing that in this area of health, most people are Christians. Interesting. And I said, well, I said, it's a good observation. I said, I think it's because what we're doing here, we're not trying to make money. We're just trying to help people. So that's going to attract people who generally have a good moral compass. And that's going to be probably more than likely mostly Christians, but others too that are just good people that want to help others, you know, get whole, get healed. And even he loved it. He said, well, I know there's evil because I think there's a very real evil that creates always the first step, man.

16:52 That's Tommy Wolf, Adam C. Curry right there, man. It was a setup. And I said, yeah, because, man, if there's evil that's causing people to eat bad and it's killing them, you know, trashing their health, then there's got to be good. And he said, yeah. I mean, it was a great conversation with Froda. And he had a very thick accent. Oh, yeah. The fish. Yeah, he was neat, though. Gosh, we met a guy in the tech world from San Diego. No, San Francisco, San Diego. He's San Diego. Met another guy. And all these guys came up to us after it was over with and either wanted to talk about our faith, the connection of faith and health or health. They wanted practical things. So we got there at 5 p.m. for the dinner.

17:35 We left at 11.30 p.m. Because not only did we close the theater down, we stood outside for another hour, an hour and a half talking to people, a group of people who didn't want to leave. I love that. Because they were learning and growing and we were just connecting. So that happened twice. It happened once in Dallas. Then we got back on the plane, flew to Austin, did it again the next night. I love that. Five o'clock that night till 11:30. So, like, the Holy Spirit is moving around this topic. And as you're out there, and I'm always looking for, you know, topics for the show, you know, we always try to hit things that are happening in culture.

18:12 How does that fit in with our world, with our worldview? 60 Minutes has this entire piece about food. And wow. I mean, I had to bring a couple clips and I have some thoughts about how we can look at this. But I'll just kick it off with their beginning because the stuff you hear from this and a guy named Kessler used to be the FDA administrator and RFK Jr., they're both in this piece, and I pulled some clips for us. Today, an increasing number of Americans across the political spectrum, from Make America Healthy Again activists to everyday shoppers, are voicing concern about the health impact of ultra-processed foods, those boxed and wrapped in plastic, ready-to-eat items lining grocery store shelves.

19:03 Leading the charge are two men who disagree on pretty much everything else about public health: Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Dr. David Kessler, the former commissioner of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. The two men have found common ground over a common culprit, a 67-year-old government classification for substances in our food. It's called grass or generally recognized as safe. Kennedy and Kessler say it has allowed big food companies to use ingredients without a full government safety review and flood the market with ultra-processed foods that now make up 50%.

19:45 of our calories and 60% of our children's diets. Over the last 40 years, the United States has been exposed to something that our biology was never intended to handle. Energy-dense, highly palatable, rapidly absorbable, ultra-processed foods that have altered our metabolism and have resulted in the greatest increase in chronic disease in our history: type 2 diabetes, pre-diabetes, hypertension, abnormal lipids, fatty liver, heart attacks, stroke,

20:30 heart failure from our food. From our food. Yay, food. Boy, the Maha effect, man. Well, it's amazing because Kessler is definitely not on the Maha train when it comes to a lot of other things. But he is the guy that went after big tobacco. Oh, wow. For them purposely making it addictive. David Kessler was commissioner of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration during the 1990s when he helped expose how the tobacco companies manipulated nicotine levels to hook consumers.

21:08 I am here to provide you with actual instances of nicotine control and manipulation in the tobacco industry. Can you raise your right hand? He was a driving force in bringing tobacco executives before Congress and turning public attention to the industry. He's now aiming to do the same with the food industry. In terms of a public health crisis, how does this compare with tobacco? It's as large, if not larger. It's that significant. The scale of this, this affects everybody. Understand, not everybody smoked.

21:50 Look at the number of people who consume ultra-processed food. It touches all of us. 70% of Americans are either obese or overweight. And it's not because they got indolent or because we became lazy or because we suddenly developed giant appetites. It's because we're being given food that is low in nutrition and high in calories and it's making it destroying our health. Yeah, and it's addictive. Very. Play one more with some stats and then we're going to talk about some things.

22:27 We met with Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. last month after he issued new dietary guidelines that for the first time advise against highly processed foods. You have said that these ultra-processed foods are poisoning us. I think many Americans would be surprised to hear that. We're seeing in our population people who are obscenely obese and at the same time malnourished. Who wants a science? Kennedy says that's largely because we don't know the health consequences of what we're eating.

23:05 Thanks to the grass exemption enacted by Congress in 1958 that allows foods to independently verify the safety of their ingredients with no government oversight if they are generally recognized by experts as safe. Pending White House approval, he intends to close that back door. That loophole was hijacked by the industry and it was used to add thousands upon thousands of new ingredients into our food supply. In Europe, there's only 400 legal ingredients. This agency does not know how many ingredients there are in American food.

23:46 We do not know. I do not know. The estimates are between 4,000 and 10,000. We have no idea what they are. How do we know what is safe to eat? There is no way for any American to know if a product is safe if it is ultra-processed. That's a lot of stuff we don't know about that's in our food. So I want to go to the word of God. And so I started looking stuff up. You know, what are we supposed to eat? And this is food is in the Bible a metaphor, you know, food for all kinds, you know, not necessarily sustenance.

24:28 And the two that obviously I came up with, Genesis 1, 29, 30, then God said, look, I think he said like that, look, I have given you every seed-bearing process. plant throughout the earth and all the fruit trees for your food. And I've given every green plant as food for all the wild animals, the birds in the sky, and the small animals that scurry along the ground, everything that has life. And that is what happened. And then Genesis 9, 3 to 4, we get kind of an expansion. And this is just me, amateur theologian. I have given them to you for food, just as I have given you grain and vegetables, but you must never eat any meat that still has the lifeblood in it.

25:11 So is this telling us to be keto-voor? Yeah, I know. This is a loaded question of throwing at you. It is. Here's the thing. So Jordan Rubin has done a lot of work on this. He's a messianic Jewish guy who nearly died in high school because of all kinds of health issues. Turns out it was diet-related. It took a lot of work to get to it. It took him years to figure it out before he finally turned the corner and he wrote a book called The Biblio Diet, where he's talking about these very things. I like that. He makes a distinction, which I would make that same distinction that sadly, a lot of the things that are listed on that list have been genetically modified by the food industry.

25:59 Right. And so it's hard to know if you're eating really clean foods. For example, an apple today is basically like a piece of candy. Yeah. It has been so modified. It's starized and sugarized. It's got dye in the skin. It's been messed with genetically in order to produce massive, huge, large, gorgeous apples. Whereas 100 years ago, when you were eating real apples, real food that was not modified, not pest, hadn't been sprayed with pesticides, they were small. And they weren't that sweet. Even the term organic is crap. That rating is.

26:38 It's literally a marketing ploy. Exactly. It sounds good, but it doesn't mean at all that it's straight from an old school tree. Sadly, it doesn't because the parameters for calling something organic doesn't mean that it hasn't been sprayed or messed with. Right, right. It's how much has it been sprayed or messed with. So it's still, you're still getting that stuff. So the safest thing to do, I mean, if it's even possible, is to go to a farmer's market where these guys, but then again, you don't. So he was right. We don't know. We don't know. One of the things that is appealing to me as someone who has been down this walked in this space for a long time is that I want to be able to eat something that I know has the best chance of being healthy by the time it gets to my grill.

27:30 Which is why we get our beef from our ranchers and we know them. We've shaken their hand. We feel good about what they're doing. They tell us what they are and aren't doing. That's number one. But you're right about the greens, you know, vegetables and fruit. You really don't know. How many recalls have we seen recently on vegetables and fruit? I mean, lettuce will just give you explosive diarrhea these days. And what is lettuce anyway? It contains no nutrients. It's a medium for all the crap you put on it that you like. All the sweet stuff. It's instead of small oil, sugarized strawberries, you know, the stuff we add to it.

28:09 So, yeah, this goes down the rabbit hole real quick. And yet, these are not conspiracy theories around food. This is proven, documented. It's been for years, decades. It has gotten worse. Should we be doing something about that as believers? Should we be? We need to be okay. So we go back to stewardship. The word steward simply means handling God's blessings, God's ways. We were blessed with a physical body. It's the only thing we'll have from birth to death is our body, our physical, our earth suit, if you will. It's the only thing we'll have. And yet it's one of the things we treat the worst. We don't get the sleep we need.

28:50 We're loaded with cortisol from living stressful lives and not knowing how to dump that. We eat what's been handed to us. It's called SAD, the sad diet, the standard American diet. It's even called that. Yeah. Sad, because it is, because it's destroying people's health. And that is documented. There is no argument on it. There's no debate on this, by the way, because we have the receipts. And so we have to be selective and wise about what we're going to do. So going into a restaurant, I eat, I'll order a steak, and I say, do you cook with seed oils on your steak? Because when they come out and they're glistening, that's a good chance that things are bathed in all kinds of stuff. That's really bad for you.

29:34 you. And my system, when I'm clicking, which I'm back in full-on carnivore, things are clicking, things are going good. I'm down to my fighting weight again. I'm right where I'm supposed to be. Then you add those terrible ingredients, it'll actually make me sick. It'll hurt my stomach because my stomach's like, What are you doing? You've been doing so good. And so, as Christians, we do need to be mindful because so much of what we eat, we're addicted to. Let's just start with sugar. Man, it's as addictive as cocaine. You've heard that cliche thrown around. Oreos.

30:12 Oreos are as addictive as cocaine. Oh, man. And the reason why we salivate when we name these foods off is because we're addicted to them. You're listening to this. I have it still. Oreos are just as addictive as cocaine. That's true. Actual news reports. It's actually true. There is verifiable documentation on this. So, yes, as believers, I went there a little bit on Sunday just talking a little about the carnivore space. I had so many people come to me after talking. Oh, I bet. And they said, Pastor, I'm glad you said that. I really want to get going again. I did it, and then I'd not, and I feel terrible. I want to. I want to feel better again.

30:52 So I'm counseling and kind of coaching some guys through that. A couple of guys, and then others who've asked about it. So, yeah, stewardship of what God has given us. I mean, forget your refrigerator, forget that we're talking about food, forget big, big food industry. It's just this, it goes back to a spiritual issue. Am I willing to choose obedience over impulse? And much of what we do in eating is impulse. We're bored. It's your body. You're watching a Netflix series, right? What do we do? I need something. You're doom scrolling. You're doom scrolling.

31:32 I need something that's addiction. There's one other clip, just this last one, just because you were talking about our food industry, big food. And I love that 60 Minutes did this. I'm pretty sure not as many people were exposed to the 60 Minutes that should be because, let's face it, we got all kinds of stuff going on in our newsfeed. This I guess I kind of understood or knew about, but I was surprised to hear about our food industry. We met with food author Michael Pollan, who for decades has been warning about inexpensive factory-processed food. Granola bars, those look very healthy. All of these would qualify as ultra-processed foods, even though they're very different.

32:16 We have a snack food, Nature Valley. I would argue because of the number of ingredients in it. So there's a lot of sugar in here. This is sold as healthy health food. You know what it is. Pollen commends Kennedy for shining a light on ultra-processed foods. He ties their ubiquity to long-standing federal farm substitutes. Check this out. We subsidize as taxpayers through the farm bill the least healthy calories in the diet, most of which goes to people farming corn and soybeans. What's wrong with corn and soybeans? When you hear corn and soy, you think food. This is not corn on the cob. This is commodity corn. It's not the sweet corn we eat in the summer. You can't eat it, in fact.

33:01 It's all starch, big cobs. You'd break your teeth on it. And then soy, which is not in the form we grow it as a commodity, is not edamame. You can't eat it. These are raw ingredients for processed foods and animal feed. So the government is subsidizing crops that are making us unhealthy. Yes. Yeah. And one way to look at it is we are supporting both sides in the war on type 2 diabetes. We're subsidizing the high fructose corn syrup that's contributing to causing it, and then we're paying for the health care costs. I mean, it makes no sense at all. Well, there you go. I didn't know that you couldn't eat the corn or the soybeans that are being grown.

33:45 I had no idea. One of the reasons, and I started down this is as we were getting closer to 60, we started with keto, the ketogenic diet. And that's a clean, clean food diet, as clean as you can get, right? You do that in your, again, meat-heavy, protein-heavy, but you're lower carb. So that's that's the, it's sort of a great step in if you're wanting to do something. And so that's what we did for five years. That's when we began to study and learn some of these things and realize how bad our food supply had gotten. Our doctor, who was very versed in nutrition, Marcy, you know, Marcy? I sure do. We were going to be traveling to Paris in 2019. She said, oh, I've got good news. She knew we were doing ketogenic. In fact, she was doing it at the time as well. Our own doctor was doing it, and she was losing weight. She looked amazing.

34:29 amazing. She had energy. She was loved it. So we did it, and she saw the same results. She said, Oh, if you're going to Paris, you can eat the food there. Yeah, you can eat the bread. She said, Enjoy the food. She said, You're going to, she said, it's clean. They don't have all exactly what they said: 400 ingredients there compared to 4,000 plus here. She said, It's good food. So we went to Paris. We were there for 10 days. We walked. We on purpose walked everywhere. We walked the city. 88 miles is what we logged on our trackers that week. 88 miles walked. We ate everything and we had fun and we enjoyed it.

35:15 And we lost weight. Now, did you lose weight because you walked 88 miles? We were used to hurt. We were used to peddling. I mean, it's not a big deal for us. We work out. We're active. So, or because the food was legit there. It's the same in Italy. It's exactly the same. Now, they do have other problems in these countries. Of course. This is one area that I'm happy about. Very other big. And I hear that it's getting worse, though. I hear that. Because the economy and it's easier to produce these ultra-processed foods. It's cheaper. And they go further, but sadly, they're destroying people's health. So, you know, do you, it's like the old SDP commercial. You want to pay me now or do you want to pay me later? And that is why we got into this space.

35:58 We all got viscosity breakdown, man. For sure. Badly. So that's why we got into it initially. It was like we wanted to run through the tape. Because, again, being a pastor, I've buried so many people before their time. People that I knew could have had a full long life and they didn't take care of themselves. People that were type two diabetics, drinking, you know, you know, 44-ounce big gulp. Dr. Pepper's not helping. Yeah. Yeah. You brought a clip. I did. Yeah. Let me set it up, though. Yeah, please do. So that's why I'm handing it to you. I appreciate it. Nice segue. So I appreciate it. On Sunday, I preached part two of a message called Reborn.

36:42 Net and I have been talking, and we realized, gosh, you know, we throw a lot of terms around in the Christian world, right? You know, being saved, being lost. You know, you need to get born again. You need to, you know, you hear these terms. And as we were talking about one day, we were both saying, you know, most people don't even know what that means. Yeah, people have come from Catholic backgrounds, Lutheran, other denominations that don't even really use that language or lingo, or maybe don't even have that theological bent or that theological piece in their theology. So I just said, I'm going to do a re-series. They're going to be all re-words, reborn, redo, revived, all that. So I just started with reborn and I put together a sermon. I stepped into the pulpit.

37:24 I got one point of three points done. Barely scratched it. Barely got the first one out the first time. I said, this will be a two-parter. Then last week I said, this will be a three-parter. It may even keep going. But I talked about Nicodemus having this encounter with Jesus. I used a clip from The Chosen to demonstrate where Mary says, she's explaining to Nicodemus because he saw her possessed. He tried to cast the demons out of her. She had seven. Couldn't. And the demons in her looked at him and said, You have no power here. Boy, just rocked his world. Then he sees her in the marketplace and she's whole, clean, radiant. And he runs up to her and says, What happened to you? How did it work?

38:09 And she said, Oh, no. And she explained. She said, There was a man. She said, I don't even understand it myself, but I'll tell you this. I was this way and now I'm different. And in between was him. So Nicodemus starts going, Who is him? Who are you talking about? And she tells him it was Jesus. Well, that started Nicodemus on a search. Now, that's in the movie, The Chosen. Plausibility, of course, not detailed in scripture to that degree. But in scripture is detailed more the encounter between Nicodemus and Jesus. Nicodemus seeks him out. Nicodemus is a part of the Sanhedrin. That's the 70, the council that rules Jerusalem.

38:51 And he is also a teacher of teacher. Jesus even calls him a teacher of Israel. High, high-ranking Pharisees, a brilliant man, scholar. And him and Jesus sit down for a meeting and they go back and forth. And Jesus tells him, Are you a teacher of Israel and you don't even understand these things? And he says, This is why I tell you, John 3:3, you must be born again. So that's the reborn thing. So I did, I broke that all down. And wow, people were like all in. And I just went all Southern Baptist on like my roots. You know that that's. that one scene in The Chosen, it was after I saw that scene when I said to Tina, I'm ready to be baptized.

39:32 Wow, I forgot about that. That was right. We were in bed that night. I'm like, I'm ready now. I've seen it. Now I've seen that very scene on the rooftop. That scene was brilliant because that was actually very close to scripture. He even quotes, he doesn't quote John 3. He's saying John 3:16 as he's saying it. And then it gets quoted because John's over there writing down fiercely. Down at the bottom and in the dark. Yeah, writing these things down. So it was a great scene there. So, yeah, I forgot that that was what prompted you to take the plunge. So I broke all that down and really just came to this point of helping people understand it that you must be born again. We've got to be born again. What was your original question? You're setting up the clip.

40:14 There it is, the clip. Thank you. I knew there was going somewhere with that. So I decided instead of fumble around, I just asked, thanks to being honest, it's good, man. All right, because I got off preaching. So here it is. So I found this clip by Josh Howerton. Of course, he was on the Sean Ryan show, did a three-hour interview with Sean, and it was powerful. We watched all three hours. Yeah, I saw it. I heard it actually. It was powerful. And Josh just, man, 44 years old, handled himself. And Sean was great. You know, Sean was in. I mean, he was, but he asked good questions. Sean is searching. I mean, he has been searching for a long time. He does say he's a believer.

40:54 He's a Christian. Oh, yeah. Yeah. But he was asking the hard questions. The questions that most people are asking, Sean was asking. And so towards the end of the end of it, they're getting down to it. And Sean asked the question: why did Jesus have to die? Like a real core question. That was real. And I love the way Josh Howerton, Pastor Josh, handled it. He said, I am glad you asked. That's one of my favorite questions to answer. He said, but I'm going to answer it with a story. So he tells the story. Why did Jesus have to die on the cross? Yeah. Why did he have to do it? He's God's son.

41:35 He's God's only son. Why didn't God make another son? We've got a lot of questions there. I mean, I just don't, I don't fully understand why it had to happen if he is God. Why couldn't he just forgive? Exactly. Yeah. Man, that's like my favorite question to answer ever. All right. So the Bible says that God did it that way so that he could be both, let me say it and then explain it. So he could be both just and the justifier of the ungodly. All right. So just and justifier. All right. So

42:17 my favorite way to illustrate this is by a story. Okay. So best illustration of why God had, why Jesus had to die on the cross I've ever heard. All right. It goes like this. Once upon a time in a far-off kingdom, there was a king who was known by everyone of the kingdom to be the most just and loving king who had ever lived. But then it was discovered that somebody was stealing from the king's treasury. And so the king, being a just king, he sent out an edict that whenever it was discovered who was stealing from the king's treasury, that that person would receive 10 lashes. Well, the theft continued, and so he issued another decree. When it's discovered who's stealing from the king's treasury, it'll be 20 lashes.

43:01 Theft continued, 30 lashes, until finally the king issued a final decree. And he said, when it's discovered who's stealing from the king's treasury, it will be a sentence of 40 lashes. Now, the problem with that was that 40 lashes was a death sentence. And so the theft continued until eventually it was discovered that none other than the king's daughter was the one who was stealing from the treasury. So then a question began to ripple through the kingdom. What would the king do? Some thought he would forgive her, but then how would he be just? Some thought that he would issue the sentence, but then how would he be loving?

43:42 Well, it was decided. The king sat down and decided, you know what? The sentence is just. The punishment must fall. And so the decree stands. And so one day the entire kingdom was gathered. And in front of everybody, the king's own daughter was marched up to the podium in front of the entire kingdom. And she was bent over the podium. And the back of her shirt was ripped open. And the executioner stood there and he began to raise his whip to land the first slash. And as soon as he did, the king yelled, stop. And there was a silence that fell.

44:19 that fell. And the king strode forward and he took off his own shirt and he bent over and he wrapped his body around his own daughter and looked back up over his shoulder and he said, Now hit her. And the executioner objected and he said, But king, those lashes, they'll fall on you. And he said, the sentence must stand. It's just hit her. And so 40 lashes fell on the body of the king that protected the body of his daughter, and the king died in the stead of his daughter.

44:55 And what happened, Sean, in that story is the king was both just because payment for the sin had to be made, and the king was the justifier of the ungodly. She went free because he took the penalty. See, the reason Jesus had to die on the cross is because God is just. And so payment for sin has to be made. Like if somebody walked into a courtroom and a judge just went, you know what, man, you raped that girl when she was young, but you're real sorry. And I have the power to do it. You're forgiven. Nobody would think that was a just judge. So penalty for sin had to be made, but God is love.

45:40 So he made the payment himself. That's what the Bible means when it says, for the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. So it's a substitutionary sacrifice. In my place, condemned he stood. Wow. It's a great explanation. Does it make sense? Makes perfect sense. That's a good story. That is, I had never heard that analogy before. What was so remarkable is that he did that off the cuff. Yeah. I mean, he, no notes, just this is how this is how I understand it. And I looked out across our both services were packed this Sunday.

46:23 It was just to the rafters. And I was looking out. I was watching people's response during the story. You could have heard a pin drop by the time he got to the punchline and the king died. And literally, there were people weeping all over the worship center in both services. I was blown away. Of course, when I saw them crying, well, man, it's like. Did you tell the story? Did you play the clip? No, I played the clip. I played the clip. Okay. I played the video clips. So they got to see the dynamic there. And man, it landed strong. And of course, I just used that as a leaping off point to share the good news of Jesus Christ, the message, the gospel.

47:05 And hands everywhere. And I called for two things: to be reborn for the first time and to re-up. Re-up. Re-up. It's a military ceremony when guys will re-up their time. I went to many of those ceremonies in Abilene at Dyes Air Force Base, re-up ceremonies where they would re-up their time. And so I said, You can either re-up or you'd be reborn. Who am I talking to? Let me see your hand. Don't be ashamed, man. Hands is everywhere. I'll bet. It was so powerful. And what I'm seeing is that because as the world grows darker, the light shines brighter.

47:45 And there's a biblical scripture for that. It says, where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more. So the darker the sin gets in the world, the darker the world gets, the brighter grace shines. Yes. The good news. And so people are hungry right now. I've never, in my entire four decades of doing this, I've never seen more spiritual hunger than I'm seeing right now. So when I see stuff that's dumpster fire, you know, worthy in news feeds and stuff, I'm just going, all this is doing, even though it's hair on fire and craziness, people are saying, I need something bigger than me now. Everybody's tried everything. None of it works. That's why Jesus is trending. That's what I keep telling you.

48:29 Wild. And yet it's the most persecuted people group along with the Jews. Well, Jewish people. I mean, it's crazy. So let's just look at what's happening in culture. And I love that example that Josh Howardon gave of a courtroom today, because this question was almost literally posed to Francis Gill. Can I give the scripture for this? Please. There's actually a scripture that says that. It's actually Romans 3.26. It says, it was to show, this is the scripture, it was to show his righteousness at the present time, Christ's righteousness, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith.

49:14 faith in him. So the one who has faith in Christ is the one whom Christ wraps his body around and takes the blows, takes the punishment. That's good. So I just wanted to land that before you segue. That's good because there's some darkness out there. And I want to put it into context, but just because that clip ended with that courtroom scenario, this is one of the winners of the primaries for the Democratic Party. As you know, there's been a lot of Democrat socialists of America, or whether they're card-carrying or not,

49:54 so extremely liberal left that the mainstream Democrat Party is kind of in disarray because of what they're saying. And this is, and this, I think, was on the NBC. Listen to this. Right. There are plenty of people who point to some very controversial positions that DSA takes. Let's talk about some of them. Your policy agenda on law enforcement is to defund police, ultimately to get rid of police departments, correct? Well, what I would say is that we're dramatically overspending on police right now. I understand, but the goal is to defund the police department so we don't need them in the future. I think it's what we really want to see is a horizon where folks are not reliant on armed enforcement to meet our public safety needs.

50:37 Right. But it says defund police on a website. That's your goal. And also to get rid of prisons and jails, correct? Yes. So if my daughter is assaulted and raped, is there any agency that would seek to find her assailant and bring him to justice? Of course. Yeah, of course. Where would it be if not police, and where would he be if not a jail? So I guess I really want to avoid getting kind of caught into these hypotheticals and talk more about the reality that we're actually facing right now, which is that we're spending absolutely outrageous amounts of money on police and policing, and we're not spending money on things that actually make people safe and feel safe, which is things like actually

51:21 well-lit streets, the streetlights in Los Angeles. Everybody agrees it's a huge problem. Things like mental health care and substance use, substance use treatment. So things that drive people to commit crimes and to that make our society less safe. We're not doing anything about the root causes. And instead, we're funneling money into the police. So what you're hearing here is actually populism to an incredible degree. And I looked up all the numbers. When you have a primary, it's interesting how few people actually come out to vote in a primary.

52:01 But the way that it's played on mainly Instagram and X is, oh my God, another socialist one. And sometimes I'm like, did anyone get civics in high school? Did anybody learn anything? And it's so easy just to get sucked into, oh, wow, they're taking over. It's all happening. They're winning. Well, these are primaries. And I think the same woman here, Gil, I think she actually was asked a question about who was really voting for them in the private. She didn't, it wasn't asked that way, but it kind of got answered that way. Have a listen. Abdul al-Syed's victory. This is the guy that everyone's talking about

52:46 in Michigan, who is well-educated. I think he's even a Rhodes scholar, which used to sound like a really good thing, but when you see who the Rhodes Scholars really were, you're like, okay, I'm not sure. I'm not sure I like him. But he's got a real big mouth. He's really mouthing off. Now, he's still, he's only a candidate. He hasn't won anything. He's not the senator yet. This has to be an actual election. But when you hear who did and who didn't vote for him in the primary of Democrats, it's only Democrats voting for these people. It gets interesting. Abdul al-Syed's victory in the Democratic primary in the Senate in Michigan. Of the 15 counties where a majority do not have a college degree, he lost every one of them, over 15.

53:32 In the counties with high education, like you, he won. So how can you say you're for the working class when working class counties in Detroit and voted against your candidate? I think what we're seeing is that people who are highly educated in this country were promised this path of economic success. If you go to college, if you get the degree, if you go down that path, you're going to be guaranteed economic success. But really what we're seeing is that there's this huge downward mobility problem where people are putting in the money, taking out hundreds of thousands thousands of dollars. of dollars of student loans. You know, I have a half a million dollars in student loan debt personally

54:15 and not seeing that translate into actual economic success because our society, the scales are so tipped in one direction to benefit the rich and the wealthy. So, this is what I mean by populism. It's absolute, she's right. There's an entire generation that was told, you go to school, you take out the loans, which just it's a whole lot. You're going to get the big job. You're going to get the big job. And unfortunately, two things happen. One, the debt that was created because they're government-backed loans, which is just an amazing mistake on behalf on government's behalf. The other one is that the degrees they got would have been useless in any time.

54:59 So, you know, gender studies, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And I saw it with their own girls. They got into these woke universities and it's like, no, not necessarily really a useful degree that you have there. So they're not really concerned about anybody than themselves. And I'm not saying that it sucks because it does. They really got gypped, if I can just use that word. But at the same time, there's 7 million jobs available to people who don't even, you don't need to have a degree. And these are jobs that will pay up to $175,000, $200,000. You don't know how to turn a wrench.

55:42 If you're willing to learn how to turn a wrench, there is so much. And that's the real message. I'm sorry, but we have to, hey, I might have to go learn how to turn a wrench, you know, but the jobs. The jobs are there. And all of these Democrat socialists of America, yeah, you can motivate highly educated people through online campaigns to come in and vote for someone in a primary because the turnout is incredibly low, really low. And it's mainly highly educated white girls, to be fair about it, who are voting these candidates in for their party.

56:22 I do not think that in a general election, if people actually go out and vote, which we have to do, I don't think they stand a chance at all. And they really only care about everything against Trump. That's their entire platform. It's abolish ICE, abolish the Senate. Seriously, which is laughable, abolish or defund the police, get rid of jails. Open the borders again. Literally open the borders under the guise of protect our communities.

56:59 These people cannot be taken seriously. But we have to be careful because I already see it like a defeatist attitude. And that's just people misunderstanding or misrecognizing that they didn't win anything. Yeah, they won a primary. That's a good point, Adam, because I heard Jack Hibbs say, you know, only 23% in California now identify as Republican. I don't know where he got that. Was it Republican or Christian? I thought he said Christian. I think it was Christian. So he said basically, so it's over for us. I mean, he literally had a complete fatalistic statement, which I absolutely disagree with.

57:41 I mean, I'm like, even Annette was like, man, he's just robbing people. He's basically telling them it doesn't do you any good to go vote. Right. Man, that stuff gets all over me real quick. And I've liked Jack Hibbs from a distance and all this. But man, just this alarmist, defeatist, fatalistic thinking, that's not even the core of Christianity where it's all about hope. Faith, hope, and love. These three remain greatest is love. But faith and hope, man, you don't have love without faith and hope. They all work together. And pray, vote, and multiply. Absolutely. Get busy. Get busy, young man. So to kind of wrap this up, there's a study came out of Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

58:26 And it plays into this. Let me see where it is here. The study was called Thinking, Fast, Slow, and Artificial. And the researchers, they took over a thousand people and they asked some people to solve certain questions without an AI chatbot, some to use only an AI chatbot, and some to use, you know, to just refer to it if they felt like it was necessary. Well, you'd be amazed at the people who just kind of referred to it once in a while didn't do so well. well. And the reason is something they call cognitive surrender.

59:10 And I actually heard about the survey on a pastor's podcast. I forget what it was. I'll have to look that up. And he was talking about pastors doing their sermons with AI. And the big problem is that when people are using chatbots, robots, AI, whatever you want to call it, when the AI is wrong, people still follow their advice 80% of the time. And so if you don't know what the outcome is, a chat bot, if you don't know what the answer is supposed to be, a chatbot is not going to be your friend. Agreed. So this happened last night in reverse with me. Tina's scrolling Instagram.

59:52 She says, oh my, the owner of Royal Blue Grocers was killed. Now, Royal Blue Grocers is very famous in Austin. This small little grocery stores. If you're an Austinite, you love them. Neighborhood groceries. Neighborhood, but they're very, very famous. I'm like, oh, wow. So I go look. I can't find anything on regular searches. I go to Gemini and I say, okay, here's what's going on. No, this is an online hoax. And I'm saying to Tina, it's like, I mean, where are you getting this? She says, it's on Instagram.

1:00:29 Well, of course, I'm always like, okay. Right, right. But then she says, go take a look. And there it is, the official Royal Blue Grocer's Instagram account. He was, now it didn't say killed. This was a little interesting thing. He died suddenly and, oh, gosh, I should have written it down. Suddenly and like a real quick, sudden goodness. I should. Yeah, that's different than being killed. No, well, and that's just easy to misread, you know? That's true. So I'm not blaming Tina for it. Let me just, I want to make sure. Here it is.

1:01:09 Here it is. George Scariano Jr., father, husband, son, brother, and friend died suddenly and tragically on Thursday, August 6th. So I understand where she might have in her brain said killed, you know, depending on whatever she just read before. So that's okay. But I go to Gemini, I say, no, this happened. No, it didn't, because that would be in the news. I say, yeah, but I'm seeing it on the Instagram post that is from the grocery. And so I give it the link. It says, well, that link doesn't mean anything to me. I said, I take a screenshot. And the screenshot, and it says, well, that's just a screenshot. You've been hoaxed. That's an online thing. Gemini's arguing. Yes, I went through. I said, you are so

1:01:50 convinced. You're so sure of yourself because, you know, a community leader like this, then I'm starting to think this probably was a suicide because they also had, you know, please give money to the mental health department of some hospital. And so then I say to the robot, we'll have you consider this. Then all of a sudden it goes, you're right. I'm completely. So the point is, I fought with it just to fight with it. I believe what Tina was saying. You're just pushing to see how far this will go. And it took me eight, nine turns with this thing to get it there. So it's you like Gemini. That's been, I mean, it's one you've kind of like.

1:02:33 But I knew the outcome had to be something closer to the truth. So I didn't give into cognitive surrender. Good. But when you give into cognitive surrender, this is where you start to lose the plot. And I believe that this is starting to seep into our brains with all kinds of news. Totally agree. And the most recent one is, well, McKinney, Texas, they approved the mosque. I looked that up on Grok. What did you get from Grok? Grok said it went into the Muslim Brotherhood 100-year America plan. What? And that they're 50 years into their plan, according to sources. What about the mosque approval?

1:03:18 Right. And on that one, they said the mosque was not, only the site work was approved. The mosque, actually, that's another big thing. But people showed up in hordes protesting that. But that's not even the mosque approval. It's just the site work for the mosque, potentially. I brought a clip. We'll knew overnight a step forward for the proposed mosque in McKinney. The city council voted just before midnight to approve a site plan for that mosque. And Travis Hahaki joins us live from McKinney. Trevor, people who live there kind of split on the issue. More than 100 people gave public comment both for and against. Yeah, that's right, Madison. This vote on the mosque came. came after more than five and a half hours of public comment.

1:04:03 But in the end, all seven city council members voted unanimously to approve the site plan. This motion carries. My vote is 7 in favor. Now, city council told residents the vote was procedural, saying they were just voting on whether the site plan fits the city's ordinances. The proposed property would sit near Virginia Parkway and Crutcher Crossing. The McKinney Islamic Association says it wants to build a dedicated prayer area, gym, classrooms, cafeteria, and a community space. The group wants to develop the new property to accommodate the growing community. So you're absolutely right. But this is the part that no one really, except us, I guess, took the time.

1:04:43 It's taught me well. Took the time to look up. So in 2024, the McKinney Islamic Society, I think they're called, came up with a plan, and it was a 40,000 square feet building. And no, that's not zoned for that. So no. They came back. Now it's, you know, it's 15,000 and broken up into smaller. That's what they're doing. They're fitting into the requirements. Right. Into the zoning requirement. Which was not, the zoning requirement was not even done by the city council. It was the previous city council. Right. So this is not a mosque that has been approved and we all have to have our hair on fire.

1:05:25 There's plenty of opportunity for this not to take place. But if you want to make a change in your community, you got to get on the zoning committee. You got to get on the zoning board. You can't just go to the meeting and complain. Or go on to IG and start typing out your fit. And that McKinney approved it. We're lost. Texas is lost. So here, can I ask you a question? Because you and I have gone around around about this. And is there a level? Yes, we know it's dumpster fire stuff, hair on fire stuff. It's fear-mongering. You know, we're being taken over by Islam. They're working the plan.

1:06:04 This plan's working. Is there a level or a place, and where is that, where we should start to say, we need to get busy. We need to do something. Is there a point where we say, yeah, is this mirroring Europe? But we're 30 years behind, 50 years behind. Well, this is what we talked about on the last show. Yes, the time is now. It has been time, but not to sit around screaming on Instagram. Okay, I agree with that. So what do we do? Get into city council. Get into that's what happened. What happened is in Europe, they just let it go. And then people started running for office. And then, oh, now these people here don't represent my interest in the community I'm also a part of.

1:06:49 That's it. So are we seeing that the beginnings of that? I mean, with Mom Dami in New York and now, you know, others that have been elected, I forget what the number is of how many Muslims are now sitting in places of authority and leadership in various communities across the United States, especially as of the last general election. So there seems to be movement. Yes, absolutely. Momentum. Absolutely. So I had dinner with a lobbyist friend of ours. I'm not going to say his name. I know who it is. Yeah. And I just asked straight up questions about that very thing. And he said, here's the thing. I disagree with the premise that it starts at the local level.

1:07:31 He said, if we do not deal with the federal level, state and federal, he said federal. He didn't even say state. He said, if we don't deal with it there, the trickle-down effect is a community like McKinney, even though they are their own county, their own state, they're still under federal jurisdiction in terms of various laws and whatnot. So they can't just shut out or ignore the First Amendment because that's very interpretive, as you know. And I said, so then what do we do? If it's not getting involved in the local level, what do we do? And he told me three things that scared the snot out of me. I don't know. See, I disagree.

1:08:12 I don't think the mosques are the issue. That's why I brought this up. I want you to talk about this because I too have adopted. I can't maybe impact Washington. I can't run for, you know, what about here? But what do people want to do? You want to outlaw Scientology? You want to outlaw, you know, look, if you have someone speaking, which is a problem, you know, speaking seditious language against the United States, guess what? That's protected under the First Amendment. Right. Just like you're protected in your pulpit. Right. But who is controlling our local community? Who controls whether whatever kind of building is built?

1:08:54 Right. I wouldn't necessarily want a county. Wouldn't want a Scientology headquarters here either. It's local and county commissions. You know, what I hear is this, and I think it's a cop-out. I felt fatalistic when he said it. It's a cop-out. It's to go say, well, we got to have a law against Islam. Declare it not a religion. A good luck. Right. Good luck. Yeah, you're fighting the Constitution. But I saw this happen for 25 years. That's why I think we have a long way to go before we're in trouble. However, if we see that train coming, if it's like, you know, the title of Eric Clapton, slow train coming, start now. Then we need to do something now. And I think what people would like to know, what do we do?

1:09:37 Well, you're doing it. When the Texas School Board Commission wanted to know, okay, what goes into the curriculum? Judah and Annette and other people from our community went to the state level. No. No, we want this. We don't want that. And I believe we were successful. It did. And what they wanted was no Ten Commandments, Quran, other things. No Bible stories to teach literature. That is how it's done. So I appreciate the lobbyist. From now on, I'm just going to be known as the Hill Country. The lobbyist. The lobbyist. If he's listening, you'll be laughing right now. And that's fine. No, it is.

1:10:19 But I just really don't agree. If you don't want that stuff, don't go on your text group or Instagram like, oh, no. You need to get off your blessed estate. Thank you, brother. I was going to say it if you didn't. And you've got to do something. You know, we, as a church, we wanted to get leadership here in Fredericksburg that we agreed with, who agreed with our principles, our ideas of what our community values should be about. Thought that the other candidate might not represent those entirely. So we went to town.

1:10:57 That's what it is. Don't think that the DSA and the DSA are the ones who, you know, it's always the left and the left who will go with these types of groups, like political Islamists. It's documented. This is exactly what happened in Amsterdam, in Rotterdam, in London, in the Netherlands, because that's really what had the most experience in the Netherlands nationally. Now, they have a parliamentary system, which has other problems. So we're not exactly in the same boat. And we have regular elections.

1:11:36 So, you know, New York, it's going to be up to New York. It is. If New York is real happy, if everyone's really grooving in a couple of years when it's time for the mayoral election, I think it's six years, you know, you can also impeach somebody. But if they're still really happy and it's moving and grooving, which I doubt, then they'll keep going that way. But this is America. We have fought for our freedom and for what we believe and for our values. We fought for that. We'll just fight for it again. Exactly. And that's it. So I'm not, I think it's a cop-out to say it has to be changed at the federal level. I see, oh, Abbott, how come you're not fixing it? Ken Paxson, where are you now?

1:12:18 And this, you know, it's like, stop panging on the keyboard. Get up and organize and do something. And I truly, I've seen it. I think our pastors, our priests, our rabbis, you know, whoever it is, they organize people. If you can get 700 people, 800 people on a Sunday to come listen to you, then you can organize them to at least prayerfully vote for who they want to, which we did. Which we did. Or stand to vote. And we all know now that you have the right to be political too, which was a scam of epic proportion with the Johnson amendment.

1:13:00 Which set us back decades, decades. So I get really fired up about that. I'm glad I did that on purpose, you know. No, it's good. I poured gasoline on the fire because I too am beating the drum of I may not be able to impact. Long game, I can. Short game, I can't impact Washington, but I can impact Fredericksburg, Texas. Yes. But what does the lobbyist say? What do we have to do at the federal level? What? What is like outlawing? He literally said, I don't know. We got to elect the right people in. And I'm going to go on, but at the federal level, we have very limited impact on who's elected at that level. I mean, we can go out. We'll continue to vote. But what can an elected person do? What can a lawmaker do?

1:13:43 They have to represent us. Right. But we have a very clear constitution. Yes. So just because you can't make laws against what people believe and what they're thinking doesn't mean you can't make laws about what building is placed somewhere. You can make laws about that. You can have dress code laws if you want. I mean, you know, you make you can outlaw dancing. Hello, Footloose. I mean, you can literally do whatever you do, but you can't curtail freedom of speech or freedom of religion. So instead of like this crazy, stupid, we've got to outlaw Islam.

1:14:23 Tell them it's not a religion. Good luck. Yeah, that's not going to happen. Pastafarians everywhere. You know, it's not going to happen, bro. It's not going to happen. No. So, but you can do all these things. But we also don't need to show up in meetings with pitchforks. No. Wrong, exactly. Flamethrowers because we're mad. No, because we're mad at ourselves for not doing it earlier. Exactly. But also, it leaks over into very much ungodliness. Thank you. As a follower of Jesus, I have a responsibility to say yes to obedience and no to impulse. And a lot of this is what we're talking about: impulse, control, lack of.

1:15:00 And so we get upset, we get outraged. We see a video, a clip, a 12-second clip or a headline: alert, alert, breaking news, you know, and we just go into this, we just forget who we are, who we say we are, and we start acting like something we're not. And I see that. And yet we think we're doing it in the name of righteousness and God. And when that's dangerous, exactly. What scripture can we apply to this? Because that is exactly, we're doing the opposite. Well, it's any of the wisdom scriptures. We're to act and walk in the wisdom. We've been given the mind of Christ. He says, you've not been given a spirit of fear.

1:15:43 Because this is what these things are. They're fear-driven, right? Yes. So Timothy 1:7, you've not been given a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind, the ability to think well. There's your scripture. Because what's happening, people are getting to the first gate, which is fear, and they don't get past that to power, love, and a sound mind, the ability to think well. Man, we got to keep running through that scripture and get to the end. It's one thing to have a reaction, a visceral reaction, because, man, that's what these are designed to do, right? These news feeds. They're vying for your attention. It's all about your attention. It's gaslighting. It's totally that. But you've got to get past that too.

1:16:24 Wait a minute. No, no, no. I refuse to walk in fear. I refuse to toss it. I refuse to say, I don't know. There's nothing we can do. That's as un-American as it gets. I'm with you on that. I think that there's nothing we can do. Man, just tell our founding fathers that who gave their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor for this. So anyway, I'm with you on that. I'm stirred up about it as well. So instead of running around with pitchforks and torches, let's get strategic. Let's think well. Let's calm down so we can think well because you cannot make good decisions when you're in a cortisol dump. No. No, I get a little fired up too. Let's

1:17:10 land this. Yeah, we asked. It's turned into no agenda here. Three hours. With Jesus. So we do have an agenda. We've got a Jesus agenda. Yep, we do. Gotcha. We asked people to come up with names for people who listen and write in and comment and are part of our We Get To Do This audience. I'm going to run through a couple because we got quite a few. That's good. We got Paul Frogdenhill said doers, and he referred to James 1:22. Don't just listen to God's word. You must do what it says. Otherwise, you are only fooling yourselves.

1:17:53 Todd Allen came up with a whole bunch of them. I'm just going to list them. I mean, I don't agree with all of them, but Crusaders, Saints, Stewards, Apprentice, Companions, Guardians, Vanguard, maybe. Our own Wendy, Wendy Winstead. She said the get-to crew, which I kind of like the get-to crew. And she also said, maybe we should just be leaky buckets. I love how you're thinking, Wendy. We see this one. I don't know who sent this. Faith Weavers, Weavers, the Faithful, Testifiers. Michael Anastasio, who donated again today. We'll get to that. He said

1:18:35 devotees. I don't know about devotees. Casey Van Hiel, doers. we get to doers or do gooders. We get we need changing the name of our podcast. We could also get we get to do bags. That's pretty funny. I know where that's coming from. I like that we get to lyrics. The do bags. That's pretty funny. Another one for doers from Carl Markley. Several people came up with doers. So I don't know. I think it's still up in the air. What did you have before we started at the beginning? I'm leaning towards Get To Nation.

1:19:19 Get to Nation. Get to, like, get Mo. Yeah, yeah. Get Get Too. It's got a vibe. It's got a rhyme. It's got a flow. I like the idea of nation because I mean, you know, I'm one of those Christian nationalists. So, you know, I like the name. So I'm not averse to this at all. But I'm leaning that way. But let's, man, I love hearing these. I appreciate people putting some moment into this. People love doing these things. That's cool. Now, I want to thank some people who supported us. We are value for value. And that means whatever value you get from the show, we just love it if you send that back to us.

1:29:12 Star Wars? Yes. Yes. That's what it was. Did we talk about that? I don't think so. I think you said, hey, bring this next week so we can talk about it. Talk about it. And I failed. We received it and we'll make good arms. You're very cool. Yeah. So, yeah, we have a P.O. box. You can find everything at wgtdt.com. Wow, brother, I love doing this. This is so much. I've been looking forward to this. Me, too. And man, I love that you got fired up today. That was fun. Well, you know the trigger. You know exactly. You did that on purpose. I did it. Yes, I did. I punched the button. You want to close us out? Yeah, yeah. Father, thank you for this time. I pray that what we say and do here is pleasing to you.

1:29:55 That's our heart. Yes. And, Father, for all of our friends, thank you so much for those that have been donating and giving their time, talent, and treasure, Lord, towards this. Our heart is to bring something that's fresh, something that's life-giving, that giving, like the scripture says, that we're to let our light so shine before others that they may see the good and glorify our Father in heaven. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. And we will be back next week because we get to do this. Join us then. Goodbye, everybody. This is the life we've been blessed with. This is a gift we get to do this. This is a chance we dare not miss.

1:30:40 This is the life we get to do this.