[SPEAKER_02]: Welcome to the Way Community Church Podcast.
[SPEAKER_02]: Our mission is to show people the way to life with Jesus.
[SPEAKER_02]: My name is Darahal and I am the pastor of the Way Community Church.
[SPEAKER_02]: If you would like to join us as a member or of you simply need prayer,
[SPEAKER_02]: or if you want to worship through giving, you can find the links and the transcription of this podcast.
[SPEAKER_02]: Today, we're continuing our conversation on what are we stand as we explore the beliefs of the way community church.
[SPEAKER_02]: As a young church, we've done our own theological work and we want to express that work through simple statements on key cultural issues.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so today we'll discuss where we stand on politics.
[SPEAKER_02]: You can follow along in the transcript of this podcast.
[SPEAKER_02]: I want to encourage you to grab your Bibles, the studying hours, we're together.
[SPEAKER_02]: Now, it's our custom here the way to start our messages with the Bible or reading a biblical passage, but this series is a little different than normal.
[SPEAKER_02]: And what I will do in this series is,
[SPEAKER_02]: display for you how to build a solid theological framework for whatever subject matter you're trying to figure out where you stand or what that means is we'll consider a multitude of passages throughout today's message that will help us follow a 3-ed so to speak through scripture to get a clear point of view.
[SPEAKER_02]: of what the Bible is saying about this subject.
[SPEAKER_02]: So today I'm going to talk about where do we stand on politics.
[SPEAKER_02]: Now, if you're on this side of the room, I want you to look across the aisle at everybody on this side of the room.
[SPEAKER_02]: If you're on this side of the room, look back at them.
[SPEAKER_02]: I want you to get a good look at them.
[SPEAKER_02]: You got a good look.
[SPEAKER_02]: Now, imagine I took a rope and dropped it in the center aisle,
[SPEAKER_02]: and whichever side wins gets to evenly split a billion dollars.
[SPEAKER_02]: Look at them again.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: Uh-huh.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: So Jackie not even blinking right now.
[SPEAKER_02]: All that north in her just came out, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: All that New York just came out.
[SPEAKER_02]: If you go a few seats back, we got two sisters right beside each other.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, yeah, you remember when we was kids who used to win, took a war?
[SPEAKER_02]: Right?
[SPEAKER_02]: My hope is whoever win was split it with the other one, who loses.
[SPEAKER_02]: But the truth is, you're like, y'all know Tunisia, I don't know.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm gonna pay my tires with all of us splendid with my soul.
[SPEAKER_02]: The truth is, this aisle that for us becomes a picture of the tug of war between two sides is a true picture of what is light politically in this nation.
[SPEAKER_02]: But it's not just the politics of the nation between red and blue that pulls back and forth.
[SPEAKER_02]: It is the conflict within the soul of the believer.
[SPEAKER_02]: who lives with a dual citizenship that I am both American and a kingdom citizen and the true poll is in my soul at the level of my values and the question is which side is going to end?
[SPEAKER_02]: Because as I learn and walk in the way that Jesus walk and show people the way to life with Jesus, what I start to realize is that the kingdom values are upside down compared to the world's values.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then I have a value based tug of war at my soul, which side is going in.
[SPEAKER_02]: And the truth is Christians for all ages have dealt with this same tension.
[SPEAKER_02]: We're not the first in the 21st century to deal with the tension between my dual citizenship.
[SPEAKER_02]: My heavenly bound citizenship with my earth bound citizenship.
[SPEAKER_02]: that are in conflict against each other.
[SPEAKER_02]: The Bible is full of believers who lived in real countries that had real political situations, but who in that environment wanted to live above the frame as it were, and to live out the ideals that were on our guard and on our their covenant with God.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so that internal conflict doesn't just challenge us as individual believers, it also challenges our ability to be in community with other believers.
[SPEAKER_02]: If the last eight to 12 years have taught us nothing, it has revealed that people who would have otherwise both called themselves Christian now look at each other suspiciously because you said on the opposite side of the outing me.
[SPEAKER_02]: And we start to question how you could even be saved and sit on the other side.
[SPEAKER_02]: Am I telling the truth?
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's not just an internal conflict with believers.
[SPEAKER_02]: There's communal conflict within congregations.
[SPEAKER_02]: There's communal conflict within the kingdom.
[SPEAKER_02]: One church stands for this political party, another church stands for this one.
[SPEAKER_02]: And two churches who call on the name of Jesus,
[SPEAKER_02]: still subdivided along a long party lines.
[SPEAKER_02]: The conflict is not something that the Holy Spirit is afraid of.
[SPEAKER_02]: Holy Spirit won't all the smoke, because what conflict gives the Holy Spirit a chance to do is to end the wake of that conflict, bring about something great and beautiful through the kingdom.
[SPEAKER_02]: For example, in the Book of Acts,
[SPEAKER_02]: It was persecution politically primarily that pushed the church out on Jerusalem and ultimately gave the Holy Spirit the opportunity in the midst of that persecution to replicate the church to the ends of the earth.
[SPEAKER_02]: So we shouldn't be afraid that the church won't survive but we should be sober about the fact that we live in a crucial moment where how we handled it could influence what happens to another believer.
[SPEAKER_02]: So, the Holy Spirit is not scared of the smoke, and as Christians, we shouldn't be scared of a conflict that conflict should make us have a conversation.
[SPEAKER_02]: Let the church say conversation.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so, that's what we're doing.
[SPEAKER_02]: We're having a conversation in the semblitude of church leaders of yesterday year, who because of theological and political conflict, we have these church councils.
[SPEAKER_02]: And there are seven church councils that help to shape the beliefs of the church throughout the centuries on where the church stood as a result of certain disagreements or conflicts.
[SPEAKER_02]: within the church with them belief systems or even politically.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so here at the way community church, we've adopted that same mechanism of having a council to have a conversation about cultural issues that could cause conflict.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm going to say it again.
[SPEAKER_02]: Here at the way, we've adopted that same approach to creating a council.
[SPEAKER_02]: to have a conversation about cultural issues that could cause conflict.
[SPEAKER_02]: So for the last two years, eight of us have been approved by Board of Directors to come aside and have crucial conversations around six cultural issues and politics is one of those issues.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so here again are the demographics of the committee to help to shape my message today.
[SPEAKER_02]: It was made up of eight people.
[SPEAKER_02]: four male, four female, of the eight people.
[SPEAKER_02]: We had at least one person in their 20s, two in their 30s, one in their 40s, two in their 50s, one in their 60s, one in their 70s.
[SPEAKER_02]: Which means it was intergenerational.
[SPEAKER_02]: It was intergender.
[SPEAKER_02]: Then we had three of the eight with posts, grass, seminary degrees, and all eight were Tito of CC Gangang for real, certified wayfines.
[SPEAKER_02]: And the aid of us came together to say language around where do we stand on certain issues.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so I started a few weeks ago having a conversation about where do we stand on gifts of the spirit?
[SPEAKER_02]: right?
[SPEAKER_02]: We are non-denominational church on purpose.
[SPEAKER_02]: That means we're not attached to any denominational heritage, which means we didn't pick aside.
[SPEAKER_02]: We didn't pick the side that loved the Holy Spirit a little too much to the point that they manipulate the Holy Spirit and we didn't pick the side that scared the Holy Spirit and now we'll none of them know ghosts, even if it's a holy one.
[SPEAKER_02]: So we embraced the gift of the Spirit.
[SPEAKER_02]: Last week we had a conversation about women in leadership and where do we stand on women in leadership.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so in the similar tool of those two conversations today, I want to have a conversation about when we stand on politics.
[SPEAKER_02]: Here's the first thing.
[SPEAKER_02]: Number one, here is one position on politics.
[SPEAKER_02]: Here is the way community churches official, one position.
[SPEAKER_02]: on politics.
[SPEAKER_02]: If you want to, you can read it with me on the count of three.
[SPEAKER_02]: One, two, three.
[SPEAKER_02]: We believe that Jesus is sovereign over any ruler, authority, power, leader, or anything else.
[SPEAKER_02]: Not only in this world, but also in the world to come.
[SPEAKER_02]: God established order to reflect His desires for creation.
[SPEAKER_02]: Governmental authority comes from God and is accountable to Him for the good of all people.
[SPEAKER_02]: Therefore, we are responsible to use our freedom to support God's agenda.
[SPEAKER_02]: Christians ought to be righteous citizens who respect authority.
[SPEAKER_02]: truth to power and the neighbors as themselves.
[SPEAKER_02]: We are to pray for our community, state, nation, and world and all those in.
[SPEAKER_02]: If you like it, let me see.
[SPEAKER_02]: If you like, let's see how this
[SPEAKER_02]: So in this conversation about politics, like the other two and the ones to come, it is not my goal as your pastor to tell you the answer.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's my goal as your pastor to display for you, how to build a solid theological framework about any subject.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so if we want to know what the Lord thinks about government or what the Bible says about government, we have to start with the law of the first mention.
[SPEAKER_02]: The law first mentioned is the first time in the Bible, any concept we are studying is mentioned in Scripture.
[SPEAKER_02]: And we take from that real cues and real data about that experience and that begins the thread of that subject matter through Scripture.
[SPEAKER_02]: So when we look at the law of first mention of government, we see God's design for government.
[SPEAKER_02]: The first time the cognitive self of government was mentioned in Scripture
[SPEAKER_02]: Now, before we read the two verses, I'm going to run back through chapter 1 through 8 real quick.
[SPEAKER_02]: In the beginning, God created heaven and earth, chapter 1.
[SPEAKER_02]: God made man and woman in his image to be vice-regions over all the cosmos, chapter 2.
[SPEAKER_02]: chapter three, the man that won the sin, because of the temptation of Satan, God gives a consequence to the serpent, the man in the woman, because of their part in the fall, and the effects of the fall start to take a room almost immediately, chapter four.
[SPEAKER_02]: There are four people on earth, and one of them killed the other one, and God shocked when God was like, where is your brother?
[SPEAKER_02]: One man killed 25% of the earth's population, and was a Paul that God will ask him about it.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like, we not gonna realize one of y'all missing.
[SPEAKER_02]: And from there, it was a downward, ethical, and moral spiral.
[SPEAKER_02]: He got so dark, so soon that by chapter six, God regretted that he even made humans,
[SPEAKER_02]: So God thought in God's holiness, I am going to render judgment because they've used the one gift I gave them to rebel against me.
[SPEAKER_02]: What gift is that?
[SPEAKER_02]: Free will.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'll make you in my image and improve that I'm aging in my image.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm going to give you free wheel.
[SPEAKER_02]: You have a sovereign choice.
[SPEAKER_02]: You have agency.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's my gift to you.
[SPEAKER_02]: And how you use that agency determines if you are mine or not mine.
[SPEAKER_02]: And everybody on earth was using their agency in an ungodly, unmore, unmore, unethical way.
[SPEAKER_02]: Even though there was no organized religion,
[SPEAKER_02]: All right, so, God says, you know what?
[SPEAKER_02]: And my holiness, I'm a judge this, but in my mercy, I have found one man who finds favor with me.
[SPEAKER_02]: And if I started first with two, I can restart for real with eight.
[SPEAKER_02]: So he took a man, know what his wife, their three sons, their three, their wives, and then subsets of the animal kingdom.
[SPEAKER_02]: We all know the story of Norse art, but it's not the cute one that's in your children's first Bible.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's an ugly one.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's a ugly one of damnation and judgment that Noah survived by the skin of his teeth and was so depressed after that harrowing experience that as soon as he got off the boat, he got a draw.
[SPEAKER_02]: Noah was so stressed out he planted a garden, the fruit grew from the garden and Noah got he got a draw.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, he was a recipient of Mercy.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, he please God, but he was a human being.
[SPEAKER_02]: And it's possible that he was, he was pushed beyond the limits of his capacity.
[SPEAKER_02]: To hear these people beating on the side of the ark, screaming as rang toward from the sky and water burst up from the deep.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then all these screams at once went to a scary silence.
[SPEAKER_02]: And it was so silent, for so long,
[SPEAKER_02]: that he wondered what was happening outside.
[SPEAKER_02]: He finally gets outside and realizes it all starts over with him.
[SPEAKER_02]: The chapter after that or right after the art lands and they walk out on dry land, God gives the first mentioning of government or the spirit of what government should represent.
[SPEAKER_02]: Look at Genesis chapter nine verse five through six.
[SPEAKER_02]: The word of the Lord says, this is God speaking, I certainly will require your life blood.
[SPEAKER_02]: From every animal, I will require it and from every person from every man as his brother, I will require the life of a person for some of six.
[SPEAKER_02]: whoever shares him in blood by man, his blood shall be shed.
[SPEAKER_02]: For in the image of God, he may mankind now.
[SPEAKER_02]: I know you're smart, liar, I only see government and nowhere in those two verses.
[SPEAKER_02]: Too shate, but you see the spirit of what government represents, and that is justice, let the church say justice.
[SPEAKER_02]: What God is saying is he read those, this human project.
[SPEAKER_02]: He said, we're going to move forward now with some justice.
[SPEAKER_02]: And here's the expectation.
[SPEAKER_02]: The expectation is that there will be accountability, especially when someone is mistreated.
[SPEAKER_02]: And my image in them is abused by someone else.
[SPEAKER_02]: The spirit of governing society so that victims get justice is the whole basis of what government was built upon.
[SPEAKER_02]: So, in Genesis 9, what we're reading about here is, it's first degree murder, it's not what scripture would later come to call man's slaughter.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's not talking about self-defense or righteous defense of another vulnerable person, because those people would be able to run to cities of refuge here soon as society was established.
[SPEAKER_02]: What this verse is talking about is those with malice in their heart who in that malice commit that crime.
[SPEAKER_02]: Y'all picking up what I'm putting down?
[SPEAKER_02]: So the spirit of government, which is Justice, let the church say justice, is first mentioned in Genesis 9, verse 5 through 6.
[SPEAKER_02]: But the impaletics comes on the same two chapters later.
[SPEAKER_02]: Because government is not politics.
[SPEAKER_02]: Okay, Genesis chapter 11, let's see the spirit of politics.
[SPEAKER_02]: In Genesis 11, there's a story called a Tower of Babble.
[SPEAKER_02]: And all human beings decide they're going to leverage their collective influence to together, rebel against God.
[SPEAKER_02]: And look at the spirit of politics in Genesis 11, verse number four.
[SPEAKER_02]: And they say, calm, here's what politics is.
[SPEAKER_02]: Last, be a watcherach, ourselves.
[SPEAKER_02]: a city and a tower whose top will reach into heaven and let's make a name for who church?
[SPEAKER_02]: Otherwise, we will do what?
[SPEAKER_02]: Be scattered or brawn over the face of all the earth.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so the Lord heard him and said, hmm, they decide to use their collective agency to rebuild against me.
[SPEAKER_02]: So let me confuse the languages to create diversity.
[SPEAKER_02]: So from that diversity, the heart of man turned and said, well, since we can't pull together to turn against God, we're going to pull with people who speak our language, to turn against people who don't.
[SPEAKER_02]: So we're God intended diversity.
[SPEAKER_02]: We're going to create division.
[SPEAKER_02]: And whether there's division, there will always be power struggles.
[SPEAKER_02]: which leads us to the first mentioning of war in the Bible.
[SPEAKER_02]: If you ever read the Old Testament, I want you to hear me.
[SPEAKER_02]: The Old Testament is a bloody story learned.
[SPEAKER_02]: Scripture is not sanitized.
[SPEAKER_02]: It tells the ugly truth and war is a part of the ugly truth of the Old Testament.
[SPEAKER_02]: The reason why I can still read it full of faith because the Old Testament is bloody and the New Testament is bloody, too.
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh my God, but there is a fountain field with blood drawn from Emmanuel's veins.
[SPEAKER_02]: Sort of blood in the new, counteracts to shed blood in the old.
[SPEAKER_02]: So you got this war.
[SPEAKER_02]: The first war is mentioned in Genesis 14.
[SPEAKER_02]: We started the war rev politics, which you mean power struggle, which you mean it was five kings who were under the thom of one and they said, we tied to him ruling over us.
[SPEAKER_02]: So we gon' form an alliance that gon' fight him.
[SPEAKER_02]: He said, no, I might know where things are set up and I'm not gon' let you go free.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I'ma get him alliance and fight against y'all.
[SPEAKER_02]: So you got five kings fighting against four.
[SPEAKER_02]: Five mad at one who rule all of them.
[SPEAKER_02]: But the one who rules all of them don't want the power dynamic to change, because he's at the top of the pyramid.
[SPEAKER_02]: His name is Shado Lua Mar, Genesis 14.
[SPEAKER_02]: So he says, now we're going to fight about this.
[SPEAKER_02]: In the midst of this scuffle,
[SPEAKER_02]: A righteous man's nephew is taken as a prisoner of war and Abraham shows us the tug of war that happens in the heart of a garly person because when war is happening, sometimes the righteous are called in the crossfire.
[SPEAKER_02]: So what do you do?
[SPEAKER_02]: When you want to live righteous, but it's a war happening above your head.
[SPEAKER_02]: because of politics and power struggles, and who won't power and who won't give up power.
[SPEAKER_02]: But you find yourself called in the middle as a citizen of earth and a citizen of heaven.
[SPEAKER_02]: What we learn in these scenarios is that government, politics, war, all a part of the storyline, but none of them can eclips the power of Jesus.
[SPEAKER_02]: Here's why I'm still a Christian.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm still a Christian because Jesus won the war that really matters, then gives us the power to win the other wars that don't matter as much as the main.
[SPEAKER_02]: What's the real war?
[SPEAKER_02]: Paul said, you own fighting against flesh and blood.
[SPEAKER_02]: If you think your enemies are brown people from the other side of the globe, you miss the spirit of deception behind your malice.
[SPEAKER_02]: You fight against precipalities.
[SPEAKER_02]: powers in high places.
[SPEAKER_02]: But as believers, we don't fight for victory, we fight from it.
[SPEAKER_02]: Y'all picking up what I'm putting down.
[SPEAKER_02]: So that's our one position on politics.
[SPEAKER_02]: Number two, is about to get either good or terrible.
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know.
[SPEAKER_02]: Tell me in 10 minutes.
[SPEAKER_02]: Number two, here are two perspectives
[SPEAKER_02]: We got one position on politics.
[SPEAKER_02]: Now let's look at two perspectives.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm gonna tell you from the outset that the two perspectives are not the two we think they are, but it's probably the two we not aware of.
[SPEAKER_02]: The two perspectives of not which side of the aisle you sit on, read a blue, donkey or elephant, left or right, conservative or liberal, Democrat or Republican.
[SPEAKER_02]: Those are not the two perspectives I'm talking about.
[SPEAKER_02]: The two perspectives I'm talking about is the difference between government and politics.
[SPEAKER_02]: So what I'm hoping you will be willing to do it, me, is rise above the fight.
[SPEAKER_02]: They told us we was fighting to see that
[SPEAKER_02]: that's happening on the level of the difference between politics and government.
[SPEAKER_02]: The two are not the same.
[SPEAKER_02]: There's a difference between government and politics.
[SPEAKER_02]: And there's a passage in Roman 13.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's a great passage.
[SPEAKER_02]: We about to read it here verse 1 through 7.
[SPEAKER_02]: It is a passage about government.
[SPEAKER_02]: not a passage about politics.
[SPEAKER_02]: Let's read it.
[SPEAKER_02]: Romans 13, 1 through 7, every person is to be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except from God and those which exist are established by God.
[SPEAKER_02]: Therefore, whoever is this authority has opposed the ordinance of God and they who have opposed, we receive condemnation upon themselves.
[SPEAKER_02]: For rulers are not a cause of fear, for good behavior, but for evil.
[SPEAKER_02]: Do you want to have no fear of authority?
[SPEAKER_02]: Do what is good, and you have praise from the same.
[SPEAKER_02]: First number four, for it is a servant of God to you, for good.
[SPEAKER_02]: But if you do what is evil, be afraid, for it does not bear to soar for nothing.
[SPEAKER_02]: For it is a servant of God, and a venge of who brings wrath on the one who practices evil.
[SPEAKER_02]: First five, therefore it is necessary to be in objection not only because of wrath, but also for the sake of conscience for some mistakes.
[SPEAKER_02]: For because of this, you also help with Jesus.
[SPEAKER_02]: Pay taxes.
[SPEAKER_02]: Why?
[SPEAKER_02]: Because rulers are serving some God, devoting themselves to this very thing.
[SPEAKER_02]: Pay to all what is due them.
[SPEAKER_02]: tax to home tax, custom to home custom, respect to home respect on a to home honor.
[SPEAKER_02]: Now, the reason I'll say that passage is about government and not politics, because that is not a sweeping okay for whatever politicians do.
[SPEAKER_02]: That passage is not saying, whenever the people above you do, just deal with it.
[SPEAKER_02]: That passage is saying the idea of government
[SPEAKER_02]: as a mechanism to protect justice has divine origin.
[SPEAKER_02]: But there's a difference between government and politics, which I may end up with because people will get in government positions and then use it politically.
[SPEAKER_02]: But as believers, the idea of government is something we know comes from God.
[SPEAKER_02]: All right, listen to what Kelly McQuill can say it.
[SPEAKER_02]: This brilliant op-ed our read the other day on Cornell University's School of Industrial Labor Relations.
[SPEAKER_02]: She released this in August 21.
[SPEAKER_02]: The name of her op-ed is, we confuse politics with government, they're not the same.
[SPEAKER_02]: Kelly says, America is facing a polarization crisis.
[SPEAKER_02]: What that means is every time someone in news happened, it's trying to push us to further extremes.
[SPEAKER_02]: During the 2016 election, Pew Research found that among those highly engaged and politics, 70% of Democrats and 62% of Republicans say that they were afraid of the other party.
[SPEAKER_02]: More recently, in 2019, Pew Research found 40% of voters didn't have a single friend from the other political party.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know what that means?
[SPEAKER_02]: That means if we could all see each other's voting interest, 40% of the people who I asked across the aisle wouldn't have did it.
[SPEAKER_02]: We go to the same church.
[SPEAKER_02]: We got to sign grandma and granddaddy somewhere down the line.
[SPEAKER_02]: We got baby old, vitamin E or aloe vera, Vaseline on our skin.
[SPEAKER_02]: We got our locks in, our curls on our head.
[SPEAKER_02]: We sing, believe me, to the right.
[SPEAKER_02]: But if all of our shirts turn the color of our political interests, almost half the people in this room when we're nothing to do with each other.
[SPEAKER_02]: Distrust and government is inherently tied to this distrust we display in each other.
[SPEAKER_02]: So the two perspectives that I want to lay at your feet is that government is different from politics.
[SPEAKER_02]: Let's look at it on a graph, we move through this quick.
[SPEAKER_02]: The government is the institution politics is the process.
[SPEAKER_02]: Government refers to the structure, the officials.
[SPEAKER_02]: agencies that hold the authority to making enforce laws, politics involves negotiation, debate, power, struggles to influence, create or change policies.
[SPEAKER_02]: The purpose of government is to focus on maintaining order and applying policy.
[SPEAKER_02]: The focus of politics is to focus on acquiring power and shaping policy.
[SPEAKER_02]: You see the difference.
[SPEAKER_02]: Let's keep going.
[SPEAKER_02]: The government is the what politics is to who?
[SPEAKER_02]: The government is designed to be stable and in enduring structure is designed to uphold society.
[SPEAKER_02]: The politics is constantly changing and fluid, which means what?
[SPEAKER_02]: The map will turn red, this election, and blue, the next election, is constantly fluid.
[SPEAKER_02]: From a source standpoint, government finds its source in the divine, politics finds its source in the human.
[SPEAKER_02]: government was established conceptually by God as a means of keeping society in good standing by maintaining justice, especially for people at the bottom.
[SPEAKER_02]: The politics, as we see, in Genesis 11, marks human kind struggle for power against God.
[SPEAKER_02]: After being scattered abroad, nations began to struggle for power against each other.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so I've got some stats here from Pew Research.
[SPEAKER_02]: I tried to find a partisan data source.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then this is one of the best ones I could find.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I'm not going to go into the details of all of them, but it's in your notes on the Bible app.
[SPEAKER_02]: Let me read this quote though that I found on Pew Research from October 2025.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's from a group of five people.
[SPEAKER_02]: It says, when it comes to specific issues, the Republican Party holds advantages on crime and immigration while the Democratic Party holds advantages on policies related to race, health care, abortion, and the environment.
[SPEAKER_02]: in contrast to a few years ago, neither party now holds a clear edge on economic policy.
[SPEAKER_02]: Some of the issues, particularly the conflict between Israel and Hamas and Gaza, significant share say they do not agree with either.
[SPEAKER_02]: So we saw one position.
[SPEAKER_02]: There are two perspectives.
[SPEAKER_02]: Number three, and I'm gonna let you go.
[SPEAKER_02]: Here are three questions.
[SPEAKER_02]: Three personal questions for every mature believer.
[SPEAKER_02]: We saw one position on politics.
[SPEAKER_02]: We saw two perspectives for Christians in America.
[SPEAKER_02]: Here are three personal questions for every mature believer.
[SPEAKER_02]: Now, I didn't just get these questions from nowhere.
[SPEAKER_02]: I got these from Mark chapter 12.
[SPEAKER_02]: Jesus answered three questions.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I think if we can answer these three questions, we will have better clarity on our own political point of view.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm going to give you the three questions.
[SPEAKER_02]: Here they are.
[SPEAKER_02]: What do I believe about God?
[SPEAKER_02]: What do I believe about people?
[SPEAKER_02]: And what do I believe about money?
[SPEAKER_02]: Your political point of view is based on how you answer those questions.
[SPEAKER_02]: Because in every one of those politicized subjects I gave you, there's an element about God, people and money in everyone.
[SPEAKER_02]: If you go to abortion, what do I believe about God?
[SPEAKER_02]: I believe God creates life.
[SPEAKER_02]: or I don't, what do I believe about people?
[SPEAKER_02]: God uses two people to bring in the world, one or eight.
[SPEAKER_02]: God, I remember the woman is bringing in.
[SPEAKER_02]: You got to answer that question for you.
[SPEAKER_02]: What do I believe about money?
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, I believe people shouldn't have more kids than money.
[SPEAKER_02]: Ah, so the end that determines my perspective on abortion and the morality I feel behind it.
[SPEAKER_02]: Nobody can't see these three questions for you.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm your pastor.
[SPEAKER_02]: I can't answer these for you.
[SPEAKER_02]: What you believe about God, what you believe about people and what you believe about money, the term in your political point of view.
[SPEAKER_02]: And it's not just what you believe about that three is how you rank on them.
[SPEAKER_02]: So let's look at these options.
[SPEAKER_02]: How did you rank on it?
[SPEAKER_02]: Did you put God people then money?
[SPEAKER_02]: Did you put God then money then people?
[SPEAKER_02]: Did you put people then money then God?
[SPEAKER_02]: Or do you put people then God then money?
[SPEAKER_02]: Do you put money then people then God?
[SPEAKER_02]: Or do you put money then God then people?
[SPEAKER_02]: Do you put?
[SPEAKER_02]: You are a preacher, not a rapper.
[SPEAKER_02]: I said the came out with an album before I say yes to my call.
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, sorry, Louis.
[SPEAKER_02]: You're like, okay, Ram, you're going to give us questions.
[SPEAKER_02]: Let us give you a question.
[SPEAKER_02]: Since we ask in questions, Reverend, what does a Christian do?
[SPEAKER_02]: Abuse their people, or develop ungodly policies.
[SPEAKER_02]: Should Christian speak truth the power or pray for those in leadership?
[SPEAKER_00]: Which I'll say, both be O, F, F, both.
[SPEAKER_00]: Both on.
[SPEAKER_02]: Be O.
[SPEAKER_02]: What you mean speak truth to power?
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean hold accountable those we vote it into office to represent us What you mean pray for those in power?
[SPEAKER_02]: That's what I mean how should we pray for them?
[SPEAKER_02]: It depends on who empower you praying for?
[SPEAKER_02]: How depends on who when it comes to prayer?
[SPEAKER_02]: You like ribs, you're making this up.
[SPEAKER_02]: Am I read the book of songs that sang book we got when my heart is over?
[SPEAKER_02]: Leave me to the rock, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: Guess what else the song is saying?
[SPEAKER_02]: Lord, slay the wicked.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: Lord, it's in justice in the land.
[SPEAKER_01]: Kill him or let me do it for you.
[SPEAKER_02]: Read the Bible in the messes version, and you're gonna do that, what?
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, my ops is really yo ops.
[SPEAKER_02]: Let me get the blicking go to work.
[SPEAKER_01]: I just lost everybody over 30, two years old.
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, you got me, okay, yo, mother butchers, and now I'm good.
[SPEAKER_01]: I know about the blick.
[SPEAKER_01]: I keep oblique it for the raw, raw, two-rail.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's why her personal heavy.
[SPEAKER_01]: We know what you stand on God and some other blitzer.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm gonna give you two passages.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm gonna let you go.
[SPEAKER_02]: Primer is 31, verse number one.
[SPEAKER_02]: The words of King Lim Newell, the pronouncement which his mother taught him, verse 8, open your mouth for the people who cannot speak.
[SPEAKER_02]: For the rights of all the unfortunate.
[SPEAKER_02]: Open your mouth, judge, righteously, and defend the rights of the poor and needy.
[SPEAKER_02]: That came had a good mama, didn't he?
[SPEAKER_02]: Right, what does that mean?
[SPEAKER_02]: Speak truth to power.
[SPEAKER_02]: But then look at first Timothy.
[SPEAKER_02]: Chapter two, we got to pray, as well.
[SPEAKER_02]: We got to do both.
[SPEAKER_02]: First of all, then I urge that request prayers, intercession, and thanksgiving be made in behalf of all people for kings and all who are in authority, so that we may what lead a tranquil and quiet life in our godliness and dignity.
[SPEAKER_02]: This is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior who wants all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
[SPEAKER_02]: For there is one God and one mediator also between God and mankind, who is that church, the mankind Christ, amen.
[SPEAKER_02]: I finished.
[SPEAKER_02]: Give the Lord a hand clap of praise if you would.