The American Soul
The American Soul
If You Say You Love Someone But Don't Show It, Your Words Are Dead and Useless
Making time for what truly matters reveals our authentic priorities, regardless of what we claim to value. While many Christians profess that God is their highest priority, their daily schedules tell a different story. Athletic legends like Kobe Bryant succeeded by making contracts with themselves about training—pushing through when motivation waned. Yet many believers fail to apply this same disciplined approach to their spiritual lives.
The book of James pulls no punches: "Faith without good deeds is dead and useless." This biblical principle exposes the emptiness of claiming faith without demonstrating it through action. When we tell someone who's hungry to "be well fed" without providing food, our words are meaningless. Similarly, professing love for God while neglecting prayer, Bible reading, and obedience to Christ's commands reveals a fundamental disconnect between our stated beliefs and lived reality.
This principle extends beyond individual faith into our understanding of American constitutional history. Supreme Court rulings from the 19th century clearly established that the First Amendment was never intended to place all religions on equal footing or separate Christianity from public institutions. Rather, it prevented any single Christian denomination from receiving state preference. Cases like Murphy v. Ramsey (1885) declared the traditional family as "the sure foundation of all that is stable and noble in our civilization," while Davis v. Beason (1890) affirmed that religious freedom never protected practices contrary to "the general consent of the Christian world."
The gradual removal of Christian principles from American families, education, and civic life has produced exactly the moral and social deterioration these early Court decisions warned against. The solution begins with honesty about our priorities, intentionally planning time with God, and recognizing the Christian foundations that made America exceptional. If your faith matters, make a contract with yourself to put it first in your day—not just in your words.
The American Soul Podcast
https://www.buzzsprout.com/1791934/subscribe
Hey folks, this is Jesse Koch, back with another episode of the American Soul Podcast. Hope y'all are doing well, wherever y'all are and whatever part of the day you're in. Sort of appreciate y'all joining me, giving me a little bit of your time and a little piece of your day, well aware that y'all have other things pulling vying for your attention. So thank you for joining me here. Hopefully we'll get some more tools for our toolbox out of it. Hopefully it'll help us all turn back to God and Jesus Christ a little bit more, as individuals and as a nation, here in America and around the world. Whatever nation you're in, wherever you're listening. For those of y'all that continue to pray for the podcast and for me, thank you so much. For those of y'all who continue to share the podcast with others, tell people about it, thank you so much. And for those of y'all who are new, I'm glad you're here. Hope you enjoy it. Hope you come back. Father, thank you for today. Thank you for you, father, and your Son, jesus Christ, and your Holy Spirit. Thank you for your love and your mercy, your grace and your forgiveness. Thank you for sending your Son, jesus Christ, to die for our sins. Thank you for sending your son Jesus Christ to die for our sins. Thank you for him being willing to come. Thank you for all the many blessings you bestow upon us, the ones we admit and the ones we don't. Forgive us our greed, our selfishness, our laziness, pride, arrogance, judgment of others, brash words and actions, our cowardice and our unbelief. Help us to overcome our unbelief we do believe. Help us to follow the commands of your son Jesus Christ each day, to be doers, not just hearers, of your word. Be with those in the military, law enforcement, firefighters, ems those who protect us, who go out in the cold and the rain and the dark, who defend us against evil, men and women. Be with them. Bring them home safe to their families. Protect them, father, as they protect us. Be with our leaders. Help them to all turn to you, father, and your Son Jesus Christ. Be with those who do in particular. Give them wisdom and courage and a strong faith perseverance. Give them wisdom and courage and a strong faith perseverance. Be with those who are listening to the podcast today. Thank you for them, father. Be with their families. Guide us all, lord. Bless us, surround us with your angels, heal whatever heartache we have, ease whatever burden we're carrying. Please Be with those who are Sick or injured. Heal them. Be with those who have broken relationships, whether it's between kids or parents or their spouse. Heal the Marriages across our nation, in particular, fathers that are broken and struggling. And God, my words here, please, in your son's name, we pray, amen. Have you made time for God today? Have you made time to read his word? Have you made time to pray? Are you going to? Do you have a time outlined, god, today? Have you made time to read his word? Have you made time to pray? Are you going to? Do you have a time outlined for it? You know one of the things?
Speaker 1:I saw a video earlier this year or late last year, I don't remember. It's been a month or two, maybe longer. It was an interview by Kobe Bryant, and I go to a lot of these athletes just because, as I've said on the podcast before, that's one of my weaknesses when I find myself wasting time, as I can fall into sports Not all sports, but some. Like college football. I used to be able to sit there all day, I kid you not. I could watch college football all day, saturday, from the first game, and I would flip in between games as they're going on. So the sports resonate with me a little bit.
Speaker 1:But he was talking about summer training in between seasons, and he said look, you need to have a plan and you need to make a deal with yourself. He said you need to make a contract with yourself that this is what your training plan is going to be. And he said I guarantee you there's going to come times when you don't want to do it. He said it's going to happen and you're going to get to the end of the day and your body's going to hurt and you're going to be tired and you're going to have a couple sets of something left. You'd be like you know what? I'll just double up tomorrow. He said don't do that. He said that's so dangerous. He said make a plan and stick to it. And stick to it, make a contract.
Speaker 1:You know we talk about marriage as a covenant relationship, right, even more than a contract like a covenant. I mean that's powerful to go into covenant with somebody. And we talk about our faith, our relationship with God. I mean he's the God of the universe. That's supposed to be the most important relationship. It's the most important relationship that's even possible, right?
Speaker 1:But we don't have a plan. We have a plan for our academic career, like when we look at our children, if we have children, or if you're a kid, if you're in junior high or high school or college. You have an advisor, right, and they have this plan. And it's this huge deal to go in and sit down with your advisor and go over your academic plan, your high school graduation plan, your college plan for your degree right, your degree plan, whatever it is. And they start this off in junior high even, right, you go down and you sit down and you plan the next four years out academically. Sports, right, like Kobe Bryant, and basketball, like he was talking about. You have a plan and you stick to that plan. I've seen so many hyper-successful athletes. They talk about that. You have to have a plan and you stick to the plan. That's what you do every day, day in and day out, professional, once we get out of college, out of athletics right, our career we have a plan. Now you can make the argument that there's a lot of people today that don't have a plan, but your successful ones do. This is the career I want to go into. This is how I want to get there. This is the path I want to take. I want to go to this college and get this degree and I'm going to get this job and this is where I'm going to start and this is what my aiming point is. Right Body I've talked about my wife used to really enjoy CrossFit back in the day and you would see we had some friends that were pretty big or she did.
Speaker 1:I showed up every once in a while, but she had some friends that were really into CrossFit and they had goals. They set targets Right, and we know this about our own health. You have a body weight target. You have a bench press target, a squat target, a weightlifting target. You know a run target and you plan and you have these targets. Like, if you're going to go run a marathon, you don't just walk out the door one day and say, hey, I'm going to go run. You know 20, 30 miles, you have a plan and you build up to that. And so I know I'm hammering this folks.
Speaker 1:But what the amazing thing is is I can almost guarantee that most of us, most of y'all listening to myself included we don't have a plan when it comes to developing our relationship with God, which is way, way, infinitely more important, eternally more important than any of those other things that I've just listed. And then second to that, but also again exponentially more important than any of those other things I've mentioned, is your marriage. But we don't have a plan. We don't make a plan. We make a plan for our grocery list, right? Some of y'all that are the shoppers for the family that you're listening right now. You know what I'm talking about. You have a plan when you go into the grocery store. Some of y'all have the layout of the grocery store. You know where you're going and you have that layout so well honed in your mind. You know what you're going to get, where you're going to get, like the order you're going to get stuff in.
Speaker 1:You have a plan for your day starting off on Monday. I got to get up at this point. I got to be here at this point. I got to take the kids here at this point. I got to be in this class at this point. I got to be at work at this point.
Speaker 1:Like, you have a plan, we have a plan for all these things, but we don't have a plan for God and Jesus Christ, and then, second to them, our spouse. What's the plan? What's your plan? How are you going to spend time with God today? How are you going to execute his will today? I was thinking about this the other day. I don't know if this will help y'all or not. It's a pretty poor plan, but I was going through my day and I thought about a gentleman who is a widow in our community and I think really could probably use some company sometimes, and I was trying to like get in my head Okay, how are you going to plan? And really, what I, what I should say is how are you going to leave time in your daily plan so that you can go spend time with him? And full disclosure I have not executed this yet, but I'm starting to go that way, folks, we have not executed this yet, but I'm starting to go that way.
Speaker 1:Folks, we have to have a plan. How are we going to? When are we going to spend time with God? And it's not because it's a formal thing that has to be by the book, but we need a plan because otherwise, what happens when you don't have a plan? Come on, folks, y'all know. Come on, folks, y'all know.
Speaker 1:For 90% of us, 90% of the time, if we don't have a plan. It doesn't get done, or it gets done in a slipshod manner, right, really poor, and we don't end up achieving whatever that goal was that we really wanted to attain, which begs the question did we really want to obtain it in the first place? Right? But I have a plan. What's the plan for your spouse? Are you going to love them? What are you going to do tomorrow, today, to love them? And of course, this goes back to what we hammer on the podcast so often, and then we'll move on.
Speaker 1:Folks is what you give your time to, is what your priorities are, and that includes planning. If you're giving your time to all this other stuff besides god and jesus christ and the holy spirit and besides your marriage, then then those are your priorities, and it's not god and jesus christ and the holy spirit in your marriage, no matter what you would like to think about yourself, no matter what you would like to tell other people, no matter what you actually tell other people. In your heart, in your mind, if you're honest with yourself, you have to acknowledge that your priorities are not really God and Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit. Your priority really is not your husband or your wife, because if they were, you would be making a plan in how to develop that relationship each day. I cannot emphasize that enough, folks.
Speaker 1:James, chapter two a warning against prejudice. We could use that today. Huh, my dear brothers and sisters, how can you claim to have faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ if you favor some people over others? For example, suppose someone comes into your meeting dressed in fancy clothes and expensive jewelry and another comes in who is poor and dressed in dirty clothes, if you give special attention and a good seat to the rich person but you say to the poor one, you can stand over there or else sit on the floor. Well, doesn't this discrimination show that your judgments are guided by evil motives? Listen to me, dear brothers and sisters. Hasn't God chosen the poor in this world to be rich in faith? Aren't they the ones who will inherit the kingdom he promised to those who love him? But you dishonor the poor. Isn't it the rich who oppress you and drag you into the court? Aren't they the ones who slander Jesus Christ, whose noble name you bear? Yes, indeed, it is good when you obey the royal laws found in scriptures. Love your neighbor as yourself.
Speaker 1:But if you favor some people over others, you are committing a sin. You are guilty of breaking the law. The person who keeps all the laws except one is guilty, is as guilty as a person who has broken all of God's laws. For the same God who said you must not commit adultery also said you must not murder. So if you murder someone but do not commit adultery, you have still broken the law. So whatever you say or whatever you do, remember that you will be judged by the law that sets you free. There will be no mercy for those who have not shown mercy to others. But if you have been merciful, god will be merciful when he judges you.
Speaker 1:Faith without good deeds is dead. What good is it, dear brothers and sisters, if you say have faith but don't show it by your actions? Can that kind of faith save anyone? Suppose you see a brother or sister who has no food or clothing and you say goodbye and have a good day, stay warm and eat well, but then you don't give that person any food or clothing. What good does that do? So you see, faith by itself isn't enough. Unless it produces good deeds, it is dead and useless.
Speaker 1:Now someone may argue some people have faith. It produces good deeds, it is dead and useless. Now someone may argue some people have faith, others have good deeds, but I say how can you show me your faith if you don't have good deeds? I will show you my faith by my good deeds. You say you have faith, for you believe that there is one God shown to be right with God by his actions when he offered his son Isaac on the altar. You see, his faith and his actions worked together. His actions made his faith complete and so it happened. Just as the scriptures say, abraham believed God and God counted him as righteous. Because of his faith, he was even called the friend of God. Of his faith, he was even called the friend of God. So you see, we are shown to be right with God by what we do, not by faith alone. Rahab the prostitute is another example. She was shown to be right with God by her actions when she hid those messengers and sent them safely away by a different road. Just as the body is dead without breath, so also faith is dead without. So these two sections are huge. We could spend a long, long time here.
Speaker 1:I'm going to choose the second half today as opposed to the first half half today as opposed to the first half. But if you get a chance, go back and read the warning against prejudice the first half of James 2. And I think the thing that's really condemning here and I'll move on to the second half is if you're judging other people based on superficial traits right, skin color, ethnicity, class you're not following Jesus Christ. If you're looking at somebody good or bad, right. If you automatically see a person of a certain skin color and you go man, they're great, I know that that's a good person because of the color of their skin. Or if you automatically look at a person based on the amount of money they have in their account and you automatically go man, they got a lot of money. I know they're evil, I know they're a bad person. If you look at somebody based on their accent right, their language, where their parents came from, and you go, I already know they're good or bad. Whichever way you want to go, you're not following Jesus Christ. You have to look at actions. What do those people do? How do they act? Are they kind? Are they patient? Do they obey the law? Right, are they just? Are they merciful? So again, we could sit and talk here for a long time, but I want to get to this, the second part, because we talk about it so often at the beginning of each podcast, folks.
Speaker 1:But what good is it if we say we have faith but we don't show it by our actions? Right? Can that kind of faith save anyone? And this isn't right. If you've got a denomination or a pastor or priest, pope, bishop, cardinal, telling you that you have to have actions in order to be saved. If they mean that you have to have actions in order to show that you have faith, which is what saves you, well and good. If they're saying that you can earn your way into heaven based on your actions, that's not it, folks. That's not going to work, it's not going to cut it. You need Jesus Christ and him alone. But how do we know if we have faith in Christ? We have to look at our actions. How do we know if somebody else has faith in Christ? We have to look at our actions. How do we know if somebody else has faith in Christ? We have to look at our actions, right? I like this particular translation of verses 15 and 16.
Speaker 1:Suppose you see a brother or sister who has no food or clothing and say goodbye and have a good day, right, stay warm and eat well. But then you don't give that person any food or clothing. What good does that do? It doesn't do any good. If they're cold and you say, stay warm, that's awesome, they're still going to be cold. If they're hungry and you say be well fed, hope you I hope you have your well fed today, but you don't give them any food. They're still hungry. I hope you're well fed today, but you don't give them any food. They're still hungry. If somebody's thirsty and you say, man, hope you get some water today and you walk away, they're still thirsty. You haven't given them anything.
Speaker 1:If you say you love someone but you don't show them they still are unloved and you haven't done anything right? That's what we talk about with marriage each day, right? So this faith, right, the good deeds don't earn our way into heaven. The good deeds aren't enough for our salvation. But the good deeds illustrate our faith in Jesus Christ and that is what our salvation is based on. The good deeds stow the faith. The faith is what's important.
Speaker 1:But how can you have faith?
Speaker 1:How can you believe in Jesus Christ?
Speaker 1:How can you love Christ who says if we love him, we'll follow his commands. So how can we love him if we don't follow his commands? You can't Just like, you can't say that you love somebody. You can't tell your kid you love them and not spend any time with them. It doesn't work. You can say it and the world might pretend to believe it along with you, but it doesn't matter. You can't tell your spouse that you love them and not show them each day, right? You can't tell them that they're your top priority each day and then give all this time, like here. Look, if you tell your spouse that they're your top priority and yet they constantly see you on your phone throughout the day, watching TV and sports throughout the day, and you don't give any time to them, much less you don't give more time to them than you give to that, right, like the role should be reversed. If your spouse is really your top priority, then all those times when you pick up your phone or turn on the TV, you ought to be picking up your spouse or turning on your spouse, and then maybe at the end of the day, maybe if you have time to get on your phone for a little bit, maybe the phone doesn't love you back, folks, the phone doesn't love you back, folks. The tv doesn't love you back. The sports can't love you back. The video games can't love you back. You can pick up that remote control all day long. It's never going to love you back if you don't show with actions your faith.
Speaker 1:What does it say here in James? It says it's dead and useless. If you don't show your spouse that you love them with actions, each day, throughout the day, then that word is dead and useless. Your word, verse 19,. I think this illustrates it really well. You say you have faith or you believe that there is one god good for you. Even the demons believe this and they tremble in terror. How foolish. Can't you see that faith without good deeds is useless, right, even the? The difference is actions show our real faith. If we truly love Jesus Christ, then we follow His commands. If we don't follow His commands, it doesn't matter whether we say we have faith. We're not showing it, we're not acting on it. It's not that the works we can't earn our way into heaven, folks.
Speaker 1:I need to be really clear on this. It's because it's really important, and there's a lot of people out there today that are selling a lie your works are not going to get you into heaven. Your works are going to illustrate your faith. Your faith is what's going to get you into heaven. Your works are going to illustrate your faith. Your faith is what's going to get you into heaven, and you have to understand that. Why are you doing stuff? If you're doing stuff trying to earn your way into heaven, it's not going to work. If you're doing stuff, if you're following Jesus Christ's commands because that's what he said to do and you have faith in him, that's illustrating your faith. That's going to get you into heaven. I know there's a lot of people out there that could explain this so much better, more clearly than I. As I said, I'm not a priest, not a pastor, not a theologian, so that's the best I can do with my layman's and just leave you with verse 26,. Just as the body is dead without breath, so also faith is dead without good works, so also marriage is dead without love. Right, all right.
Speaker 1:Where are we going today? Oh, yes, we're going to read through some pilgrims, progress's, progress quotes, if we have time at the end, but we are going to start with some Supreme Court cases. Where we left off on the previous podcast, I wanted to go back and read one. We're going to talk about family today, the importance of family, the importance of family illustrated through some Supreme Court decisions, and you've got to remember how this ties back into Christianity, right? So over the last century, really since the 1920s and the really big explosion of feminism in the United States, rejection of God on into the 40s and kicking God out of the state. But it starts in the family. When you take God and Jesus Christ out of the marriage, then you take it out of the family, then you can start to take it out of your community, school states, even your churches, right? So we read this on the previous podcast. I think this is Reynolds versus United States, 1878.
Speaker 1:It is a significant fact that on the 8th of December 1788, after the passage of the Act establishing religious freedom and after the Convention of Virginia had recommended, as an amendment to the Constitution of the United States, the Declaration and the Bill of Rights, that all men have an equal, natural and unalienable right to the free exercise of religion according to the dictates of their conscience, that the legislature of that state substantially enacted the death penalty for polygamy right. So there's two things here that jump out at me penalty for polygamy, right. So there's two things here that jump out at me. One is polygamy, just in general, the fact that our country said that marriage right. Just like in the Bible you talk about marriages between a man and a woman and they cleave together and that bond is supposed to represent the relationship between Jesus Christ and the church, and it's a huge deal. It's central to the nation, and so anything that attacks that marriage between a man and a woman, which we've done a great job of today, attacking and dishandling it, it's going to be a big deal. Right, they enacted the death penalty in Virginia for polygamy. The other thing here is where did it go? Oh, it's important to note that.
Speaker 1:So this religious freedom, right, but religious freedom didn't give you the right to be anti-Christian or pro something else that was anti-Christian, right. So this religious freedom. The idea today is that it makes all religions equal, all faiths equal. That was not the original intent of our founders, Right? For example, there's some faiths out there that don't view polygamy as bad. Christianity trumps that. This legislature is saying, yeah, you've got religious freedom, you have the right to exercise your religion, but not if it goes against Christianity, and that goes back to the Supreme Court case that we talked about and Justice Joseph Story story, right the Vidal versus Gerard's executor, saying if Christianity is not to be maliciously or openly reviled or blasphemed against to the annoyance of believers or injury of the public, so you can practice your freedom of religion as long as it doesn't injure the public, as long as it's not anti-Christian. Again, public schools have to be Bible-centric. In a Christian nation that doesn't mean you can't go home and be Muslim or Buddhist or Hindu or whatever else, but in our public institutions, our public courts, the foundation has to be Jesus Christ and if you do something that blasphemes Christianity or you do something that hurts the public, that's anti-Christian, that's not okay, according to our Supreme Court. A lot closer to the founding of our nations than so many of the brilliant talking heads that you see today. Supreme Court 1885. This is Murphy versus Ramsey and others. Supreme Court 1885. This is Murphy v Ramsey and others.
Speaker 1:Every person who has a husband or wife living and marries another is guilty of polygamy and shall be punished. Certainly no legislation can be supposed more wholesome and necessary in the founding of a free, self-governing commonwealth than that which seeks to establish it on the basis of the idea of the family as consisting in and springing from the union for life of one man and one woman in the holiest state of matrimony. The family is the sure foundation of all that is stable and noble in our civilization, the best guarantee of that reverent morality which is the source of all beneficent progress and social and political improvements. That's a lot, folks. The family, one man and one woman in the holiest state of matrimony, that's the sure foundation of all that's stable or noble and noble in our civilization. So when we attack the family, we're attacking everything that's stable and noble in our civilization. According to our Supreme Court in 1885, right, the best guarantee of reverent morality which is the source of all beneficent progress, all the progress that we're going to make. We want people that are moral, that are upright. You want nobody out there says we want people who do the wrong thing, although maybe today some do. People want other people who do the right thing. A lot of times we don't want to do the right thing, but we want other people to do the right thing. If you want a moral and a virtuous people. What the Supreme Court is saying the best guarantee of that morality, that's reverent, right. Guarantee of that morality. That's reverent, right, reverence, god, the Father and Jesus Christ. That's the source of all real progress. Social and political improvement goes back to that family. And so, look, if you can attack the family, if you can undermine the family, if you can destroy the family, then you can start to destroy the social and political institutions in a nation. You can start to destroy that morality. That's necessary for a republic, for liberty. You've got to go back to John Dewey.
Speaker 1:Look, folks, the left has been telling us what they're doing for a long time. I wish I had the quote in front of me from Churchill. There was a great quote in that Churchill biography talking about despite all the things that Hitler had done, chamberlain and the pacifists in England still were clinging to the hope that they could negotiate with him, despite all that he had done, despite all the things that he had showed them by actions. Right, this goes back to our reading in James Day actions, actions, tell the truth. Right, this goes back to our reading in James Day actions, actions, tell the truth.
Speaker 1:The left has been telling us and showing us for a decade that their goal is to separate children in America From God and from their families. Why do they want to do that? Because if you can separate children from God and from their family, then you can start to undermine and destroy the nation. Look at the cases going on in our country right now about some of the people at the colleges right, harvard and Columbia, I think, are both right now again in the news because they've had these anti-Semitic, anti-american, pro-muslim terrorists rallies. They're promoting things that destroy America.
Speaker 1:How did we get from a Harvard that started off that education without Christ or without the Bible was basically useless, right, and that for Christ and the church. How did we get from that point to the point we're at now? Because we took God and Jesus Christ out of education. We separated children from God and from their family, right, you send them off to college and then college starts to say you know what your parents, if they are parents that follow God, jesus Christ, they're pretty stupid, they're not real bright and you really don't want to listen to those people. You can start to separate kids, folks, you cause all sorts of havoc, and so, again, what's the point of this?
Speaker 1:Supreme Court case 1885, mercy v Ramsey and others. Any person that marries somebody else when they've got a husband or wife still living is guilty of polygamy and shall be punished. Marries somebody else when they've got a husband or wife still living is guilty of polygamy and she'll be punished. No legislation can be supposed more wholesome and necessary than founding of a free, self-governing commonwealth, than that which seeks to establish it on the basis of the idea of the family as consisting in and springing from the union for life of one man and one woman, not two guys, not two girls, not some other combination, not a guy in a tree or a woman in a goat or anything else. One man, one woman, right. And now you think about all the ways that we've attacked that. Supreme Court 1889. This is Davis versus Beeson 1890. And so let's see here.
Speaker 1:The United States considered bigamy and polygamy as crimes, right. The state of Idaho also declared bigamy and polygamy illegal. The state of Idaho also declared bigamy and polygamy illegal, declared that anyone who committed it, teaches it or even encourages it is forbidden from voting or holding office in the territory. This man came along, samuel Davis. He was caught in the crime, fined and jailed and he argued that he was being imprisoned for religious belief and he should have the freedom to commit bigamy and polygamy under the First Amendment. So we're going to read through the decision by the court. This was Justice Stephen Field, who had been appointed by President Abraham Lincoln. But you really need to think about this, because we have such a poor understanding of the First Amendment today. So the United States and the state of Idaho said bigamy and polygamy are illegal. There's going to be punishments for it, and not only that, you don't have the right to vote if you have committed those crimes, not in this territory in Idaho. Right, because we were a Christian nation and that's the basis for our Christian nation.
Speaker 1:Some of y'all that are a few steps ahead of me are saying well, you know, there's people in the Bible, especially in the Old Testament, that had multiple wives. David had multiple wives. He was considered a man after God's own heart. Okay, I got you. There's a speech by Teddy Roosevelt that we get a chance to read today. We will. But basically he said, even if the rare exceptions manage to do certain things and not suffer for it, that's not saying that if the society as a whole adopts those sins, that society is going to destroy itself. Right, he says it much better than I do. So we'll get to it. But again, so this guy comes along he says hey, bigamy and polygamy are part of my religious beliefs.
Speaker 1:Freedom of religion First Amendment right. Does that sound familiar to today? Here's the problem. This is what we don't understand. This is where we've made so many mistakes. Freedom of religion does not the First Amendment does not lower Christianity down to the level of other false religions. We were not a deist nation. You go back to that Supreme Court case we read the other day, right. You go back to that Supreme Court case we read the other day, right. And the Supreme Court unanimously saying we don't even have to worry about a school or a college being founded based to promote or propagate deism or some other form of infidelity, because that would never happen in a Christian nation. Right? Little did they know where we would get to today.
Speaker 1:The First Amendment was made to keep the state from favoring Roman Catholicism or the Anglican Church or Greek Orthodoxy or being a Baptist or Methodist, right, those Protestant denominations or some other. That's what the First Amendment was about. It was not separating God out of the state and it certainly was not pretending that false religions like Islam or Buddhism or Hinduism or even Judaism by itself were equal with Christianity. And so this guy comes along and says hey, this is my First Amendment. You know, religious freedom I believe. My religion believes in bigamy and polygamy. You can't fine me or jail me for that. And if we don't have the principles of Christ as our foundation, then we have to go along with it. We have to say, yeah, you know what You're right. Whatever your religion is, we got to go along with it. But that's not what the Supreme Court said. What did they say?
Speaker 1:Bigamy and polygamy are crimes by the laws of all civilized and Christian countries. They are crimes by the laws of the United States and they are crimes by the laws of Idaho. They tend to destroy the purity of the marriage relation, to disturb the peace of families, to degrade women and debase men. To extend exemption from punishment for such crimes would be to shock the moral judgment of the community. To call their advocacy a tenet of religion is to offend the common sense of mankind. There have been sex different denominations which denied, as a part of their religious tenets, that there should be any marriage tie and advocated promiscuous intercourse of the sexes follow the carrying into effect of its doctrines, and no heed would be given to the pretense that their supporters could be protected in their exercise by the Constitution of the United States. Probably never before in the history of this country has it been seriously contended that the whole punitive power of the government for acts recognized by the general consent of the Christian world must be suspended in order that the tenets of a religious sect may be carried out without hindrance. We're going to come back and read those two paragraphs again in a minute.
Speaker 1:The constitutions of several states, in providing for religious freedom, have declared expressly that such freedom shall not be construed to excuse acts of licentiousness. The Constitution of New York in 1777 provided the free exercise and enjoyment of religious profession and worship, without discrimination or preference, shall forever hereafter be allowed within this state to all mankind. Discrimination of preference shall forever hereafter be allowed within this state to all mankind, provided that the liberty of conscience hereby granted shall not be so construed as to excuse acts of licentiousness. The constitutions of California, colorado, connecticut, florida, georgia, illinois, maryland, minnesota, mississippi, missouri, nevada and South Carolina contain a similar declaration. They'll not be construed as to excuse acts of licentiousness.
Speaker 1:What do we have today? No-fault divorce, sexual promiscuity off the charts, lgbtq relationships, pretend marriages between two men or two women, right, or some other weird combination. How did we get here? Well, if you take God and his unchanging principles out of the core of the country, then you have to allow anything to go right. You cannot deny people the ability to do whatever the heck they want to do if you don't have God and Jesus Christ at the center as the foundation, as those unchanging principles, right? So we're going to go back and read these two paragraphs here again real quick in the middle.
Speaker 1:So the sect, right. So there have been different denominations, different religions which denied, as a part of their religious tenets, there should be any marriage tie. So they said there shouldn't be any marriage tie and advocated promiscuous intercourse of the sexes is prompted, promoted or prompted by the passions of its members. So, whatever you want to do, however, you want to do it right. Basically, what we have today Whatever you want to do with whoever you want to do, whenever you want to do it, however, you want to do it right. And the Supreme Court here says that should either of these kinds ever find its way into this country, either a denomination of either of these kinds ever find its way into this country, swift punishment would follow the carrying into effect of its doctrines. So as soon as they started to act that way, there would be swift punishment and no heed would be given to the pretense that their supporters could be protected by the exercise of the Constitution of the United States.
Speaker 1:We're not going to pretend that you can come in and do whatever you want simply because of the First Amendment, which is exactly what we do today. We pretend that if you want to be a Muslim, you can come in and be a Muslim and act that way. Sharia law right. You want to be Jewish? You want to act according to the laws of Judaism? You want to Buddhism, hinduism, atheism, satanism right. We have statues being put up to Satan in our courts now.
Speaker 1:Just a side note, folks if you don't think, if you think we've somehow escaped God's judgment or the bill that we're going to have to pay for stuff like that and abortion, I have to tell you that I highly doubt that that's true, and I think we've got some really hard times coming and the only thing we can do is cling to God and Jesus Christ, turn back to Him, beg for mercy and forgiveness and just trust the outcome, whatever that is, and it's probably going to be pretty hard and that, as Jefferson said, I tremble for my country, for my own family. But they're saying look, we're not going to pretend that just because you come up and claim that bigamy or polygamy or whatever else is part of your religion, that you're protected under the First Amendment. Oh, hold on. Second paragraph right. Oh, hold on, second paragraph right.
Speaker 1:Probably never before in the history of this country has it been seriously contended that the whole punitive power of the government for acts recognized by the general consent of the Christian world that's huge Recognized by the general consent of the Christian world must be suspended in order that the tenets of a religious sect, one particular religious sect, may be carried out without hindrance. So you want to come in and be a Muslim, or you want to be somebody that believes in bigamy or polygamy or whatever else, and then you want to be protected in the First Amendment and the Supreme Court here is saying no, no, no, we're not going to play that game. The general principles of Christianity are the foundation of this nation, they're the foundation of our court system, they're the foundation of our constitutions, of our institutions. And if you're going to come in and do something that's blatantly anti-Christian, there's going to be swift punishment for it. We're not going to go along and we're not going to play this little fairytale game where you get to be protected because you want to be LGBTQ, whatever right. We're not going to play this game that you get to be protected because you want to be lgbtq, whatever right. We're not going to play this game that you get to be protected because of your first amendment, a free exercise which includes rejection of of god and jesus christ, atheism, right, socialism, communism, leftism, atheism. We're not going to go along with that right. Just because you want to join the military doesn't mean that we're not still going to have pastors in there preaching the general principles of Christianity. If you want to be Muslim but you want to join the military, our military is still going to be based on the foundation, the principles of Christ, and we're not going to hire an imam or whatever to come be part of one of these units in the military just so that you can join the military. You don't have that right. Same thing with law enforcement. Same thing with firefighters. Same thing with education If you want your kid to be educated in the United States but you're an atheist, you reject God, that's fine. That's on you, on your end. But if you're going to send your kid to school, to a publicly funded, taxpayer-funded school, it's going to be Bible-centric, it's going to be based on the principles of Jesus Christ and that's what we're going to teach.
Speaker 1:Your First Amendment right does not mean that the country has to completely—it's the tail wagging the dog, folks. And we've been allowing it for 80 years, more and more. And you can make this argument about every single tenet of the left. Seminism pops in my head right now. You want to not follow along with the general roles and responsibilities as's laid out in the general principles of Christianity for men and women. That's on you, but we're not going to bend over backwards to make it out. And the military is a textbook example. You don't have a right to serve in the military because you want to. You don't have a right to be allowed entrance into a military academy because you want to. Every single woman that fills a spot in the military and the military academies could be replaced by a man who's equally mentally, emotionally strong and stronger physically. That's just a fact, folks. You can find a guy out there that has the exact same academic, emotional, mental capabilities and better physical capabilities for every single female that's in a military position. You don't have a right to come in and demand that the system revolve around you, and that's what we have allowed the First Amendment to turn into. And that's what we have allowed the First Amendment to turn into.
Speaker 1:It was meant so that the Catholics couldn't get in control, right, like Bloody Mary, like we talk about on this podcast, and burn Christians of the state because they were Protestant or the Anglican Church or the Greek Orthodox or the Baptists or the Greek Orthodox or the Baptist or the Methodist. It was made so that no one denomination could get in and be favored by the state or control the state, right? It was not meant so that you could take whatever ideas you had in your head and demand that the country bend itself about backwards to meet your selfish desires. It wasn't meant so that you could be a Muslim from a different country and come into America that's a Christian nation and say, well, you have to honor my Muslim religion. No, sweetheart, we don't. You wanted to come to America.
Speaker 1:America was found as a Christian nation. You adhere to the general principles of Christianity in our institutions, in our schools, in our country, not the other way around. You assimilate into our nation. You don't try and force the nation to assimilate into your desires. You want to be a Buddhist that comes to America? Great. But don't come into America and say, well, you have to respect Buddhism because that's my faith. No, darling. We don't come into America and say, well, you have to respect Buddhism because that's my faith. No, darling, we don't. You wanted to come to America. America was born a Christian republic. You assimilate into America. You follow the general principles of Christianity. You uphold the general principles of Christianity in our institution. Do you want to serve in law enforcement? Great. You're going to uphold the general principles of Christianity there. You want to serve in our court system? Great. You want to serve in our education system? Great, awesome. The foundation is going to be the general principles, not the Catholic doctrinal denomination, not what the Anglican church says specifically, not what the Baptist church says specifically what the Bible says the general principles of Christianity. That's going to be the basis, and if you don't want to do that, then don't come.
Speaker 1:For those of us that are here, you need to wake up and realize that that's what's going on. That's what's been going on for a long time and the idea with peaceful coexistence with citizens who demand on following the left or Islam, in particular those two. That's a pipe dream. You can't have peaceful coexistence and maintain liberty with citizens that demand on following the values, the evil values of leftism, socialism, communism, nazism, fascism, which all go hand in glove with Islam. God bless y'all. God bless your marriages, if you're married. God bless your family. God bless America. God bless your nation, wherever you are around the world. Listen, we'll talk to y'all again real soon, folks Looking forward to it.