The American Soul
The American Soul
Medal of Honor: The Bernard Bell Story
We explore the vital connection between faith and freedom in America, challenging listeners to examine their daily priorities and how they reflect true beliefs. The podcast addresses how denominational divisions can distract from salvation through Christ alone, while highlighting the extraordinary courage of Medal of Honor recipient Bernard Pius Bell.
• Making time for God should be our first priority if we truly believe what we profess
• Marriage responsibilities outlined in Scripture aren't burdensome but should be our highest priority after God
• Denominational divisions often mirror the circumcision controversy in Galatians, placing human traditions above faith in Christ
• Technical Sergeant Bernard Bell's extraordinary courage in WWII exemplifies sacrifice for freedom
• Founding Fathers like Charles Carroll, John Hancock and Henry Knox had strong Christian faith, contrary to revisionist claims
• America's liberty depends on maintaining Christian moral foundations across generations
Take time today to pray, read Scripture, and reflect on what truly matters in your life and marriage. Remember, our nation's future depends on people of faith who live by these principles.
The American Soul Podcast
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Hey folks, this is Jesse Cope, back with another episode of the American Soul Podcast. Hope y'all are doing well, wherever y'all are, whatever part of the day you're in. Sure do appreciate y'all joining me, giving me a little bit of your time and energy, a little piece of your day. I will try and use it wisely. For those of y'all who continue to share the podcast and tell others about it, thank you so much, very grateful for that. For those of y'all who continue to pray for me and for the podcast, thank you, I need the prayers, I want them. So thank you very much, father. Thank you for today.
Speaker 1:Thank you for you, father, and your Son, jesus Christ and your Holy Spirit. Thanks for your love and your mercy, your grace and your Holy Spirit. Thanks for your love and your mercy, your grace and your forgiveness of sins. Thank you for those who have gone before us, who have been willing to suffer and sacrifice so much so that we might worship your Son freely, without fear of persecution by either church or state, and read your word free of the fear of persecution, again, by either church or state. Forgive us when we take that for granted, when we are not grateful for that privilege. Be with those around the world who don't have that privilege, father, who are persecuted for following your Son. Help us to help them in every way possible. Bring them comfort, and give them your comfort, father, and your peace, wherever they are China, syria, nigeria, iran, other places. Forgive us our sins here in America, not only our individual sins, father, but forgive us our national sins for supporting evils like abortion, feminism, no-fault divorce, sexual deviancy of every kind. Help us to truly repent as a people and turn back to you, father, and your Son, jesus Christ. Forgive us our greed and our pride, our vanity, our hypocrisy, our judgment of others. Help us to love you with our whole heart, mind, soul and strength, and to love our neighbors as ourselves. Be with those listening to the podcast, father, wherever they are around the world. Bless them, guide them and their families. And God, my words here, father, please, in your son's name, we pray Amen.
Speaker 1:Have you made time for God today? Have you made time to read his word? Have you made time to pray, to talk to him, to listen to him? Is he your top priority? Is he the most important part of your day? If we really believe all of this stuff, why wouldn't we be most concerned each day with spending time with God, with doing his will. I find myself often, when I am not really feeling like reading the Bible or praying, asking myself that question If you really believe this stuff, cope, why wouldn't you want to read the Bible before you do anything else? Why wouldn't you want to talk to God, to seek his guidance, his blessings, before anything else? We should. If you're married, do you act like it? I cannot tell you the number of times and I think this is on social media, but I think this is really representative of a lot of us as a whole today Talking about the fact that loving our spouse each day, the way that scripture lays out, is somehow a burden or oppressive.
Speaker 1:We don't have time or energy. That's really what you get a lot. Oppressive we don't have time or energy. That's really what you get a lot. And you get all sorts of excuses, from everything from work to children to needing me time, my own personal time, self-care. It's all nonsense, folks. The problem is that we have our priorities way out of line and we put so many things before our spouse that shouldn't be there. Nothing should be before our spouse before clinging to them, cleaving to them, besides God and Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit. Nothing Any day, not just some days every day. That's our job, folks. We have a job. It's very clear in Scripture what our jobs are as a husband and wife. The problem is we don't want to follow those often and we want to do our own thing.
Speaker 1:Galatians 5, verses 1-12. So Christ has truly set us free. Now make sure that you stay free and don't get tied up again in slavery to the law. Listen, I, paul, tell you this If you are counting on circumcision to make you right with God, then Christ will be of no benefit to you. I'll say it again. I'll say it again but we who live by the Spirit eagerly wait to receive by faith the righteousness God has promised to us. For when we place our faith in Christ Jesus, there is no benefit in being circumcised or being uncircumcised. What is important is faith expressing itself in love. You were running the race so well. Who has held you back from following the truth? It certainly isn't God, for he is the one who called you to freedom. This false teaching is like a little yeast that spreads through the whole batch of dough. I am trusting the Lord to keep you from believing false teachings. God will judge that person, whoever he is, who has been confusing you. Dear brothers and sisters, if I were still preaching that you must be circumcised, as some say I do, why am I still being persecuted? If I were no longer preaching salvation through the cross of Christ, no one would be offended. I just wish that those troublemakers who want to mutilate you by circumcision would mutilate themselves.
Speaker 1:Psalm 63, verses 1 through 11, regarding a time when David was in the wilderness of Judah. Oh God, you are my God. I earnestly search for you. My soul thirsts for you. My whole body longs for you In this parched and weary land where there is no water. I have seen you in your sanctuary and gazed upon your power and glory. Your unfailing love is better than life itself. How I praise you. I will praise you as long as I live, lifting up my hands to you in prayer. You satisfy me more than the richest feast. I will praise you with songs of joy. I lie awake thinking of you, meditating on you through the night. Because you are my helper. I sing for joy in the shadow of your wings. I cling to you. Your strong right hand holds me securely. But those plotting to destroy me, will come to ruin. They will go down into the depths of the earth. They will die by the sword and become the food of jackals. But the king will rejoice in God. All who swear to tell the truth will praise him, while liars will be silenced Proverbs 23,. 22. Listen to your father who gave you life, and don't despise your mother when she is old.
Speaker 1:A couple things out of Galatians, if you go back and you look at verses 2 all the way through verse 6. I don't feel like it's really. We don't have a controversial issue inside the church about circumcision today, but there's one issue that we do have that we've had for quite a while, and that is whether you belong to a particular denomination or not. Right, and you have certain people that claim to follow Christ that tell you if you don't belong to their denomination, then you can't be saved. And it sounds a lot like scripture here talking about if you're not circumcised, you can't be saved. And it cheapens and lessens the value of Jesus Christ, folks, because what it is really is it's people trying to make themselves right with God by belonging to a particular denomination, to try and find favor with God by belonging to a particular denomination instead of through Christ alone, right.
Speaker 1:Placing our faith in Jesus Christ. It doesn't matter what your denomination is, whether's roman, catholic or any protestant denomination, orthodox. The question is, is your faith in christ jesus not in any other person or any denomination right? And and the one of the ways that you can really see the truth of this is if you're out there and you're preaching Scripture and you're preaching salvation through the cross of Christ, right, like here in Galatians 11. If you're preaching salvation through the cross of Christ, nobody that claims to follow Jesus Christ should be offended by that. Anybody that claims to follow Christ and you're preaching salvation through the cross of Christ, they ought to be 100% on board with that. You might disagree on other smaller issues, but not that path to salvation. More concerned about their denomination, more concerned about whether you belong to the Roman Catholic Church or a Protestant denomination or a particular Orthodox denomination than they are, whether you are preaching salvation through the cross of Christ, and that kind of shows. That proves the point right there.
Speaker 1:And the last thing is, when you go back up and you look at verse 10, I'm trusting the Lord to keep you from believing false teachings. God will judge that person, whoever he is who has been confusing you. It's really dangerous for those people that are claiming false that you have to belong to a certain denomination, because not only do you have to question their own soul's future, right, because again, are they really putting their trust in Christ or are they putting their trust in you know this kind of analogy that we're going with here circumcision are they putting their trust in their denomination? Are they trying to make themselves right with God by being part of this denomination or by following Christ? And so it's endangering their own soul and then it's also endangering the souls of people that listen to them. Because you go back to verse 9, false teachings, right, it's like a little yeast that spreads through the whole batch of dough. So when you're out there saying, hey, you have to, christ isn't enough, you also have to belong to this particular denomination. That's obviously not true when you read scripture, and so it's really dangerous. At any rate, we'll move on. Medal of Honor for today. We'll move on. Medal of Honor for today.
Speaker 1:Bernard Pius Bell, technical Sergeant. World War II, india Company, 142nd Infantry, 36th Infantry Division, us Army, 18 December 1944, middleware, france if that's even remotely close. For fighting gallantly at Middleware, france, if that's even remotely close For fighting gallantly at Little Ware, france, on the morning of 18 December 1944, he led a squad against a schoolhouse held by enemy troops. While his men covered him, he dashed toward the building, surprised two guards at the door and took them prisoner without firing a shot. He found that other Germans were in the cellar. These he threatened with hand grenades, forcing 26 in all to emerge and surrender. His squad then occupied the building and prepared to defend it against powerful enemy action. The next day the enemy poured artillery and mortar barrages into the position, disrupting communications which technical sergeant bell repeatedly repaired under heavy small arms fires. He crossed dangerous terrain to keep his company commander informed of his squad's situation. During the day, several prisoners were taken and other Germans killed.
Speaker 1:When hostile forces were attracted to the schoolhouse by the sound of captured German weapons fired by the Americans, at dawn the next day the enemy prepared to assault the building. At dawn the next day, the enemy prepared to assault the building. A German tank fired round after round into enemy foot soldiers attempting to reach the American position. And when this force broke and attempted to retire, he directed deadly machine gun fire and rifle fire into their disorganized ranks, calling for armored support to blast out the German troops hidden behind a wall. He unhesitatingly exposed himself to heavy small arms fire to stand beside a friendly tank and tell its occupants where to rip holes and walls protecting approaches to the school building. He then trained machine guns on the gaps and mowed down all hostile troops attempting to cross the openings to get closer to the school building. By his intrepidity and bold, aggressive leadership, technical Sergeant Bell enabled his eight-man squad to drive back approximately 150 of the enemy, killing at least 87 and capturing 42. Personally, he killed more than 20 and captured 33 prisoners Accredited to New York, new York, not awarded.
Speaker 1:Posthumously. Presented August 23, 1945 at the White House by President Harry S Truman. Presented August 23, 1945 at the White House by President Harry S Truman. Born December 29, 1911, grantsville, calhoun County, west Virginia, united States. Died January 11, 1971. Delano, florida. Buried Arlington National Cemetery 25, tech 3840, arlington, virginia, united States. Location of metal Mason County Public Library, mason City, west Virginia.
Speaker 1:Bernard Pius Bell Yet again another name, folks, that we desperately need to remember, more than lyrics of modern singers or statistics, or names of athletes or lines to movies, for that matter. I'm guilty of all of those, by the way. Couple more quotes before we shut down for the day. Charles Carroll Without morals, a republic cannot subsist any length of time. They, therefore, who are decrying the Christian religion, whose morality is so sublime and pure, are undermining the solid foundation of morals, the best security for the duration of free governments. Charles Carroll was a signer of the Declaration of Independence.
Speaker 1:Anybody that's attacking Christianity or seeking to replace Christianity or pretend that any other religion like Islam or Buddhism or Hinduism or atheism or Judaism and it's equal to Christianity and it's equal to Christianity, all they're really doing is undermining the solid foundation of morals which, as Carol says here, that's the best security for the duration of free government. So, if you've got somebody that is really interested in liberty, they're going to promote Christianity, regardless of whether they sues Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior or not. Which again, folks, if you're in that boat, I cannot highly recommend that you fix that today. I cannot highly recommend that enough that you fix that today. But anytime you see somebody trying to lower Christianity to the level of imposters or try and push Christianity out of our institutions, constitutions, you know that they're not really interested in strengthening our republic and they're not really interested in free governments and freedom and liberty, and they're not really interested in free governments, in freedom and liberty.
Speaker 1:John Hancock, principally and first of all, I give and recommend my soul into the hands of God that gave it, and my body I recommend to the earth, nothing doubting. But at the general resurrection I shall receive the same again, by the mercy and power of God. And one more, henry Knox, to the supreme head of the universe, to the great and tremendous Jehovah, who created the universal frame of nature, world and systems in number infinite, to this awfully sublime being do I resign my spirit with unlimited confidence? Just a couple of examples.
Speaker 1:When people tell you that our founding generation didn't have a strong faith, it's just not true, folks. It's detached from reality, from history, from experience. It's detached from reality, from history, from experience. Our founding generation had an extremely great faith overall in God, the Father and Jesus Christ, the Son. And our nation can only survive with a people that have that faith, as the majority of people, and who follow those principles of Christ. Our republic will not survive in any form that produces liberty without that. God bless you all. God bless your families, your marriages. God bless America. God bless your nation, wherever you are around the world. Listen, folks, we'll talk to you all again real soon. Looking forward to it.