Scripture As A Compass

A lot of people claim they’d stand for truth under pressure. Acts 1 forces the harder question: would you still stand if it cost you everything? We start with Jesus appearing alive after His suffering, speaking about the kingdom of God, and promising the gift of the Holy Spirit. That promise is not abstract. It’s presented as power for witness, and we take a sober look at the reality that many of the apostles later faced horrific deaths, which makes their testimony harder to dismiss and harder to ignore.

From there, we bring Scripture into everyday life through Genesis 9 and the command to “be fruitful and multiply.” We talk plainly about biblical marriage, Christian family, and what happens when a culture treats God’s commands as optional. We also read how the early believers stay united in prayer and how they use the Psalms to guide a major leadership decision, then we pair that with Psalm 121’s picture of God’s protection and Proverbs 16:18’s warning that pride is the front door to collapse.

We also zoom out to American memory and public rhetoric. We highlight a Civil War Medal of Honor story that deserves more attention than celebrity noise, then we raise concerns about modern political language that echoes the 1930s, including anti-Semitic themes and the historical record of alliances that many people forget or deny. If you care about Christian theology, Acts 1 Bible study, American Christian heritage, and how faith should shape discernment in public life, this conversation is meant to challenge you.

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Transcript

Acts 1 Opens The Frame

SPEAKER_01 0:02

ACTA 1, starting with verse 3. During the forty days after he suffered and died, he appeared to the apostles from time to time, and he proved to them in many ways that he was actually alive, and he talked to them about the kingdom of God. Once when he was eating with them, he commanded them, Do not leave Jerusalem until the Father sends you the gift he promised, as I told you before. John baptized with water, but in just a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit. I think it's really important to remember often, and I don't remember often enough, that the apostles, most of them, died pretty horrifically. And you have to assume that they wouldn't have done that. Unless they had a really good reason to. Sentenced to 20 years. Ace arrested him after his release for deportation. He was a Mexican national who illegally re-entered the U.S. after a prior voluntary return. He had a criminal history, including this child murder.

Welcome And A Prayer For Discernment

SPEAKER_01 2:09

Hey folks, this is Jesse Cope, back with another episode of the American Soul Podcast. Hope y'all are doing well. Sure do appreciate y'all joining me here and on the America's Christian Heritage Podcast. Hope y'all enjoyed that last episode. We'll do one about every two weeks on Thursday. I think Thursday. Yeah, anyway. About every two weeks, same day. For those of y'all who continue to share the podcast with others, thank you. For those of y'all who continue to pray for me and for the podcast, thank you very much. Very, very grateful for your prayers. 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 of sins through the merit of your son, Jesus Christ. Thank you for all the blessings you've bestowed upon us as individuals and as a nation here in America and other nations around the world where people are listening. Give us insight, Father, courage, wisdom, understanding, perseverance, discernment. So much today. Father, help us to discern the difference between truth and lies, right and wrong. Be with our leaders, both in the pulpit and in the state. Be with their families. Protect them. Surround them with your angels. Be with those who are injured and ill, sick, comfort them.

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Help them to feel your presence. Draw them close to you. Forgive us our sins, Father. Be with those listening.

SPEAKER_01 3:49

Comfort them, be with their families, be with their children, bless their marriages. And guide my words here, Father, please, in your sons' name we pray. Amen.

Marriage And The Call To Multiply

SPEAKER_01 3:57

Marriage verses for today. Genesis 9, 1 and 7. Then God blessed Noah and his sons, saying to them, Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth. 7. As for you, be fertile and multiply. Populate the earth and multiply in it. Being fruitful and multiply was not just some random suggestion of God's folks. And you can see the damage that has been done by us ignoring. Whether you're talking about abortion and the fact that we've murdered 65 million plus of our own citizens here in America, and you know, numbers horrifically the same in other places around the world. Or whether you're talking about the fact that so many households that claim to be Christian have foregone having children, having as many children as God blessed them with. Again, where's your marriage advice come from? God. Wherever else you're getting it from, if it doesn't line up with what God says, you need to trash it.

Witness Power And Replacing Judas

SPEAKER_01 5:09

Acts 1, 1 through 26. In my first book, I told you, Theophilus, about everything Jesus began to do and teach until the day he was taken up to heaven after giving his apostles further instructions through the Holy Spirit. During the forty days after he suffered and died, he appeared to the apostles from time to time, and he proved to them in many ways that he was actually alive, and he talked to them about the kingdom of God. Once, when he was eating with them, he commanded them, Do not leave Jerusalem until the Father sends you the gift he promised, as I told you before. John baptized with water, but in just a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit. So when the apostles were with Jesus, they kept asking him, Lord, has our time come for you to free Israel and restore our kingdom? He replied, The Father alone has the authority to set those dates and times, and they are not for you to know. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, and you will be my witnesses, telling people about me everywhere, in Jerusalem, throughout Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. After saying this, he was taken up into the cloud while they were watching, and they could no longer see him. As they strained to see him rising into heaven, two white robed men suddenly stood among them. Men of Galilee, they said, Why are you standing here staring into heaven? Jesus has been taken from you into heaven, but some day he will return from heaven in the same way you saw him go. Then the apostles returned to Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives, a distance of half a mile. When they arrived, they went to the upstairs room of the house where they were staying. Here are the names of those who were present Peter, John, James, Andrew, Philip, Thomas, Bartholomew, Matthew, James, son of Alpheus, Simon the Zealot, and Judas, son of James. They all met together and were constantly united in prayer, along with Mary, the mother of Jesus, several other women and the brothers of Jesus. During this time, when about one hundred and twenty believers were together in one place, Peter stood up and addressed them. Brothers, he said, the scriptures had to be fulfilled concerning Judas, who guided those who arrested Jesus. This was predicted long ago by the Holy Spirit speaking through King David. Judas was one of us and shared in the ministry with us. Judas had bought a field with the money he received for his treachery. Falling headfirst there his body split open, spilling out all his intestines. The news of his death spread to all the people of Jerusalem, and they gave the place the Aramaic name Akeldama, which means field of blood. Peter continued, This was written in the book of Psalms, where it says, Let his home become desolate with no one living in it. It also says, Let someone else take his position. So now we must choose a replacement for Judas from among the men who were with us the entire time we were traveling with the Lord Jesus, from the time he was baptized by John until the day he was taken from us. Whoever is chosen will join us as a witness of Jesus' resurrection. So they nominated two men, Joseph, called Barsabbas, also known as Justice, and Matthew. Then they all prayed, O Lord, you know every heart, show us which of these men you have chosen as an apostle to replace Judas in the ministry, for he has deserted us and gone where he belongs. Then they cast lots, and Matthew was selected to become an apostle, with the other eleven. It's a little here, folks, but isn't it interesting that they were using Psalms, using ancient scripture here, saying, Let someone else take his position to guide them, right? Just like we're supposed to use scripture today to guide us, how often I fail there.

Psalms For Help And A Warning

SPEAKER_01 9:15

Psalm 128 or 121, 1 through 8. I look up to the mountains. Does my help come from there? My help comes from the Lord who made heaven and earth. He will not let you stumble. The one who watches over you will not slumber. Indeed, he who watches over Israel never slumbers or sleeps. The Lord Himself watches over you, the Lord stands beside you as your protective shade. The sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon by night at night. The Lord keeps you from all harm and watches over your life. The Lord keeps watch over you as you come and go, both now and forever. Proverbs 16, 18. Pride goes before destruction and haughtiness before a fall. Interesting. I was just thinking about that. Proverb earlier today or yesterday. Lord, I hope I'm not setting myself up for a fall. Help us to be humble, Father, to do your will. In your son's name we pray. Amen.

Reviews Donations And The Book Series

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If you are looking for a family-friendly, middle grade read, faith-filled, hopefully I manage to do that. Uh, along the lines of The Hobbit, Percy Jackson, Harry Potter, Narnia, Fablehaven, if you would check out the Countryside series. There's two books so far in the series. And if you enjoy them, if you would leave a review, those reviews help immensely. Others find the series, especially the five-star ones. Same thing for the podcast. If you feel like you're getting something out of it, if you would leave a review wherever you listen online, those five-star reviews help a great deal. And if you have five or $10 a month, which you can donate to the podcast, there's a link in the show notes where you can do that. I would be grateful for that. And also, hopefully, you're joining us over on the American or America's Christian Heritage podcast. We just started, uh, produced that every couple weeks, one episode every couple weeks. So a little deeper dive there into the history of our nation tied to God and Jesus Christ.

Illegal Entry And A Hotel Assault Case

SPEAKER_01 11:18

July 2025, near the Bell Hotel in Epping, which happened to be an asylum accommodation. You notice that trend, right? We put all of these illegals and Muslims up in these hotels, and what do so many of them do? They rape, pillage, destroy. I don't even know how to pronounce this name. Kabatu is the last name. 41-year-old Ethiopian national asylum seeker. Staying at the taxpayer-funded Bell Hotel, arrived illegally by small boats, so they break in, they hate our nation to begin with, and we're paying to set them up. He approached a 14-year-old girl who offered him pizza, attempted to kiss her, put his hand on her thigh, brushed her hair. He was also linked to assaulting another woman.

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Convicted of sexual assault.

A Medal Of Honor Worth Remembering

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Daniel G. Caldwell, our Medal of Honor winner for today. Really interesting, by the way. If you noticed about a week ago, there was a major, I think he was a lieutenant at the time of the action from Vietnam, who got awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions by President Trump about a week ago. Fascinating story. Daniel G. Caldwell, sergeant, highest rank, captain, U.S. Civil War, Hotel Company, 13 Pennsylvania Cavalry Volunteers, 117th Regiment. U.S. Army, February 6th, 1865, Hatchers Run, Virginia. In a mounted charge, Caldwell dashed into the center of the enemy's lines and captured the colors of the 33rd North Carolina Infantry. Not awarded posthumously, accredited to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Presented February 25th, 1865. Born June 1st, 1842, Marble Hill, Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, died April 15, 1917, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, buried Mount Peace Cemetery, HTAC 105, TAC 3, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Daniel G. Caldwell. Another one of those names we need to remember more than World Cup athletes or any other professional college sport athletes or their statistics, actors and actresses, movie or TV show lines, song lyrics, right?

Anti-Semitic Rhetoric And 1930s Echoes

SPEAKER_01 14:25

So the last couple days on the podcast, we've been talking about this phenomenon that's not modern, but it's reoccurring. It's shocking that it's reoccurring. Just shows how little history we know or pay attention to anymore. The number of supposedly Christian cultural political leaders who are using really nasty rhetoric that is so, so similar to what was seen in Nazi Germany in the 1930s and by those in Britain who were really huge proponents of pacifism and appeasement. They thought, you know, if we just give Hitler everything he wants, he'll leave us alone. Very much pro-Nazi sympathizers, anti-Semitic. And you see the same language today. We talked about that. Well, one of the things that you'll notice when you go back and really study history is the coordination between Islam and that whole bucket of isms: leftism, socialism, communism, Nazism, fascism, Marxism, right? You see it with the USSR and the countries that they backed. You still see it today with China. That's why you see that relationship between communist China, North Korea, Iran, the terrorist Muslims, right, which are just Muslims. It's why you saw it with Nazi Germany. You know, you you just consistently, these socialist, communist, leftist countries that coordinate with the Muslims. One of the examples from the 1930s is the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem. Uh Hajj Amin Al Husseini, if I said that right, uh, actively, openly worked with Nazi Germany, met Hitler in 1941, very pro-anti-Semitic, obviously, and worked to set alliances with the appeasers in Britain and the fascists in Italy under Mussolini working against Jewish immigration to Palestine. And and so you you saw this again. Um there's another one that I'm not familiar with. Um Clivedden set, uh one of the aristocratic circles that really looked on Arab Muslim nationalism as a counterweight to Jewish influence. And so you see the Muslim leftist connection has been around for a long time. Um and one of the words that you the catchphrases you often you'll hear them talk about Zionism, the Zionists. And I it just it's astounding to me that we're going down the same path today, folks. When you hear people just attacking the Jews, not necessarily attacking actions of Israel, which is a state, right, that they don't like or they don't approve of, that's one thing. But just the rhetoric of anti-Jewish anti-Semitism. And then you hear these same people really talking about, well, the Muslims, you know, they're not so bad. We can really work with them, despite the fact of just mountains of overwhelming evidence to the contrary. It's just astounding.

Lord’s Prayer And Closing Blessing

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Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day, our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us, and lead us not to temptation, but deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom of the power and the glory forever and ever. Amen. It's one of the reasons, as a final side note, folks, that we go over these examples on so many of the podcasts about the rape, pillage, and plunder by Muslims, just because those are actual events. That's not rhetoric. That's not what people want to make believe. That's events that have actually happened, just like this study that's come out where these quarter million British girls have been raped by Muslims. God bless y'all. God bless your families, your marriages, your children, your nation, wherever you are around the world listening. God bless America. We'll talk to y'all again real soon, folks. Looking forward to it.