A poetry reading on this Christmas Eve, from the great T.S. Eliot. He starts by quoting a Christmas sermon from 1622 and then ends with a line I hope to think of every day this year.

Welcome to Politics by Faith, a very special Christmas Eve edition. Taking a time out from preparing Christmas Eve and a little bit of prep on Christmas Day's feast for a quick poetry reading. 

T . S. Eliot became a Christian when he was 38 years old. There's a lot to share there in his journey as well, but this poem of his was his proclamation of becoming a Christian. It's called The Journey of the Magi. He wrote it in 1927. It starts off with a quote. 

A cold cuts three stanzas. A cold coming, we had of it. Just the worst time of the year for a journey. Such a long journey. The waves deep and the weather sharp. The very dead of winter. 

That quote is a paraphrase of a Christmas sermon that was given in 1622 by Lancelot Andrews. How about that for a name? Lancelot Andrews. The original line is, so this is the preacher speaking of the Magi. T . S. 

Eliot's poem is from the perspective of the Magi, so he changes a little bit there, but here's the original sermon. A cold coming they had of it at this time of year, just the worst time of the year to take a journey, and especially a long journey. The waves deep, the weather sharp, the days short, the sun farthest off, the very dead of winter. Let me read a little more from that sermon, actually. It's so good. Come is soon said, but a short word, but many a wide and weary step they made. 

before they could come to say lo here we are come and at our journey's end it's like easy to be like yeah yeah we're coming this was a journey we don't exactly know but somewhere between 500 and 900 miles maybe took one to three months for the magic. We just read about it in a sentence or two in the Bible. And we're like, oh yeah, they saw a star and they followed it and they arrived. You're like, well, hold on. That's a very long journey, a miserable journey. 

And certainly a journey that somewhere along the line, one of the guys had to be like, meh, are we, do we really want to do this? Do we need to do this? We just do something else instead. Should we just turn around? Should we turn around? We should turn around. 

Shouldn't we turn around? 

Months. 

Of this journey, the preacher goes on, we must consider the distance of the place they came from. It was not hard as by the shepherds. This was riding many a hundred miles. The shepherds only came a little bit. The way they came was through deserts, all the way waste and desolate. It was exceedingly dangerous through the midst of thieves and cutthroats. 

At the time of their coming, the season of the year, it was no summer progress. A cold coming they had of it at this time of year, just the worst time to take a journey. And he goes on, that's where the weather deep, sharp, days short. And these difficulties they overcame of a wearisome, dangerous, unseasonable journey. And for all this, they came to see Jesus because there was a star. These pagans saw a star. 

That's what they did. They studied the stars. If you heard our interview with Lee Strobel recently, he talked about how these were people who studied stars. So they would have noticed something odd and they followed it. Just hard for us to imagine, right? Navigation by the stars. 

They did that back then. Okay. Let's keep going. So that's just the first little opening quote. And then so T . S. 

Eliot then speaks just like this preacher did about how difficult this journey was. And the camels galled, sore -footed, refractory, lying down in the melting snow. 

There were times we regretted. 

The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces and the silken girls bringing sherbert. This is what they left. Then the camel men cursing and grumbling and running away and wanting their liquor and women. And the night fires going out and the lack of shelters and the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly and the villages dirty and charging high prices. A hard time we had of it. At the end, we preferred to travel all night, sleeping in snatches with the voices singing in our ears, saying that this was all folly. 

What are we doing? Look what we left. We left a beautiful place for this. And all day, sleeping in snatches, singing in our voices, singing in our ears, saying, what are we doing? Let's go to stanza number two. Then at dawn, we came down to a temperate valley, wet below the snow line, smelling of vegetation with a running stream and a water mill beating the darkness and three trees on the low sky. 

And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow. Then we came to a tavern with vine leaves over the lintel, six hands at an open door, dicing for pieces of silver and feet kicking the empty wine skins. But there was no information. And so we continued and arrived that evening. Not a moment too soon finding the place. It was, you may say, satisfactory. 

You can go back and listen to that stanza again and, or better yet, you read it and you can see, maybe easier to see, the, um, all the allusions to Jesus. Three trees. for the three chords. A white horse. Maybe the water mill beating the darkness is baptism. We have a river here, like a water river of life. 

We have dice, right? Casting of lots. Jesus is the vine. We have wineskins. A lot of biblical imagery here as they're on their journey. And essays and essays could be written about the last line of this penultimate stanza. 

And arriving at evening, not a moment too soon, finding the place, it was, you may say, satisfactory. When I first hear the word satisfactory, I think, uh, it's like, uh, all right, I guess. I guess it's fine. It's like a motel six or something like, all right, like it's a bad, I guess, I guess it's fine. Right. But no, that's not what satisfactory meant. 

So I went back to Webster's 1828 dictionary. Satisfactory, a most wise and sufficient means of salvation by the satisfactory. 

and meritorious death and obedience of the incarnate Son of God, Jesus Christ. 

" That's their definition of the word satisfactory. It means Christ is the satisfaction of the law. Satisfied. We've turned satisfied into a performance review. Satisfactory, not satisfactory, above satisfactory. Satisfactory is amazing. 

Satisfactory is unbelievably profound. We have this long and this constant longing that we can never fulfill until we die and go to heaven to be satisfied. And Jesus was the price paid. His death on the cross was the price paid for our sins. It's satisfied. It was satisfactory. 

So it shouldn't be read, and arrived that evening, not a moment too soon, finding the place. Were we led all that way for birth? There was a birth, certainly. We had evidence, no doubt. I had seen birth and death, but I thought they were different. This birth was hard and bitter agony for us, like death, our death. 

We returned to our places, these kingdoms, but no longer at ease here. And the old dispensation, just way of things, and our old way of things. With an alien people clutching their gods, I should be glad of another death. No longer at ease here. Everything's different for them. It's the same. 

The place is the same, but they are different. They now see these alien people clutching their gods. They saw Jesus. And we know Jesus. We put to death our old ways. Once they saw the Savior, the old way of things for them was a death. 

Just like when we become Christians. And they didn't feel at ease where they were anymore. And neither should we. Our real home is heaven. Hence this unbelievable last line, I should be glad of another death. I think of the story of the Magi as a bit of an odd placement in the Bible. 

I love that like I'm a Like, I'm the editor. I mean, I don't know, God. I don't know if you really needed to put this part in here. It seems a little random. God put it in there for a reason. He wanted us to know the Magi as a part of the birth of Jesus. 

And I don't think it was just plot development to get Herod involved and all. He wanted us to know their story. And I love this poem. 

It's a nice reminder that God came with us, Emmanuel, to save us so we can go to heaven. 

We are with an alien people clutching their gods down here. I should be glad of another death. Merry Christmas. Mike Slater dot Locals dot com. Transcript commercial free on the website. Mike Slater dot Locals dot com.

Homeland Security quoted a line from Thomas Paine's "American Crisis". This post from DHS reminded me that it is almost the 249th anniversary of George Washington crossing the Delaware. We should understand Revelation 6, which Paine referenced in his essay and which was read to the men in Washington's Army.

Welcome to Politics by Faith. Thanks for being here. The other day, yesterday, I believe it was, we quoted John Locke with his Appeal to Heaven, which made it to the George Washington approved, commissioned flag. Appeal to Heaven, a quote on Judges 1127, John Locke and his second treatise of government. Today, I want to go from John Locke to Thomas Paine. Thomas Paine, during the Revolutionary War, in the beginning of it, we were losing. 

We were getting crushed battle after battle. And Thomas Paine wrote The American Crisis, a series of 13 essays, in order to boost morale. A lot of famous lines in there. These are the times that try men's souls, one of them. I just want to share some of it here. He starts off explaining the desperateness of the situation. 

He says, let it be told to the future world that in the depth of winter, when nothing but hope and virtue could survive, that the city and the country, alarmed at one common danger, came forth to meet and to repulse it. The heart that feels not now is dead. The blood of his children will curse his cowardice, who shrinks back at a time when a little might have saved the whole. I love the man that can smile in trouble, that can gather strength from distress and grow brave by reflection. Tis the business of little minds to shrink, but he whose heart is firm and whose conscience approves his conduct will pursue his principles unto death. " So I'm just imagining being 1776 and you're in this country that's getting attacked by the king and how desperate the situation is and reading this. 

is to myself as straight and clear as a ray of light, not all the treasures of the world, so far as I believe, could have endured. me to support an offensive war, for I think it murder. But if a thief breaks into my house, burns and destroys my property, and kills or threatens to kill me, or those that are in it, and to bind me in all cases whatsoever to his absolute will, am I to suffer it? Of course not. " And then he makes a reference to Revelation 6 .16. That's why I'm talking about it now here in the Politics by Faith podcast. Revelation 6 .16. He doesn't quote Revelation 6 .16. He was so familiar, and so was his audience, so familiar with Revelation 6 .16 that he could just talk of it. Most historians today overlook how often our founding fathers would quote the Bible, because if you have no biblical knowledge of your own, you would miss this. You wouldn't even recognize that it was of the Bible because he doesn't say, as it says in Revelation 6, it doesn't say that. It just says these words. I conceive likewise a horrid idea in receiving mercy from a being who at the last day, so he's talking about if we lose this war, Even if they were to grant me mercy, I conceive it a horrid idea of receiving mercy from a being who at the last day shall be shrieking to the rocks and mountains to cover him and fleeing with terror from the orphan, the widow and the slain of America." That's Revelation 6, 16. 

So he's talking about how the British, even if they win this war, they will be cursed by God. They will be like people on the Latin, the last days. I'll wrap up with Revelation 6, 16 at the end of this podcast here. But the British too will be taken out by God, crying to God for forgiveness. for their sins. " Thomas Paine says, there are cases which cannot be overdone by language and this is one. 

And then he goes on and he says this, which Department of Homeland Security posted the other day with a painting of George Washington crossing the Delaware. Not the famous one, a different one, but still a great painting of Washington crossing the Delaware. Paine said, I thank God that I fear not. I mean, it just went through a pretty horrific description of the state of things, but his turn is, I thank God that I fear not. I see no real cause for fear. I know our situation well and can see the way out of it. 

I saw Homeland Security posted that and under it, someone posted a meme with that painting and it says, Americans will cross a frozen river to kill you in your sleep on Christmas. Literally not kidding. We've done that before. Which brings me to December 26th, 1776, 249 years ago. It's always fascinating to me how we look back on history and we think, oh, well, of course it turned out that way. Of course we won World War II. 

Of course we won the Revolutionary War. Of course, George Washington made it across the Delaware. Of course, we invented the atom bomb first. Of course, of course, of course, we made it to the moon, whatever. Of course, we did this thing. Of course, the Wright brothers were the first to invent. 

No, not even close. All these things that we look back on and think, well, yeah, of course it went this way. They're all miracles. And George Washington crossing the Delaware coming out to about 249 years ago was absolutely one of those miracles. His men were starving. It was freezing cold. 

It was in the 20s. There was a nor 'easter. The wind, they wrote, cut like a knife, driving sleet and snow. Many of them had no shoes. And they went on a three mile hike to get to the river by midnight. Three, three mile hike, 20 degrees, not wearing anywhere near proper attire, pitch black to get to the starting point of the mission. 

And that's when George Washington, 2 ,400 men, 18 cannons, 200 horses crossed the Delaware. Well, of course that worked. No, there were two other crossings planned at the same time or attempted, I should say. So three in total, two of them never made it. They never made it. The ice was too thick. 

The plan was too preposterous. And George Washington himself, the group he was in, he was about to abort too. They were three hours behind schedule. So by the time they made it across, if they made it across, there was still another 10 mile hike that would take another five hours. So they'd get there after the sun came up, they would lose the surprise and they'd all be killed. But he decided in his own words, quote, push on. 

Thank God they did. 22 enemy soldiers were killed, 98 wounded. The Americans captured a thousand prisoners. Only three Americans were killed in the Battle of Trenton, thanks to George Washington's crossing of the Delaware. And this was the turning point. It should not have worked. 

Conditions couldn't have been worse. They fought through a Nor 'easter. Thomas Paine published his first essay on December 19th, 1776 in Philadelphia. It was read to George Washington's troops on December 23rd, 1776. Right before, on Christmas Day, they crossed the Delaware. These are the times that try men's souls. 

The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of his country. But he that stands it now deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered. Yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. Let's go to Revelation 6, which Thomas Paine knew intimately enough to reference as an offhand imagery, and that the American people and the people fighting, crossing that Delaware, knew so well that it was powerful and meaningful to them. Revelation 6 is about the six seals on the white horse, red horse, black horse, pale horse. 

Then we finally get to the fifth. Let me quote here. When he, Jesus, opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain for the word of God and for the testimony which they held. And they cried with a loud voice, saying, How long, O Lord, holy and true, until you judge and avenge our blood on those who dwell on the earth? Then a white robe was given to each of them, and it was said to them that they should rest a little while longer, until both the number of their fellow servants and their brethren, who would be killed as they were, was completed. When all the martyrs are made, God will set it right. 

Then the sixth season began. This is the one that Thomas Paine was referencing. I looked when he opened Jesus opened the sixth seal and behold there was a great earthquake and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair and the moon became like blood and the stars of heaven fell to the earth as a fig tree drops its late figs when it's shaken by a mighty wind then the sky receded as a scroll when it's opened up and every mountain island was moved out of its place and here it is the kings of the earth The great men, the rich men, the commanders, the mighty men, every slave and every free man hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains. 

Okay. 

They hid themselves and said, let me go back to Thomas Paine. He said, I conceive likewise, a horrid idea and receiving mercy from a being who at the last day shall be shrieking to the rocks and mountains to cover him. Here's revelation 616. So everyone, great men, mighty men, commanders, kings of the earth. They shall hide in the caves and rocks of the mountains and said to the mountains and rocks, fall on us and hide us from the face of him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the lamb for the great day of his wrath has come. And who is able to stand all the mighty Kings, all the great men, everyone brought low. 

It's so bad. They're begging the rocks to fall on them and crush them and kill them rather than face God or in this case, the wrath of the lamb. And that's the final point I want to make here. coming up on Christmas. The wrath of the lamb in Revelation 6. The lamb we think of as the gentle lamb, the baby who we are. 

celebrating coming to earth, Emmanuel, God with us, right? Maybe you'll see some Christmas plays or whatever. That's a little baby, right? This innocent little precious baby, the gentle lamb. Well, his judgment in Revelation 6 is so dreadful that all the mighty kings and great strong men will plead to die, plead to be crushed by rocks rather than face him. So let us celebrate first George Washington and the men who crossed the Delaware. 

Coming up here on the 249th anniversary of that, let us celebrate Jesus as a baby. And also let us know that the wrath of the lamb will happen. Let's not be the people begging to be crushed by rocks rather than face him. We should be people who run to Jesus as a place of refuge, not people who run to caves, begging to be crushed to death. I'll end here. Could go on forever about this. 

Go to Revelation 16. This is the pouring out of the bowls. And this is the third, the third angel poured out the bowl on the rivers and springs of water and they became blood. And I heard the angel of the waters saying, you are righteous. So Lord, so you're thinking you hear all these, this wrath and it's horrible and awful. And here's, here's an angel saying you are righteous. 

So Lord, the one who is and who was and who is to be, because you have judged these things for, they have shed the blood of saints and prophets and you have given them blood to drink. So that's their punishment. They shed the blood. Their punishment is they have to drink the blood for it is their due. And I heard from. I heard another from the altar saying, Even so, Lord God Almighty, true and righteous 

are your judgments. Even in the midst of what we may look at today and think horrible, rough, whatever. From our perspective, God is good. God is good. His punishments are fair and appropriate and just. So repent, run to him, make him Lord of your life. 

Merry Christmas. Mike Slater, not your normal Christmas message. MikeSlater . Locals . com. Transcript commercial free. It's all on that website. MikeSlater .

Two topics on today's podcast: I love when the Appeal To Heaven flag returns to the news. Also, too many families know what the Reiner family went through with an addict son.

Welcome to Politics by Faith. Thanks for being here. I want to talk about Rob Reiner in a moment. Let me get this out off my chest first. Every once in a while, this flag comes up in the news and it's great when it does. The latest is a USA Today report. 

The congressional reporter at USA Today found a Christian nationalist flag. In his words, a controversial Christian nationalist flag. This one hanging outside the DC office of a top education department official. This USA Today reporter is very upset because this is the flag that was raised by rioters during the January 6th insurrection. Don't remember it there, but I'm sure someone had the flag. It's the same flag that flew at Sam Alito's house. 

Unbelievable. 

It's the Appeal to Heaven flag. It's a white flag with a tree in the middle and in black letters on the top it says Appeal to Heaven. Now this USA Today reporter, after being roundly criticized online, deleted the tweet and he wrote back, this flag is more accurately described as quote, a symbol associated with Christian nationalism. Why? Because when you call it a Christian nationalist flag, it makes it sound like the January Sixers made it up a couple of years ago. It's a brand new flag that they just made up themselves. 

The appeal to heaven flag was commissioned by George Washington. The tree, the pine tree in the middle was a symbol of new England. It's a symbol of, uh, well, it's a symbol of tyranny too, because the colonists, There were all these regulations that the crown put on the colonies of harvesting our own timber. The King's officials would come by and they would mark the best pine trees. It was an Eastern white pine. They'd mark the best pine trees for the King's Royal Navy, but they were our trees. 

and we wanted to use them for our boats. So the pine tree became a symbol of resistance and a symbol of independence and a symbol of our Navy, the boats, our boats that we'd use the trees for. There was also something called the Pine Tree Riot in New Hampshire in 1772. So that's the pine tree. The appeal to heaven comes from John Locke on his second treatise of government. And his point was that if you don't have anyone else to appeal to, in our case, appealing for freedom, then your ultimate appeal comes from heaven. 

He wrote, sufferers who have no, who having no appeal on earth to write them, they are left to the only remedy in which cases, in such cases, an appeal to heaven. And he quotes judges 1127, which says, you go a little bit back actually. Therefore, I have not sinned against you, but you wronged me by fighting against me. May the Lord, the judge. render judgment this day between the children of Israel and the people of Amman. So we have lacking a human court. 

The Jephthah must appeal directly to God and appeal to heaven. I love this story and I love when this flag pops up every once in a while because it highlights a few realities. One, that people have no idea about our history. That's sad. We should all know this flag. Everyone should be intimately aware of what this flag is. 

Second, how ignorant people are about our Christian roots and our Christian founding. where they see this flag and appeal to heaven and they're like, Oh, that must be some crazy evangelical Christian nationalism. George Washington, okay, appeal to heaven. George Washington commissioned the flag. John Locke wrote about it. And to prove how far we have to go still, that flag 

and the concept of an appeal to heaven should not be controversial. Go get the flag yourself. Fly it high, fly it proud. All right, let's talk about Rob Reiner and this horrible, tragic story. Rob Reiner's wife murdered by their son with a knife, slit throats, where it's reported. It's worth, as horrible as it is, I think it's worth taking a minute. 

I think it's important to take a minute to consider, to imagine this. And what Rob Reiner must have been thinking, and his wife must have been thinking, one of them saw the other die. They saw their son do it. The fear that... I don't even know. 

I don't even know. 

Just go there for a minute. It's important to do that, I think. It's about as awful as it gets. I don't know if there's a family, obviously. They made a movie together, Rob Reiner and his son, Nick. It's called Being Charlie, about their experience with addiction. 

Nick went to a It's called rehab for the first time when he was 15. He's been 17 times. He's been homeless in many different States before. I've seen three family photos and everyone in the family looks very happy and healthy and rich except for Nick. He's standing there, but he's not there at all. He's not wearing appropriate clothes that everyone else is wearing. 

And his eyes, his eyes are totally spaced out. It's just not, not there. And it's very sad. And I know this is very relatable for a lot of people. of families as well. I don't know enough about addiction. 

I'm just gonna be honest. I'm tangentially connected. I'm in no position to give any advice at all. What is the balance between people, you know, back in the day we used to say, you have a couple screws loose. That was the old expression. And how much of it comes from, like people are born that way versus how much of it is trauma from childhood. 

What the amounts are of each, I don't know. But I do know, and this is going to be next week's or this week's special is Spiritual Warfare is Real. I know it's real, and I know that plays a role. The Bible talks about alcoholism. Talk about nothing new under the sun. It's there. 

Isaiah 5, 1. Woe to those who rise early in the morning, that may run after strong drink, who tarry late into the evenings as wine inflames them. Titus 2, 3. Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine, not being a slave to wine. They are to teach what is good. It's a sin. 

And if you're addicted, you are a slave to it. It doesn't end well. Woe to those. Romans 6 20. It says, but when you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. But what fruit were you getting at the time from the things of which you are now ashamed? 

For the end of those things is death. If you're a slave to sin, what do you get from it? Nothing. The end is death. I don't know how to break addictions other than the same way we break any sin. The only way to break sin, and that's through salvation with a new heart. 

We played the clip the other day of Jelly Roll on Joe Rogan's show, talking about a new heart, a new creation, not a slightly modified heart, not fixed a little bit here or there, a new creation, a new heart. Romans 6 .11 talks about being dead to the power of sin and alive to God through Christ Jesus. It's the only way to do it. My TV producer sent me a note the other day. It's something I'm thinking about a lot lately. Everyone's always like thoughts and prayers. 

You hear it all the time. Whenever there's a tragedy or thoughts and prayers, thoughts and prayers or thoughts and prayers go with now. Thoughts is the most ridiculous thing ever, but I'm setting my thoughts. I don't even know what that means. Really. It's definitely become an odd trite thing to say thoughts and prayers, but the prayers part is interesting too, because as my producer said, why not just pray right there? 

Thoughts and prayers is essentially a social way of acknowledging a situation, but not actually praying. Notice this in churches a lot too. You'll be seeing people in the hallways of the church and someone will share something. Oh man, I'll pray for you. And then you go on. And how many people actually pray for the person later? 

How often does that happen? Maybe a lot. I don't think so. Not enough. As opposed to, pray right there. Here's my challenge. 

If someone says something to you in church this Sunday, instead of saying, man, I'm going to pray for you about that. How about let's pray right now and just do it. Let's do it right there. No one will think you're weird. That's the place to do it. Now you do it anywhere, but that's a good place too. 

It's not an odd, it shouldn't be out of character to pray in the church building. What may be out of character is to pray on a podcast. Dear Heavenly Father, I want to pray for everyone who's going through addiction right now. Way too many people, God. I want to pray that you can break their addiction, give them a new heart and have the Holy Spirit speak so clearly to them that they can focus on you. and focus on good things. 

God, I pray for peace for families that are going through addiction with family members. God, I'm having a hard time thinking of anything more difficult than that. I pray for peace for them and a clarity, God, that everything will be perfect in heaven. There will be no crying or pain or addiction in heaven, and I can't wait to be there. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. We talk about the Puritans a lot on this show, and they wrote often about how God has limited our comforts here. 

and how that is a blessing so that we don't cling to this life too tightly, but instead we long for what is to come. We long for eternity. Maybe that perspective, if you can relate to what the Reiner family went through for a long time, if you can relate, maybe that perspective can be helpful. That's all I got. mikeslater . locals . com. Transcript commercial free on the website mikeslater .