Please subscripe to our podcast at youtube.com/@politicsbyfaith

If the president says he's going to bomb Iran, the left says he's a war criminal. When he doesn't bomb Iran, the left says he's a coward and always chickens out. You can't help the Trump deranged. But we can learn from 1 Samuel 15 on the importance of following God's Word completely. 

Welcome to Politics by Faith. This is where we take the news of the day and we bring it to the Bible. So you can walk away with peace and perspective. There's new headlines every day, but Ecclesiastes says there's nothing new under the sun. So thanks for being here to get the true story, the story of the day. Donald Trump chickens out. 

It's very funny if the left says that, well, let's say Trump says he wants to drop a bomb, right? Oh, he's committing a war crime. And then Trump doesn't drop the bomb. Oh, he's a chicken, a coward. You cannot win with the Trump deranged, which is fine. The very short of the story, Trump talked, he spoke loudly and carries a big stick. 

He talked a big game in a way that the people he was talking to, Muslim lunatics in Iran, would understand. They came to the negotiating table at the last minute because, again, the big stick part, he's used it. They know he will. So they negotiated and they agreed, Iran agreed to open the Strait of Hormuz. So Trump didn't attack. Great news. 

Now we'll see if they open up the Strait. That's all we want at this point is open up the Strait of Hormuz. If they do that, then we're probably done in Iran. It kind of depends who rises from the ashes. And if the people there can rise up and run their country, we'll see what they're able to do. But this is possible that we're done in Iran at this point, if they open up the Now, if you lived online when this all happened, it was a dark and weird place, even more than usual. 

People very anxious about what was going to happen by the Trump administration. very anxious or confused when it didn't happen. And then people saying we lost the war and Trump showed weakness and it was all very bizarre and weird. Now on the Iran one part, there are a lot of people. First of all, there are a lot of people on MSNBC. Apparently, I didn't even think that people really thought this never even crossed my mind. 

When Trump said there will be a civilizational erasure, people on MSNBC were thinking that Trump was going to kill 90 million people. And Iran just bombed them all. 

What? 

He's been doing this for 11 years, guys. You still don't know his MO? You don't know how this works? 

Geez. 

Now, people even afterwards said that Trump lost and Iran is winning. Iran won. Iran came out ahead. They're the ones winning. So someone said, all right, let's flip it. Let's flip the script here for a second. 

Imagine Iran killed Trump in the first five minutes of the war. established air superiority over the U . 

S. 

mainland, wiped out the entire U . 

S. 

Air Force, U . S. Navy, killed half the cabinet, flattened the U . S. military -industrial complex, then started building runways in Missouri to land Iranian troops without losing any casualties. Would you say that it was a U . 

S. victory if America managed to keep the Panama Canal closed for a couple weeks? I don't think anyone would say that that was a U . S. victory, so how on earth could you say this is an Iranian victory? Now, before we get to the biblical story of the day, I have two frustrations that I would like to share. 

Let me try to do this quick. So, number one, it's very frustrating that we are unable as a country to talk about what is good and right and proper without having to run it through the prism or framework that is the midterms. We've got the midterms coming up eight months from now. we have an election. So we can't talk about if it's good to do anything. It always has to be, well, how is it going to affect the midterms? 

Okay, well, what are these midterms? Well, this is when the people vote. On what? Gas prices. That's it. Just gas prices. 

That's the only thing people vote on, apparently, is gas prices. Okay, so what happens if gas prices are $3 .20 a gallon? They vote for Republicans. 

All right. 

What if gas is $3 .86? Oh, Democrats. Hold on. Democrats want gas to be $10 a gallon. That's what they want. And you're going to vote because gas is a little too high for your liking. 

You're going to vote for the Democrats who want it even worse. If that makes sense. And then you're like, all right, fine. The election's about gas prices. Okay. Well, who sets the gas prices? 

Oil futures markets, which is based off of what people think gas will cost later. Okay. That's not, I'm not going to analyze a thing, war in Iran, or deporting the U . S. or whatever the thing is. I'm not going to analyze that through the prism of the midterms, which is decided by voters who only care about gas prices, which are determined by future oils markets of predictions of what, like that's not happening. And Trump doesn't either. 

Trump only cares about what is right and he's going to do it now. He doesn't worry about timing. Maybe he'll worry a little bit about the timing, he'll tend to drop bombs on Fridays, but that's only because he doesn't want people in the stock market to freak out unnecessarily. Give it two days, he'll know, and people will be fine about it on Monday. But big picture timing, Trump doesn't care, just does what is right. And I am frustrated that we, every time we're faced with something like this, 

it through the midterm matrix. All right, second frustration. This perception or this opinion, I hear it a lot. Matt Walsh articulates it well. I love Matt Walsh, big fan. He said, Americans are suffering. 

It's way too expensive out there to live for most families. Our cities are not safe. Our country's being transformed every day by foreign migration. Our elections are not secure. The SAVE Act was not passed and won't be passed. Okay, I agree with all those problems. 

Then he says, it's time to end this war on Iran and focus on our country, our people, our future. Far too much of Trump's second term has been spent on foreign adventures. It has to end, turn the attention back home. Matt Walsh and I, same team, not a criticism of him at all. First of all, MAGA does not mean non -intervention. It does not mean isolationist. 

It means what's in America's best interest, and that may sometimes involve foreign adventures. That's the first thing. Second, the economy, the country doesn't work. where something only happens if Trump is staring at it, and if Trump's not staring at it, then the thing does, everything else stops. The best example I can think about this, to make this clear, is let's say the Memphis Safe Task Force. Matt Walsh talked about our cities aren't safe. 

Memphis Safe Task Force. It's not like because Trump is looking at Iran right now, at the moment, he's staring at it, that the Memphis Safe Task Force over here is just at a standstill. We can't do anything, we're stuck. Why not? 

Why can't you guys do anything? 

Well, Trump's not staring at us at the moment. We have to wait till Trump's staring. Well, can't you just do what you told you to do? No, we can't do anything. We can't. We have to stop here. 

Oh, wait, he's looking at us now. Okay, back to work, everyone. And then for like a couple hours, Trump's looking at us. at that. And then he got to stop his work. He's back on Iran. 

He tweeted about Iran. We're done. We can't do anything anymore. All these things still happen. Trump, Trump's the CEO. So he has, I don't know how many buildings he ever had, like 50 buildings. 

Maybe he doesn't. It's not like when he's working on one building, all the other buildings are like, ah, we're closed. No, you can't stay here, can't golf here. Sorry, Trump's not staring at us at the moment. No, Trump says, you go fix the thing. You're in charge of that building. 

You're in charge of that building. Go get it done. So there's just this frustration that people have about the Iran war, again, not looking at it objectively. And you could be against Iran or what Trump's doing in Iran. You could be against it. But I don't think it's a fair or wise argument to be against it because, well, we have other stuff at home to focus on. 

Like, yeah, of course we do. Those things are still being done. A couple weeks ago, we talked to a guy who's running a mine for rare earth metals in Arkansas. He's still doing that. They're still mining for rare earths in Arkansas. It's not like he's like, ah, president's not paying attention to me at the very moment. 

I guess I'll just sit at home and do nothing. Like things are still going on. Berta wrote me a note. She said, as for things not getting done, if Trump's not looking directly at them, I have a way to dumb it down. If you load your dishwasher and turn it on, you don't have to stand over for two hours while it runs. Oh, Berta, that's so good. 

It's the same with the washing machine and dryer. If you hire someone to do a job repairing a car or your house, you can go about your business while the job gets done by someone else. Trump hires competent people and delegates jobs and they usually get it done. Well done, Berta. Perfect. Okay. 

That really had nothing to do with this so much as I just wanted to get those. Alright, what's broken about the current moment? People are very anxious about war. That's what I want to talk about here. People are very anxious about war. I want to tell a story. 

1 Samuel 15. So you've got the prophet Samuel and you've got the king of Israel Saul. We'll start in verse 3. God told Samuel to tell Saul, now go and strike Amalek and devote, like a town, a city, and devote to destruction all they have. Do not spare them, God says, but kill both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey. I want to share this because people get very uneasy about the scripture. 

You often hear people who are not Christian criticize Christians for this story right here. Now I skipped over the first part. Let's go to first Samuel 15 verse two. Thus says the Lord of hosts. I have noted because you think, well, why, why, why, why, why kill everything and everyone in Amalek? What's up? 

Well, God says, I have noted what Amalek did to Israel in opposing them on the way when they came up from Egypt. This was a total judgment against the Amalekites. because of something they did centuries prior. They were the first people to attack the Israelites when they left Egypt. Bible talks about this a couple of times. Exodus 17, 14. 

Then the Lord said to Moses, write this as a memorial in a book and recite it in the ears of Joshua, that I will utterly blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven. And Moses built an altar and called the name of it. The Lord is my banner saying a hand upon the throne of the Lord. The Lord will have war with Amalek from generation to generation. Jeez, what are the... What did they do again? 

What did the Amalekites do to the Israelites, to God's people? Here's Deuteronomy 25. on the way when you were faint and weary and cut off your tail, like the back of the caravan, those who were lagging behind. And he did not fear God. Therefore, when the Lord your God has given you rest from all your enemies around you and the land of the Lord your God has given you for the inheritance to possess, you shall blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven. You shall not forget. 

" So here we are. The Israelites are, time has passed, and this is the time to do it. The Amalekites, to do what? Enact God's judgment. The Amalekites attacked the weakest of the Israelites, the youngest, for no reason. They just killed them. 

God hates it when the strong take cruel advantage over the weak. So let's go back to 1 Samuel 15, verse four. So Saul summoned the people and numbered them, 200 ,000 men on foot, 10 ,000 men in Judah. Saul came to the city of Amalek and lay in wait in the valley. Then Saul said to the Kenites, go, depart, go down from among the Amalekites, lest I destroy you with them. For you showered kindness to all the people of Israel when they came out of Egypt. 

So the Canaanites departed away from the Amalekites. So this is great. So the Canaanites, Saul says, Hey, we're not, we're not going to attack you. You go, go get out of the way. Because the Israelites, they don't want war for war's sake. And if I may, neither does Donald Trump. 

He doesn't want war. And the Israelites didn't want war here. They're like, you people go, get out of the way. Verse seven, and Saul defeated the Amalekites. And he took Agag, the king of the Amalekites, alive, and devoted to destruction all the people with the edge of the sword, but saw in the people spared Agag, and the best of the sheep, and of the oxen, and the fattened calves, and the lambs, and all that was good, and would not utterly destroy them. All that was despised and worthless, they devoted to destruction. 

" Uh -oh. 

Saul did not obey God. He did not destroy the Amalekites. He spared the king. I don't know why exactly, but he didn't. The armies back then were paid by plunder, but God said, destroy everything. They didn't. 

They destroyed the things they didn't want. They destroyed the useless things, the worthless things, but they kept the best of everything. They kept what they wanted. That's true for us too. We all have no problem obeying God's commands that are easy. But what about the commands that cost us something? 

That's when most fail. God said, I regret making Saul king. And because Saul did not kill all the Amalekites, they kept popping up in the Bible. They kept having to fight him over and over again. 1 Samuel 30 in your Bible might be entitled, David destroys the Amalekites. He had to fight them all over. 

And in 2 Samuel 1, this is the story of Saul's death. The man who pushed that sword in the final blow to kill King Saul was an Amalekite who Saul was supposed to take care of already, but he disobeyed God. So one point that people make here is that if you don't obey God completely, what you don't take care of will come back to haunt you. But I want to share this story here because people have a tough time with God calling on a people to wipe out an entire group of other people. It's God committing genocide. How could your good God do such a good thing? 

It's very simple because they were a wicked people. So I would advise everyone who has a tough time with this scripture to take note of what God can do to a wicked people. I don't want to follow any God who could do... Okay, but he can. That's God's judgment. You're going to question his judgment. 

I would advise you to not. Now on judgment, when Samuel did kill Agag, he said, as your sword has made women childless, so shall your mother be childless. God hates wanton killing. Now what actually is shocking is not God's wrath. That's not shocking at all. What's shocking is his love for us. 

God said the wages of sin is death. There should be no surprises there. But the fact that we can be made alive in Jesus, that's the absolute miracle. But back to the questioning of, of God's judgment. I think of Job 38, I recommend you read it all often 38, 39, 40. And the gist of it is God saying, who are you to question me, Job? 

Starts off, where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? And it just goes on beautifully to describe all these other things that prove that God is God. And it ends with, shall a fault finder contend with the Almighty? He who argues with God, let him answer. Go ahead, your turn, Job. Humans have, you know, I say partial knowledge, not zero knowledge, basically. 

The faintest amount. God has complete total knowledge and authority. Who are we to question him? The story of the Amalekites and his judgment. Now today, I know war is anxiety inducing, but we must trust that God has it under control. We must pray, but know that nothing thwarts God. 

No evil will get in God's way. I'll end with Psalm 2. Why do the nations rage? So the kings all gather up. They're like, Oh, let's, let's do this against God saying, let us burst their bonds apart and cast away their cords from us. Okay. 

What's God's response? I've set my king on Zion, my holy hill. If that God is, sounds like a mean God that you, uh, I recommend you worship him. YouTube . com slash at politics by faith. YouTube . 

com slash at politics by faith. If you give us a subscribe over there, that'd be awesome. It helps with the algorithm so we can together spread the word.

It is essential that every servicemember knows that, in America, we never leave a man behind. That hasn't been the case lately. But with the rescue of these two airmen, every servicemember knows it's true once again. Let's learn from the Bible about this principle from the life of Aristarchus.

Pam Bondi is the second cabinet member fired after Kristi Noem. What does this say about Trump's presidency? And how should we look at this after just celebrating Resurrection Sunday?

Welcome to Politics by Faith. It's the show where we take the news of the day and we bring it to the Bible. You can walk away with peace and perspective. There's new headlines every day, but Ecclesiastes says there's nothing new under the sun. So thanks for being here to get the true story, the story of the day. Pam Bondi is fired. 

The third high profile filing, uh, firing. in the cabinet. Mike Waltz was a while back. He was the national security advisor. He's now the ambassador to the UN doing a fine job there. That was back in May of 2025, though. 

But earlier in March, we had Kristi Noem and she was fired for what seems to be some bad behavior. You may have missed this. I kind of missed this. Conservatives didn't talk much about it, but I'm sure people on the left did. But it deserves to be highlighted as a reminder of don't do sinful, stupid things. So Kristi Noem is accused of funneling millions of dollars of contracts to friends. 

She would approve these contracts to companies that were run by people connected to the conservative movement. And the most egregious one seems to be this contract that was given to the husband of the then Homeland Security spokeswoman. Tricia McLaughlin, you've seen her before. So she's the spokesperson on Homeland Security. Her husband was getting these multimillion dollar contracts. And it's all kind of tricky to follow the money about who owns this and got that and blah, blah, blah, whatever. 

But they're like hundreds of millions of dollars contracts. And I thought, of course, of Ephesians 5. That was my first thought. But if you asked me to quote Ephesians 5, I would have missed part of it. So the Ephesians 5 that I always think of is, but among you, there must not be even a hint of sexual immorality. or any kind of impurity. 

because these are improper for God's holy people." " So I was going to play that, I was going to read that scripture and leave it there. Be like, oh, you know, sexual immorality and money, immorality. But I didn't realize that Ephesians 5 actually says this, but among you, there must not even be a hint of sexual immorality or of any kind of impurity or of greed. because these are improper for God's holy people. So I didn't need to connect another dot. 

I didn't need to stretch that at all. It's right there. It's sexual immorality or greed. Getting $100 million contracts. That would be, I'd put that under the greed category. So Noam is gone out of Homeland Security and now Pam Bondi is out as attorney general. 

We're not quite sure what happened there. There's some rumors or reports that maybe she gave a heads up to some Democratic congressman that he was under investigation for something or some documents are going to be released about him. I don't really know. Right. Maybe we'll find out. It may have just been in general that she wasn't doing enough to arrest bad people. 

I mean, over a year has gone by now, so we got to get going. Like, let's let's go. We got stuff to do. So maybe she just wasn't doing enough. Maybe we'll find out more as time goes on. But either way, she's gone now. 

So I don't know. Out of all the cabinet members the president picked, we got The theme that comes out of this for me is that it is hard to be good in DC. And I think when people are doing good in DC, they need to be praised and commended for it. There are a lot of forces, this is true anywhere, but there's a lot of forces around you that are trying to take you out. And there's so much sin around you and there's so much easy money around you. And it's just all the more reason, gosh, first Peter 12 says, keep your conduct among the Gentiles, be the non -believers, keep Gentiles. 

Excellent. So that when they speak against you as evildoers, They may see your good works and glorify God on the day of visitation. " So it's like, these horrible Christians in DC, they're awful. They're the worst. And people are like, what, like what? Well, they're, uh, they're, they got nothing, not a hint of immorality. 

And then of course, we're told in Romans 12 to overcome evil with good, even, and especially when surrounded by a bunch of pagans as you would be in DC. But here's what I want to go to the Bible with today. Last couple episodes of our podcast here, Politics by Faith, we focused, of course, on Good Friday. On Friday, we talked about the moon and creation as good, and we connected that to Good Friday. Then Saturday and Sunday, we had two of our TV specials about the resurrection, which everything hinges on. To me, that was one of the things that I took away from this special that I haven't in years past, is that the entire religion of Christianity is hinges on this one thing. 

And it's amazing, actually, I'm impressed that the Bible emphasizes this. To me, this is a point of proof that the Bible is true because the Bible could have said or if someone was just making up a cult or something they could have said yeah and then this thing happened this resurrection back from the dead that's crazy and kind of hard to believe so don't really worry about that but no no the whole Bible is like this is the entire point everything rests on this crazy thing that happened I just love that unfortunately I think a lot of Christians today or over Easter it's dressing up nice and all that stuff. Right. And they don't even think of the resurrection. So you might as what's the difference between never even considering the resurrection and what it really is and what it really means versus not even believing it was possible. 

There's no difference, but we have to believe it happened. 

Okay. So here we are now the day after resurrection Sunday. Now, what, how should we live our life in light of the resurrection? Now I should note this real quick. We should not think of the resurrection only one day a year. And therefore we shouldn't think about how to live life. 

only the day after this one day, the resurrection and how we should live accordingly is an everyday consideration. Of course, just wanted to say that. So I think the place to go is James, James three in particular, but all of James and I like to go to James because James, the brother of Jesus was an unbeliever. He didn't, he didn't believe his brother was, was the son of God. But then it says in, uh, first Corinthians 15, seven, it says, then he, Jesus appeared to James. then to all the apostles. 

" So he was an unbeliever. John 7, 5 says, for not even his brothers believed in him. Mark 3, 21 says, and when his family heard it, they went out to seize him for they're saying he's out of his mind. So he was a, he was an unbeliever. And then he had this direct encounter with the resurrected Jesus. 

And gosh, wouldn't you like to know everything that was said in that, that meeting, that hangout. Uh, but we know that there's a scene in, uh, Acts 15, you got Paul, Peter and Barnabas. They were all speaking to this council in Jerusalem. And then, uh, it says James replied. Brothers, listen to me. And he goes on. 

All right. So we know who, where he was and we know in Acts where he ended up. So James goes from an unbeliever to a believer because there was an encounter with a resurrected Jesus. And then James wrote how we should live life. He wrote this whole thing about how we should live our life in light of the resurrection. And it just wrote down a couple of the, just some verses stand out. 

It's so good. I mean, the whole thing, you should read the whole thing. James 1 12. And blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial. For when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life, which God has promised to those who love him. " I would share that with Christians who are living in DC or anywhere, of course, but anywhere where there's a lot of trials around them. Blessed is the man who remains steadfast. 119 says, know this, my beloved brothers, that every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger. for the anger of man does not produce righteousness of God. Therefore put away all filthiness and rampant wickedness and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls." 

There was one key word there that I want to get back to in a different verse. Let's go to chapter three. Are you with me on this one? away? Putting away all the filthiness, put away all the wickedness, get rid of all that stuff. James chapter 3 talks about taming the tongue. 

See how great a force a little fire kindles and the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue is so set among our members that it defiles the whole body and sets on fire the course of nature and it is set on fire by hell. Let's go to 13. This is the verse I wanted to Focus on that. Verse 13, James 3, 13. Who is wise and understanding among you? 

Let him show by good conduct that his works are done in the meekness of wisdom. That was the word in the scripture I just shared that I wanted to focus on, meekness. So for a minute, he was talking about how a Christian should talk, which really comes from the heart. But now he's talking about how a Christian should live. Verse 14. But if you have bitter envy and self -seeking in your hearts, do not boast and lie against the truth. 

This wisdom does not descend from above, but is earthly, sensual, demonic. For where envy and self -seeking exist, confusion and every evil there are there. But the wisdom that's from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, without hypocrisy. " Wow, that's amazing. Pure, peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruit, without partiality, without hypocrisy. Now the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace. 

So meekness is the key here. Meekness is not weakness. They sound the same. They're one letter off. Just flip the letter around 180 degrees, but they're very different things. Meekness, as Martin Lloyd -Jones said, is the seeing the true, having a true view of ourselves as vile sinners before God. 

This ties a bit into Friday's episode as well about how we can't accomplish anything without him. But when you have a true view of yourself as a vile sinner, then you will be meek. Because from that posture, you will rely on God and the Holy Spirit. If you do that, you will inherit the earth. I just give a shout out to Martin Lloyd -Jones. There's a book of him by him called Sermon on the Mount. 

It goes through all of it. It's just brilliant. But I'll quote here Matthew Henry, who's a Puritan in the mid 1600s. He said, meekness preserves the mind from being ruffled and discomposed. And the spirit, Holy Spirit, your spirit from being unhinged by the vanities and vexations of this lower world. Meekness stills the noise of sea, the noise of her waves, and the tumult of the soul. 

Meekness permits not the passions to crowd out in a disorderly manner like a confused, ungoverned rabble, but draws them out like the train bands, rank and file, everyone in his own order, ready to march, to charge, to fire, or to retreat as wisdom and grace give word of command. That's from a book called The Quest for Meekness and Quietness of Spirit, Matthew Henry. But again, it doesn't mean weakness. It's knowing when and how. to march and charge and fire, right? Notice Matthew Henry didn't say, oh, meekness is never doing anything. 

No, it's not. You gotta know when, properly, how to march, charge, fire, and maybe retreat, whatever the Holy Spirit says. So if you're ever put in a position of power, whether you're head of Homeland Security, or you're the attorney general of the United States of America, or you're the manager of a business, or you're the lowest down in the totem pole that you can get, first day on the job of a fast food burger joint whenever you're you have people under you or around you meekness is a virtue we're lacking and a virtue we need more of whoever humbles himself will be exalted whoever exalts himself will be humbled do your job and do it to the glory of god do it well thanking god for the opportunity staying away from sin and knowing the fullness of your sinful nature being meek YouTube . com slash at politics by faith is podcast page. If you can subscribe over there, that'd be awesome. YouTube . 

com slash at politics by faith. If you're listening to this, you can see my awesome office behind me. It's unbelievable. This office, the greatest office of all the offices, YouTube . com slash at politics by faith.