If you've ever wondered what will come after the Trump era, I pray it's more of what we saw out of Marco Rubio in Germany. 

Welcome to Politics by Faith. Thanks for being here. We take the news of the day, we bring it to the Bible so that we can walk away with peace and perspective because there's new headlines every day. But Ecclesiastes said there's nothing new under the sun. I want to get to Marco Rubio's speech in Germany this weekend. It was tremendous. 

It was shocking, really. I don't get shocked much, but we should allow ourselves to be shocked that this presidency has only been a year, but Marco Rubio gave such an astounding speech. I'm amazed this is where we are now. And I praise God for it. It's incredible, and this is an important moment. This speech, I encourage you to read it all. 

We only have time for a few parts here, but let me get to it. Again, he's in Germany. It's the Munich Security Conference. So the essence of this is about national security, but he got to the root of it. Marco Rubio, our secretary of state said, for the United States and Europe, we belong together. America was founded 250 years ago, but the roots began here on this continent long before. 

The men who settled and built the nation of my birth, arrived on our shores carrying the memories and the traditions and the Christian faith of their ancestors as a sacred inheritance, an unbreakable link between the old world and the new. " I'm so grateful that we have leaders in America now who will say Christian faith. First of all, it's obviously not Muslim faith, although some think it is or should have been or wish it were. But a lot of people do the cop out and be like, faith. Oh, yes. We have memories and traditions of faith, of ancestors that... 

No, no, no. What faith? Name it. Christian faith. Puritans, known as separatists, carrying the Geneva Bible across the ocean to the New World. Rubio said we are part of one civilization, Western civilization. 

We are bound to one another by the deepest bonds the nations could share, forged by centuries of shared history, Christian faith, culture, heritage, language, ancestry, and the sacrifices our forefathers made together for the common civilization to which we have fallen error. So don't lose it to the Muslims or pagans who want to destroy you from within. It's not what he said, but I think kind of what he was getting at. Two more long quotes here. Rubio says, and so this is why we Americans may sometimes come off as a little direct and urgent in our counsel. This is why president Trump demands seriousness and reciprocity from our friends here in Europe. 

The reason why my friends is because we care deeply. We care about your future and ours. We are connected spiritually. We're connected culturally. We want Europe to be strong. Check out this next line is so good. 

Again, this is at a security conference and he's talking about Western heritage, national security, which this conference is largely about. is not merely a series of technical questions. How much we spend on defense or where, where we deploy it, et cetera. These are important questions, but they're not the fundamental one. The fundamental question we must answer at the onset is what exactly are we defending? So great, you can lose the plot real quick. 

You get focused on defense and after a while you're like, wait, what are we, what are we, why are we doing this? And then eventually you just stop, stop defending it. Rubio said, what are we defending? Because armies do not fight for abstractions. Armies fight for a people. Armies fight for a nation. 

Armies fight for a way of life. And that is what we are defending. A great civilization that has every reason to be proud of its history, confident of its future, and aims to always be the master of its own economic and political destiny. Gosh, this is such an amazing rebuke of last few decades of wokeism, particularly the 1619 Project, where you were told only to be ashamed of everything that America has ever been. Last part, Rubio says, it was here in Europe where the ideas that planted the seeds of liberty that changed the world were born. It was here in Europe where the world, which gave the world the rule of law, the universities, and the scientific revolution. 

It was this continent that produced the genius of Mozart and Beethoven. of Dante and Shakespeare, of Michelangelo and da Vinci, of the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. I would have left that part out, but OK. And this is the place where the vaulted ceilings of the Sistine Chapel and the towering spires of the Great Cathedral in Cologne. They testify not just to the greatness of our past or to the faith in God that inspired these marvels. Amazing. 

They foreshadow the wonders that await us in our future. But only if we are unapologetic in our heritage and proud of this common inheritance can we work together to begin the work of envisioning and shaping our economic and our political future. So good. So good. So what's broken in this scenario here? Because the speech was fantastic. 

We have been so demoralized lately. We've been humiliated, shamed and humiliated. And we've let ourselves get to this point. We've been ashamed of our heritage, taught from a young age to be ashamed of it, that it is bad. Ashamed of the pilgrims. And dare I say, shamed to live and proclaim your Christian faith. 

I never learned our heritage. I never learned our history. I lost the memory of it. So of course I couldn't be inspired by it. How could we be? I didn't know who anyone was. 

I didn't know who these people were. Who are the people who came before us? 

I don't know. 

We don't know their stories. Maybe. get little glimpses of the fact that there were stories. King Arthur. I've heard of that. 

It's a Disney movie. 

But were we ever taught who King Arthur was? Who were the knights at the round table? We've been humiliated. Christians were shamed into being silent on incredibly important cultural and political issues because we were told not to judge. Don't force your religion down my throat. And we let the pagans roll in and control everything. 

We've been shamed. I'll give an example, maybe a silly one, but I think it's tied in. I saw a video of Chappelle Roan. Are you familiar with her? Chappelle Roan is the current pop star person. And I saw her before she got famous and she was a beautiful, modest, lovely singer, very talented. 

And now she's just like all of them. She's like Madonna or Lady Gaga or whatever. 

It's sad. 

You're like, oh, why? Why do that? 

Why? 

Christians have been self -silenced, shamed, as our Christian heritage has been ridiculed and forgotten. Here's an example. I got a, uh, let me see if I can find this clip here. I don't know if I played this the other day. This is a documentary in Birmingham, Birmingham, uh, England. A migrant fella walks by. 

Wow. 

What do you think of Birmingham Cathedral? It's shit. But it's, it's a nice place to smoke weed. It's not my ancestors. 

I don't know who's ancestors it was, uh. 

It's not your ancestors, man. 

It's not. 

No, no. No, it's not. Let's go to the Bible. Matthew 5, 15 says, neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel. but on a candlestick and it gives light unto all that are in the house let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your father which is in heaven we've been told instead to keep our the candle hidden Charles Spurgeon he said I long for the day Keep this in mind when you remember people telling you to keep your religion to yourself and don't talk about that. Separation of church and state, total nonsense. 

Of course it's backwards. We've gone over a million times. Let's see if I can do it in 10 seconds. I don't think I can do it in 10. Let me see how fast I can do it. Separation of church and state is not in the constitution. 

It is a letter from the Danbury Baptist in Connecticut telling new president, Thomas Jefferson, please don't interfere with our affairs in the church. And Thomas Jefferson, oh, don't worry. I, the government, will not interfere in the inner workings of the church. There's a separation of church and state. I'm not going to interfere with what you do in your church. And that has been spun to be the exact opposite, where people in the church have been told that we're not allowed to have any influence on anything in politics. 

Totally backwards. If Thomas Jefferson came back to life, among other things, he'd say, whoa, whoa, whoa, that's not what I meant. You guys don't totally took that the exact opposite of what I meant. But that's what you've been told. So keep that in mind when you hear Charles Spurgeon. He says, I long for the day when the precepts of the Christian religion shall be the rule among all classes of men in all transactions. 

Spurgeon went on and said, I often hear it said, do not bring politics, excuse me, do not bring religion into politics. That is precisely where it ought to be brought and sat there in the face of all men as on a candlestick. I would have the cabinet and the members of parliament do the work of the nation as before the Lord. And I would have the nation, either in making war or peace, consider it. Watching this speech from Marco Rubio, some have wondered what will happen at the end of Trump's presidency. He's come into the world stage and brought a wrecking ball to it. 

But what comes next? Well, I pray this Marco Rubio speech is a hint of what's to come. I pray that godly men with a Christian conscience and an eternal purpose, leading on the principles of the New Testament, do the work of the nation as before the Lord. Here's to much more talk of our Christian heritage. Mike Slater dot locals dot com. Transcript commercial free on the website.  Mike Slater dot locals dot com.

James Van Der Beek, an actor who was a part of every Millennial's childhood, passed away at the age of 48. He died with dignity. One thing we can learn from his dying is to proclaim the whole truth. Don't hold back.

Welcome to Politics by Faith. This is where we take the news of the day, we bring it to the Bible, and we can walk away with a perspective and peace. There's new headlines every day, but Ecclesiastes says there's nothing new under the sun. So thanks for being here. I'm gonna get the true story. Sola Deo Gloria, glory to God alone. 

I want to talk about James Van Der Beek, who passed away. To every millennial who's listening now, he was an important part of our childhood, star of, I was gonna say Party of Five, Dawson's Creek, and then Varsity Blues as well. He was 48 years old and died from colon cancer. He had six kids, beautiful family, kids like over the top cute. And he wrote on Instagram relatively recently, just posted this stunning picture of his family. And he said, being a father has been the most treasured honor of my life. 

Thank you to my kids for reteaching me how to live, laugh, love, and show up in my own life and in the world. And thank you to my superhero of a wife who constantly exceeds the boundaries of what I thought was human capacity. I love you with all of my heart. Being a father has been the most treasured honor of my life at Scream. His family shared pictures of his final days here on earth. This very handsome man, weak, frail, skin and bones, in a wheelchair, out in nature, outside, looking at the sunset. 

Here's a note from a friend. Spending these final days with you has been a true gift from God. I've never been so present in my life. When you know time is sacred, you don't waste a single breath. How can we live like this every day? How can we live treating life sacred? 

You don't rush. You don't scroll. You don't worry about tomorrow. You sit. You listen. You hold hands. 

You watch the sky change colors and let it change you, too. In these past days, you taught me more about being present than any book ever could. You showed me what it looks like to trust God's plan, even when it breaks your heart, especially when it breaks your heart. You are a gift, an incredible husband, an extraordinary dad. The way you showed up for your wife and your children, steady, strong, devoted, was a blessing to witness. It has been an honor to stand by your family in these sacred moments. 

It's pretty incredible how someone can fight so hard for so long, travel the world battling so much, and somehow still look so handsome doing it. You've given this world so many gifts. Your presence was a bright light in my life and in so many others. And maybe the lesson you leave us with is this. The present moment is everything. Love the people in front of you. 

Say the words. Watch the sunset. Trust God even when you don't understand. Very nice. Katie Holmes, who's, again, to millennials, indistinguishable, the two of them. together, but she wrote out this really nice note to him and hand -written and then took a picture of it, which is a nice way to present the note. 

At the end of it, she said, life is art, creating a beautiful marriage, six loving children, the journey of a hero. 

It's great. 

Someone else said, I think I can finally see the beauty in death. It's sad, but it's also one of the few things that forces us to be fully present and accept our mortality. And suddenly, everything except the people you love matters less. Maybe we're never more human than when we're dying. Okay, so this is usually the section of the podcast where I talk about what's broken in the situation and that's maybe a bit, it's not quite right, not broken. 

I just want to offer this as an encouragement. There are some videos that are making the rounds of James Van Der Beek and I want to use these to encourage you as well and not wait till the end of your life to have boldness. And I think James Van Der Beek in these videos, although beautiful and well -presented, it's missing that last little, no, I didn't say little, that last most important bit of truth. So I'm gonna play this video, it's three minutes, sit back and enjoy it for what it is and how it's presented. And then we can talk about what's missing. 

Today's my birthday and it has been the hardest year of my life. And I wanted to share something that I learned with y 'all. When I was younger, I used to define myself as an actor, right? Which was never really all that fulfilling. And then I became a husband, and that was much better. And then I became a father, and that was the ultimate. 

I could define myself then as a loving, capable, strong, supportive husband, father, provider, steward of the land that we're so lucky to live on. And for a long time, that felt like a really good definition to the question, who am I? What am I? And then this year, to look my own mortality in the eye. 

Quick timeout. Last time I'll stop. Super important to make sure you find your real identity as soon as possible. And it's not in any of these things. Beautiful things. Some people identify themselves as things that are not good, but even if people identify themselves as things that are great, but it's not your truest identity. 

And when you get to the end of your life, you realize that when you lose your body, you lose your ability. Maybe you identify yourself as a runner. Okay. What if you lose your legs? What if your legs don't work anymore? Who are you now? 

Not a runner. What are you? Well, I'm a radio show host. You lose your job. Now what are you? Oh, it better be something that's unbreakable, which actually was the last segment of our last TV special we did about building your house on a rock. 

James Van Der Beek had to confront this issue. 

I had to come nose to nose with death. And all of those definitions that I cared so deeply about were stripped from me. I was away for treatment, so I could no longer be a husband that was helpful to my wife. I could no longer be a father who could pick up his kids and put them to bed and be there for them. I could not be a provider because that wasn't working. I couldn't even be a steward of the land because at times I was too weak to prune all the trees during the window that you're supposed to prune them. And so I was faced with the question, if I am just a too skinny, weak guy alone in an apartment with cancer, what am I? 

I meditated and the answer came through. I am worthy of God's love simply because I exist. And if I'm worthy of God's love, shouldn't I also be worthy of my own? And the same is true for you. And as I move through this healing portal toward recovery, I wanted to share that with you because I think that revelation that came to me was due in no small part to all the prayers and the love that had been directed toward me. So I offer that to you, however it sits in your consciousness, however it resonates, run with it. 

And if the word God trips you up, I certainly don't know. I can't claim to know what God is or explain God. My efforts to connect to God are an ongoing process that is a constant unfolding mystery to me. But if it's a trigger, it feels too religious, you can take the word God out and your mantra can simply be, I am worthy of love because you are. Thank you for the loving prayers, everyone. 

So close. 

Let's go to the Bible. Maybe my frustration is a strong word. It's that, oh, it's like great. And then it's, well, however you define God, you're like, oh man, just according to the Bible, we are not worthy of love. We're horrible sinners. who are worthy only of God's wrath. 

Ephesians 2 .1 says we are dead in trespasses and sins. We are spiritually dead and unable to merit God's favor. It is God who demonstrates his love by choosing to save us. Ephesians 1 .5, in love he predestined us for adoption as sons through Christ Jesus. Our righteousness, whatever we think we do, is filthy rags. But Jesus 

died to save us from hell. And now if you make Jesus Lord of your life, you can come before God and spend eternity in heaven. Or however you think is best to divide, right? I mean like Hebrews 10, 19. Are you with me with that last little quip that I threw there? It's either this or not that. 

It can't be everything. It can't be this very specific thing. And then however you feel good about a thing, that I'm saying, but want to take the words, but use very different meanings for the words, like not a Hebrews 10, nine, therefore brothers, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, by the new and the holy places, by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is through his flesh. I love in the Bible, how when Jesus died on the cross, the curtain at the temple was torn from the top. So it was not by human hands from the bottom, but it was torn from the top. It was the curtain that separated. 

in the tabernacle or in the temple, from everyone else, from the most holy place, ripped. And since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart and full assurance of faith with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering for he who promised is faithful. In Hebrews 4 .16, let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. This is scripture. My encouragement for you, for all of us. 

is to go all the way because people desperately need to hear it. They need to hear the truth, not half the truth and then new age mumbo jumbo, not 90 % of the truth and then a cop out of or whatever else you think people need to hear all of the truth. 

It also sounds like this diagnosis helped you find some sort of new perspective on faith. 

Before cancer, God was something I tried to fit into my life as much as possible. 

After cancer, I feel like a connection to God, whatever that is, is kind of the whole point of this exercise on this planet. He's right. He's right. Glorifying God, but exactly who we know him to be from the Bible is the point of life on this planet. Go all the way with the truth. Don't hold back. 

MikeSlater . Locals . com. Transcript commercial free on the website MikeSlater .

Roy Cooper is running for Senator of North Carolina. When he was governor, he released 3,500 criminals from prison because of COVID. 51 of those criminals were serving life sentences. Why? Why would a governor do this? We'll explain here with a warning from Numbers 4.

Welcome to Politics by Faith. This is where we take the news of the day and we bring it to the Bible so we can walk away with perspective and peace. There are new headlines every day, but Ecclesiastes says there's nothing new under the sun. Thanks for being here. Let's get to the true story. Soli Deo Gloria. 

Glory to God alone. I know I missed the Super Bowl halftime show. It's now two days after it. So that's old news now. So I apologize that you didn't get my hot take right when it happened. In short, it's degenerate filth that you should keep your kids away from. 

And you. The lyrics are as obscene as you could try to make them. And all the church ladies were right when they said that CBS shouldn't allow Elvis's hips to be on the TV because it's a slippery slope downhill from there to hell. And all those church ladies were right. If we could fast forward the church ladies 50 years from when they were making the argument that Elvis was a bad influence on youth. They'd have a heart attack after they said, we were right. 

If this is what we call normal dancing and lyrics, I'm gonna break. One thing that really annoys me, and then we'll get to the show. It's when people who are talented, they're talented, but then they just sell filth. Lady Gaga, she can sing. She can play the piano. Her little bit she did was lovely. 

She was dressed beautifully and had a nice band behind her that was playing some nice puerto rican music and everyone was dancing nice and it was it was good why can't like why not just be normal why not be good money's in filth i suppose so celebrities and artists just spit out the filth first john 269 the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. All right, let's get to the story of the day. We talked to Michael Watley. Michael Watley is running for Senate in North Carolina. He's running against Roy Cooper. 

Roy Cooper, the Democrat used to be the governor of North Carolina, used to be the attorney general before that. And he's running for Senate. He's got a good name recognition. It turns out that Mike, excuse me, uh, Roy Cooper, when he was running, excuse me, when he was governor, during COVID released 3 ,500 prisoners. Because the NAACP and the ACLU, who've always wanted to release prisoners, said, oh, we can't keep them in prison because they'll get COVID and we don't want them to get the sniffles. And Roy Cooper did it. 

He released 3 ,500 people from prison. 51 of those people were serving life sentences. Why in the world would you release someone who's serving a life sentence? So what's the background here? We should know that one of the reasons why there was a major spike in crime across the country, and blue places in particular, is because in 2014 there was a Supreme Court ruling in California that said California prisons are overcrowded, and that's cruel and unusual punishment, because criminals aren't getting the healthcare that they deserve in prisons. So the Supreme Court said, you've got to fix that problem, California. 

This was back in Moonbeam. What's his name? Jerry Brown's second term. And the state of California, instead of fixing the overcrowding problem by building more prisons, they released a bunch of prisoners into the jails. And then the jail said, well, we're full. So they released a bunch of people onto the streets. 

And then the activists said, well, what if people get arrested? Where are we going to put them? So that's when. the activists in California passed Prop 57, which said, well, let's just not arrest anyone anymore. Let's make it merely a misdemeanor to steal up to $800 worth of stuff. And that was the beginning of the, I shouldn't say the beginning. 

That was a major push forward in the decriminalization movement across our country. And then crime went out of control and then we elected Donald Trump. But in the midst of that, when COVID came along, the NAACP and other prison abolition groups went to governors, blue Democrat governors, and said, we have to release the prisoners. And Roy Cooper did. 3 ,500 of them. And 51 were serving life sentences. 

If you must release someone from prison for whatever reason, you have to release a person from prison. Wouldn't you release the guy who was serving a one -year sentence or someone who was near the end of their sentence, not someone who's serving a life sentence? So now we know who some of these people are. Kids warning, if there's any kids listening right now, but I'll keep it PG. Sean 2 Jenkins murdered a pizza delivery driver. It was an armed robbery inside of a Domino's. 

Life in prison. Simon Janopoulos. He stabbed a person 24 times in the back after he tied him up. Life in prison. Life in prison plus 26 years. Released. 

Shanone McClintock. Convicted first -degree rape and robbery broken broken to a woman's home life in prison released Javier Alexander convicted of two murders unrelated two different unrelated murders life in prison released Eric Johnson first -degree murder murder shot his 22 year old estranged wife in the head Mandatory life sentence for that crime released. I got plenty more. I mean, there's 51 of them you get the idea What in the world so? what's broken here? What's going on? 

How did we get to this point? Now you can go as cynical as you want. The great Jesse Kelly shared a video of a judge in Louisville who let a criminal who was convicted by the jury of his peers, found guilty and recommended 64 years in prison, life in prison. And the judge said, no, no, no, that's too long. I'll give you 30 years. And 30 means like seven. 

for a heinous crime, horrific, horrific, horrific crime to a woman. And unrepentant, like wildly unrepentant, said to the victim in the courtroom, I'll see you in 20 years. Like that level of unrepentant. Why would this judge let this person go? And this is, again, if you want to go down this road, it's great. I'm not going to stop you. 

Jesse Kelly said, everyone would understand this stuff better if they just read about the communist revolutions in China and Russia. You want to kill your political enemies? Who's going to do that for you? Who are you going to get to do that for you? Decent people? No. 

They recruited and protected the scum of every village. So you can say it's that intentional, or you can go down the misguided compassion, the toxic empathy that we've talked a lot about in the last couple of weeks here. Like, oh, poor kid. He never had a chance. Never had anyone love him. Fell through the cracks. 

Oh, he needs to be rehabilitated and all that. And anywhere in between those two. And maybe a little bit of both. What's the Bible say? First, we need to know. that justice is good, is biblical. 

The Bible talks about punishment for evildoers. Proverbs 21 15, when Jesus is done, it is a joy to the righteous. When a person who commits a horrific crime against a woman in this last case that I was just telling you about, when justice is done and that person is put behind bars, that's a joy to the righteous. That's a joy to the woman, the real victim. That's a joy to the rest of us. 

And it's a terror to evildoers when justice is done. Justice protects law -abiding people, and it's very bad for evildoers. It is biblical. for governments to punish criminals. Romans 13 three says governing authorities as God's servants, punish evildoers and bear the sword, not in vain. We had a great caller today who, when I was talking about these horrific things that people did that had been released, he was just lamenting that we've removed God from our society. 

And that's what this all is. And of course he's right. People who commit crimes like this, no question, but also just the whole, just our country in general, that we've created these systems that let people out of jail. That only happens when you have a total disconnection from God and his word. I want to read here a piece of scripture. All of scripture is there for a reason. 

God put it all there for good. This is a seemingly irrelevant one. Those are my favorite kinds. Numbers four, verse one. Numbers four. The Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron. 

Sorry, this is my fault. This is numbers four, verse 18. 

The Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron saying, let not the tribe of the clans of the Kohothites be destroyed from among the Levites, but deal thus with them, that they may live and not die when they come near to the most holy things. 

colon. Aaron and his son shall go in and appoint them each to his task and to his burden, but they shall not go in to look on the holy things even for a moment, lest they die. " So what's going on here? We have a Levite clan here that's tasked with transporting the tabernacle's most holy items. They're the ones who'd carry stuff on the poles, right? And you couldn't touch them, couldn't touch them. 

If you touched anything, or even looked beyond this curtain into the most holy place, you would die. So here, God said, do these things, do it this way so that no one dies. So what's the lesson we can get from this? First of all, obey God's commands, but also take God's holiness seriously. We are way too casual with God's wrath. We're way too casual with our own justice system here on earth. 

But more importantly, we're too casual with God's wrath. Don't take God's holiness casually. If God says, do this, you better do it. If God says, don't do this, woe to you. If you do it anyway. Now we are sinners, of course, which is why we're going to hell. 

Unless we make Jesus the Lord of our life, then we get to go to heaven forever. But that amazing thing that Jesus did doesn't mean anything. If you don't think you're a sinner and you won't think you're a sinner. If you don't think God is Holy, because you're not, what are you comparing yourself to the guys in jail? Of course you're better than them. You behave better than them, but that's not what you should be comparing yourself to. 

You compare yourself to God's holiness. And if you're doing that, then you won't take breaking his commands lightly. Take God's command lightly. as seriously as the Levites. And the command was don't even look at the holy things. Or else you will die. 

And you will die too. Are you going to heaven? Mike Slater dot locals dot com. Transcript commercial free on the website. Mike Slater dot locals dot com.