MikeSlater
Politics • Spirituality/Belief • Culture
What Might Be Missing From Easter Sunday
Politics By Faith, April 18, 2025
April 18, 2025

Shout out to all of the Creasters! I used to be one. That is someone who only goes to church on Christmas and Easter. And while the people you see on Sunday might kiss your butt and tell you how wonderful it is you're there, if I may tell you (and 20 year old me) a different message (what I wish someone told me).

Welcome to Politics by Faith. Thank you for being here. Happy Easter. I hope you have a wonderful Easter weekend. I've always wondered this and I've found a good answer to it. So I'll just come out with this little fact. You know, he resurrected, Jesus resurrected. That's what we should be thinking about all the time, but once a year we give an hour to it. But then other people come back from the dead in the Bible too. So I don't quite get that.

Well, check this out. There's several examples in the Bible of people being resuscitated before Jesus, such as the widow's son in the days of Elijah and Lazarus. Each of these was resuscitated from death, but none of them were resurrected. Each of them was raised in the same body they died in and raised from the dead to eventually die again. Interesting. Resurrection isn't just living again. It is living again in a new body based on our old body, perfectly

suited for life in eternity. Jesus was not the first one brought back from the dead but he was the first one resurrected. Those differences make sense to me. I just want to share that in case you've ever been wondering the same. We did a special the other day on the TV about Jesus's resurrection and the word Christer came up and I thought it'd be worth a minute to talk about this. The Christers. I was a Christer, went to church on Christmas and Easter,

my whole life growing up. And I look back at that, I'm not really sure why we did that, but I wanted to think, like as opposed to just not going at all, like, you know what I mean? Like why go Christmas Eve and on Easter Sunday?

I don't, just don't do any. What's the good of two out of 52? I don't understand, you know? But I was trying to think what I would tell myself 20 years ago, who only went to church on Christmas and Easter. What would I say to that person?

Me, what would I say to me? Now people have different motivations and you need to motivate people in different ways. Right now, by the way, I would tell that person you should go to church every Sunday. There's gonna be a lot of people at church on Sunday. You know a lot of people, a lot of Christians showing up. I would tell

them all you should go to church every Sunday. We tend to cater to the softer side of people these days. I think that's starting to end. I think people realize that they really just want to hear the truth. But we're still, we're getting out of this zone where it's all about, Oh, you know, I got to make sure the feeling is going to be, Oh, Oh, you know, it's like on the show today

we talked a lot about the self-esteem movement in America, where that came from. The everyone gets a trophy movement. That came from a California government task force. You're like, oh yeah, of course it did. That makes perfect sense. There was this California assemblyman

who was in the assembly from 1967 to 2004. It's all he ever did. He was a total lunatic wackadoo from Silicon Valley, San Jose. And he came up with this idea that the reason there's all these problems in society, teenage pregnancy and murder and crime and child abuse and spousal abuse, the reason all these things happen is because people don't feel good about themselves.

They don't feel good enough about themselves. When in reality, the problem is people feel way too good about themselves. But anyway, so we had to tell our kids and this report came out in 1990, the problem is people feel way too good about themselves. But anyway, so we had to tell our kids, and this report came out in 1990 called The State of Esteem, and it went to every county in California, and they all embraced it and put it into our schools. And then that turned into, well, everyone gets a good grade, right?

No more red pen when it comes to marking papers, and everyone has to be passed on to the next grade and everyone gets a trophy passed on to the next grade and everyone gets a trophy and all this other nonsense. So this really harmed us in dramatic ways. This isn't just like some sort of gimmicky little side point to make.

This is a big deal. This is where our work ethic comes from. If we wanna be the manufacturing capital of the world again, if we wanna be the strongest military, like we need work ethic. We need people who wanna strive for excellence.

We want people to be self-motivated, not just giving everyone trophies for showing up. Like this is a big problem. The beginning of the self-esteem movement, and it was 35 years ago, well, those kids are now all grown up and they've had kids

and we've been living through this for a couple decades. It's not good. We really have to get rid of this. It's a big problem. Actually, it sounds funny. Like, oh, we'll give everyone a trophy. What a funny segment. No, no, really big deal. We have to stop doing this. So it's also coming to our churches. It's very like, oh, yay, You showed up! I'm so proud of you, you look great in your pastel today. That's what we do now. Maybe that motivates someone, I guess. I would prefer a more direct approach.

I think many people would. So again, I'm just talking to me. I'm talking to me 20 years ago. Been a Christian for 10 years, 11, 12, something like that. So 20 years ago, me, I'd be like, hey man, you should show up on Sunday, next Sunday. Every Sunday, you should come every Sunday

because you should be a better leader of your family. I would say, hey man, you should show up on Sunday. You need to be more connected to your heritage, your roots as an American or Christian nation. This is important to who we are as a country. That's something that's an appeal, not the most important, but I'm just, I'm talking to me from 20 years ago.

I'd say, Hey Slater, you, Hey, Hey you, me, you should stand for something. You should be a man of conviction for once. Okay, maybe a little harsh, but just came across this from John Eldridge. I guess he has a new book out and he wrote this. He said, I don't remember the issue my friend and I were talking about. It had something to do with Christianity, but I remember my friend's response. He said, gosh, I'm not really sure. And I thought it a humble and gracious posture to take.

Only it's been five years now and he's still saying, I'm not really sure. He's landed in that place. And now I see what happened. He has chosen doubt, a posture, very attractive and honored in our day. Doubt is in. So doubt masquerading as humility has become a virtue. See the difference? Humility is a virtue. Doubt is not. But we think they're the same. I just don't know. Oh wow you're so humble. Doubt has become a virtue, a prerequisite for respect. People of strong conviction are suspect. Many

Christians I know have settled for a sort of laid-back doubt, believing it to be a genuine character decision. They think it's a virtue. Now, I appreciate the desire for humility and the fear of being dogmatic. I think those are good concerns, but friends, conviction is not the enemy. Pride is.

Arrogance is. But not conviction. I would say, so I would say to myself 20 years ago, like be a person of conviction. I would say, so I would say to myself 20 years ago, like be a person of conviction, believe in something, stand for something. And the Bible is a pretty good thing you should stand for. And I would say to myself, Hey man, you're choosing football and brunch and sleeping in. And you think those things are good, they're comfortable, they bring you pleasure or something.

But hell sure sucks forever. Excuse my language. But we don't talk about hell. I think a lot more people would show up to church if they thought hell was an option when they die. But if we and Satan get people to forget about hell and never think about

it, then it's a lot easier for people to make choices about the me and the now and the pleasure and the present. I think I'm making it one of my missions of this podcast. This is where our ratings go to zero. Our number of views go to zero to talk about hell because no one else ever does. No one, you never hear about it anywhere. Certainly not church. I think it's important to talk about it, know about it. John Edwards, he said, almost every natural man that hears of hell flatters himself that he shall escape it. Jonathan Edwards was one of the men who ushered in the Great Awakening in America in 1730 and he did it by talking about hell

and how you are hanging by a slender thread over the fire of hell right now. How do you feel when I say that? I don't want to listen to this at all. This is a major downer. Yeah that's the problem that's the problem we don't want to hear it but it's true and while you're here in this pew enjoying Easter brunch and Easter egg hunts and having fun because that's what we do we think about how we can make church more fun for everyone you're hanging by a thread

that can be cut in an instant where you going Jonathan Edwards he said there's nothing that keeps wicked men at any moment out of hell but the mere pleasure of God. The bow of God's wrath is bent and the arrow already made on the string and justice bends the arrow at your heart. Any church going to preach that on Sunday? Probably not.

So I'm just adding some balance. That's all. Just give me one more minute. I just want to add a little balance here right so we get a little bit of everything nice little assortment when he has a platter here one more quote from sinners in the hand of an angry God that's his most famous summer it's not nearly his best but it's his most famous this how he ended he

said therefore this is the end of the sermon therefore let everyone that is out of Christ now awake and fly from the wrath to come. The wrath of almighty God is now undoubtedly hanging over a great part of this congregation. Let everyone fly out of Sodom. Haste and escape for your lives.

Look not behind you escape to the mountain lest you be consumed. Thanks so much for coming. Everybody Easter egg hunt begins in the back... He said unconverted men walk over the pit of hell on a rotten covering and there are innumerable places in this covering so weak that they will not bear their weight. Honestly that would have helped me come back to church next Sunday because of a couple

reasons first of all these people are not afraid of telling the truth and I'm interested Honestly, that would have helped me come back to church next Sunday because a couple of reasons. First of all, these people are not afraid of telling the truth and I'm interested in the truth, but also it knocks me out of talking about me and thinking about me all the time. All we ever do is we think about ourselves all the time, constantly. So to go back to the self-esteem movement and the everybody gets a trophy movement, actually, gosh, this ties in perfectly to yesterday's show about Ezekiel 27 and 28. The Prince of Tyre

thought he was God and so many people today do too. So this whole self-esteem movement was based off the fact that people need to think better things about themselves and if they just think good thoughts about themselves and they won't beat their wives and they won't use drugs and they won't abuse alcohol they won't do all these terrible, pathological things anymore.

We just need people to feel good about themselves. We're just gonna tell everyone, you're great, you're amazing, you're wonderful. And I would argue that people already feel too good about themselves. You're thinking, oh, people feel bad about themselves.

Well, maybe the argument is people are just thinking too much about themselves. Whether it's good or bad, we're thinking too much about us. Pride was the reason for Satan's fall, wasn't it? So you name it, arrogance, the things we see today, arrogance, selfishness, narcissism, you're the center of the universe, the world revolves around me, focusing on my pleasures, my comfort, what's best for me, unwilling to sacrifice.

All of this is pride. What's in it for me? Serve me. I'm entitled. Give me this. It's all pride.

It's everywhere.

We all have it.

And even if you don't love yourself enough, you're still obsessed with yourself. But that's not, you go to the bookstore and there's sections of self-help books, very few books on helping others. It's all about helping me. It's thinking about me all the time.

And then also the other problem with self-help is, you know, it's me, me, me,

me, me.

And then it's the idea that you can change yourself as opposed to it's all God. We need to focus on Him. Set your mind on things above and also, Hebrews 12, fix our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. C.S. Lewis said, if anyone would like to acquire humility, I can, I think, tell him the first step. The first step is to realize that you are proud and a biggish step too. At least nothing whatever can be done before it. If you think you're not conceited it means you are very conceited

indeed. I remember a friend of mine it's very early in me becoming a Christian, I don't even know if I was at this point, but this is my mentality and he had it too of I'm good. Like I don't, God you're busy, you got a lot going on. I got it together, like I'm pretty capable, I'm good. If I need you, I'll call you, I'll you know, set up a flare or something, but you go worry about other people. I'm good.

How wildly arrogant is that? But I would hear that and be like, well, no, I'm not conceited. That's like my humility. Actually. It's like I'm not conceited at all. Like I'm being generous by saying, God, saying God go spend your time with other people who need help that's great that's great gosh I was just like that guy at the temple she's got thank God I'm not like that guy I'm alright if you think you're not conceited it means you're very conceited indeed first Peter 1 8 for you know that it was not with

perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your ancestors, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect." Lamb, reference to the Passover as well. The point of today's rant is that if you are a Christer, if I may, you should go to church every Sunday. You should also be baptized and born again. Then you get to go to heaven for all of eternity and not hell.

We'll get back to politics on Monday. Hope you have a great Easter. Mike Slater dot locals dot com. Transcript commercial free. Transcript commercial free. Mike Slater dot locals dot com.

 

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https://archive.org/details/FOXNEWSW_20220122_110000_FOX_and_Friends_Saturday/start/5640/end/5700

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Dean Abbott,
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Morning Motivation, April 21, 2023

I found a way to easily transcribe the podcasts, so I will post them here first before they go out to iTunes and the rest.

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0:00:44
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Inflation and ANGER

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October 23, 2025

Good day Brother Slater, et al.,

Regarding your mention of Church Bells contra the apostate Muslim Call to Prayer, a deep history article link, below, for your Kit Bag of "what to think".
May God Bless and Keep you and yours

Pax Christi en regno Christi

Exodus 28:33 And beneath at the feet of the same tunic, round about, thou shalt make as it were pomegranates, of violet, and purple, and scarlet twice dyed, with little bells set between:

Exodus 28:34 So that there shall be a golden bell and a pomegranate, and again another golden bell and a pomegranate.

Exodus 39:23 And little bells of the purest gold, which they put between the pomegranates at the bottom of the tunic round about:

Exodus 39:24 To wit, a bell of gold, and a pomegranate, wherewith the high priest went adorned, when he discharged his ministry, as the Lord had commanded Moses.

Sirach 45:10 He put upon him a garment to the feet, and breeches, and an ephod, and he compassed him with many little bells of gold all round about,

The Holy Bible,...

October 10, 2025

Good day Brother Slater,

Given your propiquity for History, here’s a Euro-Catholic Christian Feast of Great Fanfare for you and your peeps.

The Salvation of Western Civilization: The Battle of Tours, October 10, 732 A.D.
by Jack Wheeler, October 10, 2022

Gibbon noted that had the Muslims won this day, all of Europe would have been Islamized and Western Civilization would have been extinguished.

https://x.com/RodDMartin/status/1976624966696149365

That's all I got; have a grand and Glorious Columbus Day, you and yours.

Pax Christi in regno Christi

Top Silva 🔝

October 09, 2025

Good day Brother Slater,

Wondering if you have checked out this dialogoue between Ross Douthat of the NYT and Pastor Doug Wilson and if you have any commentary of consequence.

Thanks and may God Bless you and yours.

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https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/09/opinion/doug-wilson-america-religion-theocracy.html

Pax Christi in regno Christi
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Why Are There 42 Million Americans On Food Stamps?
Politics By Faith, October 28, 2025

This is not a sign of a healthy nation. How can we reverse the trend of more people relying on the government dole and return to the way God wants us to help each other?

Welcome to Politics by Faith. Thanks for being here. 42 million Americans are on food stamps. That's not a sign of a strong, healthy country. We talked earlier today about creeds. AOC gave a speech where she talked about how there's countless creeds in America. 

The immigrants and people who speak hundreds of different languages. And I'm like, that's not good. The crowd was cheering. There was a Zohan rally. And they're like, oh, it's amazing, 100 different languages. And I'm like, hmm, that sounds like the Tower of Babel. 

Yay, we can't communicate with each other. Yay, none of us believe the same thing about important principles of life and governance. Yay, I think. That doesn't sound good. So then we read from this thing called the American ethos. It was about 100 years ago. 

This person says, the American ethos, I do not choose, excuse me, the American creed, I do not choose to be a common man. It is my right to be uncommon if I can. I seek opportunity, not security. I do not wish to be a kept citizen, humbled and dulled by having the state look after me. I want to take the calculated risk, to build and to dream, fail and to succeed. I refuse to barter incentive for a dole. I prefer the challenges of life to the guaranteed existence, the thrill of fulfillment to the stale calm of utopia. 

I will not trade freedom for beneficence, nor my dignity for a handout. I will never cower before any master nor bend to any threat. It is my heritage to stand erect, proud and unafraid. to think and act for myself, to enjoy the benefit of my creations, and to face the world boldly and say, this, with God's help, I have done. these 42 million Americans. And I don't want to be cruel. 

I don't want to be mean. But this is not good. One in eight Americans are on food stamps. Now I'm taking a pretty moderate approach here. I'm not saying we got to get rid of entirely. Maybe one day it'd be great if we could get, and I used to make this argument, it'd be great if we could get to the utopian ideal, which is where when someone's down on their luck, first you go to family. 

If you don't have any, you go to friends. And if you don't have any, then you go to church. And if that doesn't work or whatever, then there's other charities, faith, you know, Christian based, like rescue mission, stuff like that. And then like way down the list would be food stamps, but it wouldn't even exist at that point. It wouldn't be necessary. I think one reason why people don't want to go to church is because church requires a relationship and people don't want relationships because the person giving the charity may say, Hey, maybe you should stop doing drugs, or maybe you should make these other changes in your life. 

And people don't want to hear it. They just want the anonymity of getting the free money. So you can continue to live in this way that's clearly not going well. Another benefit of having church be the main means of charity is you don't just get regular water. You get a water where you'll never be thirsty again. People want government cheese. 

When if you go to a church, you'll get a lot more than your regular old bread. Charity through a church is a blessing for everyone. And food stamps are a track for everyone. But people don't want to go to a church because again, relationships, accountability, better to just get it for free in the mail. Better for what? 

Of course. 

So I'm taking a pretty middle of the road approach here. And I think for the next few decades, probably, we should limit food stamps to the elderly, the disabled, and people with an IQ under 80 who can't hold a job. IQ under 80, Jordan Peterson talks about this a lot. You can't fold a paper into thirds to put it in an envelope. That's what that IQ is. 

And everyone else, you gotta get to work. It's probably 60 % of people on food stamps is a combination of fraud and able -bodied adults who can work but don't. Probably 60%. So we'll say 20 million Americans are elderly, disabled, and otherwise unable to hold a job. 20 million. That's a pretty... 

Am I a horrible person for saying, I only want to give food stamps to 20 million Americans? I think if we do that for a while, then maybe, and we change a lot of other things in our culture, in our country, then I think maybe we can start to get to that ultimate ideal. But right now we're nowhere even close. Now we did talk on the radio. And we're going to do more on this tomorrow because someone sent me a article written by John Stuart Mill, or an essay written by John Stuart Mill in 1861 about universal suffrage. And it's very funny because this is 1861. 

This was 60 years before women had a right to vote. So this John Stuart Mill, very progressive guy, says, no, everyone should have a right to vote. Everyone should be allowed to vote. Women, laborers, low -income people, everyone should be allowed to vote. Unless, of course, you're on welfare. If you're on government dole in any way, then no, like definitely. 

And he also said, unless you can read, if you can't read, then obviously you can't vote. He went through all these exceptions that would pretty much accept, exempt or remove everybody's right to vote in America. He said, if you've ever been, if you've ever had bankruptcy, you can't vote. If you're in debt, you can't vote. So like no one in America would be allowed to vote. today if this progressive John Stuart Mill had his way a long time ago. 

But we presented this question of if you, just in an effort to shake this up and try to turn the ship around, if you're on specifically food stamps, you can't vote in federal elections. Again, I know there's problems, there's pros and cons to this, and I get it. I mean, you're still human, you're still a person, you're still all these things, you're still a citizen, but you can't vote in federal elections. So we brought this up as just something to think about. And then John Stuart Mill said the exact same thing back in 1861. But here's what I want to talk about on today's show on Politics by Faith, different than what we do on the radio. 

One last thing, someone wrote on Twitter, they said, my mom is disabled, 78 years old. She would die without food benefits. Oh, wow. Do you hear yourself? Your mom would die without food stamps? Your 78 year old disabled mother would die without food stamps? 

Feed your mom. Feed your mom. Honor your parents by feeding them goodness. All right, here's what I'm talking about here. Isaiah 58. Last night, I was reading a sermon by Jonathan Edwards on Isaiah 58. 

I'm not done with it. So maybe we'll do a part two of this when I'm done with Jonathan Edwards' words on it. But let's run through Isaiah 58. It's fascinating. It's about hypocritical religious observances versus true God -pleasing worship and action. That's what Isaiah 58 is about. 

And this opening section here is entitled, Why Do Our Prayers Go Away? And one of the reasons why our prayers go unanswered is because of our own sin. Isaiah 115 says, When you spread out your hands, I will hide my eyes from you. This is God talking. I will hide my eyes from you. Even though you make many prayers, I will not listen. 

Your hands are full of blood. Isaiah 59 verse one, behold, the Lord's hand is not shortened that it cannot save or his ear dull that it cannot hear. He's like, well, I'm able to do whatever I want people. Don't don't. I'm not answering your prayers because I'm not able to don't be fooled. But your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear. 

Adam Clark in 1823, he said, how can any nation pretend to fast or worship God at all or dare to profess that they believe in the existence of such a being? while they carry on the slave trade, and traffic in the souls, blood, and bodies of men. O you most criminal of knaves, and worst of hypocrites, cast off at once the mask of your religion, and deepen not your endless perdition by professing the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, while ye continue in this traffic. " Of course, this applies to abortion today. The fasting in Isaiah 58 that's hypocritical is a fasting that You know, you're fasting to hurt your enemies, or you're fasting for selfish needs, or you're fasting to, the scriptures say, make your voice heard on high so to glorify yourself. This is no good. 

So what's true worship? Verse six, is this not the fast that I have chosen, colon, to loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, to let the oppressed go free, and that you break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry? and that you bring to your house the poor who are cast out when you see the naked that you cover him and not hide yourself from your own flesh? Loose the bonds of wickedness. Don't oppress others. 

Undo heavy burdens. Break every yoke. So stop oppressing others, but then actively love others, right? So stop doing the bad things and then share your bread with the hungry. So I know, hopefully you sense the pivot here. So my opening of this podcast is about, the receivers of the welfare. 

And now Isaiah 58 is talking about the givers of charity. And what happens when you serve others? First, it should be done for its own sake. But then when you do serve others, then your light shall break forth like the morning. Your healing shall spring forth speedily and your righteousness shall go before you. The glory of the Lord shall be your rear guard. 

Then you shall call and the Lord will answer. How about that? So why are my prayers not going answered? Well, here's why. Okay, fine. What if I do that? 

Well, then you shall call and the Lord will answer. You shall cry and he will say, here I am. If you take away the yoke from your midst, the pointing of the finger and speaking wickedness, if you extend your soul to the hungry and satisfy the afflicted soul, then your light shall dawn in the darkness and your darkness shall be as the noon day. It's great. The Lord will guide you continually and satisfy your soul in drought and strengthen your bones. You shall be like a watered garden and like a spring of water whose waters do not fail. 

Those from among you shall build the old waste places. You shall rise up, raise up from the foundations of many generations. You shall be called the repairer of the breach. the restorer of streets to dwell in. Wow. If we fast and pray and live a life of righteousness and love, then our prayers will be answered. 

And of course, if you're living that life. then your prayers will be in line with God's will. But I love this line, last part, those from among you shall build the old waste places. So if you do all these good things and you will build the old waste places. Wow, we need a lot of rebuilding today. It's a broken world. 

There are breaches all over the place, but you shall be called the repairer of the breach. There's brokenness, broken homes, broken hearts, a lot of waste places. We need to rebuild a lot. It needs to be a lot of rebuilding. There used to be protections. around sacred institutions or aspects of our life, the family. 

And those have been, protections have been torn down. Therefore the institutions have been torn down. We need to build up the protections again. We need to reclaim these waste places. And I'll leave you with two more scriptures that are convicting to me to be more generous. 1 Timothy 5, 8, anyone who does not provide for their relatives and especially for their own household has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever. 

Whoa. In Proverbs 19, 17, whoever is generous to the poor lends to the Lord and he will reward them for what they have done. MikeSlater . Locals . com for the transcript of this episode and no commercials. MikeSlater .

 

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Thank You, Pete Hegseth: Holy Warrior
Politics By Faith, October 24, 2025

The Atlantic wrote a hit piece on Pete Hegseth, calling him a Holy Warrior. She said his introduction of Christian principles is a departure from how previous military leaders have led the military. She's wrong. And if he can lead an organization of 3 million people this way, we have no excuse.

Welcome to Politics by Faith. Thanks for being here. I want to expand on something we talked about in the show this morning. Actually, something we're going to do next week. We'll talk about gambling, sports gambling. It was an incredible hour of the show. 

We briefly mentioned the sports gambling scandal with the head coach of the Trailblazers and all that stuff. But I quickly wanted to pivot into sports gambling and how prevalent this is among people and how dangerous it is. And I don't think it should be allowed because I don't think laws Laws, well, here's the question. Are laws here to protect our freedom or are they here to promote human flourishing? Think about that. Let's table that till the weekend, till next week, over the weekend. 

Are laws here to promote freedom or to protect freedom or promote human flourishing? It's an important question. It'll lead us to two, down two very different paths. Gambling does not promote human flourishing. Let's leave that there. So we'll chat more about that one next week. 

But it was a great hour because we had all these people call in who were gambling addicts, lost everything. And they all said they weren't. Here they are years later and they're not upset at the money they lost. Although hundreds of thousands, one person was a million bucks in gambling. It's not the money they lost, it's the time. And I asked one guy, you know, what's a thing you miss that you regret? 

He said, the birth of my daughter. It was a powerful moment. This forced gambling is a bad thing. So we'll talk about that next week. I want to share this first. The Atlantic wrote an article about Pete Hexeth called Holy Warrior. 

Pete Hexeth is bringing his fundamentalist interpretation of Christianity into the Pentagon. I love this. The fundamentalist interpretation. It's like THE interpretation. I guess it's opposed to the LGBTQIA plus trans -inclusive interpretation of Christianity that exists. But by fundamentalist, she means what the Bible says. 

So she went to a sermon that Doug Wilson gave and Pete Hegseth was in the front row. Although Wilson's Christ or chaos approach to spirituality is interesting enough, I like that Christ or chaos. That's great. The reason I'd come this morning is that I wanted to better understand what Hegseth saw in him. Unlike the 72 year old preacher, Hegseth heads a force of 3 million service members and civilians whose mission, a secular mission, is to keep the nation secure. So she believes that in no way are Christians allowed to introduce their ethos into their profession. 

or leadership or organizations that they run. But the left must. The left must infuse their religion into everything. And it is all a religion over there on the left. Black Lives Matter, trans, whatever it is. It has to be inserted into every single thing. 

They taught transgenderism to kindergartners for the love of Pete. We saw what they did. We're onto them now. And now we're doing it. And there's no holding back. The point I would like to make here is that Christianity has always been a part of our war department's ethos. 

This is the key to her whole article here. She goes into a bunch of examples of how Pete Hegseth is a Christian. All of this is a departure from how previous US presidents and military leaders have understood the intersection of faith and duty for generations. Although America's armed forces have always made space for religion, going back to the Battle of Bunker Hill, that place is a circumscribed one, entrusted primarily to several thousand chaplains responsible for attending to troops of their own faith and facilitating observance by those of other traditions. Prayers may be abundant in the foxholes, but commanders typically do not dictate matters of spirituality. 

" Totally wrong. By the way, she said religion is a circumscribed one. I mean, something's restricted within limits, but like outside of a circle circumference, it's outside of, right? So like we'll allow it, but it's severe, strict limits outside of what we're really here for. Totally not true. Now she brought up the battle of Bunker Hill. 

So I'm going to go as my evidence that this is wrong to the battle of Bunker Hill. There's a book written by J . T. Hedley. He's a historian. He wrote this around the hundredth anniversary of America. 

So 1876, it's called the chaplains and clergy of the revolution. Let's read a couple things here. As before hostilities commenced, there was scarcely a military muster, military gathering, at which the clergy were not present, but they were very circumscribed and kept under strict limits as to what they were on some occasion saying, behold, God himself is with us for our captain and his priests with sounding trumpets to cry the alarm. That's second Chronicles 13 12. It was to be expected when war broke out. They would be found in the ranks of the rebels, that's us, the colonists, urging forward what they had so long proclaimed as a religious duty. 

The first outbreak at Lexington and Concord gave them no opportunity to exhibit their zeal officially. It happened too fast. So some shouldered their muskets and fought like cocks. 

soldiers at the Battle of Bunker Hill. 

Among these were, and then he lists a couple ministers, who showed that clergy could fight as well as pray. It's great. I didn't bring up Bunker Hill. She brought it up. So here I am telling you about what happened with the tightly, very strictly, tightly circumscribed preachers, clergy at Bunker Hill. Yeah, right. 

They were deeply, intimately, profoundly involved. The militia troops were also religious. and their respect for the opinions of the clergy unbounded. To avoid the expense of chaplains, the clergy in the neighborhood of the camp near Bunker Hill were invited by Congress to perform divine service, 13 of them every Sabbath, a request they punctually complied with. Three or four chaplains, however, were attached to the army and prayed with the troops every morning on the common. " I love that. 

Like, hey, listen, we're not going to spend money on chaplains because we're kind of broke here, but why don't you just go grab some local preachers from all the churches nearby? Just knock on the door of the churches and have them come out. And they all did. Some of them grabbed guns and fought. One of the most important chaplains was David Avery. Washington saw in him the embodiment of all those qualities he wished in a chaplain, intrepid and fearless in battle, unwearied. 

And again, just to go back to the Atlantic article, what Pete Hexeth is doing is very, very different, a sharp departure from what the secretary of the military has always been, the total return. Intrepid and fearless in battle, unwearied in his attentions to the sick and wounded, not only nursing them with care, but faithful to their souls. as though they were members of his own parish. With a love for his country so strong that it became a passion, cheerful under privations and ready for any hardship, never losing in the turmoil of war. camp that warm and glowing piety, which characterizes the devoted minister of God. He rode with George Washington, ate meals with George Washington, close friends with George Washington. 

He's Pete Hex, that's Doug Wilson, David Avery. And he wrote in his journal, again, I didn't bring this example up. She could have mentioned any other time in history. She mentioned Battle of Bunker Hill. David Avery wrote in his journal, early in the morning, the enemy attacked our entrenchments, but was driven back. After repeated trials, they succeeded in dislodging the troops. 

In the retreat, many of Colonel's men were killed. My dear friend, Dr. Warren, was shot dead. I stood on a neighboring hill, the name of that hill was Bunker, with hands uplifted, supplicating the blessing of heaven to crown our unworthy arms with success. This is the reliving of Exodus 17 .8, when the Amalekites and the Israelites were battling and Moses was holding his arms up in the air. And as long as Moses' arms were in the air, the Israelites were winning. So Aaron and Hurrick came over and held up his arms and Joshua went on to defeat the Amalekites. 

This is what David Avery was doing. To us infantile Americans, unused to the thunder and carnage of battle, the flames of Charlestown before our eyes, the incessant play of cannon from their shipping from Boston and their wings in various cross directions together with the terror of the field, exhibiting a scene most awful and tremendous. But amid the perils of the dread encounter, the Lord was our rock and fortress. Oh yeah, but no, a military never had any religious tradition, ever. Only now after Pete Exe. Robert E. Lee. 

an incredible man. He would always attend prayer services, always attend church, no matter what. And he said to his troops, he said, soldiers, let us humble ourselves before the Lord, our God. By the way, just imagine if Pete Hexeth said this. I mean, he probably would, and maybe already has or will, but just imagine when this happens and the left would just freak out. Let us humble ourselves before the Lord, our God, asking through Christ the forgiveness of our sins. 

beseeching the aid of the God of our forefathers in defense of our homes and our liberties, thanking him for his past blessings and imploring their continuance upon our cause and our people. Allahu Akbar. All praise the monkey God. No, no, no, not that last part didn't happen. It was praying to God in the name of Jesus. I love this from Washington Post. 

Talks about what Pete's like behind closed doors. Several people told me that he's talked about having prayed over personal decisions. He's praying about personal decision. What a weirdo. And once called for a group prayer before an airstrike. Love it. 

This reporter then said, Hegseth has invoked George Washington as a kindred spirit. Washington was famously private in his faith, and rather than infusing the American government in its infancy with his beliefs, he stood for religious freedom. That's not true. George Washington's farewell address. Again, she brought up these examples. I'm not cherry picking anything. 

This isn't a random letter that George one time sent to his wife. This is his stinking farewell address. Everyone in school always talks about entangling alliances. In his farewell address, he said, I now make it my earnest prayer that God would have you in his holy protection and that he would incline the hearts of the citizens to cultivate a spirit of subordination and obedience to government to entertain a brotherly affection and love for one another. and for their fellow citizens of the United States. And finally, that he would most graciously be pleased to dispose us all to do justice, to love mercy, and to demean ourselves with that charity, humility, and pacific temper of mind, which were the characteristics of the divine author of our blessed religion. 

That's God. And without a humble imitation of whose example in these things, we can never hope to be a happy nation. He's talking about Jesus there. Yeah, George Washington here never said the word God. He's a divine author of our blessed religion. He's not talking about Hinduism. 

And he never said the word Jesus. Not in the farewell address. But he's talking about the humble invitation. That's Jesus. Farewell address. But he was very private about it. 

George Washington was not private about his faith. That's a lie we've been told to get us to be quiet about our faith. The Muslims want to blast their call to prayer across America five times a day. 

That is not quiet in their faith. 

But we're expected to be. Not anymore. Thank you to Pete Hegseth for being an example. Her point was, can you believe he's doing this in an organization of three million people? All the more encouragement to the rest of us. If he can do it in an organization of three million people, it's ours. 

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

 

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Charlie Kirk: Freedom, Without Virtue, Leads To Chaos
Politics By Faith, October 16, 2025

Charlie was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom on what would have been his 32nd birthday. His wife said 5 profound statements in about 40 seconds. We break them down in today's episode. 

Welcome to Politics by Faith. Oh, I was on vacation last week and I had big plans to record episodes and I didn't. A lot of high hopes, always on vacation. Alas, we're back. I want to play this clip of Erica Kirk at her husband's Medal of Freedom ceremony. I think in this 40 second clip, there are five profound truths that are worth knowing. 

Charlie often said that without God, freedom becomes chaos. and he believed liberty could only survive when anchored to truth. And I remember in one of his speeches, he told the audience that the opposite of liberty isn't law, he said it's captivity, and that the freest people in the world are those whose hearts belong to Christ. But what's so powerful is that Charlie had the ability to communicate so brilliantly across all generations. And he reminded us that in a world that tells us freedom is doing whatever you want to do, the real freedom is the power to live freely and to do what is right. And in one of his journal entries, he wrote that he wanted everyone to know that you can't have liberty without moral responsibility. 

Freedom divorced from faith eventually just destroys itself. 

It's incredible stuff there. Incredible truths there. Without God, freedom becomes chaos. The opposite of liberty is not law, it's captivity. The freest people are those whose heart belong to Christ. Freedom is not doing whatever you want. 

True freedom is the power to live freely and do what is right. You can't have liberty without moral responsibility. and freedom divorced from faith ultimately destroys itself. Again, going back to chaos. Our founding fathers knew these things. I'm so grateful that Charlie brought them back to the forefront. 

It's our job to take them and run with them and live, live them and share them with as many people as we can. John Adams knew that the American system of government was designed only for a moral and religious people. And if you live a life of the flesh, With your mind set on things of the flesh, you will do things of the flesh and it will lead to death. It will lead to a bad life. You'll become a slave to those things here on earth, not to mention what will happen to you for all of eternity. But our founding fathers knew that true happiness did not come that way. 

And they knew that a country can never survive if people were living in the flesh. This idea that the opposite of liberty is not law, because that's the idea is like, Oh, you can't tell me what to do. I'm gonna do whatever I want. You can't make a law to tell me. It's like, all right, fine, but you're going to go down this road and it's not the law, but it's going to be captivity. It's going to be chaos and captivity and destruction and slavery. 

You're going to become a slave to the flesh, a slave to your sin. John 8, 34, Jesus says, whoever commits sin is a slave of sin. Romans 6, 16, to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey. You are that one slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death or of obedience leading to righteousness. 2 Peter 2, 19, they promise them freedom. but they themselves are slaves of corruption. 

For whatever overcomes a person, to that he is enslaved. " I want to read a few more quotes here from this book I've been going through, Reading the Bible with the Founding Fathers. I've got like three quotes here that I think echo what Charlie had said and Erica is going to continue to say, and we need to know. This is Noah Webster of the dictionary. And of course, to prevent crimes, war, and disorders in society, no human laws dictated by different principles from those in the gospel can ever secure those objectives. 

All the miseries and evils which men suffer from vice, crime, ambition, injustice, oppression, slavery, and war proceed from their despising or neglecting the precepts contained in the Bible. These are our founding fathers. For instruction then in social, religious, and civil duties, resort to the scriptures for the best precepts and most excellent examples of imitation. Reverend Sam Cooper gave a sermon. He preached in front of the governor of Massachusetts, one John Hancock, also preached to the Massachusetts assemblymen at the time. And this was on the very beginning of the Massachusetts constitution in 1780. 

And the preacher man said this directly to the leaders. He said, our civil rulers will remember. that as piety and virtue support the honor and happiness of every community, they are particularly requisite in a free government. Virtue is the spirit of a republic. for where all power is derived from the people, all depends on their good disposition. That's such a good point. 

If power comes from the people, power to the people, power from the people. If that's where the power comes from, you better make sure they're good people. If they are impious, factious, and selfish, if they are abandoned to idleness, dissipation, luxury, and extravagance, if they are lost to the fear of God and the love of the country, all is lost. Having got beyond the restraints of a divine authority, they will not brook the control of laws enacted by rulers of their own creating. You think they're going to, if they disobey the laws of God, you think they're going to obey the laws of man? Having got beyond the restraints of a divine authority, they will not brook the control of laws enacted by rulers of their own creating. 

They elect these fools. They're going to listen to their own laws. And now we live in a society where those people don't even enact laws. And we have judges that just let people free after they break the law. I'm going to look up. Two words here. 

Dissipation, I want to make sure I get that one right. Dissipation, scattered attention, a dissolute, irregular course of life, wandering from the object to object to object in pursuit of pleasure. Oh, that's a good idea. They're abandoned to idleness, dissipation. Oh, there's lost. A course of life usually attended with careless and exorbitant expenditure of money, indulgence in vices, which impair or ruin both health and fortune. 

Very good. And then I wonder what the old time definition of brook is. Having got beyond the restraints of a divine authority, they will not brook the control of laws. They will not brook, bear, endure, support. I never heard that used before. 

I'll give you one more. 

We'll go back to Benjamin or Noah Webster. The Christian religion is the real source of all genuine Republican principles. It teaches the equality of men as to the rights and duties. And while it forbids all oppression, it commands due subordination to law and rulers. It requires the young to yield obedience to their parents. and enjoins upon men the duty of selecting their rulers from their fellow citizens of mature age, sound wisdom, and real religion. 

" Check this out. Real religion. Men who fear God and hate covetousness. It's Exodus 18, 21. The religion of Christ and his apostles and its primitive simplicity and purity, unencumbered with the trappings of power and the pomp of ceremonies, is the surest basis of a Republican government. Those men who destroy the influence and authority of the Christian religion. 

Oh, the sentence right here. Those men, and we've had decades of these men and women, those men who destroy the influence and authority of the Christian religion, sap the foundations of public order, of liberty and of Republican government. We see the chaos. Noah Webster was totally right. Completely right. We've had decades now of people of influence and authority sapping the foundations of public order. 

We have on the SiriusXM show tomorrow, a lot of stories about crime. And there's two things that will stop crime, the law and God. The law is there for when you get caught. There's the law, you break it, there's proper punishment. We have breakdowns all throughout that, which we'll talk about more tomorrow, but you know it all, right? Just letting people, people have been arrested 30 times for violent crimes, letting them back on the streets. 

That's a breakdown. But those are all the things that we see. But do you know, we only solve about 44%. The last time we had these numbers was in 2023. It's worse now, surely. We solve 44 % of violent crimes. 

What percent of murders do you think get solved? If you asked me, I'd be like, oh, like 98%, 99%, 57 % of murders. And I've heard some numbers as low as 45. Obviously, it depends where you are too. That means there's some cities probably where maybe 30 % of murders get solved. So what do we do with that? 

The law is there for when you get caught. But what about when no one sees what you do? I should say, what about when no one sees what you do? He does. God does. He sees everything. 

And going to hell is a pretty good deterrent to stop people from doing bad things. But we've replaced God with Santa Claus and his naughty list. It's one of many reasons why there's so much crime today. No more idea of hell. But to bring it back to Charlie Kirk, freedom is not the point. Freedom is not the end of the story. 

Freedom is the beginning. Virtue is the goal. Freedom is only good if it directs people to virtue. If freedom leads people to sin, that leads to death. You know, the suspect of the LA Palisades fire was captured. This fire he started destroyed 6 ,000 homes, killed 12 people. 

A month before he lit the fire, he told a family member that he burned a Bible. He said, I literally burnt the Bible that I had. It felt amazing. I felt so liberated. Liberated. I'm so free. 

I can do whatever I want. And he did. He went on to do whatever he wanted. And what he wanted to do was to start a fire that destroyed a community. Freedom.

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