Trump signed an Executive Order ending the reign of Desperate Outcome theory. We've been talking about this for 11 years since Obama forced this on schools, but it will take time to unwind. In the meantime, perhaps understanding the Mixed Multitude in the Bible help us figure out what should replace this old system.

Welcome to Politics by Faith. Thanks for being here. I have a news story and I think we can make a biblical connection to this in this one particular way. Let's talk about an executive order that Trump signed yesterday reinstating common sense school discipline policies. So Barack Obama instituted this idea called disparate outcome and

the claim was that if there is a school discipline policy that results in a disparate outcome of races, then the policy itself is racist. So the example we always use because I've been talking about this for 11 years is if there's a policy that says a student can't punch a teacher in the face and more black students punch their teachers in the face,

that policy is racist. See the problems with this. So this executive order ends that threat because the threat was that if you continue to have these policies where more black or Hispanic kids are punished, disciplined in any way,

any punishment all the way to expelled, if more black kids or Hispanic kids are expelled than white kids, then you risk losing your federal funding. So as Obama back in 2014, it's called one of his dear colleague letters from the Department of Justice,

excuse me, Department of, well, Department of Justice and Education Civil Rights Division. So that's gone now. Now this also has an implication in the workforce as well. Same idea, disparate outcome.

Any disparate outcome in any aspect of a business and there's threats of lawsuits. This is one of the reasons why all these businesses spend all this money on all this DEI training, all these DEI courses and training, because they're like, we're not racist.

So they can have a policy and there's a disparate impact to it. But if they have enough DEI training courses that they require everyone to do all the time, then they can prove in court, look, we're not actually racist. That's what that is. So hopefully now with that threat of disparate

outcome theory gone, we can stop with all the DEI stuff and businesses and we can also get back to real actual discipline in our schools. So talked about that today on the radio. It's a wonderful thing that Trump did. The survey from the American Federation of Teachers, 88% of teachers said poor student discipline and a lack of support for dealing with disruptive students is a very serious problem.

I can't even begin to describe the violence that occurs inside of so many of our schools. It's crazy, like insane, insane stuff. Just yesterday, this pops up on my Twitter all the time and I hate it, but one just popped up yesterday of a 15 or 16 year old fighting, and then the kid who was on the ground,

I don't know who started it, who knows the backstory, but the one who was on the ground gets up and takes out a knife and stabs the other guy a bunch of times, right in the hallway. And kids are like part of this all the time. It's crazy the insane amounts of violence that happens. And you can't discipline anyone. It's not allowed.

And you have those extreme examples, but then you also just have a general state of chaos. Kids wandering the hallways, busting in the classrooms, beating people up, leaving. No one's paying attention. Someone's on drugs.

It's just crazy what goes on and no one's allowed to discipline. It's awful. Now, a little sidebar, but I think it's related. We were talking about education a couple weeks ago and someone called in and said, our schools are too big.

And I think there's something really to that. We used to have one room school houses,, where the schools were not too big. They were very small, all grades, one teacher. A very decentralized system. And now we have a very centralized system. And the reason we talked about this a couple weeks ago is because Rand Paul had the idea

of having one teacher for 10 million students. You have the best chemistry teacher, and this chemistry teacher teaches all the chemistry students. You have the best chemistry teacher and this chemistry teacher teaches all the chemistry students. And I guess I don't even know how that would work. Like you have just like advisors in the school that, that what great papers help keep the kids in line. I don't know. I remember in school when they wheeled in the TV, it wasn't like time to pay attention now. We're really going to enjoy this. So that's just not going to work. Didn't we live through COVID and how learning on the computer,

it's not it. That's not the answer. So I don't think we need more centralization, which is the way we're moving. I think we've got to get back more to the one room schoolhouse idea where we were decentralized as much as possible. And part of that was smaller. In 1920, the average size of a public school was 80 kids. In 1940, the average size was 217. Today, the average high school is 800. Some high schools have three, four, 5,000 kids in it.

That's insane. And the reason we keep that, well, the reason the government likes that is because it's easier to control 100 large districts than it is 10,000 smaller schools, obviously. But I think one reason why we also go along with it

is because the bigger the school, the better the football team, the better the sports. Like, oh, we gotta keep it. 1% of schools educate 20% of our kids. So 20% of our kids are funneled through these massive, enormous factories that are spitting out a not good product when it comes to the education. Just education, knowledge, let alone cultivating virtue.

So we're talking about discipline this morning and we had some teachers call in one in particular who does this in California, they call it restorative justice. So instead of discipline, you have restorative justice. And this person was one of those people. And she talked about how awful these kids' home lives are and what's a school to do?

And I kind of agree with that. We're kind of left in a hopeless place. But then finally a gentleman called in who works at a school that is small and where discipline is the culture. And these are black kids, broken families, many of them kicked out of school. So this isn't the best of the best, the cream of the crop, or of course it's going to work

where parents are super involved. That's not what this school is. But it's a Christian school, it's the first thing. But then also discipline is the culture. Because we started talking about discipline, oh, you're not allowed to discipline kids,

and oh, what do you wanna beat them? Like not that long ago they paddled kids, but no, that's not what I'm talking about. about is a culture of discipline, a culture of expectations, a culture of standards. This is who we are. This is what we expect out of everyone. And you have to fall in line with this.

This is the culture we do here. A smaller school, it's easier to do that. A bigger school, I mean, the kids are going to set the culture, right? All right, let's pivot. So that's the news story. Hopefully we see a lot of fruit of that in our public schools, although our public schools

are still run by people who hate Trump and will probably still institute all these restorative justice programs and still not disciplined properly, even though the threat of the lawsuits are gone. The damage is already done.

It's gonna be hard to unwind. So let's turn to the Bible. We talked to a rabbi the other day on our TV special. We did a special on biblical leadership. And at the end, just cause we just read, my family and I, we just read Moses, Mount Sinai,

Israelites, golden calf, that whole scene. So I was like, I'm talking to a rabbi, I ask him about it. Because it's crazy. It's crazy to think that everything the Israelites went through, that they would build a calf, a cow, a golden cow and worship it.

This is the God that let us out of Egypt. What are you talking about? And after two seconds of being shocked by these people, I think, oh, I'm the same way. Just as sinful, just as absurdly comically blind as to what God has done for me and who he's calling me to be and what he's calling me to do.

And I just go on with my own life, worshiping my own cows all over the place. So I asked him about this and how this could have happened. And he brought up this term called the mixed multitude. And I've heard this word before, the mixed multi, I've heard these words, but I've never thought about it. I've never stopped and sat and pondered

and studied the mixed multitude. What is, who are the mixed multitude? So we're in Egypt. We had all these plagues. And we mentioned this the other day that most of them did not affect the Israelites at all.

So it's pitch black for everyone except the Israelites. That's crazy. All the animals died except for the Israelites animals. So after the 10th plague killing of the firstborn, here's Exodus 12. Pharaoh rose in the night, he all his servants and all the Egyptians and there was a great cry

in Egypt for there was not a house where there was not one dead. Horrific. Then he called for Moses and Aaron by night and said, rise go out from among my people, both you and the children of Israel. Go serve the Lord as you have said. Also take your flocks and your herds as you have said and be gone. And bless me also." Threw a little, what's in it for me there too.

So then they got all the gold and the silver and all the clothes and everything from the Egyptians and they're out of here. Exodus 12, 37. Then the children of Israel journeyed from Ramseed to Sukkoth, about 600,000 men on foot beside the children. So they're thinking two million people. Could you imagine two million people

marching out of a city? What, like two million? Look up a population here. I don't know, the first city that came to mind was Boston. What's the population of Boston? Computer's super slow right now.

Everything's taking like five seconds. And the population of Boston is 650,000. All right, so we got, we're bigger than Boston. Maybe the Boston metro area. Let's see what the Boston metro area is. It's gotta be over 2 million, right?

5 million, all right. So that's Boston, Cambridge, Newton. So imagine like half of the whole Boston area or whatever city you want to be. Half of them all packing up, shipping out, hiking out of the city. Crazy scene, incredible scene, unimaginable scene. Now check this out.

A mixed multitude went up with them also and flocks and herds a great deal of livestock. Oh man, it's so easy just to skip right by that. A mixed multitude. Who are these people? The mixed multitude are non-Israelites.

So these could be people of other nations. Maybe some Egyptians. mercenaries, maybe the children of some Israelites and Egyptian parents, all different types of people, not Israelites. That's the point. Joining the Israelites, people who said, I'm out of here. And I don't know if it was, it probably wasn't.

I believe in God, I believe in their God. It was probably more, this place is crazy, I'm getting out of here, I can't take the frogs anymore. And who knows what's next? So we're going with these people. I don't care where they're going, I'm out of here. So what are we to think of these people? Let me quote John

MacArthur. He said, you'll find the expression mixed multitude three times in the King James Version of the Bible and each time it is a disparaging expression used to describe the backslidden, spiritually eclectic, morally compromised during the time of Israel's worst apostasies. For example, Numbers 11 verse 4, and the mixed multitude, multitude that were among them fell to lusting. So these people were a problem. Let me quote here Charles Spurgeon. It's

hard to quote Charles Spurgeon's sermons because I don't know when to stop. He says, and now beloved we must finish up in a very solemn manner by reminding you of the companions that came out of Egypt with the children of Israel. When the children of Israel came out of Egypt, there were certain persons in Egypt dissatisfied with the king, very likely culprits, condemned persons, debtors, bankrupts, and such like persons who were tired of their country and who, as is wittily said, of those who are transported left their country for their country's good. But

through these people, excuse me, but though these people went with the children of Israel, mark you, they were not of them. Hmm. They escaped, but the door was not opened to let them out. It was only open to let out the children of Israel. It is said that the mixed multitude fell a lusting. It was the mixed multitude that taught them to worship the golden calf. It was the mixed multitude that always led them astray." Interesting. The mixed multitude, they

were the ones who grumbled and said, let us go back because they weren't slaves like the Israelites were. And maybe for them it was better to go back to Egypt. And Spurgeon's point is similarly today, people don't understand the depth of what Jesus has done for them because they never understood the depth of sin that they were for them because they never understood the depth of sin that they were living in. So it doesn't mean anything to them that

they're the mixed multitude of today, the hanger-on-ers, the people who aren't really committed. Spurgeon said the Egyptians never had any real bondage and therefore they could not rejoice as the true Israelite did when they were set free from the yoke of Pharaoh. He said, O ye mixed multitude, you are the ruin of the churches. You set us a lusting. The pure Israelites blood is tainted by union with you. You sit as God's people

sit and yet you are not his people. You sit as God's people sit, and yet you are not his people. You hear as God's people hear, and yet you are in the gall of bitterness and in the bonds of iniquity. You take the sacrament as sweetly as others, while you are eating and drinking damnation to yourself. You come to the church meeting, you sit in the private assembly of the saints, but even when you are there you are nothing but a wolf in sheep's clothing, entering the flock when you ought not to be there.

Wow. My dear hearers, do try yourselves to see whether you are real Israelites. Oh, could Christ say to you, behold, an Israelite indeed in whom there is no guile? Have you the blood on your doorpost? Have you eaten of Jesus? Do you live on him?

Do you have fellowship with him? Has God, the Holy Ghost, brought you out of Egypt? Or have you come out yourself? Have you found refuge in his dear cross and wounded side? If you have, rejoice, for Pharaoh himself cannot bring you back again. But if you have not,

I pray my master to dash your peace into atoms, fair and lovely as it may be. I beseech him to send the winds of conviction and the floods of his wrath, that your house may fall now rather than it should stand to your death." I love that idea. If you're not a preacher, church I used to go to that said this a lot, this idea that if you're not a Christian, I hope things go really badly for you. I hope you hit a rock bottom fast now before you die so you can turn to Jesus.

And this came up during our most recent special here that we've had churches for a long time that their number one goal is to increase in numbers no matter who they let in. And I've lost sight of the fact that the church is for the saints, the church is for the church. Like Sunday morning is for the church. James Orr, it's in the early 1900s, he said, "'Nominal adherents are no source of strength, but a great weakness to the church.

It may be the church's duty to bear with them, but she can never derive benefit from them. She may benefit them, and that hope should treat them tenderly, but they will never benefit her. Oh man, how much in these last just like a couple of years,

COVID and Black Lives Matter, all this trans stuff, whatever, has the church thought that if we just be more like the world, if we let more of the world in, then we can be more like it, and we'll be better.

No, no, no, no, no. You can benefit the world, but they will never benefit the church. They will they will be a drag upon her activity in proportion to their number. Will they exert a chilling and detrimental influence? They will stand in the way of good schemes. They will fall a lusting and provoke discontent.

The morale of a church can scarcely avoid being lowered by them. What then put them out? Not so we shall work in vain to separate tares and wheat. And we are forbidden to act on this principle, but let us do what we can to keep down their number. Interesting. I also found this analogy here of the remora type of fish, and it always hangs around the bottom of

a shark so you'll see a shark swimming around there'll be a couple of these these fish and then maybe a shark will get pulled out of the water and this this fish will just swim around the bottom of the of the ship just picking off whatever it can and the analogy is these hangers on resemble our social ones in the following particulars. They like traveling about. They do not care what they attach themselves to so long as it suits their

purpose for the time. They will not get along by their own exertions if they can find others to carry them. They are sharp in their own interests. It's very interesting, a new concept that the rabbi brought to my attention, the mixed multitude. We can bring it back around

to the political topic I mentioned. It doesn't take a lot of people to ruin it for the rest of us. It doesn't take a lot of people to ruin it for the rest of us. It doesn't take a lot of people in a school to really screw it all up. So how long must we accommodate

the people who are not playing along? Do we need a separate school system for these kids who just will not behave and will not participate and I know that sounds not nice Because we're supposed to accommodate the one But that one disruptive student destroys the education for the other 30 that are in the classroom And that's being kind that's not even referring to the violence and how much destruction is

caused, how much time is wasted for everyone else. And I don't want to accommodate the one anymore when we're letting down 30 more. I'm sure it's even worse than that. I don't know what that looks like practically. I have no solutions right here. Although I love the school that the gentleman brought up earlier. Again, with the culture of discipline and order,

that's obviously what we need, big picture, but we have to be careful of a mixed multitude that just destroys. Now, these are kids we're talking about, right? I'm not suggesting we throw these kids in prison and just be done with them forever. They're ruined. There's compassion and mercy and grace, of course, and it's all done out of love. Everything we have to do moving forward is love.

And I don't want these kids to end up in prison. That's the point. We're trying to avoid sending these kids into prison and continuing the cycle of poverty and impregnating women and more poverty and abuse and drugs and gangs. Like we want to stop all that. But what we're doing now isn't working for them and it's not working for the other kids

who want to learn either. Remember there's a study done a while back where they took a disruptive student and put them in a group of kids that were unified to see what would happen if the one bad apple spoils the bunch theory was true.

And then they also took some kids that were disruptive and they put like one good apple in there and it didn't work. It was, it was, it was, and the one, the good apple didn't work on the other kids and the one bad apple was able to tear down everything else.

Like that principle is true. A mixed multitude can cause a lot of trouble. Let's identify this, prioritize appropriately, and see how we can solve this major problem in our country. Mike Slater.locals.com is my website. Transcript commercial free on the website. Mike Slater. locals dot com is my website. Transcript commercial free on the website. Mike Slater dot locals dot com.

It's time we take environmentalism back from the lunatics, atheists, and pagan Mother Earth worshippers. Environmentalism should be, once again, led by conservatives and Christians around the Creator's commands to "subdue" and "rule" the earth.

Welcome to Politics by Faith. Thanks for being here. Happy Earth Day. Feels like Earth Day is not really a big deal anymore. I didn't really think about it leading up to it. I'm not going to spend time here talking about the founder of Earth Day, how he murdered

his girlfriend, stuffed her in a trunk in his closet for about 18 months before the neighbors started to notice. Not going to do that here. Doesn't seem appropriate or necessary or edifying. On my San Diego show for the last maybe 15 years, we've done an Earth Day tradition, and that is to share the story about how you should not recycle.

Recycling is a giant waste of time, money, and energy. It actually hurts the planet, and you should immediately stop doing it. We also, over the years, have thrown in there a little more about how the Great Barrier Reef is not dying, it's not being bleached, and there's no such thing as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. And generally, all these things together speak to a larger hysteria that people like to have. They cling to things and there's a conversation here about the concentric circles, how conservatives,

their concentric circles, they start in the middle with the person, the self, and then family, community, nation, world. And liberals, progressives start from the outside. They start from the world and then work their way in, if possible, to get to the middle.

Conservatives start from the middle and work their way out. I think that's a better way of ordering everything, starting with yourself and then working out. It's actually better for the world that way. Progressive start with the world, but even that wasn't far enough away. So progressive start with like another concentric circle of, of the health of the planet forever in the future.

Like that's like there, it like, it's just pagan. It's the pagan worshiping mother earth is what that is. But so we go to bigger conversations like that. Don't need to do that here. We did that on the radio. We've done it on the radio every year for 15 years. I want to share this story instead. And for a bigger reason, the other day, just a couple of days ago, someone walked down the streets of LA with a chainsaw, cutting down trees, dozens of trees,

in the city streets. So you got the street and then the sidewalk, and these are trees intermittently planted and been there for a long time. Along the sidewalk there, beautiful trees, important trees for the neighborhood,

and just cut them down. And that made me angry and sad and I think it's probably some progressive person who did that it's not a it wasn't someone in a MAGA hat going down with a chainsaw I'll bet you money on that one probably someone on the left that's interesting isn't it and we'll find out they don't know who did it yet. Obviously we can't have this person walking around.

This person can't be trusted in any aspect of their life. And it's okay, we have places for people like this where we send them so they can stay away from the rest of us. Stay away from chainsaws and trees. Who knows who they're gonna use that chainsaw on next. So we mentioned this on the radar today because I got thinking like this really interesting that it's probably a lefty who did this

and why did it bother me so much? I just started the other day reading this book, I don't know why, it's by Eric Sloan, it's called American Barns and Covered Bridges. It's beautiful, stunningly beautiful book. It's an ode to wood.

He said, because he started, did I mention this yesterday? I may have mentioned it yesterday. He was dismantling or renovating a barn and he was just amazed at how well built this thing was being hundreds of years old. And he got thinking, who were the Americans who built this thing? Who were these men? And he went on this whole adventure about barns and covered bridges. And he made the point that we think of symbolic things of America, we think of wheat or gold

or steel. He says we should also think of wood. It was just 20 years after the pilgrims barely made it through the first winter in America. 20 years later, they were exporting wood as far away to Madagascar on ships built with American trees. And it was so ingrained in our culture from the very beginning in America that if a man was strong or weak or honest or dishonest, he was likened to some sort of tree.

Now I'm a conservative and I think to strengthen our conservative movement, I think we need to go back to not only our founding fathers fathers but our founding grandfathers and to learn that our founding grandfathers loved wood so deeply, so profoundly. It just drove home again that environmentalism should be a conservative issue. So add this one to the list. There's all these different issues, just these last couple of years now, this realignment,

this political realignment that conservatives have taken from the left. I don't know if the conservatives have taken them or the left has dropped them and we've just picked them up. I don't know, but it's good. And this is one of the geniuses of Trump is that he's taken some of the issues that the left was right on, like being pro freedom of speech, anti-war, fair trade, for the working class.

These ideas that the left has had for a long time, Trump just, yoink, thank you very much. These are now ours. And this is another one, we talked about one on the radio today, with child labor and how many illegal aliens came under the Biden administration

and hundreds of thousands of children working 12 hour shifts in our country right now. And how we had no way to keep up with this. And this was done by the left. The left did this. So the left you would think would have hung their hat in the past on being against child labor. And here we are conservatives coming in and be like, I don would think, would have hung their hat in the past on being against child labor. And here we are, conservatives coming in and being like, hmm, I don't think we should have children working in coal mines anymore.

So it's like, okay, that's now ours. Thank you very much. And one of those issues also that we should take now is environmentalism. We have let the left have environmentalism for far too long.

It's ours now. I would like to take it, take it back, in fact. My neighborhood, the development, my favorite street is this beautiful street, kind of has a hill to it. It's like a bending hill. The road kind of goes down and to the right there. Massive trees on either side and it covers the whole street.

It's a canopy the whole way. And it's the one part of the neighborhood where as the street bends away, the houses are actually set back from the sidewalk and from the street quite a bit. And there's another row of trees

and it's just a beautiful little street. I go out of my way as I leave the development to drive through this street. And as you get further and further back in the development where the newer homes have been built and the trees get smaller and smaller until you get to our street where the trees are. It was like a year or so old since they've been planted.

And you look up, it's not as nice back here. This is a wait in 10 years. It'll be beautiful, but not not there yet. Trees are good. We need more trees to go back to this Eric Sloan book. He said American kids knew all about trees. And they could tell you what it was just by its smell. And they could tell you what they were used for. Black gum was for plow shares. Oak for framing and pegs. Apple for saw handles. Chestnut

for barrel hoops. Cedar for pails. Pine for kindling. Oak for heat. Even the plainest carpenter knew that a rocking chair needed at least four different kinds of wood. Each wood did its specific job. There was pine for a soft seat, hickory for a springy back, walnut for strong legs, and oak for the fastening pegs. Just love how connected we were to trees and also how we use them. That speaks to the word subdue. We'll get to that in just a moment. But one more thought in my ode to tree. Just yesterday I was running around with Grace in a park. We call it Creek Park in the neighborhood.

This is a little Creek that rolls through and there's trees on either side. And then put a little playground, a little small little playground in the corner there. And Grace likes to run around and, know, like a foot diameter or something. So they were, they were significant. And I got sad.

And I think, why am I sad? Just a tree. Well, first it was more beautiful when they were there, but is it just the aesthetics I care about? Is that it? Not that that's nothing, something, but it took a long time for those trees to grow that

tall. I don't know what that speaks to. Should I have hugged the tree? If I hugged the tree, would they not have torn it down? Oh, this reminds me, do you remember the tree, just read this the other day, they tore a tree down. Tore sounds dramatic, they cut it down,

they removed, removed the tree that was planted by Andrew Jackson at the White House 196 years ago. Does that make you sad? It kind of does for me. Should we have hugged it? Maybe they wouldn't have cut it down then. I would like to introduce an argument that conservatives and Christians should be environmentalists.

There's lots of different views on the environment. The greenies think it shouldn't be touched at all. They've elevated the environment above man or even above God, very pagan mother earth, and man is a parasite on the planet. Many I'd say most Americans have that view actually. They may not be able to articulate it like that,

but they've been influenced by people who have that perspective, that man is a parasite and that the earth is the most important thing. And we need to go back to the natural state of the planet. Others view the environment as something to exploit,

just a very materialistic perspective. That's not right either. I don't know what the Buddhist or Hindu view is on the environment. I'm guessing, I'm just totally making this up, I'm guessing they talk a big game

about being one with nature. But if you look at the rivers in Buddhist and Hindu countries, doesn't look like people who say they're one with the planet. So there needs to be a better answer here. Doesn't look like people who say they're one with the planet.

So there needs to be a better answer here. And I think we need to be the people who have a biblical view of the environment. And I would say that this biblical view needs to be centered around the words, subdue and rule. Subdue and rule, because that's what it says in Genesis 1, to subdue and rule in line with the creator, to promote human flourishing and glorify God.

Something like that. So let's talk about these words. Let's read it. Genesis 1, then God said, let us make man in our image after our likeness and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth we saw a hawk what kind of hawk Cooper Hawk a

Cooper Hawk landed when Grace and I were in that park ten feet away from us Wow look at that thing verse 27 so God created man in his own image, in the image of God, he created him, male and female, he created them and God blessed them. And God said to them, be fruitful and multiply. People know that part and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the rule, the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth. Subdue and rule over the animals and plants. Subdue and rule. Those words seem to have negative connotations. I

think that leads people to think, oh we can exploit it then? No, no. It means we're a steward over it. Our authority to subdue and rule comes from the ultimate ruler, from God. So we have to steward the earth the way that God would. If God's the president, we're the employees, we're the governors, and we're to work in the way he would want us to. It doesn't mean to waste or exploit or abuse.

It's not a license to abuse, not even close. We have to use the environment as God would have us to use it and take care of it and tend to it. Now, you may have thought, I haven't mentioned this word yet, but global warming. When you talk about environmentalism these last 10, 20 years

that it's been connected with global warming, but that's not, we got to decouple those decouple global warming and environmentalism. Global warming is not true. And God already told us he's going to burn up the earth and everything in it. He's going to make a new heaven and a new earth. So don't worry about that.

I think actually that speaks to the paganism of the global warming idea that they would take something that is in the Bible and then make it their own earthly thing, like worldly thing. Second Peter 3, 7 says, by his word, the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire, kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men. All right, I can go on. Here's my, my goal of this Earth Day. Conservatives should be environmentalists. Environmentalists who view God's creation

as something to be subdued and ruled over as a steward, given authority from our creator. We need to decouple environmentalism from global warming, two very different things. Let the atheists, let the pagans, let the left have global warming.

We will have true environmentalism. And also we should take back environmentalism from the atheists. John MacArthur quoted Aldous Huxley. So Aldous Huxley, who wrote Brave New World, his grandpa, Thomas Huxley, did not know this, was Darwin's right-hand man. So all this has a connection to evolution and all that. 1966, Huxley wrote a book called Confessions of a Professed Atheist.

He said this, I had motives for not wanting the world to have meaning. Consequently assumed it had none, and was able without any difficulty to find satisfying reasons for this assumption. The philosopher who finds no meaning in the world is not concerned exclusively with a problem in pure metaphysics. He also concerned to prove that there's no valid reason why he should personally not do just what he wants to do.

For myself, as no doubt for many of my contemporaries, the philosophy of meaninglessness was essentially an instrument for liberation. The liberation we desired was simultaneously a liberation from a certain political and economic system, and a liberation from a certain system of morality. And we objected to the morality because it interfered with our sexual freedom. How about that for a confession? A lot of the environmentalism we see from atheists is trying to fill a God-sized hole in their heart. They gotta believe in something.

We believe in morality. We believe life has meaning. We believe in creation. We believe life has meaning. We believe in creation. We believe in the creator. And we should take seriously God's command to subdue and rule the earth. We can work on the details as time goes on. But I believe Earth Day today, 2025, is a good time that we conservatives and Christians take environmentalism back from the lunatics, the atheists, and the pagan Mother Earth worshippers. Mike Slater dot locals dot com. Transcript commercial free on the website Mike Slater dot locals dot com.

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.