Roger Marsh: Well, welcome back to Dr. James Dobson's Family Talk. I'm Roger Marsh, thanking you for joining us today and for making us a part of your day. Now, if you were with us on our last broadcast yesterday, we heard the first part of a stirring presentation from Charlie Kirk. Now, if you don't know who Charlie is, I'll give you a little bit of his background.
Charlie Kirk is the founder and president of Turning Point USA, an organization he began in his teens. Turning Point is a national student movement organization that empowers teens and young adults to embrace conservative ideals. Charlie is also the host of the daily national radio talk show called The Charlie Kirk Show, and Charlie and his wife, Erica, are also the parents of a beautiful young daughter.
This program is included in this year's 2023 Broadcast Collection, by the way. If you enjoy family talk programs, you'll definitely want to add this year's collection to your home library. Now, this collection is available either as a five CD set or a digital download, and we'll be happy to send it to you as our way of thanking you for your gift of any amount in support of the Dr. James Dobson Family Institute today. So to get your copy, go online to drjamesdobson.org/2023. That's drjamesdobson.org/2023. Everything you need to complete the transaction to receive your copy of the 2023 Broadcast Collection will be right there on that page.
And now, let's jump right back in for part two of Charlie Kirk's classic presentation right here on Family Talk.
Charlie Kirk: I have to say, one of the reasons why I love Dr. Dobson's work in all of this, I got to say is we think back to the Ten Commandments, the only one of the Ten Commandments that involves your country and a promise is honor your mother and father. It's the only one of the Ten Commandments that says honor your mother and father so you may live long in the land of which you are in. And we have raised an entire generation to not just dishonor their parents, but to curse their parents. There is now incentive structures to say that my parents' beliefs, I must deconstruct them, I must push back against them. You go back to the actual Hebrew, to honor your parents, actually, the same root of the word is to treat your parents heavily, to treat them very seriously. The word curse actually is the same Hebrew word of lightly.
You think about the root of the word light and curse, it's the same thing. Heavy and honor is the same thing. Now, it doesn't say you have to love your parents. It does later in the New Testament, but not in the Ten Commandments. I hear all the time from left-wing students, "My parents don't know what I just learned at university." I say, "Yeah, it's probably a good thing they don't know what you just learned at university." But that's exactly what the totalitarians want. Lucifer knows he could destroy America. The enemy knows he could destroy America by wrecking the bond between a parent and a child.
I hear sometimes from pastors, they say, "Charlie, nowhere in the Bible does it say that I should care about my nation." I said, "Oh, you must be like those guys that only talk about Matthew and Mark, right?" Because in Jeremiah it says, "Demand the welfare of the nation that you are in because your welfare is directly tied to your nation's welfare," Jeremiah 29:7. Daniel, Nehemiah, Jeremiah, Esther, Mordecai all fought for God's purpose in secular government to be the proper role, which is counselor to the king. Is the American church currently the counselor to the king? No. In fact, there's this big divide where they say, "It doesn't matter what happens to America." How are you going to fund your ministries? 80% of all the money that funds ministries worldwide comes from America. America falls, there will be a vacuum. What will fill that vacuum is chaos, evil, discord the likes of which we've never seen.
By the way, just how ungrateful have we become as a people to say, "I don't care." We are so much better than that, aren't we? So what can this room do? This is a very powerful room. I'm so touched by meeting so many of you. Here's the call to action. We're not going to put up with another pastor or ministry that doesn't speak out against this stuff. I don't care how nice they are. That's the call to action. Because I guarantee you, if we put together everyone in this room of all the different ministries and they say, "Well, this person does so good with this topic and all this," you got to say, "Are they speaking out on the issues that matter right now or are they pandering to a broken culture in a broken world?" If this room got together and gathered and organized, it could change overnight, from the funding side, the influence side, the board member side, and then lift up people like Dr. Dobson and say, "He's been doing this for decades."
And yes, you're going to get slings and arrows and people are going to say things towards you, but aren't we called at a time like this to be bold and courageous?" Now sometimes, this is an argument I'm getting more and more where people say, "Charlie, Jesus is coming next Thursday, therefore I don't have to do any of this stuff." And so look, people ask me about my eschatology all the time, my pre-trib and my post-trib. I'm pan-trib, it's all going to pan out in the end, okay? So it's not my shtick, but I actually think Jesus might be coming soon. That's a reason to do more. It's not a reason to retreat. In fact, what do you want to be caught doing when Jesus returns? You want to be twiddling your thumbs, right? You want to be like, "Well, I was just talking to all the same people or I retreated." No, you got to lean in and try to be salt and light. And as Barry McGuire always says, salt and light are the two things that change the environment of which they encounter. They don't pander to those environments, they change it. Light makes dark lighter and salt literally changes the environment it comes in contact with.
And so this room can change America. But I could tell you, from the political side right now, the left knows exactly what they're doing. The big bet of the left, and this is why Soros is pumping money in, this is why the World Economic Forum is doing this, and I don't know even if everyone in this room is aware of this, their big bet is they take over America because they think they can get the American church not to care. They say it out loud. That's why they try to accuse you of being a Christian nationalist and all this other stuff.
And so I'm here just trying to warn you guys right now. One of two things happen. We do nothing and we just sit in our hands like, "Well, it's not really clear about the way to go. It's okay if pastors' homes are raided by the FBI. It's okay, we're just going to do our thing." Or we can have a different course of action and do what the American church has always done, which is, first, the American church founded America. We don't talk enough about this. From Jonathan Mayhew to Jonathan Edwards to George Whitefield, it was courageous pastors that founded America and gave the Founding Fathers the courage and the theological and moral clarity to write the Declaration of Independence and fight the Revolutionary War. The Black-Robed Regiment gave over 50,000 sermons across the eastern seaboard that laid this amazing framework for our Founders to be able to say, "You know what? Our rights come from God, not from King George."
From every great awakening, every time America has been falling, every time America has been slipping, it's been pastor after pastor, awakening after awakening that rises up and steps up. And yes, we are on the verge of another great awakening, on the verge of a revival in this country. Boy, does this generation need it. But guess what? It's going to be different than any other awakening and revival. It's not going to be skinny jeans. It's not going to be pandering and saying curse words from stage like you're some sort of cool pastor. It's going to be bold truth. It's going to be preaching word for word from the Bible. It's going to be going verse by verse and chapter by chapter. By the way, our pastors have to stop being afraid of the Bible. I'm going to say that again, they got to stop being afraid of the Bible.
I saw this sermon the other day, someone sent it to me, it's Woke Pastors, you guys got to follow it, it's a great social media account, where they literally clip up all these woke... This one guy says, "Yeah, we don't really talk about Leviticus and Deuteronomy around here. We just focus on the New Testament." It's like, "Wow, you don't understand the harmony of the Scriptures? You don't understand how God created this beautiful story for all mankind to resonate with? Who are you now to micromanage and saying, 'Well, maybe there's some parts we don't focus on.'" You know how we know the Founding Fathers were awesome? They put Leviticus on the Liberty Bell, okay? Not Psalms, not John, Leviticus, okay, "Proclaim liberty throughout the land of which you are in."
John Adams spoke fluent Hebrew. 55 out of 56 of the signers of the Declaration of Independence were Bible-believing church-attending Christians. And so for any of the apathetic Christians out there, I don't think there's many in this room, but they're out there, the question should also be, why do you get to receive something that Christians sacrificed for but you think you don't have to do anything? That's not being a good steward, that's being ungrateful, just casting it aside. There's never been a country like America. Period. It's the freest, most amazing place ever to exist in the history of the world because of courageous sacrifices of generations before. The greatest political document ever, the American family kept our country alive and strong despite many attempts of the enemy to destabilize it.
Let's just look realistically. If it's not for the American church, what else is going to turn this around? Because I know a lot of you have anxiety about the nation right now, but long-term, if the church sits idly by, they're going to run us over, and we know how that ends up. But here's the thing, they actually can do math the other side, and they know that if the church rises up, this thing gets out of control for them. If evangelical Christians alone start actually getting their congregation to vote and getting this message out, you're going to all of a sudden see, the bad guys, the people that are pushing for these issues that are just so unspeakably evil, they're not going to know what to do. That's why they have to do everything they possibly can to try to keep us complacent and keep us silent.
And so I think of a couple of things as I reflect back on the few years I've been doing this on college campuses, and it is a generation that is yearning for truth. It is. And it's a generation that wants to hear things that are clearly stated and things that do not change. There's two types of knowledge. There's practical knowledge, things that change, and eternal knowledge or wisdom, things that never change. We have not just a good story to tell, we have the only story to tell. This is what I always laugh at when Christians, they say, "Charlie, I'm so afraid." I'm going to say something rather controversial. I don't think you're allowed to be afraid as a Christian. I also don't think you're allowed to be apathetic or cynical.
Now, call me woefully optimistic, but if you truly believe that Jesus is your Lord and Savior, then how could you be apathetic, cynical, or afraid? Now, I'm not trying to accuse anyone of not having faith, but that doesn't seem like boldness of faith. Instead, when you see someone that really believes what they believe and is willing to lean in and do something about it, then all of a sudden you realize that that conviction, that fight for liberty, which is not man's idea but it's God's idea, that can spread like wildfire. And so it's a call to action very clearly. We just had an amazing Pastors Summit. We had 400 pastors and wives from across America that were gathering all around these issues. Someone asked me, they said, "Charlie, what does success look like for you in the church space?" Because trust me, I would be happy to just have been right with my prediction. I thought the church loved liberty. I was wrong. Here, it's very simple, I will retire from all things in the American church if we could do the following, and I'll give you some backstory.
In American Christianity, there have been chapters of heresy. In the 1820s, there was a man by the name of John C. Calhoun who wrote extensively saying the Bible supported slavery. It's a heresy. It was wrong. It was evil. There were other heresies throughout American history, and then pastors started to get a spine and rise up against it and say, "We must excommunicate these heresies and these lies from the church and from Christianity." Our goal is very simple: we want to make wokeism, postmodernism, deconstructionism, and the pushing back of the inerrancy of scripture a unconscionable, heretical belief where that if any pastor, if any board member, if any donor says that stuff, that they are put into the fringes of American Christianity. We want to abolish wokeism in the American church. That is my goal.
It's not going to happen overnight. You have to rebuke the evil where it rears its head. The enemy knows what he's doing, and this is how it plays out, I'm telling you, this diversity, equity, inclusion garbage, all this stuff, it's very simple, they start to infiltrate these big churches and then soon there will be conversations of, "Well, is the Bible really true?" It happens that fast. It's like, "Well, who's to say that Noah's Ark really happened? We don't have to teach that part." Or maybe Jesus was actually a Marxist revolutionary and we've been reading it through the wrong lens because we're reading it through a white colonialist lens. It goes straight after the faith overnight. That same framework that wants you to deconstruct your patriotism and your country goes straight after the truth itself.
Truth corrects error, but truth sets people free. And this is what's so exciting about what we can do, is that this is the greatest moment ever for evangelism, I think, in the last 50 years and the last 100 years. The opportunity is right there, but it's going to be a different revival. I think, as I said previously, it's a Galatians 3, where the law is a school teacher to Christ. At Turning Point USA, we have students from all backgrounds, we have a lot of Christians, we have a lot of kids that are not Christians. But what's amazing to see, we have these massive conferences where we have Tucker Carlson, we have Donald Trump, we have Laura Ingram, we have the biggest names you could imagine, and then we have an optional worship service on Sunday morning at 7:00 AM after many of them were probably making, let's just say, interesting decisions the night before.
And when we have that worship morning optional, we have thousands of kids showing up, hundreds giving their life to the Lord that have never heard the gospel before. Never. Here's the amazing thing, only politics got them in the room. How many times have we been told the opposite? "Oh, politics turns people off." Rubbish. There's 75 million people that voted for Donald Trump, how many of them have a ticket to heaven? How many people have given their life to the Lord of that 75 million people? Here's a good start, those 75 million people don't believe men can become pregnant, they believe America's a great country, and they believe in the natural law. Isn't that a great place to start? I know it's not for everybody, but it sure is an interesting ministry opportunity when you think about it, of people that might be in alignment with the natural law and God's commands to then set them free of all this nonsense that's happening here in our country.
And so I'll close with a couple thoughts. I'm doing a pastor's close, so it's going to be multiple closings. I do want to say, every time I come to Colorado Springs, I lose more and more respect for atheists. When you look at the beauty around here and just to say that this was the role of the dice, you go so down in the book for those... By the way, I debate atheists all the time. That's another interesting thing. You got to ask your pastor, "How often are you actually debating an atheist?" because in some ways I believe atheism is a religion. It's the fastest growing religion in America. In certain cities, there are more atheists than Christians. Atheists, by the way, are more committed to evangelism than most Christians are on college campuses, but that's a separate issue. I just had a whole debate against one. You could see in real time in my conversation with this atheist what ends up happening if Christians stay silent.
Because this atheist says, "Well, look Charlie, there is no God, but all that matters is leading a good life." I say, "Well, how do you know it's good?" He had some rubbish about Darwinism or some... And so then I asked him, I said, "Well, so you believe in the survival of the fittest?" He said, "Yeah, of course." "So then why shouldn't we just get rid of Down syndrome babies in the womb like to do in Iceland?" He said, "That's probably a good idea." Like that. That's what happens when you remove morality, you remove Christianity, you remove the center. And so often we take it for granted, don't we? We're like, "Oh yeah, these are agreed-upon customs and morals that everyone has." No, it's not. You remove that Christianity, you remove the Christian church from all of that, you start to see the preview of what we're seeing right now.
The globalists know this, and some of you have seen what we've talked about with the Great Reset and our conversation with Jack Hibbs on that. There is a global game going on here to destroy American sovereignty, to deteriorate our currency, to do all these different things. They know that if they can try to corrupt the American church, make it weak and complacent, they could take it all over. One final note here on the election, and now some people, you guys might be out there like, "Oh, Charlie, I don't care about politics. It doesn't matter who wins." I hear it all the time from Christians, by the way. All the time I get emails, they say, "It doesn't matter."
I hope those people that know that do know the FBI is literally raiding pastors every weekend because they pray outside of abortion clinics. You guys don't know about that, please get educated on what the FBI has been doing recently. But I think to myself, I say, "You know what? How privileged and entitled one must be to have said that in 2016. Those snobbish, smug Christians that said, 'I'm not going to vote for that guy, he's the worst. Donald Trump.'" That guy who's obviously led a colorful life, who you might think is braggadocious and narcissistic and egotistical, and I've heard all of your one-liners, those of you that believe those things, fine, he was used as an instrument of the Lord to repeal Roe versus Wade. That is a fact.
Guess what? Bush didn't do that. Either Bush... And I'm told they're Christians. That's great. Terrific. It took an imperfect vessel, and boy, aren't we all. Like Samson, if you read the Samson story correctly, let's just say you can't exactly explain that to a child. God came to him while he was in a prostitute's bed, took a jaw of a donkey and killed what? A thousand Philistines. And he ends up in the hall of faith in Hebrews. You know why? Because Samson was willing to fight when others weren't. When people say politics don't matter, it's a uniquely American belief now in modern American Christianity to be able to say such a thing. And really what they're saying is morals don't matter. But boy, if you even want a fighting shot of not having your church be deemed non-essential again, or not having pornography in local schools, or not having medical mutilation, then unfortunately, politics is the only vessel to be able to communicate a lot of that stuff.
How about this? They're going to outlaw homeschooling in almost every blue state in the next five years. Don't believe me, look at France and Germany. They're using that as a blueprint. "I'm going to homeschool my kids." How are you going to do that in California in five years when they try to outlaw it? Like, "Oh, a court will overturn it." Who put the judge then that will overturn it then, pal? And that's what we have to continue to challenge our pastors to stand boldly, courageously, and clearly.
I'll close with this, which is people ask me all the time... I know I keep saying I'm closing, but again, pastors close. They say, "Charlie, I've done everything you've asked of me. I bought the pillow and... " Promo code KIRK, by the way, and get those Giza Dream sheets. The slippers are great. Mypillow.com, they're really special. "I have tons of Relief Factor. I bought the gold. I have the chair that goes up the stairs. I reverse mortgaged my home. I called the Medicare helpline. I don't know what else I could do, Charlie, I've done everything that's been asked of me."
It's going to require more than that. You got to be in the arena, folks. Here's my call to action. Look, I've dedicated my short life to this, praise God. Thank you for all of you that has supported us, Mike Ingram, Barry, Victor. I look around the room, so many generous people. Thank you for making it possible. Last year we traveled 330 days across America. I do three hours of radio every single day, two podcasts a day. Just this week alone, I've been in six different states giving campus lectures from Kansas City to Tallahassee. You name it, I've been there, and doing radio and all that stuff in between. We love what we get to do, not complaining, it's awesome, and thank you for that.
But yes, it does come at a price, death threats, family put in danger, all that stuff, whatever, it's part of the game. All I'm asking you guys, there's three different types of people. There's one category of the people that do nothing. Then there's the people that are the fighters. But if you can't be one of the fighters, that's okay. Then just be one of the people that can help the fighters, and be the person that is the John Hancock that can supply the munitions and supply the things necessary for people to be able to fight on the front lines. I can't tell you how critically important that is. For the prayers of support that you guys give us, for the notes that you write to us, it does not fall on deaf ears or end up being void.
Because you know what? It does wear us down when we're on the front lines. It's just a non-stop barrage campaign of every major media... Mike Ingram and I were just talking about this... every media company trying to reach out and destroy the work we're doing at Turning Point USA. I mean, they're doing everything they possibly can to try to destabilize our work, and so I want to thank you guys for supporting us and for praying for us, but also get in the arena alongside of us. We have to try to make an American awakening happen. When the greatest man who lived in the 20th century, Winston Churchill, woke up the morning after Pearl Harbor, he was the only man smiling. I wish we taught our kids more about Churchill, Churchill is the greatest man in many different ways. Pearl Harbor was devastating, and Churchill was smiling and walked into the war cabinet room with a thing of whiskey and a cigar. His whole war cabinet was distraught and despondent, and he was chipper and cheerful.
He walks in and he proclaims to his fellow war board, "We have won the war." Everyone's like, "What?" He says it again, "We've won the war." And a brave soul decides to speak up and says, "Sir, have you lost your bloody mind? We are losing 2,000 Royal Air Force members every day. We barely got our troops out of Dunkirk. They're planning an amphibious invasion via Brighton to our isle. There is a call for your resignation. We can't field a suitable military to be able to take back the lands that were lost in Europe. What do you mean we have won the war?"
Churchill took a puff of his cigar and a sip of whiskey at eight o'clock in the morning and he said, "I've studied the Americans for a couple of decades, fought alongside of them, and they are tricky people, often late to the party. But let me tell you this, once the Americans have awoken, everything changes. I tell you right now, what happened in Pearl Harbor, those Americans, they are awake, and the Nazis will be defeated and the war is over." Everybody, we awaken and we get an awakening going in America, we're going to win and they're going to lose. God bless you, guys. Thank you so much.
Roger Marsh: Proverbs 22:6 is very familiar to us, especially those of us who are parents, "Train up a child in the way he or she should go, and even when they are old, they will not depart from it." These biblical words ring true and are so profound. I'm Roger Marsh, and we just heard the conclusion of a powerful and classic two-part presentation by Charlie Kirk here on Family Talk. Now, if there is a part of today's presentation that you missed, or if you'd like to hear parts one and two together in their entirety, head over to our broadcast page at drjamesdobson.org/familytalk. That's drjamesdobson.org/familytalk.
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Well, I'm Roger Marsh, thanking you so much for joining us here on Family Talk today. Hope you'll tune in again tomorrow. We're going to hear a classic conversation featuring our very own Dr. James Dobson as he goes one on one with Charlie Kirk. Tomorrow's program will be an excellent compliment to both yesterday's and today's broadcasts because you'll get to hear Dr. Dobson's reaction to Charlie's presentation. Together, these two culture warriors will provide some deeper perspective on what Charlie has been unpacking for us over the past couple of days. So be sure to join us again tomorrow. Until then, have a blessed rest of your day from all of us here at Dr. James Dobson's Family Talk.
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