 Welcome to the Spirit and Truth podcast with Lee M. Cummings. Today, Dr. Michael Brown returns the podcast to discuss politics and the gospel. Thank you for joining us and enjoy this episode. Thank you everybody for joining us on this episode of Spirit and Truth. And I am overjoyed today because we have a very special guest who's been with us here in Kalamazoo for a couple of days. And I asked him to join us. You are the first returning guest on our podcast, Dr. Brown. Everybody, Dr. Michael Brown is with us. And we're delighted to have you. Thank you so much for joining us. Great to be with you and great to be in your new studio also. Yeah, yeah. It's coming together. And our next thing is to add cameras and then I might actually have to dress a little nicer than I am today. Well, that works. The sweatshirt keeps the fire and the cowboy hat. We got the fire. The cowboy hat, the cowboy hat. Just the boots, just the cowboy boots. Dr. Brown, such a joy to have you with us. I want to jump right on in here because I have so many questions, so many things I'd like to cover when you have somebody like yourself who joins you. You want to really maximize the time. And I want to begin just by talking about your brand new book. Would you just tell everybody about the new book that you just released? Yeah, the political seduction of the church, how millions of Americans have confused politics with the gospel came out in September. The publisher really wanted to get it out before the midterm elections. I had one brother slam me publicly and say, what kind of person puts out a book like this before the midterms? As if the book would discourage people from voting. No, it's quite the contrary. Let's get things in the right priority. We got so obsessed with the political scene and political leadership and many of us, white evangelicals, especially Trump voters, really looking to a man almost more than we look to God. And if he lost, it's like our world was crumbling. Only Trump can save America. And the false prophecies, everything. We got things out of whack. And the only way America's gonna make it is for the church to be the church and for us to be gospel first, Jesus first, that we are infinitely better known as followers of Jesus than we are known as supporters of this candidate or that candidate or members of this party or that party. With that right perspective, of course we vote. If we don't vote, we just give the world over to those with different values. Some with very, very different values. Radically different values. Some who deeply oppose our values and wanna silence us and shut us down or enforce things on our kids or even take our kids away from us if we differ. So of course we vote. It's our sacred privilege as Americans through much of world's history, people didn't get to vote. But we must get things in order because if the church is not the church, if we fight this war the same way the world does, if we don't use the spiritual weapons that God's given us and we are just in the flesh like everybody else, we forfeit the very mandate that God's given us. So I felt it was essential to write this and address it. And although I've gotten slammed by some, which is gonna happen overwhelmingly, people said thank you for writing this. And it's not someone on the left, some woke person on the left writing it because I'm hated for my conservative moral stance as you are or Biblically based stance with compassion but we're hated for it. Jesus was hated and he's more compassionate than we'll ever be, right? Way, way more. But look, I voted for Trump twice. I voted Republican for years even though I don't put my trust in a party, I'm a registered independent just as a conscience statement, you know, just for me. But this is a matter of saying as someone who is conservative, someone who holds the conservative moral values and who votes Republican because of the radical stances of the Democrat party, we cannot put our trust in the political system. We cannot put our trust in a political leader. There's a trust that goes to God only but voting has its important place. Yeah, I can't think of a better time to release that type of a book. I mean, we're sitting here, we're about a week out from the midterms here in the United States, here in Michigan as well. And I'll tell you the kind of person that would write a book like that before the midterms, a pastor, teacher, prophetic voice that really cares about what's taking place in our country as well as what's taking place in the church because if we look at what took place in 2016, 2020 and has been playing itself out to some degree leading up to the midterms, and I'm not talking about the world, I'm talking about the way that the church has reacted in the political hot take culture that we're living in, social media platforms. I mean, what got us here in the church that prompted you to wanna write a book like this, not just kind of a voter guide, here's some general principles about how as a Christian you should vote. I think that's important, but your book really highlights some of the things that we got wrong in a very intense way in 2020 during Trump and Biden's national election. What did you see that took place then that led you to wanna write this? Right, so let me paint a picture for you. You live in a small town, some dogs are loose, some Rottweilers that have rabies. They've bitten some kids, now these kids' lives are in jeopardy, you need a dog catcher. There are two candidates that come forward. One is the nicest guy in the world, happily married, four kids, kids love him. He's the ideal neighbor, nice guy, never used to profanity, never gets drunk, no known vices, but he couldn't catch a dog if he gave him a nuclear bomb. The other candidate is this mean spirited guy, his wife left him alienated from his kids, nasty profanity, he doesn't get a sentence out without profanity, drinks a lot, but this guy will catch a dog with his own teeth. Who do you like, does the dog catcher? That guy. Well, that is an exaggerated picture, but that's what happened. We finally had someone fighting for us, and he's fighting back against the law. Okay, he's a little nasty the way he does it, but that's actually kind of funny the way he did it too. Like secretly laughing at. Snickering on the side. Yeah, yeah, and he's a little crude, but look, we're talking about the slaughter of the unborn. We're talking about international security. That's right. We're talking about fighting back against radical Islam. We're talking about standing up for our religious liberties and Trump's doing it. So we don't like his tweets. Come on, we're comparing a little offense here with grave, grave issues, and what happened was we got so caught up politically that we became really identified with a candidate, especially I can say that is white evangelicals, right? We became so identified with a candidate that we ended up hurting our witness to the people of America, and we ended up becoming like the candidate. I mean, people may deny it now, but you go back to our social media feeds and some to this day, we were just as nasty. We were just as divided. We are our pages look like they were political hit peace ads and things like that. And everything was put and mocking this one and mocking that one, as opposed to praying for them with a broken heart saying, hey, I absolutely differ with Hillary Clinton's policies. I feel Joe Biden's policies are destructive to America, but I pray for him as opposed to mocking and demonizing and things like that. You can call out wickedness without being a jerk in the process, but we kind of took this on. I wrote a book in 2018, Donald Trump is not my savior. An evangelical leader speaks his mind about the man who supports his president. So I wrote this as a Trump voter and supporter, but wanted to scream to the whole world. He's not my savior. There's only one that gets my devotion, attention, love, adoration, my heart, my soul, my life. That's Jesus. Trump got my vote to his universal support. I ended the book with seven guidelines saying we must live these out. We can't get caught up with election fever. We have to put the cross before the flag. We have to speak truth to power. We can't compromise our souls for seated at the table. I asked the question early in that book, is our alliance with Trump, is that a match made in heaven or a marriage with hell? And so we don't know yet. I know evangelicals that got close to Trump that were on the faith advisory council that are men of God who did speak truth to power, who were ethical, who did call him out, but they had to do it behind the scenes because they had that relationship with him. But in general, the evangelical voices you heard were just Trump apologists and he could do no wrong. It made us look bad. I did a Twitter poll a couple months back. I was really pleased with the results. I said if you had to choose one or the other as a follower of Jesus, which is more important, getting our man in the White House, our preferred candidate or maintaining our witness, overwhelming like 95% maintaining our witness. That's what we blew. I wrote a book in 2020, evangelicals at the crossroads will be passed the Trump test. This came out in the summer of 2020, again before the elections. And the Trump test to me was two things. One, can we vote for Trump and not destroy our witness? Two, can we unite around Jesus even if we divide over Trump? Well, we got a giant F on both of those from my perspective. So I felt it was critically important to write this now, not only so, but with this legion of false prophecies. Very, very few of these people were pented for them. Oh, they got crazy. They got crazy. People believing QAnon conspiracy theories, we have to wake up. It's the worst deception I've ever seen. I'm in the Lord now 51 years. The worst deception I've ever seen. And on top of that, almost no recognition of it afterwards. It'd be one thing if there was widespread recognition, renunciation, we blew it. How did this happen? And I try, in the book, I had someone that didn't vote for Trump in 2020, read the book and say, you really explained why you got behind Trump. I really see it much clearer now on how we got so caught up. In other words, I said, don't condemn us so quickly because there's some big issues going on here. And look at what Trump did. And look at how he fought for people and kept his word, did stuff nobody's ever done. Don't crash the man. Well, that's the confusion though, right? Because during 2020, there were people that were getting, even in the church, who were getting wrapped up in QAnon conspiracies and every kind of Facebook post you can think of. And yet then there were other people like yourself that voted for Trump but weren't buying into those conspiracies. But even the people, everybody was guilty by association. So we came out of 2020 and the church did, just as you said, lost our witness before the world in the way that we responded. Maybe not the choice that we made and how we voted but the way that we did it. We lost our witness and on top of that, then we had some of these leading voices kind of adding to the QAnon with this Christian version of the prophetic voice calling for Trump's reelection four more years. It was just this big not. Right, and then you have, so in December of 2020, so it's after the elections but we're still saying they're gonna be overturned and so on. You have the Jericho March and these rallies in DC and different cities. And you've got people, preachers with the American flag wrapped around them and talking about time for the militias to rise up and crazy talk like this. We're gonna rule and reign under Donald Trump for four more years and some respected leaders. And so it's now guilty by association on a larger level. And then now you have January 6th. Do I believe it was an attempted insurrection? No, absolutely not. Do I believe that it's been exaggerated in terms of the implications nationwide? Yes, do I believe that there may have been other agitators involved? I don't know. It could be, I mean, there's a lot of questionable stuff. Either way, everyone that I know that was there at the event praying for the righteous outcome of the elections, believing they were stolen, they were utterly mortified by what happened. They absolutely were not there in DC for that. However, everybody got too close to the flames. So now because of Trump's irresponsibility, right? Again, I said this is a two-time Trump order. The rhetoric he used and by basically telling people if you want to see America have a future, if you want your kids to have a free government, if you ever want to have another election, you're gonna have to do something about this deal. And he throws Mike Pence under the bus, right? It could have gotten really dangerous. And he was irresponsible with his rhetoric leading up to it. And there was really incendiary rhetoric before he got up. That's why he has this president and the statesman. You say, hey, listen, we got a system, we have courts, we have this, we have that. We're gonna do this the right way. Instead, it all gets inflamed. So now, because this was always the risk, there's the good with Trump, but there's the recklessness, what's gonna happen? So we always had to say the collateral damage is a four, the good is an eight, so we'll vote for him. Whatever it was. Well, that day it shifted. Just because of that, now the left and the media and the world had its narrative that we are all white supremacists and insurrectionists. And if not for that irresponsibility, they wouldn't have had that tool to beat us with, but if we were not so close to it and provoking some of it, it wouldn't have happened. I just got a note, day or two ago, from a former CIA analysis, he's been on Fox News as a whistleblower exposing corruption and things like that. He's a respected voice and he thanked me for writing the book. He said, I'm telling you, everyone has to read it. He said, it's the must book to come out at this time. Everybody has to read it. And so he was a political insider who's in the know on certain levels and sounded the alarm about various concerns and has a good voice and reputation. So I know it's essential reading, not just for now, we can just write it for now. We wrote it for now and for the next election, 2024. It's coming soon to a theater near you. That's such a great perspective. And it's helpful for me as a pastor because I don't think I'm unique in this. As a pastor, leading people through 2020 and the lead up to that, it was like level five whitewater rapids. Is like tuck your feet, paddle hard and get through it because on one side you had people who wanted you to be apolitical. Don't say anything about politics, just preach the Bible. Then you had other people that wanted you to give them information that your book contains but that kind of information to help them know how to hear the voice of God, vote their conscience, be a good citizen and vote. And then you had other people that wanted you to, they wanted you to wave the flag and they wanted you to be Trump and share all the stories and basically merge those two together. And the outcome of that, it wasn't just me. It was many pastors that I know that were leading churches at that time. In the middle of COVID, it was like the final straw that about wore them out. It was like I've done everything I can to keep the church intact during a pandemic with here in the state of Michigan, we had intense, intense restrictions and trying to work our way through that. And then you throw on top of it, after George Floyd and the race riots and the call for social justice in America and cities burning and you've got COVID and now all of a sudden you throw the election on top of it, it just literally exhausted so many pastors. And the outcome of that, you mentioned the narrative that is being portrayed from the world's perspective in the mainstream media and just kind of secular world in general, about the church, the tag that has been associated with us is white Christian nationalism. They use that term quite a bit. You make reference to it in your book but when you hear that phrase, just Christian nationalism, what does that mean to you? Because right now there are major, there's a major debate that's going on even on social media among evangelical Christians. You've got some people that have some very large followings, great people, love Jesus, love his church, but who are actually saying, oh no, Christian nationalism is a really good thing. We need to be white Christian or just Christian nationalism, leave the race part out. And then on the other side, you've got what I call Christian anarchists who are basically saying, if you're a Christian, a follower of Jesus, you really shouldn't have anything to do with civil government and civil politics at all. They're kind of like the Essenes. You've got the Essenes who are separatists. You've got the Herodians who are complicit. You've got the Pharisees who are right but spiritually mean. And we've got all of these different factions in the body of Christ, even in our leaders. When you hear the term Christian nationalism to you, is that a good thing or is it a bad thing? And what does it really mean? Right. In my years, it's a bad thing. However, it really depends on how it's defined. So I have a whole chapter in the book where I deal with Christian nationalism. I have colleagues who say absolutely own the term, use the term, it's a good term. And the more the left attacks it, the more we should own it and kind of say that's who we are. Interesting. Then I have others who say we absolutely run from it. It's wrong on every level. Because it has so many negative associations in the average person's mind. I don't think that we should fight for the use of the term. There are other ways to say, hey, I love Jesus and I love my country too. We know scripturally we render to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God. And Paul says taxes to do, honesty, you do that. We're in this system, so we're part of it. We support it as much as we can, right? At the same time, we understand that there is a difference between Christian identity, American identity. We understand that in God's sight, America is another nation in this world and the ecclesia, the body of believers, the church, that's the people of God within America and within every nation. If we apply 2nd Chronicles 714, if my people recall by my name, will hold themselves in prayer, that's us. We're the people of God. It's not America as it was ancient Israel. We the people of God within the country. So our identity is first and foremost heavenly identity. Philippians 3, our citizenship is in heaven. Right, right. Colossians 3, we're seated in heavenly places. Exiles and borners. Right, exactly, in 1 Peter 1. So we're in this world, we're not of it, but we are in it. And we thank God for the good that's in America. And we know if you took America out, tyranny would just break out. World powers would take over, chaos would break out. So America has played a good role, sent missionaries around the world, sent humanitarian aid around the world, sent pornography around the world, sent materialism around the world, Levi's around the world, sent culture around the world. So we've done good, we've done bad, because it's just a fallen nation with a church in the midst of it. So Christian nationalism to me is a negative term and it means merging of Christian identity with American identity, associating patriotism with loyalty to the kingdom of God, wrapping the gospel in the American flag. As opposed to we have many Christian foundations in our colonies, many Christian principles led to the founding of our nation, or excuse me, undergirded and informed the founding of our nation. And if we can return to those principles, the nation will be blessed. And to the extent we embrace them as a nation, blessing will come to all. But we're always gonna have diversity in people with different beliefs and non-beliefs and things like that. And America has to be a home for all of them. We're not seeking to take over, establish a theonomy or anything like that or theocracy and post theonomy. So from that perspective, you could say, hey, don't we wanna see America be more Christian? But as soon as they attach white to it, all of a sudden now it becomes a race issue. And especially in our culture, we have to be so careful about that. Right, so we overwhelmingly have to say we had certain good oranges, but we've always been mixed. When you talk to a native American and say, MAGA, make America great again, well, that's before the white people got here. They're like, we had a pretty good. Right, right. You talked to your average black American, make America great again. And we're talking about going back to the days when there was segregation. We're going back to the days when there was slavery. So it's all based on, that's why we have to be so careful. And that's another reason I don't wanna use the Christian nationalism term. Now look, there are countries around the world that have been animist and Islamic and other beliefs. And now the gospel spread and they become more and more Christian. And they say, well, it's a good thing. We become more and more Christian. We wanna be a Christian nation. When President Obama years back said America's not a Christian nation, there was this uproar. Of course we're a Christian nation. We meant it one way that it's our history and we're a vast majority Christian. He meant it to say, we're not entirely Christian. We've got all these, which is true. So it all depends on how it's meant. And to me, it's not something to be fighting for. Let's fight for gospel values. Look, the world hates our gospel values. Let's be hated for that. Not for the waving of the American flag, but for the holding up of the cross. I think it's interesting when you look at Paul, Paul as a pattern in the New Testament. Paul utilized his Roman citizenship when it was advantageous for either for his journey or for the entrance of the gospel into new territories. When he's arrested, he's about ready to be beaten. He pulls out his Roman passport and he's like, hey, is it appropriate for you to do this? And so it seems that he uses that Roman citizenship whenever it is convenient or advantageous for the gospel, but you never see Paul anywhere in the New Testament calling for protests against emperors. In fact, he tells us to honor the emperor and the emperor that he's talking about is Nero. I mean, Nero, you think Trump was something or you think Biden is something. It's like, check out Nero. But you don't see him condemning and going after the head of state. And some would say, well, he's in an empire, he's not in a democracy. But I often wondered, because Paul doesn't make reference to encourage believers to vote, right? But they couldn't. But what would have Paul done if he found himself in a democratic republic like we are? Would he have responded differently? Would the epistles have had encouragements and admonition to civil involvement? Look, he counseled slaves to be obedient to their masters and to serve as if they were serving God and masters to be compassionate to their slaves. And then he said to slaves, you can get your freedom, do it. And then there's the whole example of anesimus and he's a slave runs away. Philemon, yeah. Comes to the Lord. Now Paul tells Philemon his former master, welcome back as a brother. But because that was the system of the whole empire and for this little group of like 30 people or 105,000 people, you're gonna overthrow it. So you had to work within that system, right? So he was pragmatic in that regard, knowing that the principles of in the gospel is need to slave and are free at a certain point that's gonna burst the bounds of slavery. So there was that supernatural pragmatism that said you're gonna turn this in a long-term way. I would absolutely think that just when you say, respect the emperor of first Peter II or Romans 13, pay your taxes, it would be go out and vote, vote responsibly. I would think that would be an exhortation for sure. So you got your list of things. So you got a whole letter about godly living and pursuing the Lord and holiness and purity and being witnesses and on and on and on. And then, all right, now let me just run through a few practical things at the end, make sure you voted and be responsibly. So it's not the whole thing. It's this little appendix at the end encouraging us to do is now the whole thing is get the vote out. I've had guys say, Mike, we got it. The whole emphasis has to be get the vote out. No, the whole emphasis has to be get the church revived and healthy and vote also. Yeah, that's right. I remember asking Mike Bickel on a phone call during 2020, I said, how are you praying for this election? Are you praying for Trump to win? Are you praying for Biden to win? And his answer, I told you yesterday, I thought it was brilliant. He said, I am praying that God will do whatever is necessary to create the perfect atmosphere and environment in America for revival. And I thought, my goodness, that is a perfect, perfect answer. That's how we should be praying. We should vote like it matters, but we should be praying and recognizing that true change and cultural transformation, it's not gonna take place by whoever's in the White House primarily. It's gonna take place by the church being revived. I love that about what you're doing, both in the book and what you do on a regular basis because you're talking about believing God for a moral revolution and a cultural transformation. That's your tagline, but that's what we need, right? I mean, but that's not gonna come necessarily through politics. No, no, so politics plays its part, right? But look, let's just say that we had this incredible swing to the right and got all these really conservative Republicans in and suddenly laws changed across America, but hearts hadn't been changed. It was gonna happen in two years, four years, all those people are gonna be out and we're gonna have people so radically far on the other side in reaction to it. So I'm all for changing laws. I'm all for righteous laws being, I would be absolutely for laws that do not allow the chemical castration and general mutilation of minors. I would be all for that, absolutely to protect them. I understand the opposition. So that's what civil government exists to do. Right, right, is to stop evil and to protect good, right? So even in the Roman Empire with all of its evil, there was still the enforcement of law. You didn't have chaos, you didn't have anarchy. Even in America with all the sin, the corruption that we have, you still have, you understand, okay, if I go out and steal in broad daylight, I'm gonna pay a penalty for it. If I get caught killing someone, I'm going to jail, right? So we understand there are consequences, there's speed limits, right? So you have to have that in a society. But to think that's gonna bring the change, it won't come out. I saw an old clip of evangelist T.L. Osborn telling, he said, I was telling the leaders in Ukraine when they're under communism. He said, these gospel preachers are the best people you got. He said, because the government can't make a bad heart good, but the gospel can. So that has to be the first emphasis. We have three R's in our ministry. Revival in the church, gospel-based moral and cultural revolution in society, and redemption in Israel. And the key to the second and third R is revival in the church, revival in the church leading to cultural transformation, revival in the church leading to the salvation of Israel. Everything comes down to the health of the body. I said, speaking to your folks yesterday, that when I go into a hotel room at night, check in, flip the switch and nothing happens. I don't get mad at the darkness. I don't call the front desk and say, there's darkness in the room. My question is, what's wrong with the light? That's it. If we get the light shining brightly, that's the key and people will be drawn to the gospel. As much as the world hated Jesus, multitudes follow him. Centers wanted to be around him. So when people are really encountering the love of God, and you're just anti-gay and you're just anti, but when they really encounter the transforming love of God and when they have hope, when they didn't have hope, their freedom where they were bound before, they're transformed. They're telling their friends, I'm not cutting myself in there. I'm not suicidal. I'm not crying myself to sleep and using drugs to just... Manage life, yeah. And then to medicate my pain and I got free and this church and hey, they fed us and they cared for us. One of my colleagues that you know in Fort Worth, they're hated for their gospel stands and righteousness and being pro-life and pro-family and opposing LGBTQ plus activism and things, but they distributed over 75 million meals during COVID. You drive by the church two days a week, you drive by and they'd fill your car with one month supply of three meals a day. So, you know, fresh foods for a few days and everything else frozen and non-perishable and stuff. Well, the people that benefited from that, they know who these people are. They know their kindness, they know their heart. They're now getting calls from schools, from secular schools saying we don't know what to do with our kids. Can you send people in? So, students from the ministry school where I help teach there, they're going into the schools now at the request of secular administrators to help the kids and sharing the gospel. So, when the world's in crisis, look, how many people have come to you that are not believers but say, Pastor, you know, I don't really know about this faith stuff but you know how to pray. Could you pray for my uncle? He's dying in the hospital. All the time. Because people know that there's something that we have. Yes, that's true. And here's something interesting. The world knows what the church should look like in many ways. They expect us to be helping the poor and the needy, right? They think we should be doing that. And scandals are like that you're hypocrites because they know we're not supposed to have this. They also think we should be welcoming of everyone which we are but we want to welcome them to transform them, not to affirm them, right? But if we live that out, people will see many will still hate us but many will say, we've watched you. I mean, let your light so shine before men. Matthew 5, 16, that they'll see your good works and praise your Father, 1 Peter 2, that we should live in such a way that people around us glorify God. Yeah, even in the Roman Empire in the very first three centuries, when Christians were being systematically persecuted, the one thing that they knew about Christians is they're gonna care for the unborn or those that have been left to exposure. They have this peculiar sexual ethic. They're kind of prudes but they're rich and they're poor. The rich take care of the poor, the poor take care of the rich. Slaves are welcome. Women have more rights than they do in society. It was a peculiar people, a peculiar culture that many regarded and respected even though they were living in the midst of persecution. And today some of us are better known for USA, USA, USA. You know, this thought came to me earlier. We're here in Michigan. I was just in Alabama. So both places with big college football except in Alabama you don't have protein. So it's all Alabama, Auburn, whatever. It's a religion. Right, but let's just say it's, Michigan makes it to the college playoffs. Oh, God forbid. Okay. Let's say Michigan State makes it to the college playoffs. How about that? Okay, all right. Yeah, so anyway. Sorry, Michigan fans. Yeah, more likely for Michigan this year, but let's just say. Ouch. Let's just say that the last year as it was getting really close and it's gonna be the big game. Let's just say Michigan was coming to Michigan State to play the big game of the year. And there was a riot, the crowd went so berserk there was a riot, right? And they ended up clearing the stadium. So there was no home field advantage anymore. And Michigan won by a point. And the thought was if we just had the crowd behind us, Michigan State could have won. So you tell everyone, listen, listen, your presence in the game is important, but you got to do it the right way. If there's another riot, you're gonna get kicked out. So be in the stands and cheer, but don't start beating on people or setting the stadium on fire because we need your support. So the church has to get this right. The parties that are running, those that have platforms that we agree with versus those we differ with, those that we agree with by and large, the big things, they need our support, they need our vote. But if we don't do it the right way, we're gonna end up hurting the cause more than helping. Yeah, that's right. The church's attempt to find their place in culture, it's nothing new. I mean, trying to find, you look back in the late 70s, early 80s, you have the moral majority, Jerry Falwell and that whole movement. You kind of see the evangelical church trying to find its place in the political spectrum. That's nothing new. But what I think was really particular about the 2020 election that I've really not seen on large scale before was the introduction. And you know, this podcast is called Spirit and Truth because we're openly unashamedly believers in the present work of the Holy Spirit. We're charismatic, Pentecostal. But the introduction of the gift of prophecy through the church connected to the political bias towards Trump was a brand new thing that we've never really seen on that level of scale before. On top of, it's kind of like a lighter fluid on top of the social media world where people, anybody has a voice on Facebook, anybody publishes a prophetic word, anybody can share somebody else's prophetic word and it went far and it went wide, not only in the church, but outside of the church. And what I'm noticing and what I have noticed is the shrapnel is still in the body of Christ from that election connected to false prophecies both by our brothers who are cessationists who don't believe in that. And so it just reinforced that. And people from the world who now see the complicity that somehow they were appointing an Old Testament king and they were standing in an office like a Samuel anointing them, coins being minted with Trump's face on there and Cyrus on the backside. I know that you were really engaged with that. What are the lessons we can learn from that regarding? We all wanna hear the voice of the Lord. We all want Holy Spirit leadership in all things, elections too, but what's the lesson for the body of Christ that we can learn from that regarding this type of thing? Several. And I have a chapter on the false prophecies and document things and give specifics and quotes. And I have a chapter on the genesis of false prophecy, how this happens. So first lesson is deception can come on a mass scale. It can really happen. People can get caught up. A second, it's very easy to become partisan prophets. The one time in the Old Testament where all the prophets agreed and said the same thing. It was a false prophet supporting a godless king. Go to battle, you're gonna win. Yes, yes. So you become these yes men, these court prophets. Old Testament prophets, false prophets were criticized that they'd have prophesied for gain. And if you didn't pay them off, they'd speak against you. If you paid them, they'd give you a nice word. Well, it's the same kind of thing. Hey, we got our guy in and we want him to stay in. So our base wants to hear this and he wants to hear it. And I don't believe they intentionally prophesied falsely but they got deceived along the way. Another lesson is that that's not primarily what prophets are doing in the Bible or in the New Testament. They're not primarily telling us who's gonna win the game next week, who's gonna win the elections, what the weather's gonna be, unless there's a disaster coming you need to worry about. I would think, based on my understanding of prophecy, that the true prophets would have been calling the church to repent of political fanaticism, of division. They'd be calling on those that said, oh, I'm a follower of Jesus, but I'm voting for a pro-abortion candidate. They'd be rebuking them. They'd be rebuking those in the Trump side for a carnality and vulgarity. And looking to a man the way we should look to God. That's what you think the prophets would be doing. What's the first word you associate with prophets? Repent. That's through the whole Bible. That's what you would expect the Spirit to be saying, as opposed to Trump's gonna win, Trump's gonna win. Now interestingly, when I talked to Cindy Jacobs about this, she said that they have a network of about 70 prophets and only a handful prophesied a Trump victory. None of the others heard that, so they put out no word to that effect. Bill Hammond told me that he has a network of like 4,000 and only one that he knew of, claimed to thus say that the Lord Trump's gonna win. These are all Trump supporting people, right? But the voices that were heard, all the prophetic voices you could think of that were speaking were unanimously saying Trump's gonna win and guarantee, even after the elections were over and now it's okay, the stolen Trump's gonna be in, I guarantee, eight years. And then when it didn't happen, the excuses were beyond mind boggling. I thought anyone with their right mind that believes these excuses is willingly being deceived. Willingly being deceived. Well, I tell you, listen, Lee, I guarantee you, 100% guarantee you that the Philadelphia Phillies will win the World Series and they will win the World Series in five games in 2022. I absolutely guarantee it. Write it down. And then it turns out Houston Astros come back, and by the way, I'm from New York originally, so I don't let me use the house. Okay, and anyway, let's just say the Houston Astros come back and they win the World Series in seven games and you sit down with me and you challenge me on it. I said, Lee, you are being so carnal. You are taking things in a literalistic way. You have no understanding of the spiritual realm. It's like, admit it, you got it wrong. No, no, no, no. I've seen junk like that and worse, complete fantasy realm. Now here's the painful thing for a cessation as friends, for those that don't believe in prophecy today. They never believed any of it, but they're a tard in feather too because they're part of the larger Christian realm. We got them into trouble. Right, right, that now they get a bad reputation, we let no one believe in it. And those of us who were calling out the false prophecies, we get tard in feather also. Yeah, and we reinforce to the cessation is how crazy we are and invalidates the whole gift and the Holy Spirit. And the question comes up with all the false prophecies that have been made publicly for years. Why is it mainly the cessation as to have been calling them out instead of those of us that is this our own house? Why aren't we doing a better job of policing? Right. So, you know, in first Corinthians 11, Paul says, if we judge ourselves, we won't be judged by the world. Right. I look at it the same way, if we charismatic Pentecostals have done a better job of calling for accountability and living it out, then our cessation as friends wouldn't have had to do what they're doing. Yeah. You know, if we cleaned house better. Yeah, that's right, confront that. I know you've done that to some degree. Others have as well. And there were a few in all fairness, I'm thinking of Chris Valaton who came out, he made some statements and he came out afterwards, he apologized, he repented openly about that, about that. I have lots of room for that. I have lots of mercy and compassion. We all, we prophesied in part. We get that. And with Chris, Chris told me that he had never publicly given a political prophecy, but during a message it just slipped out and oh yeah, Trump is, you know, he said it. Yeah. So, I mean, it slipped out, he didn't plan it as part of his message or I'm gonna make this proclamation. Right, right. But what's interesting is that my wife Nancy read through a lot of the comments and a lot of them were very gracious towards him because he wasn't known as a political voice. Right. But then when my friend Jeremiah Johnson, the young friend that I've been a mentor to in certain ways, he admits he got caught up in the political spirit dangerously. So, when he then repented and said I was wrong, I absolutely blew in the most humble terms you could ask for, humble themselves and got things right, okay? When that happened, he got so blasted because so many of the people on his page had become so politicized with him. Don't back down, don't back down. Yeah, exactly, exactly. Well, if the hope of any nation, but in particular, America, if the hope is not political, we know that as you look out on the horizon at what you see culturally and even politically as well as inside the church, do you have, is there hope rising up in your heart that we can see cultural transformation, that we can see some moral revolution take place, revival? Do you see indicators that would tip you towards saying, I think there's a great opportunity for change or do you feel like we've passed the point of no return? We are in a super dire, critical, dark time, but I'm filled with confidence, expectation, encouragement, hope. One reason that's gonna sound odd is because I knew all this was coming. I've written about it years back where certain agendas were going and where they were gonna end up. And in 2004, when God called me to begin focusing on homosexual issues and things, the T word wasn't there as strong as just LGBT, but the T was coming. I looked around and assessed the situation. I read books by people who had more insight than me who had been focused on this for years, and I realized it's over. We lost. This generation is over. Things have gone too far in the culture, too far among young people, too far in media, social media, which is growing in, too far in business world, in the courts. We lost, only by God's intervention can the tide turn. So from day one, I knew we needed something from above. We need a move of God. Right, there was number one. Number two, God, I mean, it wasn't so much a revelation as much as look at what they're saying, look at what their agenda is, take it seriously, right? People I pray for, people from Jesus died, people who need the Lord, like everybody else, right? Look at what they're saying, look at their agenda and look at the trajectory. What is the natural course that this is gonna follow? Where's it going? Like a doctor looks at your condition unless you treat it's gonna go like this, like this. So I saw all that. I warned about it. I said it was coming, but God showed me this was gonna come and there was gonna be a pushback. That the left, the devil, the end, however you wanna categorize it, will always overplay its hand. And at a certain point, we're seeing it now with transgender activism, with children. You have secular people. You have people who've had trans surgery. You have gays, lesbians. You have atheists. And they're saying, what are we doing to children? This is madness. How do you have this, how is this guy winning medals? The Hale is the fastest women's swimmer. It's a male. Insanity. Yeah, I mean, it would be like LeBron James identifies as a female, joins the WNBA. And now it's what a great day for women. This is the greatest day ever for women sports. Like what kind of madness is that? So people are waking up. The emperor's new clothes are being revealed. There's no clothes at all. And in many other ways, parents are seeing what's happening to their kids and the educational system. And the stuff they're learning. Sex ed in general, and these radicals, agendas from, they're seeing it. So many people have had abortions that are hurting over it. That's right. Some may be shouting outwardly, but they're hurting on the inside. And if we can touch and help, there's gonna be this release of pain and grief and guilt that's been there. So there's stuff building. And over 20 years ago, God spoke to me that surely as there's a civil rights movement, there was a civil rights movement in America. There's gonna be a gospel based moral and cultural revolution. I'll get to be right in the thick of it. That's why I've been on daily radio since 2008. That's why I write a bunch of op-eds every week and written these books because I know it's coming. And this is how we prepare for it. However, as I wrote last year in a book, it's revival or we die. It is urgent. There is every promise that God gives, Jeremiah 18, if he says he's gonna bless a nation and we turn to sin, he'll turn the blessing into a curse. If he says he's gonna curse the nation, we repent, he'll turn the curse into a blessing. So I believe God has promised these things. I'm not guaranteeing it like Trump has four more years guaranteed in the White House. And we did pray. We prayed like crazy, right? And that didn't happen. I'm saying, I believe if we will humble ourselves and we will seek out earnestly, we will see the tide turn. We will see an outpouring in America. And I look at it like this. Every generation, you're in a tug of war, right? So you play that as a kid on the beach or something or wherever. So you're in a tug of war and no one totally, in this world, no side is gonna totally win before Jesus returns, right? That's just the reality. I'd love something different, but that's the reality. So if my generation, we grabbed it and we were a little bit on the losing side of the tug of war, whatever that means, working it out. Well, I want us to be on the winning side when I leave this world, right? So I believe that the shift is gonna come and as crazy as we've been going in one direction that we're gonna recover some of our moral sanity and take back some of the ground that was stolen by the counterculture and sexual revolution of the 60s and all that it became. So I live with constant expectation and I know there are many churches like yours around the country, some mega churches, some house churches, some networks of churches that are hungry, that are going after God, that welcome the message of repentance, that are seeing the lost saved, that are active on all fronts, both humanitarian as well as spiritual. God's working. I believe there are gonna be thousands of fires, holy fires all across America, where God is visiting and revival's being poured out. So it's not just one center that people go to from around the world or the country, but all over. The question is, will we steward it? Will we keep Jesus first? Will we keep our compassionate witness? And if we do that, we'll see America shaking. May it happen, Lord, do that. I love your optimism. Thank you so much for taking some time and being here with us. This has been brilliant. The name of your book is The Political Seduction of the Church. It's out, it's on all platforms. If people don't know where they can follow you, your radio programs, socials, tell them where they can find you at. Yes, so two things. AskDrBrown.org, ASKDRBrown.org. So go there first, center for emails. We'll put you in our welcome tour. Talk about my testimony from LSD to PhD, more about the three hours and then everything. The picture there is worth just going to the website. So all the things we can give you in terms of the free resources that we have. And then download our app, AskDrBrown Ministries. We just released it. We had battles with Apple for years. Finally got it out. ASKDRBrown, AskDrBrown Ministries. The same on Android. Make sure you add ministries on. AskDrBrown Ministries. Download that right in the palm of your hand. You can click to listen to my daily radio show, past shows, recent articles, other resources. We have Jewish Outreach website, Real Messiah. So it's all there. AskDrBrown Ministries, ASKDRBrown. Download that. Wonderful. Thank you so much, Dr. Brown. My joy. Thank you again for joining us. Stick with us, subscribe to the podcast. And we'll see you again right here on Spirit and Truth.