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00:00:01
Media Manipulation and Christian Response
52 Plays3 months ago
In this episode, Dan Sanchez and Senior Pastor Ridley Barron discuss the current cultural and political climate in the U.S. The conversation explores a variety of issues, including media manipulation, the role of Christians in politics, and the importance of discernment in an age of information overload. Ridley shares his thoughts on the media's portrayal of political figures, the responsibilities of Christians in voting and political engagement, and the significance of staying grounded in biblical truth amidst societal challenges.
Timestamps:
00:01 Introduction to the episode and current cultural topics.
01:10 Media manipulation and the labeling of political figures.
03:07 The role of Christians in political engagement.
07:40 Historical examples of Christian involvement in political movements.
13:10 Evaluating thought leaders and sources of information.
17:48 The dangers of sensationalism and tribalism in politics.
21:53 Balancing truth and compassion in Christian witness.
23:54 The importance of prayer in addressing cultural and political issues.
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Transcript
00:00:01
grovehillchurch
Welcome back to the Grove Hill Church podcast. I'm Dan Sanchez and I'm here with Ridley Barron, the senior pastor at Grove Hill Church. And we're gonna be diving into kind of a grad bag of different topics because there's a lot going on in the culture right now in the US. So there's a lot to talk about because it is just some weird times. It's been a crazy summer, so crazy that Al Mueller's had to get off his sabbatical from his podcast.
00:00:25
Ridley
Yeah.
00:00:25
grovehillchurch
He always takes this month off and you know it's been a busy month when he actually comes back on to redo.
00:00:27
Ridley
Yeah.
00:00:29
Ridley
Right.
00:00:29
grovehillchurch
Put out some episodes one of my favorite podcasts listen to But he's back on back on Thursday now August 1st, but there's been a lot going on and you even talked about it during the sermon and Still I think more more to say so I was even just scrolling through your your Facebook feed and just trying to figure out like well What's been on Ridley's mind?
00:00:43
Ridley
Mm-hmm.
00:00:51
grovehillchurch
I know you've been reading about and would love to just give some space to dive a little bit deeper into these things because
00:00:52
Ridley
Yeah.
00:00:58
grovehillchurch
There's so many voices. There used to only be a few voices and now there's thousands and thousands and thousands of them.
00:01:04
Ridley
Literally.
00:01:05
grovehillchurch
Some good, some bad and some very, very gray waters in between. It's hard to navigate.
00:01:10
Ridley
Yeah, for sure. Yeah.
00:01:11
grovehillchurch
So let's dive into some of these.
00:01:11
Ridley
yeah
00:01:14
grovehillchurch
Kind of starting with the like last thing I just saw you you post on Facebook was like this. media mashup of people Like the the essentially the Democratic Party's like come around a word called weird And it's kind of a funny thing you're like man and the the The video clip that you had reshared was like hey looks like the Democrats are all rallying around making Republicans weird and you just go through clip after clip of like a
00:01:29
Ridley
Yeah, yeah.
00:01:42
Ridley
Yep.
00:01:43
grovehillchurch
Camelot, like all the news stations, like, and all these prominent people being like, it's weird. He laughs weird. They're weird. He got weird beliefs. They got weird this. I'm like, they're clearly just trying to apply a label and making everything sound weird.
00:01:51
Ridley
Right, right.
00:01:55
Ridley
Weird.
00:01:58
Ridley
And my first thought when I saw that was, man, I feel like I'm back in junior high school when that was the accusation you made against people.
00:02:07
grovehillchurch
Yeah.
00:02:07
Ridley
Let's just make them weird and then everybody will isolate them and cut them off. And i in a strange sense, I feel like that's exactly what's going on. But I think the thing about that video that frustrates me I mean, we know name calling is part of American politics these days and this day and age, which is very sad and unfortunate. We don't talk about issues so much anymore as just saying everybody else is crazy and we're right. But it bothers me that we have such a mindless media today I mean, that that's not the first time I've seen something like that that's been put together, a mashup of media sources, a whole array of them coming together around a central thought, so much so that you can't tell one broadcast from the next. It's just different talking heads. And they're saying the same rote, memorized things about whatever the issue may be. it might mean you know This time it was Trump and Vance that they're calling weird, but
00:03:04
Ridley
you know, next time it's climate change, the next time it's the anti-life movement, it's, you know, it's just whatever it is. they They have their marching orders and they just completely repeat that stuff all the time.
00:03:15
grovehillchurch
Yeah, I've actually seen a few mashups like that before and maybe two or three of like almost, and some of them are so like where reporters are essentially reading off the exact same script from network to network that they combine all the files together and they all say it in unison in the exact same tone and pitch.
00:03:18
Ridley
Yeah.
00:03:28
Ridley
Right. Yeah, I've seen that before.
00:03:34
grovehillchurch
You've seen these before. You're like, wow, in totally different companies, huh?
00:03:38
Ridley
Yeah.
00:03:40
grovehillchurch
How could that be?
00:03:41
Ridley
Yeah. And I think.
00:03:42
grovehillchurch
I mean, I think it's pretty obvious. I mean, I think Vivek said on X last week, like we're not running against a person. We're running against the system.
00:03:51
Ridley
Oh, absolutely.
00:03:52
grovehillchurch
That's kind of what's going on a little bit.
00:03:54
Ridley
I mean, again, and I really am trying not to be Republican versus Democrat because Republicans got its share of problems.
00:04:00
grovehillchurch
Yeah. Oh, for sure.
00:04:03
Ridley
But you think about the last three candidates who have been put up by the Democrats. And strangely enough, Joe Biden is the most qualified of the three. obama Obama had no real history as a leader. I mean, he came from a community service kind of thing, briefly served as a senator. And the next thing you know, he's made the most powerful man in the and the world by his position, just riding on
00:04:32
Ridley
the recommendation of a group of people. I feel like it's back where we are exactly with Kamala Harris right now. She's got no qualifications for leading. You know, she went from being an attorney general or whatever she was, whatever her title was in California, to being a senator for maybe four years, I think. And then she was given the position as the understudy to the most powerful man in the world and she failed miserably at it. She's got nothing to say on her resume about things she's accomplished. You probably like me have seen the mashups of all the the they just the ramblings of a woman.
00:05:08
Ridley
It sounds like a kid who was given a book report assignment who gets to school and has not read the book and they're just trying to fill it with words, you know, to the teacher to say, I really didn't say read this, but I'll give it a shot.
00:05:17
grovehillchurch
Yeah.
00:05:22
Ridley
You know, I'm sorry.
00:05:23
grovehillchurch
you know There's been multiple times throughout history where the leader or the front man was really a puppet.
00:05:32
Ridley
No.
00:05:33
grovehillchurch
That's normal. It happens in Chinese history. It happens in Japanese history. It even happens in the history of Islam where you have the you know the caliphs.
00:05:41
Ridley
Right.
00:05:42
grovehillchurch
And it's it's really run by more powerful Muslims behind the scenes, but you have this religious leader up front that's the ruler over the whole Islamic empire.
00:05:50
Ridley
Yes.
00:05:50
grovehillchurch
So like it's not it's not an uncommon thing. It's it's been a it's been a power move for a long time It's just happening is the funny part is you used to be able to like make it believable but now we live with so much information that like it's just out and in the open and it's everyone can see it unless you choose not to believe it and I think that's the part that gets to me is kind of like it's it's truly like the emperor has no clothes, you know, like we're all watching watching this play out and a lot of us are like
00:05:54
Ridley
and
00:06:05
Ridley
Yeah, that's a great point.
00:06:14
Ridley
yeah
00:06:17
Ridley
yeahp
00:06:21
grovehillchurch
we're We're all seeing this. How come they don't see it the same? And the only time I've ever seen that broken was recently when everybody finally was on the same page that Biden wasn't going to be able to make it.
00:06:32
Ridley
And what's so ironic about that is the very same people who three weeks ago were telling you he is perfectly fine. He's gonna make a great candidate again this time.
00:06:39
grovehillchurch
Yeah.
00:06:41
Ridley
We're now the ones who are telling you You know, he was not capable and Kamala is going to be a great candidate. And I mean, I'm sorry, you you lose credibility with me when you, you lied to the public the way you have.
00:06:54
grovehillchurch
So how do we handle this? And at what point do you like, I have like i have some friends that are like almost like full rogue. Like they havet they have a military arsenal, like a heavy military arsenal. They almost consider themselves a little militia in their town.
00:07:09
Ridley
Yeah.
00:07:10
grovehillchurch
And they're they're like, if somebody rallied a bigger amount of people, they'd they'd be doing what they're doing and in Venezuela right now.
00:07:17
Ridley
Yeah, I mean that was revolution going on down there for sure.
00:07:17
grovehillchurch
right which is like they're They're in full like overthrow mode right now because of that election. right so and That's a scary place to be. do Do you think there's a place for Christians to did take take part in that, if there were that? Or is it always like a peaceful thing where Christians, no matter what?
00:07:34
Ridley
yeah i absolutely I mean, you don't have to go back very far in our own country to realize it was it was Christians that led the movement of the revolution here in many capacities.
00:07:40
grovehillchurch
Yeah.
00:07:42
Ridley
I mean, it was it was pastors of churches, small churches that were turned out to be unit commanders of the revolutionary troops that were gathered together. And they were some of the best recruiters there were for the revolution. Again, I think the question comes back to Are you protesting against something you just don't like and you don't prefer? Are you protesting against something that is in direct violation of God and the God-given rights that are given to all humans? and And man, nothing irritates me more than for anybody.
00:08:18
Ridley
Republican, independent Democrat, whoever to stand up there and just blatantly lie to people about what the end result will be if you choose so and so. I mean, the fact that they think Republicans are going to end democracy tomorrow is just as ludicrous as the fact that they think Democrats are going to be able to end it tomorrow. As long as we still have people in this country who have a vote, we'll still have what we got. but that's what's scary to me about, I don't know if you saw yesterday, Biden, and the Democrats are now trying to change the format of the Supreme Court.
00:08:49
grovehillchurch
Yeah.
00:08:49
Ridley
That's a big no-no.
00:08:50
Ridley
You don't start messing with that stuff. It's worked for us for 200 plus years where all of a sudden they get to rearrange how it works.
00:08:56
grovehillchurch
This might be, I think this is beyond when I was born, but didn't they already do that? It used to not be nine justices, right? It used to be something smaller.
00:09:07
grovehillchurch
Was it always nine justices?
00:09:07
Ridley
i don't I thought it was always not justice. I could be wrong. but That bothers me really badly, but what bothers me even more is his code of ethics for them that he's wanting to create and all that kind of stuff. And I'm like, okay, you're gonna hold the Supreme Court up to a standard you don't even hold up to yourself, you know? Saying they don't want financial influence over the Supreme Court justices. Well, then get rid of it in the Congress. Quit giving lobbyists the power to sway your vote because of how much money they give you or how many vacations they give you or whatever perks you get from them.
00:09:42
Ridley
Sorry, I'm on a rant today.
00:09:43
grovehillchurch
So what, what do we do about it? Like, how should Christians handle it based on where it's at now? And at what point do you like, you start mobilizing to do something more drastic? Like, you don't think we were there yet, but it could get to that point at some, at some day.
00:09:59
Ridley
yeah Yeah.
00:09:59
grovehillchurch
And I've thought about that a few times, but I'm like, my reaction was to actually move here to chapel Hill instead of like, so I'm not, I'm like, I'm outnumbered in Minneapolis. That's how I felt.
00:10:09
Ridley
Right.
00:10:10
grovehillchurch
this chapel won't save her.
00:10:10
Ridley
Well, I do think think you got to, got to, got to, got to vote. You got to register. You got to vote.
00:10:16
grovehillchurch
Yeah.
00:10:16
Ridley
You got to tell your friends around you, your Christian friends vote. Don't tell them how to vote. That's not our job. It's not our responsibility, but to tell them to prayerfully take the responsibility they have and go and vote. I think if if we do that, that begins to send a strong message. I think, quite frankly, the Republicans have even written the Christians out of their plank this year by taking away the pro-life plank and the marriage of one man, one woman being the only route of marriage. That plank has been removed from their platform. So basically they've said, you know what, we we aren't as concerned about the values as we are.
00:10:46
grovehillchurch
Yep.
00:10:50
Ridley
How do we get more votes?
00:10:52
grovehillchurch
Yep.
00:10:53
Ridley
I think the Christians should be very, very loud about that and say, no. i i fruit Especially for the last probably 10 to 15 years have really felt like we needed to get away from a two-party system and maybe the Christians need to create some kind of evangelical party.
00:11:11
grovehillchurch
We almost did. Wasn't that the tea party was kind of that.
00:11:14
Ridley
Yep, the Tea Party was kind of that. You know, back years ago might even have been Right around the time you were being born, Dan, you know, we had some of this moral majority stuff.
00:11:23
grovehillchurch
Yeah.
00:11:24
Ridley
if Remember that? Jerry Falwell was a huge part of it. And I don't agree with all those guys necessarily in some of the ways they approached it. And maybe that's the problem. As Christians, can't get our we can't get our own ducks on the road to get along with each other, much less create a party that's going to oppose anything else out there, you know?
00:11:42
grovehillchurch
So there's another topic that I've noticed based on something I saw you post on Facebook. It's actually somebody that I see you reposting frequently, which kind of leads me to a good question. I notice you often read and share Shane Pruitt's thoughts.
00:11:56
Ridley
Yeah, yeah.
00:11:57
grovehillchurch
And I actually don't know who Shane Pruitt is. i should I assume he's pretty solid though.
00:11:59
Ridley
Ooh. Shane Pruitt, I mean, never seen anything from him that i will get that bothers me at all. I mean, he's just a very solid, very godly young man. I can call him a young man because I'm a little bit older. But he is in charge of like next gen student ministry kind of stuff for the North American Mission Board, I think it is. I don't know what his official title is, but I mean, Kyle, our student pastor here has been to a conference with him, came away just completely impressed with him. He's very outspoken, but very solid in in his theology and I think he his approach to life. So yeah, I do frequently repost some of his stuff.
00:12:37
grovehillchurch
It makes me ask the question on a broader sense. In an age where we have so much information, it's honestly hard to do all your own investigative work.
00:12:46
Ridley
Right.
00:12:46
grovehillchurch
The shortcut to that is to lean on the people you know and trust to do that for you and to take a lot of their opinions. Not that you take 100% of them, but you generally are heavily influenced by just a few thought leaders.
00:12:52
Ridley
yeah
00:12:57
grovehillchurch
And that's the definition of how I define a thought leader, someone who leads the thinking of many.
00:12:58
Ridley
and Yes.
00:13:03
grovehillchurch
And there's a lot of them out there, especially on things that are going on right now, especially on politics. How should Christians evaluate their sources of information from thought leaders and how should they judge that character?
00:13:15
Ridley
So because of the fact that anybody who has access to the internet today has the potential to become an influencer, I think it's become really, really important that we filter all the information that we read. and Because literally I could type up an article and post it now. And people would assume it's true just because I've posted it. Not because I have any kind of credibility or credentials or resume, just because I posted it. So I think a good place for for Christians to start is first of all to be grounded yourself in the word. You know, anything that contradicts the words, obviously not true. I think the second thing we do is to be grounded and connected with your church and use your pastor as a filter. If you're looking for people to follow and to find information, check out who your pastor's following. Check out who he trusts or some other staff member of your congregation. If you don't see a name on their feed,
00:14:10
Ridley
Feel free to send them a text or an email and say, hey, what do you know about this guy? Because what we don't need is we don't need that there's enough bad and false information infiltrating the church in a lot of other ways. We don't need the social media becoming another avenue for for lies, outright lies to be put into the church.
00:14:31
grovehillchurch
There's I know there's a lot of influential people out there, especially in like political talk. I have to be careful myself. I, just because some groups are more prolific than others. I like Al Mueller is kind of like my go-to and I have a high trust level with him.
00:14:42
Ridley
in Yes, absolutely.
00:14:45
grovehillchurch
Uh, his podcast, the briefing, if you want, I do have to, I can't listen to every episode because if you listen to too much, you end up becoming depressed because he only covers bad news. It seems like, you know, you just, if I start feeling down, i I know I need to lay off the news a little bit.
00:14:54
Ridley
Yep. yeah
00:14:59
grovehillchurch
no matter, even if the source is really good. so he's one of my favorites, but then sometimes there's just, he doesn't post enough and I'm trying to get more information. I'll go to like a daily wire of Ben Shapiro, but I got to keep in mind, like Ben Shapiro or like for some of my, my baby boomer friends, like Dennis Prager was really influential.
00:15:16
Ridley
one Yeah.
00:15:19
grovehillchurch
You got to take everything they say with a grain of salt.
00:15:21
Ridley
but Absolutely.
00:15:22
grovehillchurch
that's like They have a different approach to how to navigate politics because of their Jewish faith.
00:15:22
Ridley
Absolutely.
00:15:26
grovehillchurch
And even though it's pretty aligned with Christianity, it's it's not the same.
00:15:27
Ridley
Yeah. Right. We have to remember at the end of the day, too, for every one of these people, even guys like Shapiro and Prager, who i both I follow both of them, yeah even though their goal ultimately is to bring truth they're going to bring it from a slant that it creates more followers.
00:15:49
grovehillchurch
Yep.
00:15:49
Ridley
So if they can take a simple statement and be hyperbolic about it and build it up a little bit more, then it creates even greater.
00:15:52
grovehillchurch
Yep.
00:15:57
Ridley
And so you know even even some of the people I follow who are trying to interpret the signs of the times, they they'll make a big to-do about nothing in order just to generate a few more followers or to get a few more you know viral statements out there.
00:16:03
grovehillchurch
Yep. Yep.
00:16:13
Ridley
And so again, you have to be That's why you have to always go back to be grounded in the word. Be be absolutely grounded in the word because it is not affected or changed by changing times. It's steadfast.
00:16:28
grovehillchurch
We were in a time where sensationalism rules, the over the top things.
00:16:33
Ridley
Absolutely. Absolutely.
00:16:34
grovehillchurch
And like the democrats sometimes the Democrats do things that you know the Republicans will make a huge stink about.
00:16:40
Ridley
Mm hmm.
00:16:40
grovehillchurch
And you're like, honestly, if you go back and listen to what they said in context, it's really not that big of a deal. you know Of course, it's kind of like the side like tribalism thing going on where, I mean, the Democrats do it even more and harder and worse than a worse degree.
00:16:46
Ridley
Absolutely.
00:16:54
grovehillchurch
but the Republicans are calling names, being bombastic and over-exaggerating things going on on on that side too.
00:17:00
Ridley
Yeah. And let's just be really honest, and I know this may offend some people, but when you take a Kamala Harris, Joe Biden, a Donald Trump, or J.D. Vance, and you stick them in a giant auditorium with 20,000, 25,000 people and get them hyped up, you're not far removed from an Adolf Hitler who used to do the same thing World War II. The only difference between the two is the substance of the person who's standing behind the platform.
00:17:32
Ridley
and how far they're willing to wield that power over the people. It's that whole mindthink kind of thing. You know, if if we can get them hyped up about, well, we'll start with the subject we talked about today. If we can get everybody convinced that every Republican is weird and racist, then we've got our following. And Republicans do the same thing about the Democrats. Again, i't I think I think if we were able somehow magically to set Republicans and Democrats in a room and say you can't call each other names and every statement you have to make is true, we'd probably come closer to agreeing on more things than we realize.
00:18:09
grovehillchurch
I find that's usually the case. One of the things I've i've learned in my little tiny, tiny taste of politics being on the board of my HOA is that generally, like some people get really mad and frustrated and send angry emails. so And I always come back to like, hey, sorry you feel that way.
00:18:29
Ridley
Yeah.
00:18:29
grovehillchurch
Let's talk. Let's go for a walk. I mean you live down the street from let's go for a walk and talk about it And by the time they're actually walking around the corner with me and we're just talking about it reasonably and there's no keyboard in between us Man, we want the same things It's so simple usually very rarely do we stray
00:18:40
Ridley
Right. Yep. And that's why the the anonymity of social media has created such a problem. because I can sit here on my side of the planet and scream at somebody on the other side of the planet who I've never really even met. I've read maybe 15 words from their post and I'm screaming at them about who they are and what they believe and the truth is we are not so far different from one another.
00:19:09
grovehillchurch
There is something about that keyboard that's just weird when you don't really know the person on the other side.
00:19:09
Ridley
I don't know. yes
00:19:14
grovehillchurch
I caught myself once where I'd submitted a support ticket for the apartment I lived in. But it's funny, I knew the maintenance guy was actually a good friend of mine. He ran the department that had maintenance and I was a little sassy in this ticket I put in.
00:19:23
Ridley
Yeah.
00:19:28
grovehillchurch
And then he's just like, he found me the the a day later. He's like, really?
00:19:32
Ridley
Yeah.
00:19:33
grovehillchurch
I'm like, it For some reason, it just didn't occur to me that this was literally going to someone like that my friend would see this.
00:19:40
Ridley
yeah
00:19:41
grovehillchurch
And i and I'd always caught myself since then. but I'm like, man, it is so easy to like add that attitude or the sass or the over-exaggerated emotions when you're typing on a keyboard for some reason. It's just something we all have to be aware of that it can come across that way.
00:19:55
Ridley
it It took me about...
00:19:55
grovehillchurch
And essentially, you have to be extra careful and put smiley faces and emojis.
00:20:01
Ridley
Right.
00:20:01
grovehillchurch
I love emojis for that one reason. I'm like, if I'm not sure what the tone is, like add a smiley face.
00:20:07
Ridley
right
00:20:07
grovehillchurch
like the one thing i could do at the end
00:20:08
Ridley
i It took me about 35 years in ministry to probably come around to realize and maybe growing up and figuring this out. But when see people send me critical texts and or emails about things, i I require myself to wait at least six or seven hours before I respond. because it gives me, first of all, an opportunity to cool down, but also an opportunity to go, you know, let me think about where they are in their life. Let me think about the fact that maybe they just got a water bill that went through the roof and they weren't prepared for it. And so I became the target. Let me think about previous conversations where we've looked at eye to eye to each other and and promised our love towards each other as brothers and sisters in Christ and go, you know what? Something's going on there that this isn't normal behavior. So there's there's there's lots of reasons I think
00:20:55
Ridley
Yeah, the again, the Bible tells us to be slow to speak, slow to become angry, slow to type on your keyboard.
00:21:01
grovehillchurch
We definitely want to be the ones. And I think we generally do a pretty good job of this, but there's always room for improvement of like when somebody comes in and yeah I see videos of like Democrats pretending to be Republicans and usually what they find is that they're actually pretty nice most of the time.
00:21:18
Ridley
Yeah. Yeah.
00:21:18
grovehillchurch
Not all the time, but they're usually pretty nice.
00:21:22
Ridley
Yeah.
00:21:22
grovehillchurch
But we got to continue to be like that online in person so that no, they can never hold it against us. Like with those people are just jerks, right? We always want to be the light and be
00:21:31
Ridley
yeah
00:21:33
Ridley
Yeah.
00:21:35
grovehillchurch
And it's an oversimplification to be like Jesus to people, you know, like, what would Jesus do?
00:21:38
Ridley
Yeah.
00:21:40
grovehillchurch
How would Jesus respond to this? But to some degree, we are trying to be a little Christ here. We do want to represent Him in His compassion and His kindness, but His firmness at the same time to others online and around us.
00:21:46
Ridley
yeah
00:21:51
Ridley
Well, and I'm glad you said that because I, and I think I highlighted this in one or two of the services on Sunday. I'm not advocating for a pushover Christianity that we just become a doormat for the rest of the world. And like because we quote unquote love the world, we're not going to, we're not going to stand for anybody, anything or anybody. I absolutely believe you still have a responsibility to call out sin. I think the most loving thing that Christians can do is tell people that they are going to hell and there is a way to be saved from that. I think it's in how you deliver that and the motives behind which you deliver that message.
00:22:24
Ridley
So I think as as Christians, yeah, we absolutely have to stand our ground on the issues that are impacting the world around us. We have to stand and demand truth rather than lies because lies don't benefit anybody. But at the same time, but there's an attitude with which we can do it and do it well that's going to be better received.
00:22:44
grovehillchurch
Oftentimes when we're afraid or even with the politics that are going on, our reaction is to fight or flight, right? We don't do any things. We're afraid and we're not sure what to do. We freeze or or get enraged and go to keyboard warrior and blashing people.
00:23:00
Ridley
Right?
00:23:01
grovehillchurch
When really we have to walk the harder, the hardest line to do is to firmly, but compassionately and kindly, like push forward, right? It's true magnity magnanimity. It's true greatness to be able to hold your strength back and to firmly apply it, right?
00:23:13
Ridley
Yes.
00:23:17
grovehillchurch
Hard to do, but that's, I think that's where we're called to go.
00:23:21
Ridley
Well, and and in all of this, obviously, we've got to be counting all these things in prayers. I mean, there there are wars literally going on around the world right now. where I mean, as you and I sit here and talk about becoming keyboard warriors, there are actually people dying for what they believe in.
00:23:34
grovehillchurch
Yeah.
00:23:36
Ridley
We've got cultural wars going on in our country right now that are impacting very innocent people. Children in our schools are being impacted by lies that are being fed to them. the There's the lie regarding climate change that's going on and it's impacting people and they're the economy of our country. We've got issues going on in our border, issues going on in our homes, issues going on in our White House. And so as Christian people, we always have to keep coming back to that that incredible gift we've been given, the prayer that we can offer to God on behalf of these things.
00:24:09
grovehillchurch
Ridley, thanks for taking some time to walk through a number of these difficult issues with me. If you're listening to this now, give us some feedback. Or do you like covering these current event topics and getting Ridley's perspective on them in order to shed some light in in a day and age where there's a lot of confusion out there? So find Ridley, find myself, let us know.
00:24:28
Ridley
Yeah. yeah