Championing Foundational Values, on Foundations of Freedom Thursday

Rick Green: 0:07

This is the intersection of faith and the culture. Thanks for joining us today. On WalBuil ders, we're taking on the hot topics of the day from a biblical, historical and constitutional perspective. If you want to know the right position on any issue out there, that's how you do it. You say, hey, what does the Bible have to say about this? I got to be in God's word every day to know these things. But then what can history teach me about this as well? What works and doesn't work? History shows us that. And then, of course, our Constitution, if you're going to apply these things appropriately under our system of government, we have to know the Constitution and get that constitutional perspective as well. So that's why we always say WallBuilders Live looking at things from a biblical, historical and constitutional perspective. We're doing that with David Barton. This guy is America's premier historian. I am so honored to get to work with David for the last couple of decades. I've run into so many people that are serving in the legislatures of states all over the country, in Congress in Washington DC, school boards, city councils you name it that say I ran for office because I saw this from David Barton or I read this from David Barton. David has been a catalyst for restoring biblical values and constitutional principles and so thankful for that and just thrilled to be here with WallBuilders and of course the name WallBuilders comes from that scripture in Nehemiah that says arise and rebuild the walls that we may no longer be a reproach. We've got to rebuild the foundations, folks. Right here in America there's major cracks in the foundation. We've got real problems and rotten the culture. But the good news is it's been revealed over the last couple of years Sunlight is the best disinfectant and now we know it's there and we're learning what to do to restore the foundations in America. So we're here with David. We're also here with Tim Barton. He's a national speaker and pastor and president of WallBuilder s. You ought to book him into your community, to your church, to your business organization, to speak. I'm telling you he'll light people on fire, he'll get him excited, give him hope and give him answers to how to turn this culture around.

Rick Green: 1:57

My name is Rick Green, I'm a former Texas legislator and America's Constitution Coach and it's Foundations of Freedom Thursday. So let's get started today. You send in your questions to radio@wallbuilders. com. Alright, David, Tim, let's jump into our questions from the audience.

Rick Green: 2:14

Kyler is the first one up that sent a question in for us today. He said first I want to thank you for your radio show and the work you do to keep us informed. I'm a fairly new listener and decided to run for school board in my district as a result of your program. I was elected this fall and began my duty on January 8th. Congratulations, Kyler!

Rick Green: 2:33

He goes on to say a concern in our school which seems to be consistent across America, is the content in our curriculum. I'm curious if you can recommend any resources that help understand what type of nonsense might be in the curriculum. That isn't obvious from looking at the product website, a curriculum being considered as I ready by curriculum associates. Doing a little digging, I found it is funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which is concerning to me. Thanks again for all that you do.

Rick Green: 2:58

That's from Kyler guys and I would bet we've got a lot of listeners that this question is something they're curious about, either because they're now a new member of a school board somewhere around the country or they've begun.. we've had parents on that lead groups that are very intent in looking into the curriculum following the school board, testifying the school board. So this is a great question because we can go complain at the school board meeting about the bad stuff that we're finding. But boy, what's a good source? And I've heard people talk about this but I honestly can't remember off the top of my head. I know we have friends on state board of education in different places that that are good at this and could probably help us, and maybe we'll get a guest on soon. But off at the top of your heads, guys, what is a good way to find good curriculum, especially for these public school school board members?

David Barton: 3:44

I want to back it up to a little wider picture than that. Right, and we answer the curriculum question, but I want to go bigger. A lot of folks are at. Boy, do I love the fact that ran for school board and got elected. Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. Yeah, if more citizens would simply do that, we could change this a lot faster and and that is so great.

David Barton: 4:03

And now, being there and wanting to make a difference, wanting to get the right stuff in there, wanting to get the kids trained, that is such good stuff and in so many ways. I'll just point out, Kyler, it's going to take you a while to get on top of what's going on. I mean, you're already looking at curriculum. That's really good. There's going to be other things that will come up and it's gonna probably take a couple years to get this rounded out. I know in Texas, if you get elected school board in Texas, the state requires you to go through 40 hours of state training on what school board is and what it does, legal abilities and and a lot of that is state indoctrination. So you have to go through that and then you have to get that out of your system and say, no, I was elected by the people, not by the state. I'm not going to carry forward the state educational agenda as defined by the teachers. I'm gonna do what the parents want and get good education. So all of that, first thing I'd say is keep being independent. Don't go along with what all the teachers tell you just because they're the "experts and they know what they need. You're the independent person, you're the adult supervision and you keep asking questions and you keep looking at stuff and you keep digging into, regardless of what your leadership tells you. You be an independent person looking for the right stuff. So that's the first thing. And with that, if you find Bill and Melinda Gates curriculum, that is a huge red flag right off the bat. That tends more to have an indoctrination view than an education view. They're going to inculcate a worldview in there and that worldview is not necessarily based on historical truth or actual results or scientific evidence or anything else. It's what the progressive left believes. So, right off the bat, you've done really good by finding out who did the curriculum. That tells you a whole lot about what they're trying to inculcate now you won't curriculum that goes back to original source documents where you search through the actual evidence and you you are able to determine what truth is, not what someone's view the truth is.

David Barton: 5:54

But I'm gonna jump in here with what Jesus said in Luke 6, where he said every student when, he's fully trained will be like his teacher. Jesus did not say you'll be like your curriculum, you'll be like your teacher. One of the big things to look at is what type of teachers do you have and what type of teacher training do you have? Because the teachers are getting their worldview from somewhere. We saw in the last two years all across the nation, so many states have been teaching DEI. They have been the black lives matter kind of racist stuff. Well, they banned that. But you know, teachers are still teaching that because that's their worldview, that's what they believe, and so it really doesn't matter what the curriculum says, we've had this out of Texas. Our state has banned that in universities and we got professors openly saying well, I have tenure and you can't get rid of me and I'm gonna keep teaching that.

David Barton: 6:42

So the next thing to look for is not just curriculum. Look at how your teachers are being trained. Look at even what the laws are because federal law requires the. Every single school that gets federal funds and that is virtually 99% of the nation's schools. You have to have, on Constitution Day, a day of teaching about the Constitution from the original document. You have to train on the Constitution. 90% of schools don't do that. That would be a great part of curriculum, but it's required by federal law but nobody's doing it. So that's really big. So how do you train your teachers is really significant. Then, when you go back to that verse where Jesus I think it's Luke 6:40 says every student, when it's fully trained, will be like his teacher.

David Barton: 7:23

Here in Texas would we had previous governors? They were really emphatic on the fact that every kid needs to be tested on actual knowledge and we should not have social promotion. You should not get moved from the seventh through the eighth grade simply because you're a year older, usually get moved from the third grade to the fourth grade because you have mastered the knowledge you need in the third and you're ready to get new knowledge in the fourth. So with this whole concept of social promotion, Texas took that on. Some states have gone after that. Social promotion still goes in a lot of states. I think I saw stats and from Baltimore I think it was four years ago where that two-thirds of the high school students in Baltimore read an elementary level. Here in Texas we do what's called the Star test and from fourth through the ninth grade, only only 39% of kids read a grade level, and yet they're advanced to the next grade.

David Barton: 8:18

So even though we have this thing saying you can't do social promotion, you got to go back to all right, you need to have the knowledge. So what they did was in Houston, the school board in Houston some years ago said well, you, we're requiring an exit exam of our students to make sure that they know before they go to the next grade. And you can't get a diploma in Texas unless you can pass this exit exam. And they said what we're gonna do is we're gonna give that high school exit exam to our high school teachers who are teaching at high school. It turned out 50 percent of Texas high school teachers in Houston could not pass the high school exit exam and yet they're teaching at high school. So you've got teachers who don't even know the material they're teaching.

David Barton: 9:01

And back to what Jesus said the students are gonna reflect what their teachers learn. Even in Texas, I'm gonna use Texas example because I'm more familiar with the stats here, even in Texas would say well, the rural districts in Texas, they're not woke. These are average conservative, God-fearing, America, loving people and we don't have that woke stuff in these Texas districts. Well, in these rural districts, as it turned out, we found this year was the 92% of the rural teachers in Texas who contributed to candidates 92% of the can is they contributed to were Democrats. So here you've got what are supposedly conservative, God-faring, country, loving people and they're contributing to woke candidates in the legislature.

David Barton: 9:43

So, going back to Kyla's question, don't put it all on curriculum. You've you've done a great job and look curriculum. Now start looking at how your teachers are trained, what the teachers know, what the teachers are teaching an extra curriculum. We know that in all 50 states that 16 19 project is being taught, even though a lot of states have forbidden that it's being taught. So look, look at the teachers you've got.

David Barton: 10:07

Look at things that you can't implement, like Constitution Day. Say, hey, we're going to observe Constitution Day. That's federal law. 13 states, I think, Rick, they passed the law that you came up with in Texas to celebrate Freedom Week where that in Constitution Week you got to have the kids memorize those 56 words out of the Declaration that is the heart and essence of the American Constitutional system. Memorize those words. That's by state law. And you have to study original documents related to the founding of our government. Those are all really good things that you can do, Kyler. So lots of good stuff out there. There's a lot of stuff you can investigate, a lot of good resources. But that's just some ideas I'll throw out. Rick and Tim, you guys have other ideas as well, I'm sure.

Rick Green: 10:48

Yeah, Kyler, there's so much you can do, man, and and even and I'll say this not just a Kyler, but to a lot of our folks out there that have gotten elected. A lot of folks I've talked to have gotten elected to a school board, but they're in the minority for the first term. So maybe you got elected, Kyler I don't know what the makeup is of your particular school board. We've had friends that have been one against six or one against four, depending on the state and the makeup of their school board, and then the next cycle they picked up one or they picked up two. I was talking to one of our Constitution coaches the other day in Pennsylvania where that happened to and now they've got a dominant majority on on that school board. So stay in there, Kyler, stay in the fight. So thankful for what you're doing there and really encouraged by what you're sharing. Okay, let's get let's get one more question before we go to the break. Just finished 11 sessions of Constitution training with excellent host Lydia.

Rick Green: 11:36

Our last video was Rick Green emphasizing the negative impact of using the concept of nullification when you disagree with the law. I understand the concepts of heading into anarchy, but I have a concern about what recourse Americans would have if the executive branch bypasses the Senate's approval and should turn American sovereignty over to the UN, the World Health Organization or other non American political agencies. Once you give away the American citizens power to rule themselves and are controlled by an entity outside our Constitution, how would citizens regain what they have given to an organization that does not honor our Constitutional system of government? Thanks for what David, Rick and your staff are doing for our freedoms. Okay, great question. And and obviously somebody's been through our Constitution class, guys, and we of course lay out in the Constitution class that that single-state nullification doesn't work long term. You could try to do that then, you know, leads to war. You got to be wise. We've also talked about the fact that you don't have to enforce a federal law that you believe to be unconstitutional while you're appealing it on, you know, either in the courts or through the amendment process.

Rick Green: 12:32

But the question is really more about what happens if the World Health Organization is given, you know, through through some agreement that that, frankly, is gonna happen in May if, if we don't stop Biden. They're given, supposedly, authority to tell us what to do. What is the citizen to do? What if a governor says, hey, we're not gonna, we're not gonna listen to some international agency in our state, even if Biden thinks he gave away that. So I'm wondering, guys, if we would answer differently then we did when we originally recorded that class and I think the part she's probably were they were watching was like 10 years ago. A lot's happened since then. Would we nuance that a little bit more? Or would we empower governors more and say, hey, you do need to stand up when these things happen, but you need to get other governors on board, too. You need to come together with other states to fight this kind of stuff.

David Barton: 13:19

I don't think the answer would change from 10 years ago in this sense. When it deals with a law under the Constitution, you don't get to nullify that law under the Constitution just because you disagree.

Rick Green: 13:32

Yeah, keywords being under the Constitution. I like the way you said that.

David Barton: 13:36

That's right. We have now stepped outside the Constitution and said hey, we're throwing the Constitution aside, we're using the WHO Constitution, we're using the Geneva, whatever. When you hold in a different framework, as the authority of your government, that thing with nullification goes out the door. I'm going to do everything I can to nullify anything we do to violate the Constitution. But now, under the Constitution, that's a whole different thing. The Constitutional process is there, we go through it, we challenge it.

David Barton: 14:05

You know there's always a state that's going to disagree with every single federal law that's passed and that state doesn't get to throw out the will of the other states just because it disagrees with it. I don't know that any law has been passed - maybe there's a few laws passed where all 50 states agreed with it, but that's just very, very rare. You're always going to have some dissent. But you're not talking about under the Constitution now. You're talking about replacing the Constitution with a different source of authority and when it comes to that, every tool is available, every tool you've got.

David Barton: 14:36

And, by the way, it's interesting I think and we're seeing this already, we're seeing the federal courts striking down a number of measures where the federal government is trying to go outside the Constitution and saying no, no, no, there's no authority for enforcing that and you can't do that as the president or anything else. Your oath is under the Constitution. So we have some pretty good provisions, even in place right now, with judicial recourse and being able to say, hey, this is outside the Constitution, you can't make that that treaty or you can't do that agreement. But that would be my answer. I think what we did 10 years ago still holds If you're under the Constitution.

Rick Green: 15:13

You're right and, David, you also bring up something. That is why it's so important for people to do Constitution classes, to know what is under the Constitution or not under the Constitution. You taught me this so many years ago and you teach it in the Constitutional Alive class. But this idea of who has authority and who gets to make that decision and what power is given under the Constitution or isn't. It is so important to know that. Otherwise you do kind of just become anarchy I don't know how to say that the right way. It becomes an anarchy because everybody's deciding on their own what the law should be, or it becomes totalitarianism, where one branch of government is running everything. We have to get back to this idea of saying, okay, yes, if it's under the Constitution, the feds get to decide. Who gets to decide on those questions? If it's Constitutional, the feds, but outside of that is the state or the person, the individual or the community. Anyway, I just think what you said is exactly spot on.

Tim Barton: 16:09

This is one of the great things the founding fathers envisioned having checks and balances.

Tim Barton: 16:12

Because when we talk about giving power to the UN, that's something President Obama tried to do more than once, where he would do something with the UN. The UN firearms deal, where in America we're going to limit who can have guns and how you know what kind of bullets they can shoot, et cetera.

Tim Barton: 16:28

And fortunately we had a Senate at that time that said that's crazy. As American citizens, under the Constitution, the right to keep their arms belongs to the people. The role of the government to protect that right, not to give it over to some unelected individuals outside of America. And so this is why the founding fathers brilliantly had those checks and balances. And so just echoing that sentiment of understanding whose authority it is and what power do they have, what power don't they have, and so knowing what our rights are, but then understanding also the brilliance of the founding fathers where they understood there would be times when you might have one branch embracing wokeness or wanting to give those rights away. So there is checks and balances, even between the branches, to keep the other branches accountable, which is good news.

Rick Green: 17:12

Wow, you know, all this stuff about jurisdictions and separation of powers and checks and balances almost sounds like I don't know civics or something. Sounds like something maybe we should teach more in America so that we understand these things. Hey, in fact, there might be a really good book, I don't know. Maybe something about the American Story might likely some of that stuff out, or maybe there's some Constitution Classes out there somewhere, I don't know, maybe on a website like WallBuilders. com. Yes, everybody, go get educated on this stuff so that you can answer these same questions that we were just addressing. We got another question coming from Rick, but not me. It's a different Rick from Seaside, so stay with us. We'll be right back. You're listening to The WallB uilder Show.

Tim Barton: 17:52

Hi, friends, this is Tim Barton of wall builders. This is the time when most Americans don't know much about American history, or even Heroes of the faith, and I know Oftentimes for parents we're trying to find good content for our kids to read and if you remember, back to the Bible, to the book of Hebrews, it has the faith Hall of Fame where they outlined the leaders of faith that had gone before them. Well, this is something that, as Americans, we really want to go back and outline some of these heroes, not just of American history, but heroes of Christianity and our faith as well. I want to let you know about some biographical sketches we have available on our website.

Tim Barton: 18:20

One is called the courageous leaders collection and this collection includes people like Abigail Adams, Abraham Lincoln, Francis Scott Key, George Washington Carver, Susanna Wesley, even the Wright brothers. There's a second collection called heroes of history, and this collection you'll read about people like Benjamin Franklin or Christopher Columbus, Daniel Boone, George Washington, Harriet Tubman, friends. The list goes on and on. This is a great collection for your young person to have and read and it's a providential view of American and Christian history. This is available at WallBuilders. com that's www. wallbu ilders. com.

Rick Green: 18:55

Welcome back to The WallB uilders Show. Thanks for staying with us on this foundations of Freedom Thursday. And Probably well, we'll see if we get two more in, but probably the last one this one's comes from Rick in Seaside I'm not sure Seaside where would you guys know what Seaside? Is there a city named Seaside that you can think of? Rick? You're gonna have to send us another note, man, just so we can verify.

Tim Barton: 19:20

It's Florida. Well, my wife has a sweatshirt and a t-shirt from Seaside. Oh, okay. There's probably more than one Seaside right in fairness, but there is a seaside Florida.

Rick Green: 19:29

Well, Rick, from Seaside, you are now from Florida. Whether you're from Florida or not, all right, and here's what Rick said. He said hey, gang, this is what the nation is suffering from emotional, spiritual and educational immaturity. We're gonna key in on that one. It is running rampant in the US and it's no surprise with the lack of stable families, the absence of fathers, and corrupt leadership and all levels of Government. How else should we think it would turn out? How do we turn this around? So, guys question is how do we, how do we mature the citizenship in America? How do we get emotionally, spiritually and educationally more mature and stop running around like little kids?

David Barton: 20:07

Wow, I want to avoid the answer I want to give, but it is, quite frankly, knowing and applying the Bible. Spiritual maturity comes from spending time there, and most people do not spend much time in God's Word and they aren't very serious about that Word. They don't do much memorization. They don't say hey, I saw this new story today on this issue. I'm going to look up and see what the Bible says on that. Very few people do the work of independent study and independent feeder.

David Barton: 20:37

One of the things I think is so important is that every Christian should be a self-feeder. You should be able to have a mature spiritual life without having to have someone teach you what that is. You should be able to learn that on your own. You get in the scriptures, you study, you do the work, you do the research, you read books like Jim Garla's book on well-versed and his book well-versed has what is it? 140 or 50 different topics and shows. Bible verses apply to every one of those topics. Once you know what the Bible says about economics or what it says about government, or what it says about family, what it says about climate, what it says about all these things, that's when you start getting more spiritually mature and as you get more spiritually mature, you get more politically mature and you get more civically mature.

David Barton: 21:21

Immaturity is the result of being self-centered. In whatever realm that is, it is always being the child. Give me another bottle, I want to suck my thumb, I want somebody to feed me, I want somebody to make it easy for me, I don't want to go out and work hard. Immaturity is not taking responsibility, and so he's exactly right, but that's got to be a self-motivated thing that we have to do. Every one of us should study to show ourself approved under God. A workman needs not be ashamed, Timothy 2:15. I mean, God puts it all back on us, and if we're immature, there's nobody to blame, but we are self, because he gives us every tool we need not only to be mature but to be effective and to be efficient with what we do, and that's in every aspect of life.

David Barton: 22:04

We're told in 1st Timothy 3:16 that the Word of God gives us everything we need. It's inspired, it's infallible, everything is there, we're told in Peter. It's everything we need for life and Godliness. So spiritual and secular life, if you want to say it, the Bible's got all of it. So what we have to have is self-feeders and we are very much a nation of learners. We take what we hear on TV and repeat it without checking out the source. We take what we see in a social media feed and pass it on without checking to see if it's right, and particularly if it agrees with what we already agree with our viewpoint. We'll pass it on without checking on it, and we just got to get away from that.

David Barton: 22:42

So I don't know that there's a simple answer to that except hard work, and one of the verses I learned and memorized and still repeat is Proverbs 14:23. All hard work is profitable. We should never run from working hard or putting in. You know, we're trying to get from eight hours a day to seven hours a day, to six hours a day. Man, why not 14 hours a day? What in the Bible tells us we should only work eight hours a day? There's nothing biblical about that, there's nothing historical about that. Anybody that's been effective has put in hours and hours and hours of self-study, and so the whole mentality is put it back on ourselves. Once we get mature, we can have others be mature and we can have a mature culture. Train your kids to be mature. Train them to be thinkers. There's just not an easy answer to that one, but it goes back to each of us.

Rick Green: 23:29

No, brother, I think that is a maybe not easy answer. It's a simple, like you said is a simple answer saturate yourself in God's Word and you know the conviction that comes from Scripture too, makes you want to mature, makes you want to do better, makes you want to grow up. You know, even the whole, you know put it away childish things. But you know, even just reading through Proverbs, it makes you feel like a fool if you're not doing what God's saying to do. So you don't want to be foolish, so you try to do better, so you mature. And, man, I think you're spot on. That's a great answer to that question. The best way to gain that maturity in all those areas be saturated in God's Word.

Tim Barton: 24:05

Dad, to echo that sentiment, too, one of the things we often hear people talk about is that the sad reality that we lack so much common sense. But we've talked about it, common sense, even though we can say it's not very common anymore. The reason it used to be known as common sense, the common understanding. There was a universal thought behind truth. In America, when the Bible was the number one textbook where kids were learning to read and write, when the Bible was a standard of right and wrong, when truth existed, when morals existed, that was common sense, because it was common knowledge. The further we've gotten away from the Bible, the more we've lost

Tim Barton: 24:41

what used to be known as common sense because the Bible taught us that a husband and wife, a mom and dad, a male and female, like the basic foundation of society, basic rights and wrongs, basic understanding even of science, came from the Bible. And so even this notion of how do we restore maturity? Well, how do we restore common sense? It's making the truth common again helping reeducate people. Dad, as you mentioned, that really starts with reeducating ourselves. First we have to go back to the foundation of truth, to the foundation where common sense comes from, where it originates from. Rick, as you mentioned, even in Proverbs, where we, you know, we can read Proverbs and go man, I am really not doing right, but we wouldn't even know what was what makes someone wise, what makes them a fool, if we didn't have the standard from the Bible, from Proverbs, from Solomon. That's where we get the understanding of what makes someone wise or foolish. That's where common sense comes from. We have to go back to the foundation of truth, which is the Bible.

Rick Green: 25:39

Alright, friends, that does it for today. This has been Foundations of Freedom Thursday here on WallBuilders Live. Thanks for being a part of that today. If you'd like your question answered, please send that into radio@wallbuilders. com. That's radio@wallbuilders. com. And while you're there, go ahead and go to Wallbuilders. com. Check out some of those amazing resources If you'd like to have a better foundation for yourself, that you would like to know more about how the nation was founded.

Rick Green: 26:02

You'd like to be able to apply a biblical, a historical and constitutional perspective to what's going on in your community. Whether you're testifying at the school board or at the state capitol, or you're calling or writing your legislator, or you're just teaching friends and family at church or in your home, or even your own kids, about the principles of liberty, we have to each get educated about those things first. So go to Wallbuilders. com, get some materials today, start diving in. Maybe even consider becoming a Constitution coach and joining our 12,000 Constitution coaches around the country and hosting one of those classes in your home or at your church. You don't need any background for that. Anyone can do it and we do it for free. Check all of that out at biblicalcitizens. com. Thanks so much for listening to Wallbuilders.