Rick Green

Welcome to the Intersection of Faith and Culture. It's WallBuilders and we're taking on the hot topics of the day from a biblical, historical and constitutional perspective. And, of course, today is Friday, so it's Good News Friday. We've got a lot of good news coming up for you. The best news I can tell you right off the bat is that we have all kinds of answers to what plagues America. You know, we're all frustrated with the direction of the country, with the chaos at the border, with the economy, with the administration, with the insanity that we see day after day after day and it just feels like whack-a-mole right of all the bad stuff out there. And you try to figure out which battle do I fight? Well, join us at wallbuilders.com.

Go to wallbuilders.com today, get signed up, Make sure you're on our email list. Consider coaching one of our Constitution classes. Consider sending your pastor to one of our pastor briefings. Maybe come in this summer to one of our programs over at American Journey Experience. Or maybe sign up as a coach and come to our Coach Congress down at the Patriot Academy campus in Fredericksburg. But get engaged.

The answers are all there, folks. The Bible's got answers for everything we're facing in life and when we apply godly principles, when we line up with the laws of nature and nature's God, the blessings are there. When we go against the laws of nature and nature's God, we won't talk about the curses. It's Good News Friday. I'm Rick Green, America's Constitution Coach, honored to serve here with David and Tim Barton. Tim's a national speaker and pastor and president of WallBuilders, and David Barton, of course, America's premier historian, and he's our founder here at WallBuilders. So thanks for joining us on this Good News Friday and it is time to dive into that good news. All right, guys, looking forward to the good news you've got ready for us today, David, what's the first piece going to be?

David Barton

Well, it's a shout out and it doesn't start with good news, but it goes to a time and an era in American history. That was good news and it deals with a man named William Anders, and probably very few hearing that name today will know what to do with it. William Anders was an astronaut in Apollo 8. That was the first-.

Tim Barton

Let me just stop and say I know what to do with it. I'm going to sit here and listen to you tell the story. That's what I'll do with it, yeah exactly yes to you tell the story.

David Barton

Yeah, yeah, exactly yes, so, yeah, good. So what was the story? I'm glad you asked that question. It was apollo 8. But what happened was recently, um, William Anders, and, and, and, by the way, the astronauts all went through flight school and they were flying planes. They knew all about aeronautic stuff. So Bill Anders was a pilot himself and he was flying up in Washington State, had a crash and died. He was 90 years old and so unexplained reason for the crash. He went into the water short of an island.

But Bill Anders was an astronaut back in the Apollo program. He was on Apollo 8, which is the first mission to go to the moon. We weren't trying to land on it yet, we just wanted to make sure we could get there, circle it and get back. So Apollo 8 goes. They spent 20 hours orbiting the moon. Then they came back safely to Earth. So Bill Anders, great guy on that mission. He had a huge impact in NASA and was involved in other missions as well.

But what stands out with Bill Anders was they were orbiting the moon on Christmas Eve of 1968. And so he has a Christmas Eve message that he sends back to America and NASA told him. He said whatever you guys broadcast, this will set the record for the largest number of people hearing any broadcast in history, and at that point it was being broadcast globally, and so people were listening to see what space because even the international media is covering this. Nobody's ever been to the moon before. This is something new. So Jules Verne novel aside, back in the 1800s, nobody's been to the moon. So these guys are at the moon.

And William Anders made a really great comment, and if you've ever seen the picture, that's a real famous picture called Earthrise. He's the guy who took that picture and he said we didn't discover the moon, he said we discovered earth. I mean, he said when we came around the moon and saw the globe of earth in front of us, it's like we discovered Earth for the first time. Nobody's ever seen it from that perspective, from that distance. Nobody's ever seen that orb, that blue and green orb, and so it's a great picture.

But their Christmas greeting that they sent back to America was really, really cool. It tells you something about the spirit of America at that time, what America did and did not tolerate. It shows you something about the change that's happening in America today, because you can imagine what would happen if you were to hear the words we're about to play for you. And this is Christmas Eve, December 24th of 1968. It's a two-minute clip that was sent back by three astronauts. Frank Borman was the commander of the mission, Bill Anders was on it and then also Jim Lovell, and so they each take a part in this broadcast. Listen to what the broadcast was back to Earth on Christmas Eve of 1968.

Broadcast

We are now booking a lunar sunrise and, for all the people back on Earth, the Pearl of Apollo 8 has a message that we would like to send to you. In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth and the earth was without form and void and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And darkness was upon the face of the deep and the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters and God said Let there be light. And there was light. And God saw the light. They were good and divided the light from the darkness, and God called the light day and the darkness he called night.

And the evening and the morning were the first day, and God said Let there be a fervent in the midst of the waters and let it divide the waters from the waters. And God made the fervent and divided the waters which were under the fervent and the waters which were above the firmament, the waters which were above the firmament. And it was so. And God called the firmament. And the evening and the morning was the second day, and God said Let the waters under the ephod gather together into one place and let the dry lands appear. And it was so that God called the dry lands, earth and the gathering together of the waters called the sea. That God saw, that it was good, and from the power of the power of the light, we close with good night, good luck, a merry Christmas and God bless all of you, all of you on the good earth.

David Barton

So the first part there with it being introduced, that was Bill Anders. He read the first four verses and then Jim Lovell read the next four verses and then Frank Borman read the last two verses. So ten verses from space. Genesis 1, the creation story. They're looking at the moon, they're looking at earth and they read the creation story. What a wonderful, wonderful part of our heritage.

But it also showed the hostility. After they did that. Madeleine Murray O'Hara, the famous atheist, sued NASA, said how dare you read a Bible verse out loud in public? And that's what led shortly after that to the kind of Supreme Court decisions. She was the one in the case Murray Curled, that said no more prayer in schools. Madeleine Murray O'Hare had a huge impact in secularizing America and giving a very activist Supreme Court something to work with. But nonetheless, that's a culture of America at that time that the most listened to broadcast in the history of the world at that point was the Genesis story in Genesis 1, verses 1 through 10. And we'll miss Bill Anders, but, man, what he did for the space program and to set the culture of America was really good stuff.

Rick Green

Yeah, we miss having those kind of national actions that reinforce a belief in God and those principles, and I think it's on a comeback, though, guys. We're starting to see more athletes, more big-name folks, start to be bold in their faith and expressing their faith publicly, regardless of whatever the consequences might be for their job or the negative press or whatever it might be, so hopefully that comeback is coming. Let's take a quick break. We'll be right back. We've got lots more good news to share. Folks, stay with us. You're listening to WallBuilders.

Break

Rick Green

Welcome back to WallBuilders. Good news Friday today. Thanks for staying with us. Let's jump into some more good news. Tim Barton, with the next piece of good news, Tim.

Tim Barton

Well, this one's from Tennessee, and this happened just a couple weeks ago. The headline says Tennessee governor signs bill to stop trafficking teens to other states for secret abortions. Now the basic breakdown of this piece of legislation that Governor Bill Lee signed down, of this piece of legislation that Governor Bill Lee signed it's a pro-life measure that essentially says that nobody who is not the parent or guardian can take a minor right so an underage individual 18, into a different state for an abortion. Now I'm going to get into the details a little bit more, but a couple of things that are already boggling in my mind to some extent. It passed the Senate 25 to 4 and it passed the House 74 to 24.

I'm already a little boggled by who in the world is against this thinking. Right you are suggesting is that you support individuals who are not the parent, who are not the guardian, taking an underage girl into a different state to get an abortion without the parent's knowledge. Okay, so already I just question everything about your value system. If you think that is appropriate, well, part of even what was acknowledged in the surrounding conversation, with this law coming into existence, right. If you ask the question of why do we need something like this.

Well, earlier this year, planned Parenthood and other abortion clinic representatives were caught on camera admitting to taking teens to other states for secret abortions without the parent's consent. This was something that Project Veritas Exposé showed Emily, a Kansas Planned Parenthood managing director, admitting that we do help people get to these places and again, the nature of what people are doing. It used to be right. I mean, back in the day you guys might not remember this I saw something on social media about this person and I really didn't know much about it. I went and looked it up, do y'all? know the name? 

Rick Green

Did the youngest guy on the program just say back in the day? You guys may not remember this, but back in the day this is going to be fun Go.

Tim Barton

Well, just and by back in the day, let me also give you context. Back in the day, I mean it happened in the 1980s oh, oh, oh.

Rick Green

So that's why you said y'all may not remember this, I got you.

Tim Barton

Yeah, yeah well I don't know how much. I don't know how much. I think it happened in 1984, but I don't know how much publicity it got when it happened okay, okay.

Rick Green

It's a reason I get a pass, okay, all right.

Tim Barton

Do you know the name, and I'm not even sure I'm pronouncing this right, but Gary Plasche? Uh, no, nope okay no, oh,

David Barton

 you're speaking for me, Ricky, you're doing good man so, uh,

Tim Barton

 so he's the guy that his, uh, there was a, a really, really evil dude, uh, Doss Set, and I again I'm probably saying that name. Oh, wait a minute, I think I know what you're talking about.

Rick Green

Is this a dude that actually walked into or was at the airport on the phone? Hot, yeah, like and and they and the guy that 

Tim Barton

correct, 

Rick Green

oh my goodness. Oh, I know where you're going. Okay, I do remember. Now I feel really old, thanks, yeah so.

Tim Barton

so here's the short of it. There is a, there is a, a man who is a pedophile raper, and, uh, that that was the, the Doss Set guy. Well, he had kidnapped the son of Gary Plasche and had raped the son, and so in in the midst of this and it was Jeffrey I'm seeing now the name, Jeffrey Dossett child molester, kidnapped and raped Plaché's son. But it was captured on camera by a local news crew because they were showing this guy walking along with security and Gary Plaché was in the background pretending to be on the phone. And when this child molester walks by handcuffed, he turns around with a firearm and eliminates the dude. Well, he ends up getting a seven year suspended sentence with five years probation and 300 hours of community service, receiving no prison time for what happened.

And I say that all to give context. Right, it used to be that 40 years ago we were in a place in our nation that when there was some adult taking some child and doing untold, only God knows what things, right, I mean, what kind of person is going to take a child, an underage child who's pregnant, and say, hey, let's go to a different state, let's get you an abortion and not let your parents know that sounds like all kinds of iffy stuff, and it used to be that when the parent found out that somebody had done something to the child and the parent responded that, everybody in society was like, yeah, that kind of makes sense, because that person was really, really evil and shouldn't have done it. And I say that again for the context of now. You have entire industries, planned Parenthood saying hey, we're just here to help kids and if their parents won't help them 

Rick Green

Tim look at what they're doing in Arizona right now. They're pushing for this ballot initiative. I talked to Kathy Herod the other day. She came over and spoke at our Patriot Academy at the Capitol there in Phoenix and she was telling me that this push would literally protect child sex traffickers that are taking kids in for abortions. I mean, that's how evil these people are.

Tim Barton

And that's exactly my point. Yeah, that is exactly right, that's my point. Point yeah, that is exactly right. That's that's my point is right there. There can be some adult in this quote-unquote relationship that is raping and getting a underage girl pregnant and then taking them to have an abortion and parents never know about this and Planned Parenthood is assisting in this right now. Yeah, the reason I bring this up is because the good news is that in Tennessee, governor Bill E just signed a law saying hey, if we find out somebody's doing this, you get arrested. We're making this pretty clear.

The good news is there are still places where Tennessee, Florida, Louisiana are three of the I think those are the top three this year as far as conservative legislation being passed. But they're making a very clear line where culture is saying this is great, it's confusing, and we don't even know what's right anymore. We are seeing places in states where they are holding a very clear moral line and saying we are going to protect children. We're not going to let perverts and evil people come and do bad things to kids and get away with it. There's going to protect children. We're not going to let perverts and evil people come and do bad things to kids and get away with it. There's going to be consequences, and in some cases, like in Louisiana, it can be very extreme consequences. But this is good news coming out of Tennessee, and so kudos to their state legislature getting this passed and kudos to Governor Bill Lee for signing this pro-life measure into law.

Rick Green

Hey, guys, before we go to break, I get to do a good news. I want to tell you guys about this because I think you'll get a kick out of it. At that Arizona Patriot Academy, this kid I say kid, he's like 25 years old, but he was telling me his story and a year ago he was a Marxist. I mean he was left wing, totally on the other side, and just some things happened in his life. Some very difficult things happened in his life and he came back to his Catholic faith and he said that as he was restoring his faith, he was out canvassing I mean, he's seriously involved with the Democrat Party in Arizona and he was out helping on this initiative that we just talked about, this ballot initiative that will make abortion possible up until birth and no consequences for people. It's horrible, it's what they're trying to do. And he realized he's like wait a minute, I'm out here trying to get this thing passed. That is absolutely against my faith. Why am I doing something politically and he's very politically involved why am I doing something politically that violates my faith? So as he rediscovered his faith, he realized this political agenda for not only abortion but everything you were just saying, Tim, about the people, being able to take a kid in for abortion and all of these things, and it totally convicted him.

And, as it convicted him and he started studying, it made him completely change his positions and totally change parties, totally change what he was working for. And he basically somebody that knew him and saw the transition, knew about what we were doing with Patriot Academy at the Capitol recommended that he come. And it was just really neat guys, and it just gave me so much hope. It was like wow, I mean, that's what revival does when people come back to their faith and they actually live out their faith and they actually apply their faith. It changes their actions, changes what they fight for, changes what they believe in. Just a piece of good news I had to share with you guys, really encouraged by what this young man was doing. In fact, we may even have to get him on the program, but I just was really, really encouraged by what's happening in his life. Quick break.

We'll be back in a moment. Folks, we've got more good news for you here on the WallBuilder Show. 

Rick Green

Welcome back to the WallBuilders Show. It's Good News Friday and we're headed back over to David. What's the next piece of good news?

David Barton

It deals with what happened with Trump in New York, went through the trial. If you know much objectively about it, it was a I guess I can say this it was a trumped-up trial. Trump was the middle of it, but it was trumped up. They had to use something that was not a crime. Statute Limitations had gone out on it. They had to create crimes to nail him on.

And it's just, they cook the books. You watch the judge. He's not going to allow testimony from Trump's side, the people he wanted to call. And yet we're told in the Bill of Rights that you have the right to confront your accuser and you have the right to compel testimony on your behalf, et cetera. So just so many things were wrong with it up and down the board. And you see the double standards there. They say, well, it's OK for Biden, after he was vice president, to take classified documents home with him, but it's not okay for Trump to do that. We're not going to prosecute Biden, but we are going to prosecute Trump. You see that just recently, just last week, congress issued a criminal contempt charge and they asked the Justice Department to enforce this because they broke the law. And the Justice Department came back and said well, we're not going to enforce that. It's one of our favorites, we don't want to do anything to him and it's just crazy to see the double standards that's out there. So, after the trial is all over, people may have seen this. I'm real impressed with it.

But Dr. Phil was talking to Trump and the subject of revenge came up, because if you get elected, you get back in, you can clean out a lot of the swamp. The revenge is there, you can get even. And Trump's answer was not what I would expect it from him, because he talked about hey, we've had enough revenge, we don't need more revenge. If I want to have revenge, I'm going to see the country succeed, and so the best form of revenge is making sure the country succeeds. And I was so impressed with that statement that he didn't have that revenge.

Retaliation, evil for evil. You used a pitch fork on me. I'm going to two pitchforks on you. Just the fact that he did that the quote was the best revenge for Donald Trump would be the success of America and that's a really, really, really positive statement. We don't need to escalate this war anymore. That's going on. We need to get the trash out of the Justice Department and DOJ and other places. But revenge is not going to do it. You have to go the right way, we're told in the scriptures. You overcome the evil with the good. You don't do more evil to overcome evil. You turn it around and go the opposite direction. Romans 12: 21. And this is a really, really cool statement from Trump that I thought was just spectacular to have that attitude, because we don't need America to be drawn into a revenge kind of war where we polarize it and make it into a full-fledged civil war.

Rick Green

Yeah, it surprised me too, man.

I was encouraged by it very much because so much of what's happened in these trials has created a lot of righteous anger and so how to deal with that, how to channel that, how to bring the country back to the right place, is going to be vitally important.

And, guys, I just got to give a shout out to WallBuilders and the Founders Bible, because just reading what two or three days ago in our annual reading, our daily reading for getting through it in a year, was the article you did on the biblical right of confrontation and just a great reminder of why the Bill of Rights that you mentioned a few minutes ago, David, is so important and us falling back in love with those biblical ideas of being able to confront our accusers and call witnesses and all those things, is really, really important for people to recognize the importance of that and that it is biblically grounded, because we're seeing more and more of these courts not allow that, just like they did with Trump not allowing some of the witnesses he wanted to have and some of the evidence.

I saw it with the praying grandma when I went out there to testify in that federal trial. So those basic due process amendments and those basic biblical justice principles of the country. We've really got to get people to understand the importance of that, get them to love it. Left right, center, republican, democrat, everybody needs to love those things because that's what makes for a good society. All right, Tim, take us out with a final piece of good news.

Tim Barton

Well, guys, I had the opportunity on Wednesday of this week to go to Louisiana, as I mentioned earlier in the program. Louisiana, Tennessee, Florida all considered the tops and we're getting conservative legislation done. But one of the things that we are so excited about in the midst of this also with our pro-family legislative network from WallBuilders Audrea Decker is the one that heads that up, and we have a whole team and staff that works to help do research and really education for these state legislators on a lot of the historical precedent. One of the Supreme Court decisions I think 2019 was the Bladenburg Cross decision with the US Supreme Court, Bloomberg cross decision with the US Supreme Court. One of the standards they have set forward is that if there is a historical precedent, then there should be a presumed constitutionality Meaning. If it's something that we've always done historically, you should have the assumption that we're allowed to do this, and so we've been able to work to show a lot of the history of what we used to do in our nation with education, with the military I mean, we can kind of go across the board what we've done with our nation, and so we've been able to help connect a lot of legislators with some really great information and we have a lot of good friends and lots of arenas, and so we've been able to plug them into lots of experts in different areas as well. All that to say is I got to go to Louisiana, to Lafayette, and go to a couple of bill signings with Governor Landry.

But the one that I was really excited about, and not the only one in Louisiana that has a donated copy, display a picture, a poster of the Ten Commandments, and there's a certain poster size it has to be. But for people that want to do that, we can find out the best way to donate in Louisiana to help that happen. Nonetheless, the law says that if anybody donates a copy of the Ten Commandments, it must be displayed in the public school and just like the national motto can be displayed now once again of the Ten Commandments, it must be displayed in the public school and just like the national motto can be displayed now once again, the Ten Commandments, which we can actually track going back all the way to the Pilgrim era. We can track it from the Pilgrims all the way until 1980, the case Stone v Graham, when the US Supreme Court said in 1980, the US Supreme Court said, oh, we can't have a copy of the Ten Commandments up on school walls anymore. So from the Pilgrims until 1980, we can track that the Ten Commandments was part of public education and once again it's going to be part of public education, at least on display in Louisiana. So just so many incredible things happening around the nation and on Wednesday I'm going to be part of some of those signings in Louisiana. So really good news coming from Louisiana.

Rick Green

All right guys. Lots of great news. Thanks so much for sharing it today. We'll have more for you folks next week and there's more on our website right now. Go to wallbuilders.show and check out the archives of the programs you might have missed over the last couple of weeks. You will enjoy them there, and then that's also a great time to go to our main website, wallbuilders.com, and make that one-time or monthly contribution and get you some good materials there as well. Thanks so much for listening to the WallBuilders Show.