Rick Green: 0:12

Welcome to intersection of faith and the culture, it's WallBuilders. We're taking on the hot topics of the day from a biblical, historical and constitutional perspective. I'm Rick Green, America's constitution coach here with David and Tim Barton. David's America's premier historian and our founder at WallBuilders, Tim's a national speaker and pastor and president of WallBuilders. And the most important person on this program right now is you. That's right the listener, we need you to take action out there in your community, not just listen, but act, as John Hancock said, not only to pray, but to act, right, there's so much we need to do, there's so much you can do in your community. So get plugged in. Today's going to be all about encouraging you letting you know through our good news Friday programs, that victory is happening out there and communities across the country. You get to be a part of it, we encourage you to do that. Get signed up as a constitution coach, start hosting a class in your living room or at your church. You can do that for free at ConstitutionCoach.com . And you can actually come join us on Constitution Day this year, September 17 is Constitution Day. That's a Sunday, and we're going to have a huge celebration in Fredericksburg, Texas where the Patriot Academy campus has been built. You can come be a part of that. Kirk Cameron's going to be with us, Brad Stine. We're going to do Comedy, Constitution and Revival. So it's the American Campfire Revival combined with a Comedy and Constitution, it's going to be a huge event. And you can even stay over and do a Constitutional Defense course at our campus. Hope you'll check that out today at PatriotAcademy.com. And it's time for our first piece of good news. David Barton is going to kick us off. David, where are we headed for today?

David Barton: 1:38

Well, guys, I want to start with an activity that happened in the Fort Worth Dallas area. Recently, a couple of weeks ago, there was a national religious conference held here in town, a bunch of solid evangelical Christian people came to town. And it's an annual Bible conference that they hold and, and thousands upon thousands came and we know the leaders and they're good folks, and they're solid believers, and they really try to affect the culture and do good things and they're politically active and involved, and they do things with education. They just to a lot of really good stuff. But what I was really thrilled with, was that while people came to the convention and got some good Bible teaching, and good inspiration, and good fellowship, etc. What I really liked was the fact that during the day, they took time off, and they went out on the streets and just started talking to people and checking where they were with Christ. And do you know Christ, and can I share Christ with you? And it was really good. It's what we used to call street witnessing, just going out and sharing Jesus with people. And that's a characteristic I really have not seen much of in years and years. And that's unfortunate. Now, we've definitely talked about the fact that the number of Christians in America are definitely declining, the percentage of those that believe in God is declining. And one of the things that will cause your faith to decline is not sharing your faith with anybody else. And we just haven't seen that kind of emphasis on evangelism that every single Christian should be sharing their faith. Jesus talked in the gospels, after he did good things for people, he said, now, go tell others what I've done for you. And this used to be just a typical part of being a Christian, just like reading your Bible, just like praying, was sharing your faith. And I cannot tell you the last time that I was randomly stopped by someone who didn't know me, who just started talking to me to see if I knew God, or knew about Jesus, or anything else, and that used to be fairly regular. I could be at malls, or I could be gas stations, or whatever and people would want to share their faith, which is a great thing to do. So I find that to be really a positive sign. I hope it grows across America, every single Christian needs to share their faith with others. That was just a standard part of Christian living. If Jesus has done something for you, he says, out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. If he's changed you, that's something you want to talk about. Now, if you're really comfortable in your faith, and you know, that doesn't really impress you as something so significant you need to share with others. Maybe it's time to get back into your Bible, get back into your prayer time, get back another time, but Christians really do need to share their faith. And perhaps we've been kind of bullied in the sense that we're just kind of not wanting to share with other people because we don't know if they're going to explode on us or if they're going to kind of weaponize their talk back against us. Things are so fragile now, so polarized and so weaponized, maybe we're kind of intimidated. But that's still not a good reason for not sharing faith. So I just have to say, I thought it was really a positive thing that when they had this Bible conference, as part of it, they included the concept of evangelism, or of sharing your belief and your faith with someone else who might not know God and trying to get other people to know God. That is a great thing for everybody to do. Every Christian believer should be doing that.

Rick Green: 4:46

David, I remember you talking about self censoring, Christians self censoring their opinions on social media, self censoring, the sharing of the Gospel itself, is probably what has caused us to you know, be so quiet and you not hear more people Well sharing the gospel, but hey, what good's the First Amendment freedom of religion if you're not living out your faith or freedom of speech if you're not speaking? So very healthy thing.

Tim Barton: 5:08

Well, guys, I would add to that one of the things that unfortunately, the American culture is kind of embraced over the last several decades, it is not polite to talk about politics or religion, in certain settings. And so unfortunately, we have seen the outflow the the fruit that's been produced by those ideas, and the repercussions of it have not been good, we are a nation now much more in trouble. But it's also something we've seen in modern church culture, the idea that we just need to take our friends to church and our pastors will tell them about Jesus. We've really misunderstood and twisted part of the notion of our responsibility as a Christian, where the Bible talks about the role of the church is to equip the saints for the work of the ministry, part of the work of the ministry, is when Jesus told his disciples to go make other disciples in all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, teaching them everything that he had taught and commanded them. This was a basic notion in Christianity. And unfortunately, we have changed a lot of what should be fundamental core aspects of Christianity, because we didn't want to be pushy, we want to be polite, we're just going to take them to our pastor instead. And this is something that should be recovered, so Dad to your point, it really is great news that there are moments and times when you do see people, once again, embracing this thought of sharing the gospel of sharing the truth, the hope, the light and life found in Jesus.

David Barton: 6:36

And I would add to that that if there is one thing that Satan could have, above all else, it would be for people to stop talking about Jesus. I mean, if people stopped talking about Jesus, that other people won't know Jesus, the faith will not increase, it will die off of attrition, which is perfect for him. That that is his dream world is for Christians to go away. And self censoring certainly does that. And so, you know, Tim, to what you said, even the disciples when he told them that, they weren't professional ministers, they weren't paid guys, they were fishermen, and they were Carpenter, kind of guys, and they were government officials and others. He said, hey, you guys, you individuals, you guys have been following me, go make other disciples to follow me. And so you know, Tim, you hit it right on there. And that used to be part of what we taught was that great commission, and that's not for the paid professionals. That's for the individual believers in Christ to go share their faith. And if we don't, we're absolutely helping accommodate exactly what Satan would love to happen. And that is for us to stop talking about what Christ has done for us and what he can do for others.

Rick Green: 7:39

Well, considering it is the good news, that's the perfect story to start a good news Friday with So David, good news there for sure. Tim, where are we headed with our next piece of good news?

Tim Barton: 7:48

Well, this one is going to Oberlin College, and we talked about Oberlin College, I don't know how many weeks ago it was this point or months ago it's been. Oberlin College got themselves in trouble, because there was a local bakery. There were some individuals in one of the bakery, they stole some alcohol among other things. One of the individuals in the bakery ran out, there was a fight. The individual from the bakery ended up being beaten, police were called. Well, it was college students from Oberlin college, and they were arrested. They actually pleaded guilty. They admitted that race had nothing to do with what happened. And yet students on the campus, professors, administrators on the campus leadership of the campus came out and they said that this was a racist deal. It was white people, stopping black people from being able to get alcohol or whatever else they were getting. There was all these allegations, all these comments surrounding it. And it ends up there were protests outside the business, the business is devastated. They can't survive. So they bring a lawsuit because they were literally trying to stop people from stealing. And then they're accused of being racist. And the school is doing protests in the administration of the school is supporting the protesting and calling this bakery, bad names. And to be clear, it was a bakery that sold other things as well. But it was Gibson's Bakery. And so the college ends up losing the lawsuit. That's not the good news necessarily. This is something I think, again, we've already talked about some of this, but what's fascinating is the college said, hey, it's no problem. We are financially prepared to cover these things. And what they went on to explain was they had lots and lots and lots of insurance...

David Barton: 9:28

And by the way, let me throw in Tim, it was a massive win, the jury gave them like $32 or or $50 million. I mean, it was a massive Smackdown. And it was a massive thing. And as you're saying the college said, well that's no big deal. We can cover that.

Tim Barton: 9:43

Yeah, and specifically, it was $44 million that they were awarded, because of the state had a limitation that said you can't actually get more than $36 million from somebody. Yeah, that actually was coming up later in the article. But nonetheless, it was a huge settlement and Oberlin says, hey, it's no big deal. We've got all this insurance. Insurance is going to cover it. And the insurance by and large that... and they have several different policies with several different insurance agencies and groups. And they said, This is not what our insurance package covers, it doesn't cover you being ridiculous. So now Oberlin is suing the insurance agency. And I am not saying that's good news, necessarily that Oberlin is having lots of problems and issues. However, I do think there is good news from the signal it can send, especially from some of these insurance agencies that are over universities. Universities need to know you don't have carte blanche to silence people, to encourage your students to go protest, to damage to destroy to shut down businesses, and then think that you're not going to have consequences and you won't be held responsible, because you have a monthly insurance fee that you pay. And that means you can do whatever you want. The good news is we are seeing to this point, that there are consequences that still happen when there are actions that this is not going to be eradicated by no penalty for the college because they have insurance. This is something that I think especially if the insurance company is able to win and show that their insurance policy did not cover a university administrative official, encouraging students to go protest and damage and destroy a business that would be absolutely ridiculous to imagine insurance policy would cover something like that. But it would be very good on the backside to see this. So it's already been a great win for Gibson's bakery. But now for the reality of maybe some consequences for actions, recognizing... the Bible is very clear, God says don't be deceived, whatsoever man sows is that will he also reap, there is a law of sowing and reaping, there's a law of consequences and actions. And we live in a culture that's tried to remove the consequences for certain actions. And so it's just to me, it's very good news that at least we are having the potential example of a university having to deal with the consequences of their negative behavior, because it certainly can send a message to other universities. And as we've talked about, on this program, many times, there's a lot of universities that have embraced woke, they're silencing free speech in many places, they're stopping religious expression in places. It's a reason individuals, like our friends, attorneys from First Liberty Institute, or Liberty council or Alliance Defending Freedom, or Pacific Justice, or all these different organizations, the reason they are in business at all, the reason they exist is because there are so many universities doing this crazy stuff. But if this goes through, this can give a very clear warning sign to those universities, that you better make sure you understand the reality of the world you're living in. And there are still consequences for actions. And you need to make sure you are living accountable for what you do or don't want to pay. So again, to me, this is really good news. That right now, Oberlin is on the hook. And the insurance company is saying this is not what our insurance agreement was for. That's not what we covered you for. Hopefully, that stands up. And Oberlin will be the example the other universities that you cannot encourage your students to go trash protest shut down a local business, because you disagreed with them, even though the students who were arrested, agreed they were wrong. They pled guilty. And they said race had nothing to do with it. It didn't matter, it wasn't part of the narrative. Hopefully Oberlin College, and this example sends a message to everybody else, to not let feelings Trump the facts.

Rick Green: 13:38

I like the way you describe it too Tim, it's not just one piece of good news, it has a ripple effect. And instead of having a chilling effect, it's going to have a ripple effect in a really, really good way. Hey, guys, quick break. We've got more good news coming folks, stay with us, you're listening to WallBuilders.

Tim Barton: 13:57

Hey, guys, we want to let you know about a new resource we have at WallBuilders called The American Story. For so many years, people have asked us to do a history book to help tell more of the story that’s just not known or not told today. And we would say very providentially in the midst of all of the new attacks coming out against America, whether it be from things like the 1619 project that say America is evil and everything in America was built off slavery, which is certainly not true or things like even the Black Lives Matter movement, the organization itself, not out of statement, Black Lives Matter, but the organization that says we’re against everything that America was built on, and this is part of the Marxist ideology. There’s so many things attacking America. Well, is America worth defending? What is the true story of America? We actually have written and told that story. Starting with Christopher Columbus, going roughly through Abraham Lincoln, we tell the story of America, not as the story of a perfect nation or a perfect people, but the story of how God used these imperfect people and did great things through this nation. It’s a story you want to check out WallBuilders.com , The American Story.

Rick Green: 14:56

We're back here on WallBuilders, it's good news Friday. Thanks for staying with us. And we're back over to David for the next piece of good news.

David Barton: 15:05

This is kind of a double barrel. Rick, there's a couple pieces here. And they kind of relate. I'm going to start with the first one. This is something we talked about weeks ago, was kind of a crazy thing, where at Southern Illinois University there was a student there, I think she was in a fine arts program. But anyway, she was posting things on her social media, not part of the class, on her social media. And she was pro life and other things. But among other things, she shared a quote from John MacArthur, who is a noted Bible teacher out on the West Coast. And she put this up on social media says, Those who dare to take an unpopular stand, or who declare truth and a definitive way, or worst of all, those who express disagreement with someone else's teachings will inevitably be marked as troublesome. Compromise has become a virtue, while devotion to truth has become offensive. Now, that's just a statement, it's a belief, it's, I think, a challenging statement, she put that up. One of the things she talked about was that the storming of the Capitol on January 6 was not a good thing, the way it happened, it should not have happened that way. It sends a bad signal, bad message, it makes conservatives look really bad. And she posted things like that. And what happened was some of her peers, read her social posts and got offended at her. Now, first thing, you're in college, you ought to have enough brains to know that if offends you don't read it, don't go back to her social posts, she doesn't require you to read them. You don't have to read things that make you mad. But they read them and they were offended. And so they reported her. And so the university issued a noncontact order with her that she couldn't post that stuff, because it offended those who read it. And so as a result, what happened was she got with Alliance Defending Freedom, and they took it to court. And, of course, the Southern Illinois University lost, and they had to pay her a settlement on that loss. But what's really cool about it is the judges ordered that the the schools professors, that three of the schools professors involved in this situation, they have to undergo First Amendment training as part of the settlement. So hey, professors, you are so twisted on your understanding of free speech, as part of the settlement with the university, not only does the university have to pay her, it has to send you professors to a training for what the First Amendment means and what it does and what it protects and what the Constitution is all about. Which I think that's a great solution. Because these kinds of ridiculous things keep happening to universities, so requiring the professors... and isn't this crazy that we're at the university level, and they don't even know what free speech is, or free speech protection, or if they do know, they don't care and they just go against it. Well, then the same way, you may recall that I guess it was a year or two ago, maybe back in 20... No, I guess it was longer than that. It says 2017. There was a Southwest Airlines flight attendant that on her own Facebook, she posted prolife statements, she not... she wasn't talking to passengers on the plane, she just posted this on our own things. And what happened was, Southwest Airlines fired her over her prolife views. Now she took them to court and she won. She had been a flight attendant for 21 years, stellar record, high marks, high, high ratings from passengers etc. But because she posted these prolife things they took her off, they took her out, she sued and won a $5.1 million settlement. Part of the settlement was that Southwest Airlines has to put a notice out regarding the right of religious speech of its employees that there is a First Amendment she has the right to express her religious beliefs and views, including the fact that abortion is wrong. And so that's part of the settlement. Well, as it turns out, the three lead attorneys over southwest airlines did not make a notification that they have a right to free speech and a right to freedom of religion. Instead, they came out with a notification that says, look, if you do as she did, if you share your views on this, you're going to be fired just like she's going to be fired. Now, that's ignoring the settlement agreement they had. So they're back in court again, and she wins again. This time, the judge has ordered the three attorneys to undergo First Amendment training. Now that seems crazy in itself because they took an oath to uphold the Constitution. You would think that at some point they had a con law class, but we've already seen a lot of con law classes teach progressive con law, a living Constitution, not the actual thing. So here is a judge saying hey, you attorneys, you simply don't have a clue what the First Amendment means. You got to go back and get some training. So here's two great decisions. And now the judges are being proactive and said, this is so ridiculous. These should never come to our court, you guys that are bringing this, educators, professional educators, professional attorneys, you've got to go back and get some basic constitutional training, which is a really good piece of news. I hope the whole nation gets into going back to constitutional training. We'd have a lot less mess in a lot of areas if we did.

Rick Green: 20:08

Yeah, I love it. It's kind of a reverse of... reverse course, right? Where they did all the sensitivity training all those years? And I saw the one on the Southwest. I didn't see the one of the professor's but I thought that was hilarious that the lawyers for Southwest we're going to have to get that training. And it also made me think, David, at one point we even talked about doing a continuing education class, for lawyers on the First Amendment and on freedom of religion and all that. We should think about doing that again. Alright, Tim, I think we... well, we might get two more pieces of good news in, let's see what we got.

Tim Barton: 20:37

Well, guys, this was Louisiana. And just earlier in the month, the Democrat governor, John Bel Edwards, actually something he signed in June, it just took effect in August. However, it was a law requiring in God We Trust displays in public school classrooms. There had been a law passed back in the 2019-2020 school year that they posted in God We Trust, signed somewhere in the school it had to be on display in the school building, but this one require that and God We Trust this, please be put in every single classroom. And we actually have been able to be a part of several of these in God we trust displays going on. Starting with Arkansas several years ago, one of our good friends, a state rep. now he's a state senator in Arkansas, Jim Dotson, he's the guy that really helped spearhead that in Arkansas. And then that was done in several states. We have a ProFamily Legislative Network that we worked with a lot of different elected officials in different states. And we've been able to promote that piece of legislation and seen it now pass in several states. Well, the good news is this is now going in Louisiana. What's kind of fascinating about this, is this article identifies the measure passed Republican controlled Louisiana Senate with no votes cast in opposition. And the Republican controlled Louisiana House of Representatives voted to concur with the Senate passed version of legislation with no members opposing the effort. So both the House and the Senate, they had nobody voting against it, because when I first saw this, I thought, okay, why in the world with this democratic governor signed it? Was it maybe that the house and the Senate, they have a veto proof majority, and he doesn't want to look bad having this overridden? Well, it very well could be something along those lines, because when you have a house and Senate, where there is no opposition against putting in God, we trust displays in every single classroom in Louisiana, then as the governor, whether you agree with this or not, you know, if you come out against it, you are going to be the only one against it. And the... from the legislative bodies, and specifically in the... this kind of leadership of the state. So really encouraging news. Also, the article highlights it kind of a to me funny side note that there is a artist who was offended. He is someone who believes in separation of church and state. So he started a fundraiser, trying to bring opposition to the bill, he wanted to raise $25,000, at the point of the article, he'd raised $687. So to me, that was also good news that he did not get any momentum saying we want to stop this from going into schools. So again, good news, we've seen this, as I mentioned before, already happened in several states. We've already seen it in Arkansas, Kentucky, South Dakota, Utah, Virginia, Mississippi, all our states that have passed this, there's more states that will continue to do this going forward. And guys, this is something we have talked a lot about on the show where when we look at some of the state legislative bodies, and some of those State Chambers, we are seeing some really positive steps being taken, whether it be legislation trying to get the 10 commandments back in public schools, or these in God we Trust displays, but things to once again, remind people of some of the core foundation basic principles of America, which certainly goes back to the founders notion that we believe that there was a divine creator, and our rights came from him. Well, if there is no God, there can be no God given rights. So just the idea of getting this notion of In God We Trust back in front of students is a really good first step to helping getting us back in the direction where maybe once again, we can talk about and defend God given rights, because we will once again remember there's a God and if there's a God, then there can be God given rights, something that seems to have been largely forgotten and much of the conversation today.

David Barton: 24:35

Hey, I'm not an artist, but I've got to say I support separation of church and state too, except I support it the way Jefferson and the Founders intended it, which means the government can't stop a religious expression. So bless his heart. He's another one that needs some First Amendment training. He's probably got his first amendment training from attorneys that they came through the 60s, 70s and 80s with all the progressive stuff, and he doesn't have a clue what that phrase meant in original intent, because what Louisiana did is exactly what separation of church and state would have protected back in the founders days. So another interesting commentary on how poorly our education is done.

Rick Green: 25:10

I love this good news story. And of course, I've told this on the program many times, but this was one of the things I got to do as a state rep. when American Family Association 20 years ago had those, you know, they were in God, we trust posters with the flag, and I sent one to every school, every campus in my district, and one of the schools

voted 7: 25:27

0 their school board not to allow it to be hung, because they had bad advice from a lawyer, David, we need to get that while you're going to some good classes on this for sure. And we showed up at the next school board meeting with a couple hundred citizens in the room with their In God We Trust shirts, and that school board switched their vote from 7:0

against to 7: 25:43

0 for. And we got those posters into the classroom. And then I gave the chairman of the school board your book, David. I gave him original intent. He... and he called me later and said, man, they didn't teach me any of that in school. He was an attorney. And a couple years later he got elected district judge and he then had that good knowledge from original intent so I love these stories about the the national motto, posters and getting those into schools, it reminds me those those good old days back when I walked to school uphill both ways.

David Barton: 26:09

Hey Rick, one of those... back to the good old days, one of those political axioms that we had in the good old days was when they feel the heat they see the light. When you get crowd showing up, that 7:0 vote goes the other way. That's a great political axiom as well.

Rick Green: 26:26

Lots of good news today folks, thank you to David and Tim for doing the research and bringing them to us. Thank you for listening. You've been listening to WallBuilders.