Rick Green [00:00:07] Welcome to the intersection of faith and culture. It's the WallBuilders Show taking on the hot topics of the day from a biblical, historical and constitutional perspective. But today it's not just a Good News Friday. It's a Good Friday. So, David and Tim Barton here. I'm Rick Green, guys. this is a, what a great time to have a good, a Good News Show. We got the best news in the history of mankind. 

Tim Barton [00:00:27] Yeah, it really is. And, guys, also encouraging that we have a White House administration that actually celebrates and honors Good Friday. 

Rick Green [00:00:36] Yes. 

Tim Barton [00:00:37] You know, how, how far we've come was it? Help me remember Rick, was it when Biden was in office, so that's at least two years ago, but I don't remember if it was the last year or next to last year when they, was like a transgender something they did instead of Easter. 

Rick Green [00:00:51] Oh, when they lit up the flags and oh, yes, yes. 

Tim Barton [00:00:55] It's just how far we've come and just man, obviously we are ultimately grateful for the work of Jesus on the cross the forgiveness of sins, obviously also for His resurrection from the dead It gives hope for all believers as Paul explains so we don't have to believe with no hope and be sad about it. But, Dad, one of the things that certainly you have tracked for decades, I was gonna say so many years, but really it's decades, is a lot of the faith perspective of the founders and guys we were talking off-air, it would be fun just to take a little bit of time and then maybe highlight some of their writings Because they addressed the crucifixion, the resurrection, Easter weekend. And a lot times people don't recognize how prominent faith was in the Founding Fathers lives. But when you begin to read more of their writing you do see them talk about these kinds of things and sometimes even defending it to family members if they were teaching it as a professor in a university or in a government capacity, telling people about it. So there's a lot of great statements from the Founding Fathers, not just about their faith, because certainly there is that, and maybe we can highlight some of those too, but even things that pertain very specifically to Easter, there's a lot of great quotes from the Founding Fathers about Easter. 

David Barton [00:02:17] Yeah, and really, they tie Easter to everything else. Because of Easter there is salvation and they really tie everything not only to their salvation being a result of Easter, but also the fact that they're looking forward to resurrection and spending time with Jesus because of what happened on Easter. Here's one; George Mason who is known as the father of the Bill of Rights. He was the leading guy who really was the impetus in America after we did the Constitution saying, Okay, now let's put limits on government. But here's a statement he made; he said, "I give and bequeath my soul to Almighty God that gave it me, hoping that through the meritorious death and passion of our Savior and Redeemer, Jesus Christ, to receive absolution and remission for all my sins." I mean, he ties it directly to the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. And that is, if Jesus had not raised from the dead, we just don't have the salvation that's available. We don't have the hope in the future life that's available. Everything is on that. And these guys, there are so many quotes from them. 

Tim Barton [00:03:23] Dad, hang on a second. Hang on a second. Let me jump in and give a quote because I don't want you to run through eight quotes and then take some of the quotes that I have looked up for this moment as Rick is off on the side. 

Rick Green [00:03:34] Does the elder Barton steal quotes from the younger Barton now? Have we reversed this? 

Tim Barton [00:03:40] Well, I just know as, as we talked about finding some quotes and we're pulling quotes, there are definitely some noted quotes that are really fun to highlight from the Founders that there's several from Charles Carroll. There's some from Benjamin Rush. Dad, you mentioned George Mason, there there's several actually even from some very lesser-known Founding Fathers. But I know that he probably pulled some from Charles Carol. And so I wanted to say this one before he ran through a list like he does on Good News Friday, where he's like, I have one article and I'm going to tell five stories about. So this one, Charles Carroll, actually, this was a letter to his son. And part of what he said was "the approaching festival of Easter and the merits and mercies of our Redeemer, Copiesa, Acidium, and all of, actually Redemptio. The people listening that speak Latin that come from the classical education background, they're just shaking their heads like you're butchering this. I know I am. I apologize, but it's with the Lord. There is. 

Rick Green [00:04:37] Well, I was just going to say, yo no, Español, but I don't think that would fit either. So yeah.  

Tim Barton [00:04:42] We're in the same boat, right? But it's, "with the Lord, there is plentiful redemption, have led me into this chain of mediation and reasoning and have inspired me with the hope of finding mercy before my judge and of being happy in the life to come, a happiness I wish you to participate with me by infusing into your heart a similar hope." And he starts, not to digress the fact that I did not do well with Latin, but he starts off the approaching festival of Easter. And the merits and mercies of our Redeemer. So, the whole premise of what he's telling his son, I want you to embrace and enjoy this thing, knowing what is coming up. And so, the Founding Fathers really did appreciate, believe and encourage the message of Easter to those around them. 

David Barton [00:05:25] And, you know, one of the things too even, I've got a quote here from John Hart, who's a Signer of the Declaration. Really went through some terrible times as a result of signing the Declaration, all the kind of abuse that he went through. But he ties the Easter period to the fact that because Jesus was resurrected, we also get to be resurrected. And so, he makes that correlation. He says, thanks be given to Almighty God. He says, knowing that it's appointed for all men once to die. And after that, the judgment, which is Hebrews nine, twenty-seven. He says I give and recommend my soul to the hands of Almighty God who gave it and my body to the earth to be buried in a decent and Christian like manner to receive the same again at the general resurrection by the mighty power of God. So, they're resurrection oriented. And that comes from Easter. And these guys had such a good knowledge of basic Christian doctrine and understood really so much of what it would do in their life and in their future life. So, we had a saying that said, don't be so heavenly minded that you're not earthly good. But these guys, the founding fathers were heavenly minded and earthly minded and the heavenly mindedness helped them to be good here on earth in the sense of knowing what they had in front of them from Jesus, knowing their life was overruled in so many ways by their faith in Jesus. And they were useful in this life and hopefully in the life to come as well. So, there's just a lot of good Easter quotes and resurrection quotes from Founding Fathers. 

Tim Barton [00:06:58] There really are. There's another one from Benjamin Rush and he is one of the lesser-known Founding Fathers for most people. Dad, you actually wrote a book on Benjamin Rush. So, we grew up knowing much more about Benjamin Rush than most Americans did. But Benjamin Rush not only signed the Declaration, he helped ratify the Constitution. He served on three different presidential ministrations. A very long list. He was a medical doctor considered the most significant, maybe the most famous medical doctor in American history came up with medical cures over 200 years ago that were still being applied today to some extent in capacity, the discoveries he made. But one of the things he did is also he did a lot of teaching and writing about moral philosophy. And so one of things he wrote in teaching about moral philosophy, he talked about Jesus specifically and forgiveness and he said He forgave the crime of murder on His cross. And after His resurrection, He commanded His disciples to preach the gospel of forgiveness. First at Jerusalem, where He well knew his murderer still resided. These striking facts are recorded for our imitation and seem intended to show that the Son of God died not only to reconcile God to man, but to reconcile men to each other. And again, this is a very noted, influential Founding Father. When, when Benjamin Rush died, John Adams actually wrote that Benjamin Rush was possibly the most influential Founding Father. He said, maybe even more than George Washington and Benjamin Franklin, Benjamin Rush was the most in influential. Today a lot of people don't know him, but if people actually went back and studied and read some of his writings, this, this kind of stuff, his profession of faith, the acknowledgement of the moral teachings from the Bible are all over his writings and it keeps going with other Founding Fathers. 

David Barton [00:08:49] You know, one more that I would pick, and it's kind of thinking through the season that we're in and the focus on Jesus Christ. But there's one here from Gunning Bedford. And Gunning Bedford, unfortunately, too many people don't know him, but he was a signer of the Constitution. He served with George Washington in the military. He was an aide-de-camp to Washington. He's just, he's a really good guy from Delaware. And he was actually asked to give the oration at Washington's death. For Delaware, the official oration that Delaware did to remember Washington, and since he knew Washington so well. And he had an unusual way of closing that speech. And I was looking at this and thinking, hmm, you know, I spoke several times this weekend in Seattle and other places, and I closed by saying thank you, good night, whatever. This is the way he closed that speech, he said, to the triune God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, be ascribed all honor and dominion forevermore. Amen. That's an interesting way to close the speech. But that's a, again, that focus on Jesus being the center of everything in their life. And again, here we are at Easter. And I, you know, I think Easter and Christmas are the two biggest Christian holidays because without, without Christmas, you don't have Easter. Without Easter, you don't have salvation. And those two things are just ridiculously important in Christian in Christian belief and theology. 

Tim Barton [00:10:20] And we are just scratching the tip of the iceberg of some of the things the Founding Fathers said about faith, about Easter. And you know, guys, one of the accusations that has been out there a long time is the Founding Father's didn't ever talk about Jesus. And they mentioned providence, but not Jesus. Well, actually, if you start studying the Founding Fathers, many of them, most of them talked openly about Jesus and it is cool to see that so many of them did have something to say about Easter, about the crucifixion, about the resurrection. All right. And so again, this is just the tip of the iceberg. We do have a couple of articles on the WallBuilders website that highlight some of these quotes. And again, there are many more than just the couple we acknowledged here. Certainly, the Founding Fathers had the appreciation and acknowledgement of the importance of the life, the death, the burial, and the resurrection of Jesus. 

David Barton [00:11:13] And by the way, Tim, pick up where you were. So does Donald Trump. And that's just refreshing to say. 

Rick Green [00:11:19] That's what I was going to say, man. Yeah. 

David Barton [00:11:21] That's refreshing to say so of the current president. 

Rick Green [00:11:24] They go, yeah, it brings us back full circle because you know, a lot of people are obviously going to attack him and say he's being too, he's proselytizing or blah, blah, and man, it's just good to know the history, to know where we came from and what our founders actually did great stuff. 

David Barton [00:11:39] Do you know how hard it is for the, the tag Christian nationalists to fit on Trump? I mean, it's just, you just see them struggle with that. He is putting all this stuff out there. Nobody would consider him a Christian nationalist. And yet that's what they want to scream, you know, because of the kind of language and rhetoric he does use. 

Tim Barton [00:11:58] Well, and I think they are, they're screaming that exact thing. And when you say nobody wants to say he's a Christian nationalist, actually a lot of people do, but they do it because they want to stop the promotion of the Christian message. And not that actually, I was gonna say not that Donald Trump is the best ambassador of Christianity. Actually, he's probably a pretty fair representation in many ways of, of what the Bible shows us of some of the people that God used in very profound ways, right? If we go to Hebrews 11, that faith hall of fame, and we see some people that had man some deep flaws and yet God used them in amazing ways. That is certainly what we see with President Trump and the fact that President Trump has had the boldness to say some of these very significant Christian truths out loud. We have not seen a president do this guys. I did for sure not in my lifetime. Ronald Reagan was a probably smoother communicator, but I don't think Reagan, nobody since Reagan has had any kind of boldness like Donald Trump has when it comes to professing or promoting some of these Christian ideas or ideals. Even this week at the White House, when he talked about Holy Week and what that means, I've never seen a president in my lifetime show that kind of boldness or clarity on the Christian message. 

Rick Green [00:13:15] Yeah, super, super exciting, great, great time to be alive. And what an amazing Good Friday we get to have here on WallBuilders. We're going to take a quick break. We'll be right back. You're listening to the WallBuilders Show. 

[00:14:33] Welcome back to the WallBuilders Show. It's Good News Friday on of course, Good Friday. So, we've obviously enjoyed having a president that's willing to say these things publicly. Obviously, it should encourage us to be willing to say these things publicly and speak out more boldly. And so, I'm just thankful, thankful that we get to be alive at this moment in time and get to be in a position where we can encourage our listeners to do the same thing in their community. So good stuff, guys. Okay. What about other good news? Any, any good news, I guess, is all of our good news today gonna be related to Good Friday or is there stuff outside of that? What do you guys got for us? 

David Barton [00:15:07] Well, I got some stuff outside of it for sure. As a matter of fact, the piece of good news I've got is I don't even know how in the world to connect it to Easter necessarily. This is like we have left the planet; we are orbiting Saturn or somewhere else. I don't know. 

Tim Barton [00:15:23] Well, is it actually, is it astronauts that are on their way to the moon? Cause. 

David Barton [00:15:26] It is not Artemis. No, it is no astronauts on their way to the Moon. No, It's not, but that would be cool. 

Rick Green [00:15:32] Okay. Even though I don't agree with them at all, just for all of our conspiracy folks out there, we're finally going to go to the moon. 

[00:15:38] Guys. Good news. 

David Barton [00:15:39] Oh yeah. 

Rick Green [00:15:40] I'm kidding. I'm kidding. That was Reagan's joke. I stole it from my son, Reagan, but anyway. 

David Barton [00:15:47] Yep. And it's going to be fun, man. I was... Glenn Beck did a really long interview with Charlie Duke. You know, we did two or three days with Charlie Duke a couple of years ago who walked on the moon. And I, I mean, the conversation those two had on what's going to happen with this mission, what they're trying to do, why they're doing this. Because my question was, why would you spend $20 billion to build a base on the Moon? Where do you go? What do you do? What, why would you do that? And Charlie and Glenn answered questions that I had....they were, they were giving answers to questions I hadn't even asked yet. And it was one of the best conversations on why go back to the moon of any I've heard. 

Tim Barton [00:16:32] Well, guys, if it's only $20 billion put a base there, I mean, California is wasting that all the time. So. 

David Barton [00:16:37] Yeah, that's right. 

Rick Green [00:16:39] I mean that's one Somali daycare, right? That's that or maybe two. I don't know it could be several 

Tim Barton [00:16:43] Right! 

Rick Green [00:16:44] No, I, now, David, I'm curious because you've known Charlie for a while and, and had a lot of conversations with him. Share a little bit of that. Like, what, what do you think is our, and correct me if I'm wrong, guys, is this particular launch in this trip, are they actually going to step on the moon or are they just circling this time and then next time there? 

David Barton [00:17:04] They're just circling and they're looking at places that Charlie and the other guys made a pass over but never explored. He said they were 170 miles high, so they couldn't see. 

Rick Green [00:17:13] So they're scoping it out. 

David Barton [00:17:15] But there are places on the moon where they believe that there was water. And so, they had other missions that would come back with ice vapor. And if there's ice, there's water. And so, if that's the case and there's resources on the Moon. That we never got around to in those earlier missions. And so those eight or 10 missions, however many it was, and so they're going on a deeper dive. But the thing that really got me was I had not thought of it. He said, look, the reason for the base on the moon is China's trying to get there to put weapons on the Moon. They're trying to weaponize the moon. And I thought, oh, now that's a whole different spin on that, because I had not thought about that about being a weapons base. Because from the moon, you could shoot down anything that's coming at you. You would have absolute total control and Trump wants to make sure we get there first so that we don't let that thing turn into a, you know, a blackmail kind of base where they can control everything you do. And so, there are bad guys that are wanting to do that. And I had not even thought about that. I was thinking more from the science standpoint or the benefits that it might bring in other ways, but that makes a lot of sense to keep China from. From setting up a military base on the moon with all the space weapons. 

Rick Green [00:18:31] Did they talk anything about, or have you talked to them about, even for, what am I thinking, an advanced launching, like, can we reach further into space from a base on the moon? Or does that even matter since everything's kind of rotating? I don't know enough about, I'm terrible at astronomy, but it seems like it would give us also the ability to reach further out. 

David Barton [00:18:54] It would, but now you're talking travels of years rather than days, because the moon is so close to us and the other planets that are close to us. That's relative. You're talking, you know, what did it take them five years to get stuff to the moon or Jupiter and all the places they went. So, it is so difficult to move out from the moon that they might do something. They might come up with new technology at some point, but at this point it's really more for self-interest.  

Tim Barton [00:19:25] Okay, well, I'm going to try to bring it back to earth for a second, guys, because.... 

Rick Green [00:19:26] Oh, man, come on. We were having fun. 

Tim Barton [00:19:29] I have a good news story I do want to say. Now, Dad, it's your turn, but I just know our clock is running down. So, I don't know how long your good news stories going to take. 

[00:19:37] That was perfect. Bring us back to earth literally. 

David Barton [00:19:41] I, I, you've got a story I cede to you and I'll follow. 

Tim Barton [00:19:45] Well, I thought, so I felt like mine was appropriate to end with because it is a young, now I'm going to go ahead and go now because you gave it to me and I won't take all our time. But it is the young man who in March madness, his name is Chase Johnson. He was at, I guess still is they lost. So they're not in the final four, but from High Point University and he's the one he had a game winner. They upset Wisconsin super fun. He has the number 99 and that's something that used to be, you couldn't even have that number in basketball. And now 

David Barton [00:20:17] I'm going back when I was reffing basketball you had to have only the number because when you when you turn to the clock keeper you got to show the number of the guy who made the foul and it has to be under five and under five Because you got two hands you only got five fingers So it's gotta be like 54 or 13 or 20 21 It couldn't be 27 or anything that took two hands and they've gotten away from that rule clearly Tim as you point. But 99 that would have been so banned in an earlier years. 

Tim Barton [00:20:46] Well, so he had the Bible verse on his shoe, but he was asked why did you choose the number 99? And this is his answer and just incredible. He said it has everything to do with Jesus leaving the 99 to find one. I was trying to find any other way to share the gospel and 99 came to mind. A lot of people ask it's a random number. It's a unique number. Not a lot of people wear it. So, I chose that because there's parables in the Bible where Jesus is talking about to His disciples. And he gives a story of a man who has 99 sheep. He leaves those 99 to find one lost sheep that ran away, and He has more joy in finding that one lost sheep that came back home than the 99. That's the gospel, right? We are all sinners; we are dead in our sin. Jesus Christ left the 99, He went to the cross humbly, He became a slave for us, though He was God, He did not take up equality with God as something to cling to, and He died on the cross for our sins. And this is him in an interview, guys. This is him saying this in an interview and his team did end up losing again they're not in the final four, but man, kudos to Chase Johnson. And I felt like this is just a perfect story coming into Easter when you have collegiate basketball players and God blessed him that he got hit a game-winning shot, upset a team, super fun for him. But when you're choosing the number of your jersey to be able to share the gospel? And to tell the story of the man leaving the 99 to find the one that gets away and rejoicing, just guys, it's so incredible. So again, kudos to Chase Johnson, bravo, sir, and also well done for hitting the game winning shot in the NCAA tournament. 

David Barton [00:22:29] Yeah, I've got to do a shout out to him and Rick will understand this because Rick's such a good fan of basketball. He'll know exactly what I'm talking about here.

Rick Green [00:22:36]  I was, I was holding my tongue. I was going to have a good comeback on Tim about basketball, but nope, nope, not now. 

David Barton [00:22:42] You baseball guys don't even know what to do with the ball that size. So, Chase, Tim, who you're talking about, he won. They won the first game of the tournament. They barely lost a second, which would have sent them to the sweet 16. And what got me about this kid was he was one of the studs and sharpshooters on that team, that the High Point team. And the he won that game in the NCAA tournament with a layup at the buzzer. And that layup obviously is worth two points if you know basketball scoring. That was the first two point shot he had hit all year. Every other basket he made was a three-point basket. The kid was an absolute stud from the three-point line and not even to have a two-point shot for a whole season. That just, that's remarkable. But man, I was really touched with his faith too. That was really good to see him share that, that boldness. It was fun. 

Rick Green [00:23:33] Let's see David, have you got one to close this out today? 

David Barton [00:23:37] Yeah, this one I've got deals with and man, it's so unrelated to Easter, I guess, in many ways, but it deals with actually marijuana. And the reason I chose it because we've had several programs on here talking about how that all these states going to medical marijuana, it is kind of like the gateway drug for everything else. It never stops with medical. It always goes under recreational marijuana and marijuana is what brings in all the other hard drugs with it. And so, we keep hearing how good this is for so many disorders. And here is a study that was done that went through 45 years of marijuana studies and they randomly selected, I think, 54 different controlled trials that went from 1980 through 2025. And what they found was they could find no significant positive effect outcome with anything that marijuana is supposed to be anything that marijuana is supposed to be dealing with. It did not help with anxiety. It did help with anorexia. It did not help with psychotic disorders. It does not help a PTSD. It did not help with opiate use disorder, trying to bring people down off opiate drugs to something less. They found absolutely zero benefit to it and all those 45 years of studies. Now, the reason I think that's really, really significant is that's the stuff that's always used to be able to get it into a state. And then when it gets into a state, so much else comes with it. So, there's a lot of states have done this. I think what is it I think 23 or 24 that have done this? Maybe this will help slow some of that down because all the states have gone there. Even Colorado acknowledged that their productivity rate went down with workers, construction workers and others. There were so many more accidents, everything else. So hopefully at some point in time, that lie will kind of die to death and go away. But that was a remarkable study to me and how that relates to Easter. I'm not quite sure, but that was a piece of Good News Friday. Friday's kind of closing things out 

Tim Barton [00:25:35] So you don't need to smoke marijuana to be better in life. Accept Jesus as your savior and you're good to go. 

David Barton [00:25:44] There ya go. That's a good tie up. 

Rick Green [00:25:45] Perhaps the most interesting Good Friday, Good News Friday, on a Good Friday that we've ever had in 20 years at the WallBuilders Show. Our most interesting way to sign off anyway. But yeah, what a wonderful weekend ahead. Everybody really get with family, your church. Have a wonderful time celebrating the resurrection, celebrating our Savior and share this program with your friends and family. You know, let them know there's good news every Friday at the WallBuilders Show, but a special Good Friday that you can share with them. Go to wallbuilders.show for that, easy to share the links there, and then of course always go to our wallbuilders.com website for information about all the upcoming programs and activities, and we are not far off from the summer, and there is a boatload, there are a boatload of programs there to look at for pastors briefings, for student programs, for teacher programs, you name it, it's all right there at wallbuilders.com. Thanks so much for listening. You've been listening to The WallBuilders Show.