Latest / Worldview Matters With David Fiorazo / Andy Woods: The Bible And Your Vote - Biblical Principles For Any Election

Transcript

Andy Woods: The Bible And Your Vote - Biblical Principles For Any Election · Worldview Matters With David Fiorazo

0:00
A friend's very important book coming out from Dr. Andy Woods, actually it is out and
0:05
it is about Christians, our responsibility, and voting, and that's next on World View Matters.
0:12
Welcome to World View Matters, discussing controversial issues, discerning current events,
0:22
defending biblical Christianity.
0:25
No topic off limits.
0:28
And now, here's your host, David Firazzo.
0:32
Hi friends, I love the Reverend Charles Finney and I want to open with a quote from Andy's
0:36
brand new book.
0:37
It's called The Bible and Your Vote, equipping the American Christian to stand for righteousness
0:45
at the ballot box.
0:47
Hmm, influence, salt and light, sounds good.
0:51
So the Reverend Charles Finney, the leader of America's second great awakening, explained
0:57
the significance of Christians' role at the ballot box as follows.
1:01
He said, quote, the church must take right ground in regard to politics.
1:08
The time has come that Christians must vote for honest men and take consistent ground
1:13
in politics.
1:15
Christians have been exceedingly guilty in this matter, but the time has come when they
1:20
must act differently.
1:22
And cannot sustain this free and blessed country which we love and pray for unless the church
1:29
will take right ground and it goes on.
1:32
But Finney died in 1875 and this is still a crucial topic today.
1:38
Dr. Andy Woods, thank you so much for being back on World View Matters.
1:42
Good to see you.
1:43
David, good to see you.
1:44
Thanks for having me.
1:45
Thank you for this book.
1:47
I want to remind people midterms are coming up and gosh, is it next year?
1:53
It never stops.
1:55
But you know what?
1:56
We've got a lot of work to do just because President Trump was elected.
1:59
Donald Trump was elected.
2:00
There's a good administration in place now.
2:03
We had been declining for so many decades and the decay is deeply rooted, I think, in
2:11
our institutions, our society.
2:13
Christians have a lot of work to do and even getting Christians to vote.
2:16
So I'm thankful for this book.
2:18
Before we dive into it, Andy, you've got a couple of events coming up and one of them
2:22
is right at your church.
2:24
You're hosting a conference.
2:25
I see Olivia Melnick.
2:27
I see who else, Bill Federer, tell us about that.
2:31
I know it's sold out, but people can livestream.
2:34
It's basically a faith for final days conference and it's a prophecy slash world view conference.
2:43
So you got Olivia Melnick and Dr. Randall Price and Bill Federer and myself, and this
2:49
will be our fourth one we've done.
2:52
And it's just a way to edify God's people in special areas over a weekend.
3:00
We've got a banquet at nearby Sugar Creek Country Club, followed by the All Day Conference.
3:06
And then some of our speakers are sticking around that Sunday morning to speak in our
3:11
normal services at Sugar Land Bible Church, but it's the 21st through the 23rd.
3:17
And even though it says sold out, we still encourage people to sign up anyway to get on
3:22
the waiting list because this time of the year, a lot of people cancel and things like that
3:27
at the last minute.
3:28
And even if they can't make it into the building, we've got free livestream, which they can
3:33
get on the Sugar Land Bible Church Facebook page website.
3:38
The Andy Woods Ministries Facebook page website app, et cetera, so it's going to be a great
3:44
time.
3:45
Awesome.
3:46
And I want to also plug the pastor's point of view that you do every week.
3:50
How many are you up to now, Andy?
3:52
Oh, we just recorded today to be released tomorrow, number 440.
3:58
Wow.
3:59
And then like you, sometimes we record a little early, so yeah, 441 is in the queue also.
4:05
Awesome.
4:06
So one more conference and then we'll dive into your book in this important topic.
4:10
And that's the stealing the mind Bible conference and that's coming up Sunday.
4:14
I'm sorry, Saturday, March 15.
4:17
And compass.org.
4:18
Is there anything else people need to know about that, Andy?
4:21
No, I mean, that's going to be Patrick Wood, Brandon Holthouse, Alex Newman, wow.
4:29
Let's see David Reagan, Russ Miller.
4:32
I mean, these are all people you know that you have a hitter.
4:35
Yeah.
4:36
Yeah.
4:37
And so that's that conference is an all day Saturday one, that's that's great one too.
4:41
So people want to sign up for that and check out the streaming options they have at compass
4:46
ministries on that.
4:47
Awesome.
4:48
So compass.org stealing the mind conference.
4:51
Okay.
4:52
The in the dedication to your book, Andy, the first words on the page are in this age of
4:57
political apathy, comma, stop right there.
5:01
Let's talk about what can be done about the disturbing reality of apathy in the church
5:08
and when especially when it comes to influencing our culture, our communities, our culture,
5:14
our country for righteousness, being Christians outside of Sunday morning.
5:20
I know you talk a lot about it in the book, but what are your overall thoughts?
5:25
Well my big thought is the full council of God's word, you know, the Bible, if you want
5:32
to let it speak, is not just a book about how to get to heaven when you die.
5:37
As important as that topic is, it covers a lot of other stuff, government, worldview,
5:44
the nature of humans, why humans are different than animals, why crimes should be punished,
5:52
the type of economic systems work and which ones don't work and why why power needs to
5:57
be decentralized on and on, you know, where who was responsible for the education of children,
6:05
endless topics and we vote on those types of things all the time.
6:09
And my concern is that most Christians don't really approach those topics with the Bible
6:15
in mind.
6:16
It's just the Bible is a spiritual book.
6:19
And these other things, you know, people think God left us to our own devices on, but the
6:24
truth of the matter is if you let the Bible speak, it'll speak on all these things.
6:28
And obviously, since we have a rare privilege in this country, you know, to influence leadership
6:35
through voting, we should let the Bible speak on all the topics and we should vote accordingly.
6:41
And I think our country would be in a much better place today, you know, had Christians
6:45
done that through the ages.
6:47
How did we get to, I know this is, you know, another big, we could do a whole podcast
6:52
on this.
6:53
The compartmentalizing our faith, I guess, because leaving, you can't leave Jesus in
7:00
the car when you go in the voting booth to vote and vote for someone that doesn't uphold
7:06
biblical principles, but people do that all the time and they call themselves Christians.
7:11
But how did that, there's so much confusion, it seems, when we compartmentalize our faith
7:16
there, can you talk to that for a moment, speak to that?
7:20
Well, I think it's part of the humanist agenda, you know, they, they don't, they want
7:26
our Christianity to be like a hobby, like knitting, you know, you take it out every once
7:31
in a while, but I mean, don't, don't do much more with it than that.
7:36
And so get back into the church and, you know, keep your Christianity out of the public
7:40
square.
7:41
For whatever reason, we've bought into the humanist agenda and I like your word compartmentalize
7:49
or bifurcate, I mean, we've bifurcated our Christianity from all of these issues for
7:54
such a long time following the humanist mindset that we're really out of sorts with what
8:00
God says in His word.
8:01
So a lot of it is we're intimidated, we don't understand public policy, so we get scared,
8:08
we get sort of bullied by humanists saying, you know, keep your Christianity in the closet.
8:13
You know, it's kind of interesting, everybody today is coming out of the closet and we're
8:18
told to get back in the closet.
8:21
Or stay behind church doors, you can, you can worship or believe in that Jesus stuff
8:27
in the Bible on Sunday, but don't you come out into, you know, culture, the workplace
8:32
or Monday through Saturday, and that's, we bought that sadly, haven't we?
8:38
And that's, that's, how do you share the gospel if you're not out in public, if you're
8:44
not trying?
8:45
And let me just speak to this Andy for a minute, I just thought about the argument of
8:48
you can't legislate morality.
8:52
And to me, that's so ridiculous because someone's morality is legislated every time
8:58
a lot has passed, isn't it?
9:00
Well, the left legislates their version of morality all the time, they're the ones going
9:05
after bakers and cake designers and website designers who won't lend their skills like
9:12
Jack Phillips, for example, you know, to the LGBTQ plus agenda and they want to just
9:17
drag the guy through the judicial system, aren't they imposing their brand of morality
9:23
on him?
9:24
So I mean, if you don't want to legislate morality, let's play fair, everybody don't,
9:30
but obviously that's not the way it works.
9:33
Somebody's morality's got to prevail and our founding fathers wanted the Ten Commandments
9:38
in the Christian world due to prevail.
9:40
So Andy, you refer to this verse often, Proverbs 14, 34, righteousness exalts a nation,
9:49
but sin is a disgrace to any people.
9:53
How would you respond to the argument that as maybe a sincere Christian or maybe an ignorant
9:58
Christian, but someone that says, well, we haven't been a righteous nation for 100 years
10:03
or something like that.
10:04
So why would I go vote for secular candidates who aren't Christian?
10:10
Well, I mean, we can change that.
10:13
We can change who the candidates are because we have the ability to participate in the process
10:19
and the people making that criticism can run for school board or whatever, you know,
10:25
on their own.
10:26
And so I don't know how much of an excuse that is when we have so much freedom to participate
10:31
in the process, but I love that Proverbs 14, 34 because it doesn't say, you know, interest
10:37
rates, exalternation, tax cuts, exalternation, all these things we get focused on sometimes
10:45
as conservative.
10:46
What it says is, righteousness exalts a nation.
10:49
I mean, any nation has the ability for greatness when righteousness prevails.
10:56
And obviously there's no such thing as a perfect country.
10:59
We all have a sin nature.
11:03
And there's, you can look into American history and find shortcomings there, just like you
11:08
can in any country, but Proverbs are basically general maxims or principles, you know, all
11:13
things being equal.
11:14
This is how the world normally works.
11:17
And generally when the righteous people, you know, take their stand in the appropriately
11:23
in the marketplace of ideas, good things happen.
11:28
And we just have to, you know, what does it say there?
11:31
It also in the Proverbs, you know, in the wicked rule, the people grown, when the righteous
11:38
rule, the people rejoice.
11:40
So, you know, let's, let's let the book of Proverbs say what it wants to say in terms
11:45
of how we should participate in our republic.
11:47
Amen, brother.
11:48
Also in the book, you talk about you, you mentioned the people that have certain mindsets and
11:55
use excuses such as my vote doesn't matter anyway.
11:58
And then you say the United States cannot afford to have Bible-believing Christians approach
12:04
voting in this way because it's just an excuse.
12:07
I mean, we take our freedoms for granted and someone's going to end up influencing our
12:12
country, our children.
12:14
And look at the entertainment industry, look at corporations.
12:18
And is there anything else you would like to talk about as far as some of those, the defeated
12:23
voter, the party loyalist, the lifestyle voter, you go through a lot of these.
12:29
I thought those were very, very good, helpful, too.
12:32
Yeah, it's like a lot of people they don't vote.
12:36
And when they do vote, they vote for all these other reasons, family, background, party
12:41
loyalty, you know, as you mentioned, I list many of them.
12:45
And the point of the book is to just do a topical Bible study and say, you know, why don't we
12:50
do it this way?
12:51
Why don't we vote on the things God says are important that He's disclosed truth on,
12:58
you know, in His Word, and vote based on that.
13:01
And the whole culture would be different, you know, if the majority of Christianity
13:05
did that.
13:06
Talk to us about stewardship, because that's what you hit early on in your book and the
13:10
importance, not to be confused with controlling the earth or taking dominion, right?
13:17
But stewardship, isn't that a responsibility of the Christian?
13:21
Yeah, and what's required of a steward, first of all, what's a steward?
13:27
A steward is not an owner, but a manager, you know, it's someone that manages something
13:33
on someone else's behalf.
13:35
And Christianity is, that's a basic teaching.
13:38
We are stewards of the three T's, I call them, time talent and treasure.
13:45
Each of us have those to differing degrees.
13:48
And we're supposed to manage those things for God, because they're God-given, and He's
13:52
going to hold people to an account regarding what they did, you know, with those three T's.
13:58
And then for the American Christian, I would add another thing to our stewardship list.
14:02
It's our own government, because our government was designed that we could participate in it.
14:09
I mean, most people around the world could only dream, you know, of such a privilege.
14:15
And I think God is going to hold the American Christian, you know, accountable for that realm
14:19
of stewardship, you know, as well.
14:23
And it even goes down to right down to stewardship of the earth.
14:26
I mean, we're kind of as conservatives for trade as being anti-environmental.
14:32
I'm not anti-environmental.
14:34
I'm very pro-environmental.
14:36
I mean, I like clean air and water, like everybody else.
14:41
But I don't look at my environmentalism as Gaia or earth worship.
14:46
Yes.
14:47
Looking at it as, let's, Genesis 1, let's govern this planet that God put us over.
14:53
Not to worship it, but to manage it on God's behalf based on his priorities.
14:58
And that's a worldview issue too, because we're not putting nature or the earth above human
15:04
beings.
15:05
But yet the left, they have this whole other ideology.
15:07
We've got to take a brief pause where Dr. Andy Woods, the Bible and your vote, biblical
15:12
principles for any election, and there are some big elections coming up.
15:16
We just got to get more people engaged and involved, and we'll be right back on World
15:20
View Matters.
15:21
Introducing Patriot Mobile, the wireless carrier that stands with you.
15:26
We are committed to supporting the values that make our nation great.
15:31
With affordable plans and reliable nationwide coverage, Patriot Mobile is not just a wireless
15:37
service.
15:38
It's a call to action for those who believe in the American dream.
15:45
Free activation now with promo code, David.
15:55
Friends, thank you.
15:56
We are blown away by the recent activity with increase in podcast viewers and listeners
16:02
and video viewers and the show viewers.
16:05
But I want to just mention, I've been told by the executive producer here that we've been
16:11
averaging a quarter of a million downloads per podcast, and that's thanks to you, and
16:18
we've got a lot of great people behind us getting us out there, so it's just astounding
16:22
to me.
16:23
We've been doing this for less than two years.
16:26
Andy Woods, in the back of your book, thank you for putting some resources, iVoterGuide.com,
16:32
Christians Engaged.org, ChristianVoterGuide.com, thank you for that.
16:38
So back to the table of contents, one of the next ones, section two is economic issues,
16:45
because you talk about exploring these different issues, the economic, social, climate, power
16:50
and personal rights and foreign policy.
16:54
You mentioned the economy or economic issues and tax breaks and our concern about interest
17:00
rates.
17:01
Those aren't the main reasons we vote, but being responsible with our money and what
17:07
our government does.
17:09
That's important.
17:10
How do you balance those out in that little section on economic issues?
17:15
Well, I think those are things God has spoken to, and there's a reason communism or Marxism
17:22
has failed everywhere it's been tried.
17:25
It has to do with their built on a wrong view of man, they think people will work hard
17:31
for the common good and the doctrine of total depravity taught in the Bible denies that.
17:40
People will work hard and unleash their God-given abilities when they have an ability to benefit
17:48
from their own labors and their own sweat and a Marxist system takes that away from people.
17:54
Whatever they make goes into some kind of common pot, but an economy that's more based on
18:01
the individual and it lets people keep more of what they make.
18:05
Those types of societies tend to flourish because people are basically self-centered at heart
18:11
though labor and work if they themselves can benefit.
18:16
What's at the root of the whole thing?
18:17
It's a biblical understanding of man.
18:20
The Bible doesn't portray man as inherently good.
18:24
That's why we all need Jesus as our savior because we're all tainted by original sin.
18:29
What I was trying to say in that section of the book, among some other topics, is let's
18:34
just keep tracing that doctrine through and let it inform our worldview.
18:40
If you understand that, you'll understand very quickly why some economies succeed and
18:44
some fail.
18:46
It's based on some are built on a realistic assumption of who man is, according to Scripture,
18:52
and some are built on an unrealistic assumption.
18:55
You would not be in favor of owning nothing and being happy.
19:02
We will own nothing and be happy.
19:04
I want to quote you on page 16 because you talk about private property and we tend to forget
19:10
that.
19:11
That's an economic issue.
19:12
That's a very important issue when it comes to freedom as well.
19:15
You say the Bible favors the ownership of private property.
19:19
Our leaders must uphold the biblical persuasion of the sacredness of private property and not
19:26
regarded as a source that can be siphoned, taxed, or regulated away under the cloak of social
19:33
justice or in pursuit of the higher good.
19:37
Talk to us a little bit more about that.
19:39
That's just another way the Bible is informing the voter.
19:44
The Bible is a pro-private property book.
19:47
In other words, when God says don't do something, he's protecting something.
19:53
Don't murder.
19:54
He's protecting the sanctity of life.
19:56
Don't commit adultery.
19:57
He's protecting the sanctity of marriage.
20:00
When he says in two of the commandments, don't steal and another one, thou shalt not
20:05
covet.
20:06
He's protecting something which is the sacredness of private property.
20:11
So private property is important to God.
20:15
To be frank with you, there's a lot of people in office today are running for office that
20:20
really care less about private property.
20:23
Remember Obama to Joe the plumber said he wanted to spread the wealth around, which is an
20:29
attack on private property.
20:32
The first thing you ask a candidate in terms of figuring out where their worldview is is
20:36
what do they believe about private property?
20:38
Do they believe in the concept or not?
20:41
The ones that do should get our votes.
20:42
The ones that don't should be rejected.
20:45
You talk a lot about social issues.
20:47
In fact, you've got many of them in one of the chapters here.
20:53
When we hear that, we usually think that's probably just talking about the LGBTQ and sexuality.
21:01
This is really good that you put in number seven, social issue number seven, public expressions
21:06
of Christianity.
21:08
This is an issue of freedom.
21:09
This is an issue of free speech.
21:11
It has to do with sharing the gospel with making disciples with not being ashamed of
21:16
our faith and not being discriminated against censorship.
21:19
There's so much involved with just public expressions of Christianity.
21:24
Let's share a little bit more about that.
21:27
Jesus said preach the gospel to every creature.
21:31
Once he said that, I have a vested interest in understanding the laws that give me the
21:36
ability to do that.
21:38
Paul, as you know, in the book of Acts, routinely used Roman law to advance the cause of evangelism.
21:47
I want to know when I'm voting for someone, does a candidate favor the fairness doctrine,
21:52
which is against free speech?
21:54
Do they favor hate speech laws, which goes against free speech?
21:59
Do they favor these free speech zones where you can only allow to have free speech in
22:05
a very narrow place on public school campuses and everything else is considered a safety
22:13
zone where you're not allowed to articulate your ideas?
22:18
These are the topics that we should all be interested in because how people govern
22:24
us in those areas determine whether we can fulfill the Lord's commandment or not, you
22:29
know, to fulfill the Great Commission.
22:31
That's right.
22:32
You also say in that same chapter, when we become aware of Satan's gradual erosion of
22:36
biblical expression in the public square, we are responsible to stand against this tide.
22:43
I don't think a lot of Christians get the memo on that and understand that we are not
22:47
to just conform to the world or just compromise, we are to resist that, right?
22:53
Yeah.
22:54
Well, Obama, you remember, started using the expression freedom of worship.
22:59
That's a game changer.
23:00
Freedom of worship is what you can do in the church, the narrow confines of the church.
23:05
That's not what the First Amendment says.
23:07
It says freedom of speech, meaning my constitutional protections that protect me in church, protect
23:13
me anywhere I go.
23:14
Yes.
23:15
I go to church square in the school, in the workforce, and so we're living in this society.
23:21
We're free speech is always being eroded and for the Christian, that should be a big concern
23:27
because that has a bearing on what we're going to do, you know, with the Lord's command
23:30
in terms of fulfilling the Great Commission, preaching the gospel to every creature.
23:35
Okay.
23:36
One of the issues that in chapter six foreign policy and we are running out of time quickly
23:40
and he is, you mentioned open borders and you mentioned defending our boundaries and
23:46
is that a biblical principle?
23:48
I know Israel was given certain boundaries, the land was mapped out, what God would give
23:52
them and do we have a right to defend our borders, to close our borders, to defend ourselves
23:57
because that's a huge issue that I think is confusing even to some Christians in churches
24:03
today.
24:04
Yeah.
24:05
And that was probably the definitive issue, probably in the last presidential election cycle,
24:09
this issue of open borders.
24:11
And what you'll discover is you get into the word of God is that's actually a Bible issue,
24:15
like all these issues, we're speaking of God at the Tower of Babel created the individual
24:21
nation state.
24:23
He doesn't want humanity governed according to Tower of Babel, global governance, but
24:28
according to individual nations and what do you have to have for an individual nation
24:33
state?
24:34
You have to have enforceable borders or you're not really a nation.
24:38
And that's Acts 17, verse 26 and other passages, so that's just another example where the
24:44
Bible is speaking to the very issues that are on our minds constantly.
24:49
So we were just under three minutes now and I didn't get to some of the questions I wanted
24:53
to ask you, but obviously there's a map in the back toward the back of the book here.
24:58
You do talk about Israel and what a huge issue that is just outside of maybe the book
25:05
down this conversation and the Trump administration, Netanyahu just visited the White House.
25:11
How do you see that playing out?
25:13
Because that is a biblical issue, right?
25:15
Yeah, I mean, did you see how happy Netanyahu was speaking next to Trump, those two podiums
25:22
set up?
25:23
I didn't see that happiness when Biden was in office.
25:26
In fact, I didn't even see Biden with Netanyahu, you know, he was usually persona non-grata,
25:33
you know, it shall we say, but that's a huge issue because the Bible, Genesis 12, verse
25:38
3 gives a foreign policy statement and says, if you bless the nation of Israel, you'll
25:43
be blessed and if you curse Israel, you'll be cursed.
25:46
Well, I don't know about you, David.
25:48
I'm sure you feel the same way I do.
25:49
I want to be blessed.
25:50
I want our country blessed.
25:52
So I want to make sure we're on the right side of Israel, not, you know, running around
25:57
saying from the land to the sea, the land of Palestine, shall be free.
26:02
I don't want to go around saying stuff like that because that'll bring God's curses
26:06
on me.
26:07
And so that's just another example where a key foreign policy issue of our time is rooted
26:11
in Scripture.
26:12
Yeah.
26:13
And we need to continue to pray for President Trump and the administration, Mike Huckabee
26:19
and all those are going to be working with Israel with policy.
26:24
Andy, thank you for this book.
26:25
I pray, pray friends.
26:27
It's not a thick, long book.
26:30
It's not tedious to get through.
26:32
It's very easy to read.
26:33
It's got some very important topics and concepts in it that we need to either be reminded
26:37
of, we need to know or learn and get other Christians to know these.
26:41
Hey, it's a, it's a small enough book you can buy a bunch of and give them as gifts.
26:46
So there's my plug.
26:47
If you've got things, you can, you can, you can give people these books.
26:51
Andy, anything you'd like to share in the last couple of seconds here?
26:55
Well, I guess I would say, you know, the salt doesn't do a lot of good when it's in the
27:00
salt shaker.
27:01
So, you know, at some point we have to get out of our comfort zones and, you know, maybe
27:09
do things that we wouldn't normally do like write an article to the newspaper or pick
27:16
up the phone and call a congressman or run for school board ourselves because, you
27:23
know, I mean, if we're not going to do it, the other side will do it.
27:27
Yeah.
27:28
And we'll find ourselves in a world of hurt and our children and grandchildren simply
27:33
won't inherit the blessings of this republic that we inherited.
27:36
Amen.
27:37
The left doesn't stop.
27:38
They're always engaged.
27:39
We've just got to get back or actually get more Christians involved.
27:43
Brother, thank you so much.
27:44
We'll do this again.
27:45
Appreciate your time today.
27:46
All right.
27:47
David, good to be with you.
27:48
Thank you.
27:49
All right.
27:50
You're most welcome, guys.
27:51
Thank you.
27:52
Always keep speaking the truth about things that matter.